It’s about 5:30 in the morning, which means that I’ve been asleep for about 11.5 hours. Yesterday, as soon as I got home from my parents’ place I just plopped down on my bed and passed out. I really only had two activities. In the morning I had my run, and in the afternoon I had my bread class. Both are really draining but manageable on their own. What I didn’t anticipate was the effect that both would have put together. So yes, I fell asleep at 6, woke up briefly at 2 a.m. to turn off the lamp besides my bed, and now here I am feeling like I missed something important. I think next time I have to work on keeping my energy levels up…or perhaps rely on stimulants. I can’t afford to lose 1/8 of the weekend like this, you know what I mean? Argh.
Category Archive: fit?
All the pieces
My latest coaching gig began last night. It was the first night in a long time that I ran. If I think about it, it’s sort of embarrassing. I mean, to some extent I’m kind of an ambassador of sorts to the activity. And yet, there I was actually avoiding running for weeks. I was feeling a little bit shy to actually get out there. Well, shy or not, I just had to set that all aside. Compared to some of my previous clinics this is a relatively smaller one. All the same, I have to pump out the positivity. Every single bit matters, right?
On Monday night there was a really heavy dumping of snow in the Toronto area. By Tuesday the temperature rose well above freezing meaning that much of the snow had melted down into pools of slush on the sidewalks. During the run my clinic members gingerly sidestepped around everything. I tried to encourage them to just plow through the puddles. I set an example by doing so myself. I ended up with cold soaked shoes, but I didn’t mind. Nasty, but a good reminder about the joys of running through winter.
When I got back to the store, I got my street wear together and headed for the change room. As I sat down I started peeling off my cold socks. As I did my wrinkly shrivelled feet seemed to gasp for air. All of a sudden I had to just pause. I wasn’t about to cry or anything but I knew that there was a thought there that was begging for attention. I wasn’t really able to put it all together until I took a moment to focus. That’s when it finally came to me. The result was mildly melodramatic, but so damn eloquent. After my long absence from running, having done a run among everyone else at the store: I felt whole again.
Pre-determined stances
Ehhhh, well this week has had its share of rough patches. I’ve been having a tough time with work lately. I’m on a project with an imminent deadline that seemed impossible to meet. I stayed late on Thursday to try to catch up only to get blocked for unknown reasons. Apparently, I had been given an example to work from that was faulty in the first place. Wonderful! On Friday I was rather frustrated at myself during CrossFit. I was having a fair bit of trouble keeping good form on a certain move and as a result coach prevented me from going further that day. I knew I could do better. I was just not performing. So yeah, perhaps my last Facebook posts have been a bit gloomy.
I suppose I could focus on all of the negatives but there have been plenty of good things as well. I’ve managed to be rather social this week. Right after Friday’s workout I went home, changed, then headed downtown to hang out with friends for someone’s birthday. Today I started another improv class which acts as an assessment of sorts to see where we might fit in in terms of future performance opportunities. I have good vibes about this class. Right after I went home then drove up to Markham for a get together with some running friends. I swear, I’m everywhere.
Anyway, I guess the purpose of me writing all of this is just to have a self-reminder that the quality of our weeks depends on what pre-determined stance we take when we view things. Know what I mean? I suppose this means that I need to encourage positivity. I suppose that’s a possibility, no?
I’ll climb that one day
Over at my CrossFit box there are a couple of ropes for those days when rope climbs are part of the day’s skill lesson or workout. I really haven’t seen them get much use, but that’s most likely because I tend to go there on days when more emphasis is put on weightlifting skills. Anyway, after yesterday’s workout a bunch of us were talking about climbing the things. One of the coaches came over and gave us a short overview to satisfy our curiosity. It seemed like wrapping the rope around our legs to create enough friction was an important part of it. Well, one of us tried it out and actually got a fair bit up. In all honesty I was in awe. I half-heartedly grabbed a rope and tried to lift myself, but I didn’t get quite as far. I just got back down and stared at the rope. It brought back some memories of the gym at my elementary school. There was a rope there, but no one every climbed it. Back then I reasoned that my lack of upper body strength was too much of an impediment to ever get far on it. That fear has propagated all the way up to this point in my lift. It has formed a block such that now when I see the rope I just figure that I’d have to get stronger.
As I was getting ready to go home I spoke to another coach and pointed to the rope while saying “I’ll climb that one day.” He told me that I could do it now. I just gave back an incredulous look. He asked whether I was physically incapable or whether it was just fear. I was about to say that I was incapable but I sensibly chose fear as the better response. He said that all of us can climb it, and that he’d show us how to do it on Friday. Well, fine. I really want to know how.
When I got home, I spent a few minutes looking up YouTube videos on rope climbing to see the technique. Honestly, the videos seemed to indicate that with proper foot technique climbing a rope doesn’t involve too much upper body strength at all. Seemed a bit crazy to me, but the people in the videos made it look doable. I don’t know. It might take me a while to get my coordination down, but I might be able to do it all. I want to know that something that was a block previously is conquerable. I’m ready to prove it. I want to be able to mentally tell my 12-year-old self that I shouldn’t let a rope like that intimidate me.
