Overdue weekly roundup

Hoo-wee, life has been a little hectic lately. Thankfully, not so busy that I've had to scale back on exercise (with an exception, see Friday) -- but the one ball I've had to drop has been updating this blog. Prepare for Blog Deluge 2009, starting with this entry...

Last week's exercise

Monday, 9/28:

20 minutes on the elliptical in zone 1 (125ish bpm) for warmup

Intervals -- 3 sets of 2:00 in zone 2 (144-156 bpm), then 10:00 in zone 4 (165-174 bpm)

Tuesday, 9/29:

Superfun new full-body weight workout with SuperAthlete Jane

4 miles on the treadmill in zone 2 (144-156 bpm)

Wow, this was a great one. SuperAthlete Jane (SAJ) has been working with a trainer and got a challenging but fun weight workout which she kindly shared with me. I loved a couple of the exercises so much that I'm going to include them in a separate post.

After our weight workout, SAJ talked me into running on the treadmill instead of hitting the elliptical as I'd planned. Sneaky thing, she said she was going to do 3 miles and then increased the distance to 4 when we were within half a mile of being done. Fine by me, because we were having a lovely conversation and I felt like I could have kept running along forever. Treadmill running -- such a luxury! I also noticed that I could totally bust ass over my usual pace and easy-as-pie stay in my most efficient heart rate range. Interesting, and more on that later.

Wednesday, 9/30:

7-mile run

Once again, that wily and charming SAJ enticed me into doing something I wouldn't have done on my own: a beautiful yet hilly loop from Ballard, across the Locks and into Magnolia, around the bluff and back home. Gorgeous! My legs were tired and I wasn't feeling particularly motivated about doing so many hills, but in the end (of course) I was really glad I did.

Thursday, 10/1:

45 minutes on the treadmill, 15% incline and 1.5mph, superlow zone 1 (105 bpm)

I'm still loving this -- it feels like the perfect way to prep for the next day's long run. Have I typed those exact same words before? I suspect I have; I'll doublecheck in last week's roundup.

I was also supposed to do upper body weights but totally ran out of time. This was the one element from the week's schedule that I couldn't complete. All in all, not such a bad one to miss -- but I did give myself a major guilt trip over it nonetheless. I keep remembering what I've heard about the necessity of weight workouts three times per week in order to maintain (or is it increase?) muscle mass. Maybe twice per week is for maintenance, three times is for increase? I'll have to look it up. Another subject to dedicate a post to later.

Because I love to lay on the guilt, I stupidly promised myself -- even wrote a note on my hand -- that I'd do upper body weights after my long run on Friday. Did that happen? No it did not. I'm making peace.

Friday, 10/2:

16-mile run

Yes, you read that correctly. I ran 16 miles last week -- a milestone that deserves its own separate post (to come).

Saturday, 10/3:

Rest

Oh thank heaven. Although I probably didn't rest as much as I should have. My legs were really tired, not surprisingly, and there were several moments during the day that I thought, "I probably shouldn't be doing this." So far, the lack of actual "rest" on rest day doesn't seem to have made a bad impact on my subsequent workouts. But I can't help but wonder if I'd come away stronger if I honored the idea of rest a little bit more.

Sunday, 10/4:

Full-body weight workout

45 minutes on the elliptical in zone 1 (125 bpm)

Phew, I didn't really feel ready to go back to the gym. My legs were still tired and I was generally a bit sore. But I made myself go and it wasn't bad. Knowing that I was starting off slow, doing zone 1 cardio, helped a bit. I also got lucky with the weight workout -- I have about 6 that I rotate through, and the one that came up on Sunday wasn't a doozie. All in all, a somewhat gentle re-entry to exercise and good preparation, I hope, for the week to come.