Aeryn's Stockpiling Arms

[Aeryn]

Wow, lots of changes around here for this challenge, totally threw off my planned structure. But this'll work. So, main quest: get stronger! Specifically, upper body strength. I've just started climbing recently, did a beginner aerial silks class, and want to do a freestanding handstand. All of these things rely on upper body strength, so that's what I'm working on.

1. Bodyweight workout 3x a week. Pull-ups and rows are a major part of this, and I'll add them in separately if I'm still doing coworker bootcamp that doesn't include much pulling.

2. Handstand time! 3x a week, be upside down with my weight on my hands. Crow pose, headstands, and handstands all work for this... But mainly handstands. Next year at the juggling fest, I want to be able to use the handbalancing rig.

3. Eat well. Gaining strength isn't possible when I'm undereating, and I'm having a hard time convincing myself to get enough calories. I didn't track at all while on vacation the past two weeks, and ended up losing 4 pounds - this is counterproductive. 2100 calories a day minimum, to be adjusted at week 3 based on how the tape measure moves.

Life goal! Go to a meetup. I've been a hermit in this town for too long - I want local friends, and they are not going to find me if I stay in my house alone. There are cool people in the world, and some of them have to live near here.

As usual, I'll still be swimming, juggling, and limiting my soda intake. Time to get stronger!

[Yuen]

Pull ups and handstands? Subscribed!

 

Good luck in your challenge Aeryn

[sammiejune29]

Yay!! Glad to see you got your thread up. And I think these are wonderful goals I'm still trying to prepare myself mentally for the bulk I want to do at some point. I figure I might as well start now. Lol

[Sea Level]

The Assassins are attacking it this go-round! Good luck.

[Aeryn]

Pull ups and handstands? Subscribed!

 

Good luck in your challenge Aeryn

  Thanks! I feel like these have been my goals forever now, but I know I'm making progress... Just slower than I'd like.

Yay!! Glad to see you got your thread up. And I think these are wonderful goals I'm still trying to prepare myself mentally for the bulk I want to do at some point. I figure I might as well start now. Lol

 Haha, yeah, trying to gain weight is awfully counter-intuitive when people have spent the last year complimenting me on my weight loss. Though a couple people have been worried I was going to keep losing weight and disappear, evidently. But from the beginning my goal has been strength, and it seems adding muscle is the way to get there.

 

The Assassins are attacking it this go-round! Good luck.

Heck yeah! Thanks.

[Nymeria]

Glad to see you back!  If you work those pull-ups over the next few weeks, you're going to totally kill it on the rock wall when they re-open!

 

Good luck with your third goal, too!  You sound like you're in a great position to do a bulk and put on some muscle mass.  I'm kind of jealous, since I need to cut a bit more before I can even think of bulking. 

[lyranedara]

I'm excited to follow along with you again! This handbalancing rig you speak of sounds intriguing. What are you hoping to be able to perform?

[obax]

Nice goals! I feel like the new challenge rules threw a lot of people for a loop, but they seem to be bringing some good focus to a lot of people's challenges.

I too am intrigued by this handbalancing rig thing, I can't imagine how that connects to juggling. However it does, I'm sure it's awesome!

Good luck with this one!!

[thatgirljj]

As usual, I'll still be swimming, juggling, and limiting my soda intake. Time to get stronger!

 

Your usual is pretty badass!  :-)

 

Do you mean handstand canes?  You can DIY them, I know several people who have.  I've used them and they're actually a little easier to balance on than the ground... however they are kinda scary if you don't have a spotter, especially on the taller ones.  You can also use them for dips, l-sit holds, a lot of the things you'd do on parallettes.

 

-jj

[OrangeJorwell]

Great goals! And what is the handbalancing rig? Is that like, you do a handstand and juggle with your feet? Because that would be impressive. I expect a video of that now. Or at least a one-handed handstand while juggling with the other hand.

[KB Girl]

Will be very interesting to follow along with a bulk Very nice you're able to make that mental switch.

