Filed under: Joanna's
Excuse the poor grammer. But I stole that off the survivor website, so whatcha gonna do? Fact is, there’s a long weekend and our trainers are taking it – so we are as well.
Good news: sleep. Sleep is awesome.
Bad news: Our regularily scheduled broadcast of fitness will be moved back by a quarter hour for the rest of the week, to make up for Monday’s lapse. 5:45 am, I’ll be seeing you way too soon.
Filed under: Joanna's
It’s Saturday morning. Do you realize what time my body decided to wake up? My body is on crack. 5.30 am is not an acceptable sleeping in time. I’m definitely blaming this on bootcamp; It’s obviously a bad influence on my internal clock. I gave up trying to sleep in at 6 am. And sucks to be me since even the paper isn’t delivered that early on the weekend.
The view from the top of the stairs. What did I see? Spots.
Yesterday we did stairs and hill climbs. It seems like every Friday will be that specific torture, which isn’t actually that bad since I was running those stairs before bootcamp. I was really proud of Naomi for finishing yesterday’s class, because she too used to run the stairs with me in the winter, but was never motivated to put herself through the torture of running all the flights. So, great job! And I think this was one of the first days we weren’t breaking the no complaining rule so much. Probably because I didn’t have that much breath left over for speaking. Stairs will do that to a girl.
Filed under: Joanna's
Fact: I love to arrive early to events and engagements. It’s a compulsive thing, and also has to do with the clock in my car being 7 – 10 minutes fast. So I arrive at bootcamp early, and have been running in to our trainer at the top of the stairs, and chatting her up. I know I could use this to my advantage – but how?
Easier workouts? I’m debating this. First, if I complain to much she’ll see through my scam. Secondly, aren’t I here to have someone kick my ass? Wasn’t that the whole point? Would I want to rob myself of that? (Sometimes, yes. Hells yeah.)
And that’s about as far as I’ve gone. Apart from asking her to concentrate on a certain part of the body during the workout (“My calves weren’t shooting sharp pains up my legs yesterday, after practice. Would it be possible to manipulate them more today, so I hobble around all weekend?”) I guess I’m just not seeing any other angles. It’s a flat plain of non-usefulness.
Filed under: Naomi's
Who knew that you could ache on the side of your body next to your rib cage. Who knew?? I certainly didn’t until today..which has been filled with unsuccessful attempts to raise my arms above my head. Do you know how many times I have to raise my arms above my head a day in my job. A lot. Seriously.
Filed under: Joanna's
There are things that I took for granted before I began bootcamp. Standing up, from a sitting position. Sitting in my car without wincing. Laughing without having my abs rebel. Ah, the good old days.
Today marks the second day of regular bootcamp. We’ve stopped measuring up, and started to actually work. Yesterday, when we were doing our millionth run I said to Naomi that we were doing really well, to which she replied she was doing really well just for getting out of bed that morning. And yes, it’s a challenge. I don’t find the actual waking up that early such a difficulty – morning people rock! But organizing everything the night before, and trying to get to bed for 9 pm…I feel like i’ve skipped my adult years and gone right to grandma land. And frankly, with the hobbling I’ve been doing because of sore muscles I’ve definately started to resemble a golden girl.
Filed under: Naomi's
*So this was supposed to be posted on Monday…whoops
Today was the “assessment” day at bootcamp. It was supposed to be easy and relaxing, however I am now having difficulty reaching my hands over my head to put my guitar strap on. Hella lame.
The group is much larger than the “15 new participants” advertised on the website – in fact, the group is almost double that. I guess that means that less attention can be paid to the form of my 9 zillionth squat – which is actually alright with me. The assessment was not so bad; it consisted of 5 key elements:
1. How many push-ups can you do in 60 seconds = 15
2. How many crunches can you do in 60 seconds = 37
3. How long can you hold a plank position = 55 seconds
4. How long can you hold a 90degree squat = 1:24 minutes (with some serious shaking)
5. How fast can you run 1.1km = 6:29 minutes (which was my 5km pace only last year…sigh)
They promise that if we come to classes and lay off the sugar we will see considerable improvement by the last class. Only time will tell.
The worst part for both Joanna and I was the stupid plank hold. It seriously hurt our lower backs…I suppose that is because our abs aren’t strong enough to support the weight of our backs. Damn.
We also had to take measurements of the largest parts of our body. For obvious reasons I don’t feel like I need to tell the on-line world the exact measurement of my right thigh, however I will happily report how many inches disappear at the end.
The attitude of the bootcamp is of course non-competitive, they say that you are only competing against yourself. Yeah right. There’s no way I’m going to let myself be the first one to fall from the squat position, even though my thighs are shaking like a freaking earthquake. I think bootcamp will bring my competitive nature to exercise, which in my case will be a good thing.
