Day 2: Anyone need a left arm?

Because after this morning's weights, I apparently will never be able to use it EVER AGAIN.

Okay, not really, because I am typing with it right now.  If I wasn't, i  oul look lik hi .  hi h i kin o o    h n you hink ou i .

Or maybe my fingers have a hairball.  It's really hard to tell.

Anyhow, Day 2 of marathon training.  Did I write about Day 1?  I had the day off from work yesterday so I tried to avoid the computer as much as possible since the point of taking a long weekend away from work was to heal my brain into something more resembling a brain and less resembling pudding.  I did not necessarily succeed in that endeavor. 

For Day 1, the agenda was three miles.  I duly went into the gym and slogged out three miles.  It was tough.  I walked a lot.  Apparently I do not like the indoor track when it's all daylight outside and stuff.  Triggers my issues with heights.  And there were a lot of distractions which were more interesting and less disconcerting when I was walking.  Like the two gals working out together who it seemed had the goal of using every available surface and equipment in the gym.  Very disconcering to round a corner and find two chicks crabwalking backwards towards me on the track.  My first thought was always that they had fallen and could not get up, but then after that it was kind of ooky.  It was like a horror movie but with daylight and primary colors. 

It also reinforced my dislike of personal trainers, or rather my dislike of me working with one.  Some people do really well with a personal trainer and need that guidance and the variety.  For me, though, it's like some sort of special circle of hell.  I watched this other gal work out with a trainer as I ran my tiny little circles.  One time around they're doing lunges.  Next time around she's skipping rope.  Around again and she's balancing a ball on her nose then slapping her flippers together while barking for fish.  Then back to skipping rope.  I could be making one of those up.  But I would not have been surprised to see the ball thing. 

My friend S and her husband work out with a trainer a couple of times a week, one of those gyms where you only train with a trainer.  She's always telling me about the latest session of torture.  "Today we had to hold a small medicine ball with one arm up in the air while we jumped onto a bosu ball but then turn right around and jump back down -- on one leg!"  You could not pay me to do this stuff, much less get me to pay for it.  When I did my gratis personal trainer session at my new gym, I was not happy.  See, I want to run and I want to lift weights -- some machines, some free weights -- and do some abs.  I told my trainer this and she said "oh, I never use the weights machines."  It went down hill from there.  Personal training kind of reminds me of trying to please the playground bully.  One day you may be enjoying a game of tetherball.  The next day you may be playing keep away -- with your book report.  Later that week, you may be the tetherball pole.  This is not my idea of a good time. 

So, back to the gym in my solitary state.  After logging my miles I grabbed my trusty notebook to map out a weights program for myself.  While I can pretty much remember from day to day which machines I will be using for that particular workout (one upper body circuit, one lower body/back circuit) what I can not always remember is what weight I was lifting and -- more importantly from my point of view -- how to properly set up the machine so I do not get injured.  On this machine, the seat goes here and the pivot goes here.  Etc.  I don't want to waste my time setting and resetting the machine each time until I get it right.  I'm a schedule here, people!   I determined which machines I wanted to use and determined how to use them (some new ones in the world since I last lifted weights).  I did one rep of upper and lower body to test out the weights and the machines, then did a second set of the lower body because I had nothing else to do yesterday.

Day 2.  Was feeling the outer hip weight lifting I did yesterday (adductor muscles?  I always get them confused), but not really any of the usual aches and pains from that area.  Which is why I want to do those exercises in the first place, so yay me.  Thought I wasn't feeling any of yesterday's upper body work until I started into it again this morning.  Ouch.  My triceps are wussy.   Taking my time and going through two sets I ended up bumping up some of the weights I was using, to get closer to that fatigue point.  Learned not just my triceps are wussy; my left shoulder still has some issues, thanks to a lovely little curve in my spine right about *there*.  Means I really have to concentrate when lifting in order to keep things as even as possible, make certain both sides are doing the work.

Tomorrow is a rest day.  Yay!  I am looking forward to that.

Cheers,
the CilleyGirl