Reverse Crunch Week 2 Day 1

well, things went so well with the first set of reverse crunches, I had to decide between doing the last day of each week until I failed, then backing up a bit, or to do every one from here on out, but more frequently. I decided to do the latter, and so will be doing them daily (or nearly so) until it gets to be too hard or I complete the series

crunches: 14/14/10/10/18 on a spec of (same /15 - total of 66)

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Reverse Crunch Week 1 Day 3

well, things went so well with crunches, it's time to start on reverse crunches (lift feet from floor to about 45 degree angle, then back down). since they looked so easy, I started out with the last session of Week 1 - and had no problem...

crunches: 11/15/9/9/17 on a spec of (same /13 - total of 61)

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Now and Zen

... or lack thereof. still having problems remembering to do the meditations. perhaps once a week, on a good week. not very good.

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Walking - Week 1

totals for the the first week of walking: 24.4 k steps... that's the good news. the bad news, my total was the lowest on our team, and our team was the second lowest, beating only a short-handed team! some of these people had over 100k steps! they must be power walkers or joggers or something. oh well, need to run my own race and do what I can to up my numbers, within reason.

total: 24.4 k steps

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Crunch Final Test

* * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * *
* * I did it! * *
* * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * *

hope to figure out how to embed video soon (or at least link to one), as I did all 100 - actually did 109, as I lost count at one point, and did a few extra, rather than end up at 99 (which would truly be an epic fail).

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Crunch Week 6 - Day 3

last full set - went fairly well, should be able to do 100 good form crunches without too many problems. hope to do it as early as saturday...

crunches: 26/26/32/32/26/26/22/22/84 on a spec of (same /60 - total of 296)

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Walking

totals for the last week of prep: 20.4k steps... put some effort and a lot of general activity, plus it was all recorded. making 10k per week should be trivial...

just had our 'start' meeting, reset the counters and the first "real" week totals start now, results next week...

total: 20.4k steps

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Now and Zen

this has been going poorly. rarely done, and often interrupted. not happy with this at all, but still not sufficiently unhappy to do something about it, which is even more "not good"...

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Crunch Week 6 - Day 2

getting close to test time (could say "crunch time", but that would be pretty cheesy...).

crunches: 22/22/30/30/24/24/18/18/60 on a spec of (same /57 - total of 248)
pushups: 25/23/20/17/17/13 (plus 5/1/x) (total of 115 for 1st 6 sets, like others before) grand total of 121 - shoulder was hurting, kind of went soft on myself.

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Pushup Practice

as you may have noticed, my pushup practice has dropped off. managed to mangle my shoulder in a botched dive roll, so the pushups will be light for the next week or two. no serious damage, but have to get the shoulder back in place and loosen up the muscles.

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Walking

at work, we are preparing to start a 10k steps per week challenge. it will kick off on the 8th of April and end in September, so we're taking the days between now and then to 'condition' ourselves. each week there will be a report on how the prior week went.

last week (first of two 'prep' weeks) was good for over 8k counted steps (was only counting the steps on my lunch walk - and a 4 day work week). this week will be much higher, if I remember to wear it all day, and over the weekend...

total: 8k steps

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Crunch Week 6 - Day 1

this was a set-of-5, so totals are back to normal. did a pretty good job, given how things have been going...

crunches: 45/55/35/30/70 on a spec of (same /55 - total of 235)
pushups: 30/23/20/18/16/14 (total of 121)

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Pushup Practice

only got to 25. that sucks. still fatigued from the climbing yesterday.

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Pushup Practice

didn't do pushups, but went to Rocks-n-Ropes (indoor climbing walls), mostly to belay the boy scouts. did some low altitude free-climbing (less than 10' doesn't require tie-up) and on a 12' tall boulder. tons of fun, but my arms and shoulders ache something fierce!

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Crunch Week 5 - Day 3

did a full set of crunches, but bailed early on pushups due to shoulder cramp

crunches: 20/20/24/24/20/20/22/50 on a spec of (same, total of 200)
pushups: 20/17/15/x/ ...

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Pushup Practice

forgive me, for I have sinned - it's been over 2 weeks since my last pushup...

well, finally got back into it - cranked out 30, which isn't too bad for having avoided it for so long. hope to do a full set of pushups between crunches tomorrow.

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vacation and zen - part 2

several times during the vacation, I slipped away for 10 min or so of "me" time and meditated. things went fairly well, but it's hard for me to stay focused when I can hear the rest of the clan splashing in the pool.

didn't get much of a chance to meditate while on the road, but achieved something similar while singing along to some of my favorite music (especially when it's one both the wife and I both know and like, best when we know the harmony parts). it was super-real, just there with the music and the family. I got to relax and really get into the music, as my wife did all the driving - she likes driving almost as much as I do, but we took her car, so ...

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vacation and zen

just got back from a silly vacation - silly in the lack of planning. airfare was way too much, so we (as much on a whim as on solid thoughtfulness) drove 2200 miles each way (3 days each way) to spend 4 days with my dad.

we listened to audio books to help pass the time. in the past, audio books were a last resort from boredom, as it would intrude into my thoughts, competing for my attention, and make the trip even longer, as well as more stressful. this time, despite not being very interested in the great Harry Potter, I was able to stay focused, in the 'now', listening and allowing my full attention to stay with the audio book. the results (very good) were not at all what was expected. might have to do with the difference in material (usually, I pick biographies of people I find interesting - a two volume set on Teddy Roosevelt most recently) or circumstance (driving thru west Texas or most anywhere after sunset, vs on airplanes, ferries or while relaxing) or company (over the car's audio system vs headphones) or training...

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Crunch Week 5 - Day 2

WOW! Never expected this kind of result. Day 2 (and 3, for Weeks 5 & 6) has 8 sets, so I get 9 pushup sets in. The totals are mind-boggling. I stopped a little early on the first set of pushups (pacing), but was having problems with breathing (my Gi top was covering much of my lower face, and I kept breathing the same air, thus the low totals for rounds 2 & 3, stripped it off after that). Actually, a sweaty, heavy canvas Gi top can weigh about 40 pounds, so pulling it off was a real help to me... 8)

The crunches still aren't killing me, so I hope to have a video up of 100 crunches before the end of the month. I plan to put numbers in the footer for counting. Then I need to learn how to speed things up, so the first and last 10 are normal speed, but most of the middle is 2 or 3 times faster... I'm going to see if I can find a MIDI version of Flight of the Bumblebee, so that I can change the pace to match the speedup of the video (start slow, build the speed, slow for the finish...). Somehow I don't imagine the sound of me grunting and breathing durring the crunches will appeal, especailly once I speed things up...

crunches: 19/19/22/27/18/18/22/60 on a spec of (same (except 27, should have been 22)/45 - total of 205)
pushups: 25/17/18/20/20/16 (plus 14/14/10) (total of 116 for 1st 6 sets, like others before) grand total of 154!

no wonder I'm sore... can't wait for tomorrow...

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Pushup Practice

ground out 34 in the evening... wanted to do more, but there are a million excuses, including sliding toes, sore shoulder, tile floor (hard on my wrists, knuckles weren't even an option)... On to a complete pushup and crunch schedule on Tuesday...

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