Ow

Have been fairly consistent for the past three weeks or so. Really, for the last few months. But lately I’ve been stepping it up. And I’ve noticed that it’s keeping me a little saner. Things at work have been unpleasant. I’m burned out and disillusioned and bitter about the pettiest things.

But when I can take my anti-lunch, I feel a little better. And even more surprising is that when my morning goes poorly, I know I can always take it out at the gym or in the pool.

I can’t say it has made things better. I can’t say it has turned work around. But it has made it bearable.

I wish I knew how to snap out of the funk, but until I figure it out or find something else, exercise is a giant chasm into which I can discard my frustration.

This has nothing to do with training, but I’ve realized that every morning for the past three workdays has been filled with tension and dread.

Sooner or later I’m going to give in to it, play hooky, and go ride my bike down in the Valley somewhere.

I think I man have figured out my back issues. I think it’s my hips and IT band. I stretched them out a little yesterday, twice, and I can already tell a difference.

But I took the bus in today, so we’ll test drive that theory tomorrow when I ride in.

Lifted twice this week with Lonnie. So sore. Took yesterday off, but plan to go back today even if work is hard. Especially if work is hard!

Did incline press and butterflies. That’s what really killed me. The weight I used for flies was hilariously light — 20 lbs. I didn’t struggle, but I sure felt it.

Incline press was better: 8 reps with 115 and I didn’t struggle too much there either. Nice!

I’m not exhausted yet, but am definitely feeling more tired. I still plan to hit the gym today, however, because we’re doing a whole lotta nothing this weekend other than camping and drinkng.

Oh sure, there might be a little hiking too. But generally speaking, I expect rest. And naps.

And I think that’s the trick to staying motivated and energetic when re-starting a workout program: keep your eye on the rest periods. When you start to run out of energy, determine if you can push through to the rest period.

And then really rest. Do nothing. Put your feet up. Crash. Get intimate with your couch.

That’s one thing I’ll do wrong this weekend — in all likelihood, it will not be that restful. So I may need to take off the early part of next week to recharge. We’ll see.

Did a short swim the other night. Not more than 1,700 yards I think. But it included a basically a 500, a 200 kick, and then a 1,000 free. Felt good to swim long like that. Really forced me to slow down, which enabled me to breathe every three strokes.

I also am trying to focus on staying on my sides longer, enabling a deeper pull. The trick is that I need to keep my shoulder blades pulled tighter when I do so. Otherwise, it kinda leaves the joint out there in a bad way.

I ended up icing the shoulder last night a little. Seemed like it helped, but it’s mostly preventative maintenance. No big problems to speak of.

Today, I lifted weights. Wow. My shoulder, neck and back muscles are not strong. Need to work on that. Gonna be sore tomorrow. Weight lifting is gonna make swimming hard for a bit, but I know it’ll pay off down the road.

Anyway. Good few days. If I take tomorrow off, it won’t be a bad thing. On the other hand, I won’t work out all weekend so I should push through Friday.

Oh sweet Jesus. My back already feels sore from yesterday’s ride. And it’s not even 9 am.

Definitely will be adding a few minutes of core work to my morning routine, or I foresee a bad week of hobbling around.

I migrated the old blog over to WordPress from Blogger. Nothing against Blogger, but I really like my WordPress iPhone app. And what I say about training is not terribly verbose, most of the time.

Amanda and I have been swimming for the past two months or so. Maybe even a little more. It’s been great to swim, and while I can’t say I’ve lost any weight, it’s made me feel a little better about things.

I’ve also been doing the occasional trip to the gym. Mostly I’ve been doing that to keep my shoulders from being injured from all the swimming. It seems to’ve worked thus far.

Today, I got back on my bike for the first time in a while. I may try to commute by bike a few times in the next few weeks. We’ll see.

Three things have been going really poorly lately. My food choices are attrocious. I’ve been tossing and turning at night way more than in the past. And work’s been stressful. Possibly more stressful than normal. I’m going to try to get the food thing on track this week too — little changes mostly — and hope that the work thing works itself out.

As for the sleep problems? I don’t know what I can do. Probably my first step should be to cut waaaay the hell back on caffeine. I’ll start there today and see how it goes. Maybe I’ll try the doctor at the end of the month if things don’t sort themselves out.

Yeah. That should work out REALLY well. I’ll make three major lifestyle changes in one week. I feel EXTREMELY confident that they’ll all stick. Ha!