I'm going to cheer you on for that lifegoal, I think it's fantastic and brave. Good luck with the rest swell!

[Aeryn]

Glad to see you back! If you work those pull-ups over the next few weeks, you're going to totally kill it on the rock wall when they re-open!

Good luck with your third goal, too! You sound like you're in a great position to do a bulk and put on some muscle mass. I'm kind of jealous, since I need to cut a bit more before I can even think of bulking. 

Thanks! I'm looking forward to seeing how the strength-gaining goes.

 

I'm excited to follow along with you again! This handbalancing rig you speak of sounds intriguing. What are you hoping to be able to perform?

Thanks! The handbalancing rig is basically two metal poles with grips on top - so you grab the tops, and then do whatever moves you want. The grips on the one I tried were carved to exactly fit someone's hands - a little big for me, but still very cool. I did a tuck L-sit for a while on it, but I'd love to be able to press into a handstand, or at least a tuck planche...

 

Nice goals! I feel like the new challenge rules threw a lot of people for a loop, but they seem to be bringing some good focus to a lot of people's challenges.

I too am intrigued by this handbalancing rig thing, I can't imagine how that connects to juggling. However it does, I'm sure it's awesome!

Good luck with this one!!

Yeah, the new format is different, but I'm not objecting to it... yet. The handbalancing only connects to juggling because a lot of jugglers pick up extra circus skills - handbalancing, aerials, dance, etc.

 

Your usual is pretty badass! :-)

Do you mean handstand canes? You can DIY them, I know several people who have. I've used them and they're actually a little easier to balance on than the ground... however they are kinda scary if you don't have a spotter, especially on the taller ones. You can also use them for dips, l-sit holds, a lot of the things you'd do on parallettes.

-jj

Thanks! And yup, looking at a google search for handstand canes, that's pretty much what we were playing with, though the grips were carved very specifically to fit this guy's hands, rather than just being blocks. They were fun to play on!

 

Great goals! And what is the handbalancing rig? Is that like, you do a handstand and juggle with your feet? Because that would be impressive. I expect a video of that now. Or at least a one-handed handstand while juggling with the other hand.

Haha, didn't see anyone juggling with their feet - though I did see one guy balance another person on his feet...

 

Will be very interesting to follow along with a bulk Very nice you're able to make that mental switch.I'm going to cheer you on for that lifegoal, I think it's fantastic and brave. Good luck with the rest swell!

Thanks! Life goals are scary, but worth doing. The festival got me very out of my comfort zone, and it seems like I should take some more chances now that I'm home again.

[Aeryn]

Coworker workout this morning:

Jog .5 mile

wrist stretch – 10 each way


wrist rotations – 10 each way


Arm circles 10 each way


Press, press, fling – 10


Up, back and overs – 10


Hip swivel kicks forward – 15 each leg


hip swivel kicks side – 15 each leg


hip mobility drills ( SEALFit drill ) – 5


Mountain climbers – 20 – three count


Pushups – regular 20


Swimmers chest stretch – 10


alternate hand forward hand back pushups – 15


airborne heismans – 20


standing pause air squat – 60 seconds


standing hip flexor stretch – 5 each leg


dive bomber pushups – 10


Standing lunge – 20 (10 each leg)


air squat – 50


pushups – wide – 10


frog jump lateral jump (1 ft high minimum) – 10


eight count bodybuilders – 10


split jumps – 15


situps – 25

leg levers – 20

reverse crunches – 20

Suicides, jogging - 25 yards, 50 yards, 75 yards, 100 yards.

Agh. Two weeks of vacation means pushups got hard again. Ow.

[SpiralGalaxy]

That workout looks amazing. You rock, and good luck on this challenge!

[Kyliewyotie]

The meetup goal sounds pretty interesting.  I look forward to seeing this one work out!

 

Also pull ups, are always inspriing.

[rybo]

Big fan of increasing strength! Good luck, I'll be sure to follow along.

[UberTumbleweed]

Your coworker-workouts continue to sound epic.  And I love your meet up goal!