Kinder to myself
I’ve been battling a cold for the past week or so. It hasn’t been pretty. No man should be able to generate that much mucus. It’s ridiculous. Anyway, yesterday I decided to try to make it to the gym to make a 10 o’clock class. I woke up about half an hour before but didn’t feel so great. I decided to sleep through it and go for the 1 p.m. class. I got up at about 12:15 or so feeling groggy and off-balance. I hadn’t eaten yet. My mouth was as dry as the deserts. All the same, I was determined to make it out there. Perhaps that wasn’t a great idea. For about half the class we worked on our back squat. After completing every set of five I had to sit off at the side just to catch my breath. I was becoming really light-headed. After completing my sets it felt like my strength was leaving my body. I was suddenly hit with severe fatigue. It was absolutely frustrating.
The workout at the second half of the class consisted of an alternating ladder of thrusters and pull ups for 11 minutes. Prior to doing it we tried practicing a few thrusters. The light-headedness finally caught up to me there. I could barely get the bar above my head. It was there that coach saw me struggling and put me on a lighter bar. I was completely annoyed with myself. There was just no power. My body was rebelling against me. I still went ahead with the workout. I got it done, but I struggled. I know I did less than I could have under better conditions. By the end, I just felt like burying my head in the sand.
I’m not unreasonable. I mean, I know that I am capable of doing better. I know that not having eaten, being dehydrated, and being sick all played a part in my poor showing. Come to think of it, it’s rather dumb. I mean, why did I push myself to perform when my body was simply not ready for it? God knows, if it was someone that I was coaching I would have told the person to go home and rest. Why should the same not apply for me, right? Dumb, dumb, duuuuumb. Perhaps I was caught up in the whole new year spirit. Maybe I just wanted to desperately get back into a good habitual schedule? I don’t know. What I do know is that I need to take better care of myself. I need to be kinder to myself. If I’m ill, I need to hold back. The next time I plan to go is Wednesday. If I’m not ready, I’ll stay home and get the rest I need. The world will continue to work without me.
Jason’s 2011
I really should have started writing this post a few days ago, but I didn’t feel like forcing myself to do it. The words weren’t flowing. Well, here I am on the final day of the year and I really need to get these words out. This year, 2011, was a bit of a harder one than the last. I remember declaring somewhere that it would be a year of buckling down and riding out tougher times. I was right. That’s not to say that this was a bad year for me. I’m just likely to label it as a challenging one. Did I rise to the challenges thrown at me? I think I did.
Anyway, enough blabber. In depth text follows…after the jump!
It’s not defining
Over the past while I’ve been kind of assessing my body image. Yeah yeah, it’s been ongoing. With CrossFit I’ve been steadily gaining weight. Certainly a lot of it is muscle weight, but not all. A lot more of the clothing I wore back during marathon training doesn’t fit any more. My size was a little unnatural back then. Now, I think I’ve got a better look going–better proportions. Thing is, mentally the fact that I’ve been needing bigger clothes has made me a bit nutty. I worked hard to get away from where I was 2-3 years ago. The situation is different now though. I need bigger pants again, but I’m not as fat as I was before. God knows, I’m a lot fitter. It’s taken me a while, but it almost feels like I’m finally moving past whatever psychological block I’ve had.
Weight is not defining.
Pant-size is not defining.
Why should I be hard on myself if I can’t fit into size 33 pants that I used to be able to wear for a very brief period in 2010? It doesn’t make sense. Like I said a while ago, I’m the best me that I can be at this very moment. As long as I continue to work hard I know that I have nothing to regret.
All in time
Earlier tonight at CrossFit we doing 5×5 back squats for the strength component. I made my way up to an appropriate weight based on my abilities. I’m certainly not at the level of some of the other guys that I’ve seen at the box, but that’s not the point. There’s never any sense in trying to compare myself to someone else–everyone’s got different strengths and weaknesses. Also, some of those guys have been working out for years. I know a few of them have done Ironman triathlons. I know there are dragon boaters and firefighters. Well, in comparison what do I have? I haven’t done much in terms of lifting. Sure, I run and I do a fair bit of long distance training. As a result I have a sturdy leg muscles. My quads and hamstrings are rather meaty. It’s a good thing that a lot of the Olympic weightlifting stuff we do make good use of those muscle groups. Anyway, the point is that I can’t compare myself against them. All I can do is set continual benchmarks for myself.
So, for today I think my back squats went well. The weight was manageable and I had decent form. When I finished my sets my coaches told me that in time I might be a powerhouse. All I could do was reply with “all in time.” I’ve been doing this for about 2.5 months. I’m only scratching the surface of my abilities. I figure that as long as I stay committed I will continue to make gains. It’s far too early to be content with being where I’m at. Just a few months ago I wouldn’t have imagined that I’d be into Olympic weightlifting. It’s rather goal oriented, isn’t it? I actually can’t wait until my coaching stint starts again. I’m wondering how the combination of cardio and strength components will change me. I need to keep working hard. In time it will all pay off. I swear.
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