Anyhow, enough of this…I am happy to report that I actually enjoyed the morning and it did not feel ridiculously early. Of course, it’s only lunch time as I write this…we’ll see how happy I am when I finish my day at 8:00pm tonight.
And not even once. Multiple times. Eye rolling, facial expressions, snide remarks and questioning my own ability to perform simple manouevers. But I’ve become well aware that even simple exercises like chair sits become pretty difficult, a minute or so in.
The one preparation that I didn’t do on the weekend was a trial run to see how long it would take to commute there and back. I left about ten minutes too early, ten minutes that could have been spent in my warm bed still, but no.
What about the actual class? Well, it wasn’t a true class – we performed a number of tests, and recorded our abilities so that at the end of this ordeal we can compare. There were over 15 people (probably 15 newbies, and a couple of returnies) and 3 trainers, although that number will go down after today to two. We did push ups, cruches, chair sits and planks, and a 1 km’ish run. Let’s just say I’m not as in shape as I though I was. It sounds so much more mature and in control that holy crap! If this was day one the next 29 sessions are going to be a nightmare! I’m pretty sure I won’t make it though, so my sister can have my clothes when I die.
Restraint. Restraint is key.
I’m a little worried about tomorrow – seeing how awful I was today, with this being the “easy” day I hardly want to drag my butt out tomorrow morning. But I will. And I’ll complain about it.
Bootcamp: 1, Joanna: 0. And the final nail in today’s coffin? The coffee machine is on the fritz.
Filed under: Naomi's
Well, here we go…tomorrow Joanna and I embark on 30 days of intense bootcamp workouts. The Survivor Bootcamp promises that if we follow their program we will: get motivated/health/strong; increase energy/endurance; gain muscle/confidence; and lose inches/weight. This looked somewhat attractive two weeks ago when we signed up, seeing as our usual exercise outings (such as spin class or the ever attractive deep water workout) are almost always followed by some carbohydrate loaded breakfast, or by a sweet, rich caramel latte. Or, as sometimes is the case, we skip the whole exercise component all together and go our to a cafe for a latte and a chat. Bridget Jones anyone?
Sitting here writing this I’m not really sure what to expect when I arrive tomorrow morning, and for the next 6 weeks. Whatever the outcome, I believe that the journey should at very least be full of hilarious stories and probably a lot of complaining (except while at bootcamp). Joanna and I have decided that there is only one rule regarding bootcamp (besides that we have to be there..otherwise we will have flushed $400 bucks straight down the toilet) and that is no complaining during bootcamp. Seriously, we don’t want to look weak or anything. Of course, complaining will resume as soon as bootcamp is finished and we are away from the group and instructor. And likely it will continue on this blog.
So here we go…let’s see what the next 6 weeks have to offer us as Joanna and Naomi do Bootcamp.
Hihi, Joanna here! In less than two days Naomi and I are going to start off on an athletic journey and although we won’t be going far physically (sorry, Terry-Fox-type adventurers need not apply) we intend to reap the full benefits of our ridiculous quest. Being that we’re two average girls, fresh in our “young professionals” years (psshat – what’s that about?) we’ve decided that rules had to be enacted so our commitment won’t fade away.
We have one rule, so far - we can complain about bootcamp before and after bootcamp, but never in bootcamp. It’s pretty simple – something along the lines of Fight Club – ah, wait, I just looked it up, there’s actually 8 rules for Fight Club…hrmm, that doesn’t work at all. Well, to salvage that comparison, our rule is a simple as the rules of Fight Club. And hopefully we won’t look like to combatants once we’ve finished.
In university I joined a running club. It wasn’t a true club by university standards – it was a group of like-minded engineering students, it had no recognition, and anyone outside our little circle wouldn’t recognize it to be a true club…more along the lines of “So you’re a group of people…” Yes “…who run together?” Yes again. But we tried! We had t-shirts with iron-on decals that said “Running Club”, and sometimes we even wore them when we went running together. And although the club fell apart after a year, we had rules too. But they were pretty ridiculous. “No chatting while running” – I repetitively broke that rule, what with rule no. 2 “No talking about boys”. Well hell. Excuse me if I have to say something to get over the monotony of running in a circle and trying to keep my heart inside my chest instead of traveling up my throat, as it was wont to do. And in my defense, it’s commonly known that if you’re able to chat while running, you’re at a good pace. So there.
I imagine this blog will be an outlet for us to complain about bootcamp, to compare our progress with that of the other participants, and chat about the stuff that got us here in the first place. (Helloooo dulce de leche!) Time will tell.
