Notes by Nectar

And another good week at the gym!

Trevor cancelled our Sunday morning session and I decided to go on my own. I did 5 km on the treadmill in 47:14 (31 seconds faster than last time). I walked it, starting at 6 km/h and increasing the speed every 5 minutes until I got to 6.5 km/h.

On Monday I was a bit rushed (fire drill and birthday lunch) so I ended up doing just 20 minutes on the treadmill (17:14) and two sets of lower body exercises. Still, better than nothing!

I had yoga on Tuesday morning. It was just me as my cousin was travelling. I thought about cancelling the class for the next two weeks but then felt like I really needed to do yoga and didn’t want to stop it for so long. It was a good class. I’m always surprised when I can do a seated forward bend and hold on to my feet – when I started doing yoga my hands barely reached the middle of my shins.

Trevor’s 30-day abs challenge started on Wednesday so that’s what we did in my session. I warmed up on the bike for 5 minutes and did this weights circuit before the abs challenge:

• Combined bench squat/punches x 10 (3-kg weights)
• Deadlifts x 10 (15-lb weights)
• Shoulder press x 10 (10-lb weights)
• Sumo squats x 10 (20-lb weight)
• Lateral pulldown x 10
• Repeat

After that I did 16 minutes on the treadmill (it’s supposed to be 20 minutes but we didn’t have enough time). I alternated walking and running, and on the last two runs I increased the incline to 3%. Then I did the following abs circuit for 20 minutes:

• Mountain climbers x 40 s
• Rest x 20 s
• Side plank x 40 s (changing sides halfway through)
• Rest x 20 s
• Abdominal in and out x 40 s
• Rest x 20 s
• Abdominal toe touches x 40 s
• Rest x 1 min 20 s

I did that circuit four times. Unfortunately both gym mats had disappeared so I was doing all the exercises on a bench – which took some getting used to. The hardest exercise was the side plank, but I think that’s because I was on a bench and just not very comfortable.

I did day 2 on Thursday. I did a 5-minute warmup on the bike and 20 minutes on the treadmill (2.22 km). And then came the abs circuit:

• Situps x 40 s
• Rest x 20 s
• Spiderman crunches x 40 s
• Rest x 20 s
• V ups x 40 s
• Rest x 20 s
• Hip rolls x 40 s
• Rest x 1 min 20 s

It was much harder than the day before! Or perhaps I was already in so much pain from the day before that it felt like it was harder. I found the hip rolls the hardest and for the last two sets I swapped them for Russian twists – I figured they’d work the same oblique muscles so I just substituted them.

I thought I’d go to the gym on Friday but I didn’t. And on Saturday, the day after my birthday drinks, the closest I got to the abs challenge was doing a situp to get out of bed. And that was painful enough!

Low point of the week? My knees are still aching a bit. I had cake on Monday, and a lot of drinks on Friday night! I also had a can of Coke on Saturday – my first soft drink since 2nd January.

High point of the week? I worked out five times this week! I’d bought a pair of white linen shorts last summer and wanted to wear them on my birthday and was really pleasantly surprised when they fit. I also got a lot of comments from my friends at my birthday who said I looked fit (athletically speaking, I’m guessing). So that felt really good.

Weight loss? Still up and down – but I don’t think the scales accurately reflect the changes taking place in my body shape.

Read more updates here.