B_ex

Look at you going over your water goal! How do you plan to 'stay careful with the food'? (It always helps me to have a plan for such things).

I haven't biked to work one single time! I had to wait to get a helmet and it didn't come until I was out of town. I want to do a practice ride so I know how long it will take me and how yucky I'll be when I get there, but it keeps raining. I tried to do it one night before it got dark and had to turn around halfway because it started to rain. I boogied, but still got caught in it and was soaked. It's supposed to rain all weekend too. I should probably just ride to work and be done with it. No shower or anything, but I figured I'd bring some wet wipes and do my make up there in the bathroom. Probably get changed too. I won't know how it is until I just do it. I think I'd feel much like your J does. When I used to go to the gym and lift before work I felt so accomplished by 9 a.m. I did 3 full circuits of BBWW for the first time today! Including ten standard push-ups! It's the first time since I started doing it. I think it's partly that I'm making gains, I was alone at home, I had just cleaned the whole house so I wasn't distracted by things to get done, and that it wasn't so hot. The heat really kills my drive to continue a workout. It's one of the few drawbacks I find to working out at home as opposed to at a gym. My hips have been tight so I did this sequence after BBWW It was a good simple cool-down with some deep stretching. I've never done any of this woman's other videos, and I honestly didn't even check to see what else she has. I liked this one and found it easy to follow. I like how she didn't talk through all of the deep holds about breathing and centering. I think that type of thing is helpful in some advanced vinyasa and power yoga but I find it distracting in Hatha. I I did this one yesterday before work. You guys know that SarahBeth is my girl, but this one was just okay. Nothing wrong with it, but it probably won't wind up in my regular lineup. It's hard to be a stealthy assassin with tight hips and yesterday was Friday so I did it. It had some standing splits in it, which were a great balance focus. It's easy enough for me to have good balance and poor form doing standing splits. When bringing attention to alignment, balance gets a little trickier. I did these two before work earlier in the week. Don't remember which day. I don't have time to post after my morning workouts and then I get distracted by life after work. The first one was the "Energizing Morning Yoga" by SarahBeth that I posted earlier in my challenge and I followed it up with this one Halfway through the second one I started to worry that I didn't have enough time to get ready and wasn't focused enough. I will definitely be going back to it.

It is so hard to be punctual when other people are involved! I have learned to tell my boyfriend we need to be places earlier than we actually do so we're not late. When is your vacation? Also, isn't climbing relatively safe since you will have safety gear? Cheers to an improved week 2. Go, go, go week 3!

Week two summary has been posted and progress bars have been updated. I edited my yoga quest to feel less like a chore. The changes can be seen in my original post. In addition to the 1 circuit of BBWW I did this morning, I went for a short bike ride this afternoon. I haven't been on a bicycle in a long time but want to become a bike commuter ASAP. I'm glad I went on a ride instead of just trying to bike to work. The last time I was on a bike regularly, I lived in Florida where the world is flat.

Back from 'vacation'! I'll give a weekly update later today hopefully. Just wanted to stop in today to say that I tried waking up a little earlier to get in some exercise. I did one circuit of BBWW. Not awesome, but considering that I don't normally just roll out of bed and get active, I'm considering it a win. Mostly I'm typing this sentence for accountability: I will update for this past week and update my trackers later today.

Go hard in your activities but also your rest!

Hey Iceburner, sorry to hear that you cut your knee but I'm glad to hear that it is healing well. I can relate on a first week full of friendly festivities and less than favorable faire. I'm curious to know your method to keep yourself punctual. Are you setting reminders, using habit rpg, setting things out the night before? I try to plan ahead but sometimes my laziness gets the best of me so I'd love to hear what you do.

You make climbing sound so cool! When I read your posts about getting to bed early I kick myself for not making that part of this challenge. I know I could just do it, but that's no fun. Sounds like everything is going pretty well and that's amazeballs, but what are you doing this week to prepare food?