[HansBraggart]

as a juggler of nearly 13 years, please post details of your progress and practice. i will give you advice when you need it.

[Aeryn]

That workout looks amazing. You rock, and good luck on this challenge!

 Thanks! The co-worker workouts are always pretty tough, and never in the ways I build for myself!

 

The meetup goal sounds pretty interesting.  I look forward to seeing this one work out!

 

Also pull ups, are always inspriing.

 Haha, pull-ups are so hard. But I will get better at them! And the meetup goal is a little terrifying, but needs to happen. I can do this. Worst that happens is nobody likes me, right?

 

Big fan of increasing strength! Good luck, I'll be sure to follow along.

Awesome.

  

Your coworker-workouts continue to sound epic.  And I love your meet up goal!

 Heh, I'll have to tell our leader of his epicness. He'll be so pleased.

as a juggler of nearly 13 years, please post details of your progress and practice. i will give you advice when you need it.

Ha, thanks for the offer - I'm mostly working on club passing - eight clubs, right-and-left-handed patterns, and multi-person moving patterns. The problem with all of those is that they require other jugglers, which is why festivals make me so happy. My club has some good people, but they don't push my skills nearly as much as I'd like.

[CaraStarbuck]

Your challenge goals are similar to mine, and I will definitely be following along! I'm currently trying to figure out the best ways to build my upper body strength; losing weight has always been really difficult and I haven't weighed less than 150 since puberty, so body recomp into muscle is looking like the way to go. I'm also a climber, so it's kind of all in the service of getting better at bouldering.

And that work was beast! 

[Devyn]

Ooh a handstand! I'd love to see how you do that! I might steal yours in the future. Good luck!

[OrangeJorwell]

Suicides

 

Eww.

[Aeryn]

Your challenge goals are similar to mine, and I will definitely be following along! I'm currently trying to figure out the best ways to build my upper body strength; losing weight has always been really difficult and I haven't weighed less than 150 since puberty, so body recomp into muscle is looking like the way to go. I'm also a climber, so it's kind of all in the service of getting better at bouldering.

And that work was beast!

 Thanks! We definitely have similar goals, so I'll be following you, too! I've had an alarmingly easy time losing weight, so gaining it back may actually be the hard part for me. Bouldering is so much fun - I can't wait for my gym to reopen!

Ooh a handstand! I'd love to see how you do that! I might steal yours in the future. Good luck!

 Handstands are fun and scary - I'm doing them against a wall at the moment, but at some point I'm going to want to transition to freestanding. Even scarier!

Eww.

Agreed.

Swam today - always weird after taking a few weeks off, but I got back into the groove pretty well. My legs are super-sore from yesterday's workout, so I kicked as minimally as possible - makes me slower, but I got my 2000 in anyhow. I love the water so much.

[Aeryn]

No co-worker workout today on account of rain - took the extra hour of sleep with joy and wonder, then stepped outside of my comfort zone and went to the campus gym at lunchtime. Weird working out with different equipment, also more people there than I expected.

 

Workout:

Dumbbell rows, 45#: 8/8/8 (could've upped this weight. Felt hard, but I got all the reps)

Feet-elevated pushups: 10/10/10

5-sec flexed arm hang with negative pull-up, neutral grip: 8/6/5

Tuck L-sit, sec: 20/30/15

Quad machine, 110 lbs: 5/6/8 (no clue why I did this, I was just trying random stuff at this point. Also, nowhere I could find to do assisted pistol squats)

Back extension, 125 lbs: 8/8/9 (I love this machine, and I haven't found a bodyweight alternative to it - for once, the long lever between my hips and shoulders is an advantage!)

 

My legs are still sore from Monday's workout, so I didn't do much leg stuff - we'll see how they feel tomorrow. So... kinda random, but got the pull work in that I actually care about, and familiarized myself with the gym layout a little more. There was a woman doing squats, too, which made me happy.

[OrangeJorwell]

Extra sleep is awesome. I'm jealous. And you still got your workout in, so that's even better. I like the randomness. If you've gone the energy left, you might as well go for it.