Thursday, June 15, 2006

Who turned the heater off?

It has been soooo cold here in Canberra lately – overnight temps have been sub zero; it was minus 7 the other day and about minus 4 this morning plus fog. The house we are currently renting – a lovely old double brick Turner house – is like an icebox in cold weather; it has such inadequate heating (and don’t get me started on the dodgy plumbing). The only positive I can see at the moment is that I must be burning more calories just trying to keep warm – all this without raising a sweat! I am so looking forward to getting back to our house with its ducted heating, double glazed windows and lots of insulation – hopefully next month. So another month of living in an icebox.

Another way of keeping warm in the icebox is doing bike intervals on the windtrainer indoors and that is exactly what I did last night. I have an updated exercise plan for the next 6 weeks and the cycle session was a change from the 10 x 2min intervals that I have been doing.

Cycle session:
5min wu
5min pick up the pace and maintain (light resistance)
Increase 3 gears for 3min
Drop back 2 gears for 2mins
Repeat twice
Increase 4 gears for 3min
Drop back 3 gears for 2min
5min CD

Increasing each time was hard work and I was grinding away by the end for the never-ending 3 mins but the amazing thing was when I dropped back the 2 gears it felt so much easier, and yet before, cycling at that level of resistance was really hard work (if that makes sense).

Yesterday morning
Gym session – legs/arms plus abs/core

I am up to pushing 82kg on the leg press (no need to smirk) and managing more reps on the dumbbell curls – I had so many problems with this particular exercise. However, I have a new resistance and abs/core program starting tomorrow so I’m looking forward to that. I like a variety of exercises. Tomorrow I will be focusing on back and biceps plus abs/core.

This morning
Swim session – 700m, about 15.30min

I must be stark raving mad even contemplating swimming in subzero temperatures. Its an indoor pool but there’s still the walk to and from the pool to endure. However the pool was really warm this morning and I managed 700m –I’m slowly on my way to reaching a km which I will then maintain. So next week I will aim for 800m. There were a couple of guys who got in my lane after me and hogged most of the lane when swimming. The first couple of times I would knock one of the guys with my arm as he was swimming toward me, and I was right over to my side of the lane almost hugging the lane rope. He must have got the hint to move eventually which was lucky for him because there was going to be a fist greeting him next time he swam into me – hehehe pool rage! :-) Following the swim I had brekkie with Strewth - I always look forward to this!

Have a great day everyone!

*****************************************
Thought for the day: If you rest, you rust – Helen Hayes

6 comments:

speedygeoff said...

I cannot believe you are declining to "experience" training at Dickson Oval tonight!!

Clairie said...

OMG I must be so rusted by now...... :)

Great to see that road rage can be easily translated in the pool as well. Make sure you have your kickboard in front that you accidently leave to the right so it bumps their head....oh that is just evil isnt' it???!!!

Great efforts to even move in that temperature CJ!

Tesso said...

I won't tell you that we have perfect running/exercise weather here right now.

Whoops, I just did :-)

Toasty said...

i think you turned the heat up if anything

great work outs

Katie said...

I was complaining about how cold I was today and then heard the report of Canberra maximum 5 degrees... Brrrr, you win!!! I sympathise our old unit is often colder than outside!!

Jen said...

OMG. I must say that I've been paying particular attention to the weather in Canberra this winter
;-)

Note to self: write this down - ducted heating, double glazed windows and lots of insulation.