Now that I have a firm grasp on what day of the week it is, I realize I need to work hard to make this week a success. I am going out of town Thursday-Monday. This is something I considered when setting my goals for this challenge. I should be able to accomplish everything, but I want to front-load things if I can so I don't end up with missed workouts like I did in week 1. I just completed another round of BBWW. I think I need to foam roll my quads because I can feel that they are deeply tender. My legs feel like they've recovered from DOMS until I'm going into a parallel BW squat. I drink plenty of water and I have been eating relatively healthfully so I think it's just something I will need to grow accustomed to again. I'm not worried; I used to squat regularly with free weights, but it's been a few years. I did all ten standard pushups. Pushups and squats are keeping me at two circuits. I don't feel I should do more of any of the other components until I feel comfortable doing so with those, so I remain at 2. Followed that up with this video to help me get ready for bed: Good little hatha flow to it with a focus on chest (heart) opening. Appropriate since pushups are a struggle and the bow pose stretched my quads. Bow was particularly difficult to keep good form because my legs were already tired. No specific balance poses. Packed my lunch today too. I haven't prepared it yet for tomorrow. I'll have to do it in the morning; I need to get to bed.

Just updated! Thanks for checking in

I don't mind at all! I deciding during the last challenge that sharing the videos I'm doing would be good for me to reflect, and since they can be hit-or miss, I thought it would be good to discuss what I did or didn't like.

I think your reasoning to change your flexibility/balance training makes sense. Plus, doing it for shorter periods each day will probably help to create a habit of it. Do you like hard boiled eggs? I made up a dozen of them the other day and it's been a lifesaver being able to grab one or two when I'm feeling lazy or rushed. Plus, it was nice to have them on hand to put in a salad I made with dinner the other night. Grats on early sleep! I'm so jealous of you for that. I'm going to have to channel you tonight and get to bed before midnight.

Day 2 is in the bag and in addition to the 15-minute video I posted above, I did BBWW and a 45-minute practice following another video. BBWW was challenging, but I completed two circuits with good form on everything including standard pushups. My yoga practice was far from perfect. The flow was challenging, but my boyfriend joined me and we managed to laugh through the toughest parts. I will certainly come back to this one. It has more direct ab work than I ever prefer to do, but the poses are mostly advanced variations of things that are relatively easy. The flow is quick, and I had to take more than one break in Child's pose. The good news is, I'm better at Side Crow than I was expecting. Back on track.

YOU DID 100 SQUATS?! I just got a new washer and dryer after hoarding dirty laundry because of a move. I was so excited! Then I started doing it and my excitement quickly dissipated. On the upside, my washer and dryer both play music when they're done. Realizing that it's okay to switch things up is a struggle in itself. I'm glad you had such a great workout. I'm looking forward to hearing about your program.

I've had a similar experience with water as Buckswrath. I used to hardly drink it, now if I have less than 64 oz in a day I feel so thirsty. It's so bad that I had to limit my water intake last week for a drug screening for my new job. I was worried that with all the water I drink, they'd think I was trying to dilute my results (which I read is a thing). I really cannot get enough.

Excellent! Yes, eating out less is part of my reason to bring my lunch every. damn. day. Doing IF for my last challenge really helped me to figure out when I'm actually hungry, but this challenge I wanted to find a way to set myself up for success with my food choices that was measurable. I also moved so I have access to a full kitchen and the need to save money because my expenses increased. Thanks and good luck to you too! I didn't sleep well on Sunday, and even though I looked up a video to follow, I just couldn't find the energy to do any yoga or BBWW yesterday. I made a deal with myself to get a good night's sleep, and wake up early and get some yoga in. I'm so glad I did. I've slacked in my practice over the past few weeks and know from the gentle flow I did this morning that I would not have had a good time doing the video I intended to do last night. Here is the flow I did this morning: For the next few days, my commute is an hour and fifteen minutes. It felt so good to engage my muscles and breath; to do something between waking up and sitting in my car to then sit in front of a computer, turn around and sit in my car some more. The flow is basic and gentle but challenging enough to wake me up. I'll definitely be doing it again. I wonder if she knows she's training an assassin. I love this channel. I find SarahBeth so easy to follow. I didn't have time to make anything fun for lunch, but I had the forethought to have things I could grab for mornings like this. Two hard boiled eggs, two string cheese, a banana, and a yogurt. I think I'll buy some carrots so I can have a vegetable on hand too.

Subbed for another six weeks of awesome.

That is the perfect gif for leg day DOMS! I'm interested to learn more about this YAYOG thing, and balance poses are part of my challenge this time around. Subbed!

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Week 3 place-Summary Week 3 Scores: BBWW B Two sessions completed. I didn't plan as well as I should have to be successful. Completely my fault. To get a third workout in, I would have had to have done two days back-to-back and that would have just been a punishment and not for da gainz. Yoga B Again, poor planning on not reaching the week's goal, but I did three sessions this week. Lunch A Brought lunch every day. On Friday, I had to scramble in the morning to figure something out as I was out of everything, but I pulled Week B- it off. Glad I did because it felt good when they were taking the lunch order at work (for McDonalds!) to say 'no thank you'.

