Done

Burpee challenge completed (yesterday).

5050 burpees.

Kenway made the most amazing return, being hundreds in deficit, but he made it. Well done.

pre-new years day workoutlet

Jaclyn and I hit the gym for a little pre-gluttony preparation.

warmup:
(JD)
mountain climbers, burpees, core ball pass, leg lift machine
(ED)
renegade row, burpees, core ball crunches, kettlebell swings (24kg),
cable pull chest thrust, pullups
10min running

workout:
(JD)
7x dead lift (70#)
running 2mi
(ED)
core medicine ball machine 2min
(throw an 8lb medicine ball into a catch hood by lying back with the medicine ball over you head and then sit-up and throw the ball at a target, pick up the next ball and repeat.)
5x5 OHS (95#, 100#, 105#, 110#, 115#)

Jaclyn took me to her NYSC here in the slope to check out the gym and allow us to get in a quick workout before heading off to the MoMa. They have a good collection of cardio equipment but not nearly as many free-weight stations as you'd want. Their only squat rack was a short, angled, non-cage affair. They also had a weird '3D' smith machine--not sure how it worked but it wasn't tall enough for OHS, so I just did them on the one rack. I tried doing crunches on a 65cm core ball and it really works well. The only really fun piece of equipment was the medicine ball throwing machine. That was fun and felt like it allows you to work most of your body together. Nice that they had kettlebells. Overall, not impressive enough (and the staff wasn't friendly enough) to make me think I'm going to head back...

A run in the park

One lap of Prospect Park (3.46mi): ~40mi

Ran for ~1.5mi then ran with short walks the rest. The first run felt much better than before but the prior evenings drinking caught up with me...

A nice day for a walk in the park

Ran+walked 3.47 miles in Prospect Park this morning in 39.08. I think approximately 7.5 walking so the running speed wasn't that bad. The heat really slowed me down--but when I was running it felt better than before.

10 strict pull-ups
10 hanging knees-to-elbows
50 squats

Sunday morning grind

Took an early morning train to New Rochelle to climb with Brian, Eric, and Jaclyn. Firstly, congrats to J-Dog for an excellent second climbing day, she's got a good feel for efficiency and climbing movement already - saw her throw a right foot flag around a corner for stability on her first ever 5.8. Good session, but the pump hit us all by the end.

We worked on lead routes today, a mix of pumpy roof routes for endurance and technical face climbs. B and I warmed up on a 9 (yellow/green), big jugs steepening out for the last third of the climb. Best fall of the day was Eric's monster whipper on the same route, with an armful of slack out (and then some) going for the clip at the steepest part of the climb (nice catch, Brian). I almost ran through the pumpy 10 (black) across the roof, but threw an incorrect grip on a hold and muffed a clip - too pumped to recover without hanging, but the moves felt good. Brian worked it twice, looking much better and more comfortable by the end. Hangdogged my way up the 11b (blue/white) that Brett made look so easy the other day. Burned myself out on the tricky start, but was able to figure out the subsequent moves including the exit moves around the lip and the big throw near the end. Also hit up the tricky double roof 10 (yellow) in the back; body positioning and foot placement was crucial. Brian climbed a 10 (pink/green) that started on a vertical face but exited on an overhanging dihedral, looked like confounding moves on very thin holds.

Finished up with some quick bouldering (V3ish) before running for the return train to Grand Central. Nice way to spend Sunday morning, but I really wish that in addition to the sports drinks and energy bars, the gym would stock some real fuel...

Burpees, Day Five

So far, so easy. But we haven't really hit the first real day yet... I'm moving doing them to the mornings so that as they get harder I can finish off later in the day if necessary. And besides, G set the standard by doing them around breakfast.

5 Burpees

Inspired by the G-man... The Burpee Challenge: The Return

Because GF has now thrown down the gauntlet and because I want to see if I can make it even half way, I've started the Burpee Challenge. Apparently, JD is also insane and has started as well. Her goal was getting through day 30. I'm shooting for at least day 100 and if I can, until I get my PhD. If that doesn't motivate me to finish, nothing will. I'll post progress updates on the 5s so as to keep the blog postings reasonable.

Day One: One Burpee!

Yeah!

5049 to go...

Killington, Day Two!

So the second day on the mountain was much better for me. I was up and going fast when I hit the mountain—even if we hit the mountain a bit later in the morning than I would have liked. And, apparently, I'm at least half descent at teaching basic snow boarding techniques. At least on the toe side. I worked with Jaclyn on her balance, use of the edge and slowing down to keep control. All with her on her toes as we were going down in tandem—I was heel edging—and we kinda did a dance down the mountain. And we did better than the other pair trying the same thing! Taryn and Adrianna were off skiing after Taryn's brief attempt to snowboard. We made it back tired but reasonably happy and Jaclyn, while still not quite understanding why people freeze themselves voluntarily, at least thinking she wanted to try again someday. Unfortunately, the hot tub at the house was acting up which is not what you want to find out after a day of skiing!

Snowboarding Day One: On the Slippery (Ice) Slope

Not enough snowboarding for the last four years means that every time I hit the mountain it takes me a full day to get my skills back up above rank novice. It also seems to take a day to get my body back into the ski/snowboarding thermo-regulation regime (not to mention used to the lack of blood flow to your feet). Lucky for me I'm used to wearing climbing shoes so my feet scream less loudly when I stuff them into boots.

I managed two runs down the green beginners slope to remind myself how the snowboard worked while Jaclyn went in for her lesson. Taryn and Adrienna headed up Ramshead for some runs. After my basic runs I took the gondola up to meet the T&A at the top of Killington Peak. We took the long green down, dodging people and ice patches. Finally, I ended the day giving Jaclyn a second lesson as her first instructor apparently left a lot to be desired. We took quite a while to get down the beginners slope--the last ski patrol passed us as we reached the bottom at almost 5...

Another one caught the fever!

We did a good afternoon of climbing with our newest victim, Jaclyn. Kenway and I were doing two up per rope to work on endurance and to lose less time. I was burning out more quickly for it but Kenway looked pretty good. I tackled the 5.9 coming out of the tunnel and a bunch of 5.7/5.8 combos and a few 5.10s. Kenway tackled some of his favorites (like the 5.11s out front) and did some good work on a few easier runs. However, most of the accolades go to our newest recruit. Jaclyn not only climbed to the top on her first go, but proceeded to dominate all the 5.7s we could find here and eventually got so angry at a move on two different routes that she was swearing her return to conquer them. She was a true champ managing to back-step, pedestal and generally look like a pro on her routes. A 5.7+ that MGH set gave her some trouble, but we think it was missing a hold. With out a doubt she'll be back for more