2.12.2012

Twice-Bettered Rolls & You(Gotta)Go, Yoga!

I love rolls.  Slathered in warm butter, allowed to soak in, and then slathered again. Glorious.  That's what I was craving the other night as I stepped onto the elliptical for another game of "stay above 55 rpm."  It took my mind off the "rolls" as usual, but I encountered another sort that evening.  During that session, I rolled the mileage counter for the second time, meaning I exceeded mile 99.9 (it only records up to that amount, and then rolls to zero).  That's the second time now, in three weeks.  I've been on the elliptical for over 200 miles?  That's crazy to me- it's the equivalent of "ellipticalling" from my front door into downtown Atlanta. 

The really awesome part, is that I rolled it after 7.6 sessions this time, as opposed to the 13.4 previous ones to get the first rollover.  I am noticing that it's getting easier, but it still feels pretty effective. I'm probably ready to jack up the tension a little (I run it at level 6, manual), or maybe I should start doing some intervals or something.  There's just something nice about putting in 50 minutes at one speed, and doing the warm-up and cool-down off the machine.  50 minutes also happens to be the perfect length for the Starz show SpartacusJoey, do you like movies about gladiators? LOL! 

For now, I think I'll leave well enough alone.  I'm more concerned with how my limited amount of Yoga is affecting me.

With the exception of the last decade where I really let myself go, I worked out for literally years for my entire life before that.  Not just running and lifting weights, but doing crazy stuff, like pushing SUVs across parking lots, lunging the football field with 135 pounds on my back, duck-walking the stadium steps...real crazy stuff!  It was awesome, at least what I remember, and it hurt.  I had this buddy back then- he played D-End and I played linebacker on the same side of the field, and he and I would subject each other to the most painful stuff we could devise.  You have to remember, nobody had invented "Insanity" or P90X or anything like it.  We were doing this stuff on our own, and the idea was to make it HURT.  Now that I'm a little older, and hurting isn't my goal per se, I'm surprised we survived it all. 

Which brings me to my point.  Yoga hurts.  It makes me feel stupid.   I only have to do about 5 minutes of it as part of the warm-up in the cardio part of my Power90 workout, so we're talking 15 minutes/week at most.  There are five poses I can think of, off the top of my head: downward dog, upward-facing dog, plank (this is really a yoga pose?), warrior, and chosen one.  I'm not looking these up to see if they're real poses, it's what the guy leading the workout calls them.  By the time I've moved from downward-dog-with-leg-raised (huh?!) to chosen one, I can barely see. 

Assuming I haven't already fallen over. 

I feel like an elephant lifting one leg after the other, and expecting as I return to the first leg, that it's still in the air, and I'm airborne.  And I'm not, so I sigh and start over with the lifting of the legs again, thinking, "this time, it'll be different."  Definition of insanity? Yes.

It was really starting to piss me off.  So much so, that I actually raged through all of the different moves this morning for the first time since I started (without falling over), and I almost called the rest of the workout off, because I was breathing harder than I did during all but the most intense parts of the rest of the workout!  Yes, I RAGED through it. After up-down-dog, ass-in-the-air for the third time, I was wobbling on my arms, and I just got so mad at myself, because this is supposed to be a warm up, and I can barely handle it, that I just decided to finish it.  At pace.  Without falling over.  And I did.  So naa-naa-naa-naanaanaa!  And then I found out there's even MORE yoga in the next level of the program.  AAAARGH!!! Zumba Ninja is starting to look good.

Anyway, it's weigh-in day: I'm 308.0 (-34.6 pounds), waist: 54" (-5.5").  It's day 21 with the gadget, 9 more until I take some pictures!  Days on track: all of them!

No comments:

Post a Comment