Week 2 Summary So I went on 'vacation' this week. By that I mean, I went to Florida for 5 days to surprise my dad for both is birthday and Father's day. I'm a terrific progeny. What that means though is that my schedule was thrown all off. I stayed in the same time zone, but with the amount of napping I did in my downtime, one would think I was jet lagged. Thursday I flew there, drove around and showed my BF some of my old stompin' grounds, and had dinner with friends at my favorite local sushi spot. Friday we went kayaking on the Weeki Wachee River. This is not my photo, but you get the...picture. 5.5 miles on a tandem kayak, and dare I say that I was doing a lot of the work for some portions of it because my BF, who has never been on a river like this, was too busy being distracted by the wildlife. So let's get on with the recap! BBWW- I did it once and I will award myself 0.5 for kayaking. Yoga- Two sessions for 30 minutes total. Dismal. I thought I would be fine with no mat while out of town, but I wasn't. I did do some while away, but it was uncomfortable and hard to keep balance. I was worried about hurting myself so I gave up. Lesson learned. Brown Bagging It- It feels like cheating because I only did it for two days, but that's all I was scheduled for week 2. Week 2 scores: BBWW C Yoga D+ Lunch A Week C This weeks grade goes strongly against my nerdy tendencies. It doesn't feel like I did that poorly overall, but I guess when you look at what my quests are, I didn't do that well. I had a great week that was busy and active in a lot of ways, just most of which didn't align with my challenge. Oh well.

Week 1 Summary Gosh dangit, my days are all screwy. I started a new job on Friday and since then I keep thinking that I have an extra day for everything. Who the heck starts a job on Friday and then has the weekend off? I was thinking of updating yesterday, then too late to get in a final round of anything (because I was thinking I had one more day, which still doesn't make sense) I remembered that the weeks are Monday-Sunday. So how did it go? BBWW- Other than the update I gave on 6/9, I did another day for a total of 2 for the week. I was about to follow it up with some yoga and update when I found that my electricity had gone out due to a thunderstorm here. The first day that I did left me feeling pretty sore, and even with two days in between, getting through it again was a challenge. I could not do standard pushups, and again I made it through two circuits. I'm considering the second workout a success because I wanted to quit halfway through the first circuit, but I was glad I kept going by the end of the second. I could maybe have kept going into the third, but I didn't want to be so sore again. I didn't do a third day. Partly because I was sore, partly because I was a few hours away all weekend, and partly because when I got home I just wanted to chill. I was at Lake George all weekend and definitely got a full-body workout in doing some swimming back to the dock after floating too far. I came home on the back of a motorcycle, five and a half hours through scenic upstate New York roads, but by the time I got home I only wanted to lie down. It was a lovely ride, but it's tiring in its own way. I am going to award myself .5 of a BBWW for the swimming I did. It was not a dedicated part of my quest, but I believe it should count because it was a full body, body weight workout in which I exerted a considerable effort. Yoga- As I mentioned above, I was omw to loading up a video on good ole YouTube when I found out my electricity was out. I had big plans to do that and then comment on another video I did but no internet = no electricity. This was not true at my house over the weekend: In addition to the videos I posted during week 1, I also did this flow No arm balances in this one, but it was relaxing and got me ready to sleep while providing a lot of opening. I struggle with the 'spiritual' side of yoga. As in, it is not for me. I am definitely more of an Assassin than a Druid when it comes to my yoga practice. As such, I can find it difficult to be relaxed by a teacher who is too 'woo woo'. I had never done any of this woman's videos before, and though it didn't start off very relaxing, it was a good flow once she got into it and stopped talking about relaxing. I did three dedicated sessions (would have been four, but again with the electricity.) The total was 1.68 hours. I am going to take into consideration for this week my attempt to do another session, and my confusion about the days. Brown Bagging It- Certainly my strongest category so far. I took my lunch to work every day. I even took my lunch to my first day of my new job on Friday even though I had no idea how long I would have for lunch or what my accommodations would be. It was only two hardboiled eggs and some broccoli, but it satisfied me until I got home to eat dinner. Week 1 scores -BBWW: B+ -Yoga: B -Lunch: A___ Week: B+ Life side quest: I am doing a terrible job at this. I used to post from work, but I can't even get on the computer yet at my new job. I'm resolving to fit this into my homelife better. I promist I haven't forgotten that this is something I said I would do.