Core Commit to Exercise 2014 Round 3: May 19 - July 20

[littleman]

pics?

[Drastic]

last week 4/5.

2 x gym
2 x vball

Looking to finish strong this week, weather permitting.

Committing to 10 this week, assuming no rain in evenings.
5x gym
5x sports

[littleman]

Week 8 - 4/4

[Rupert]

week 8 was not good so good.
2 games of squash....

oh and a sail on a windy day, bit of core work leaning out, and I cycled there, forgot that.  Good thread this, helps me remember some of the positives of the previous week.
soooo 3/5 I guess.

[ergophobe]

A couple days rock climbing, a bike ride with a friend... today I did a run that I've been trying to run in under two hours for a few years... I was almost there and then the last couple miles my legs were just dead... end result: 2:03:51. The truth is that I'm happy it was 2:00:07 or something like that.

[littleman]

Week 9 - 4/4

[Drastic]

Well so much for finishing strong. Worked on a buddy's bike 2 nights last week until about midnight, blew my schedule up.

4/5

at least there was variety:
1 x gym
1 x vball (6 games)
1 x pedal biking
1 x dirt biking

[Rupert]

A pat on the back to all entrants.  bloody Marvelous.

I love the variety of Exercise taken.  I have always hated Exercise for its own sake, so please keep inspiring me with ideas  

My next goal is a week in Turkey on one of these activity holidays.  My family have said it is fine for me to be taking part in everything. So waterskiing, diving, swimming, sailing, tennis.

the one thast worries me is the waterskiing.  without practice I will die after the first day.  Any one any experience of how to build the key muscle groups?

[Drastic]

>waterskiing, diving, swimming, sailing, tennis
wow, sounds like fun. Don't forget to leave time for beer.

>Any one any experience of how to build the key muscle groups?
2 main areas - legs, and upper back/shoulders

legs primarily to get up, but you do use them a lot after getting up. I would recommend hack squats (or smith machine squats) if machine available. If not, do weighted lunges.

upper back, mainly the lats, and arms secondary. (You should primarily be using your back to hang on, but arms do get a lot of work too.) Pull ups or any kind of lat machine (rowing machine or lat pull down/pull back). Some bicep curls to help the arms. Something to strengthen your hands if you need it, too.

[Rupert]

Thanks Drastic, I knew you would have some ideas  

Beer, yes there will be some. Not too much I cannot play early in the morning though.   Sports massages every day too  

OK so no machines in the house, but I do have a few weights.

The pull up bar every day
bicep curls to help the arms.
Hands, yes forgot that forearm burn for holding on.

I needed to google these:
hack squats... yup, never tried those, I can see that working. note to self, borrow neighbours bar weights.
weighted lunges ... Ok do those occasionally, on one of Sues video workouts.

Off to the sea tomorrow for a dash overnighter...  given a sunny day, so planning a day in the water. Oh boy I love summer!

[Drastic]

RE: hack squats, I only do these on a machine:
http://bodybuilding24x7.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/hack_squat.jpg

If you do any kind of free weight squat, you need to be sure your form is PERFECT. Otherwise there is a lot of potential for injury. If you have never done them or haven't done them for years you need someone experienced to judge your form and correct you. That machine mostly resolves this issue.

Everything else sounds great, you'll be ready.

For forearms, reverse curl is a good one:
http://www.nicros.com/wp-content/gallery/training-articles/injury-reverse-curl.jpg

We rolling another round? I'm 2/2 so far this week.

[littleman]

I am basically giving up on squats, I seem to have something in my lower back that dates from my wrestling days in high school that gets irritated from weighted squatting.  I've worked on my form a lot, but the problem persists and lasts for days after squatting.  I've switched to weighted lunges and my back has been happy since.  I do a type of walking lung holding dumbbells, it seems to get the job done judging from the soreness the next day.  Interesting, I could do deadlifts without any problems.

Another good upper-back exercise is bent-over rows, works the lats in a different direction.  You could do them with a dumbbell or barbell.

[Rupert]

Otherwise there is a lot of potential for injury

eeek, i hate the sound of that.  I am up for another round..  I need ispiration, too much work recently.

[littleman]

I'm in for another round.

[ergophobe]

Littleman - have you read any of Mike Boyle's stuff? He's the godfather of "functional strength training" and preps elite athletes for the NFL Combine, Olympic athletes and so on. He basically says he the only people he will train using traditional back squats are athletes who need it for the NFL Combine. Otherwise he thinks the risk of wrecking a mult-million dollar athlete is too high.

Instead he has people do Bulgarian split squats, front squats single-leg squats, etc. Dan Jon (Olympic shotputter and age-group world champion in Highland Games) has a strong preference for split squats over walking lunges. I like walking lunges myself..

--

Just in from a 15.2 mile (24.4km) run with over 3300 feet (1000m) of elevation gain. Typically I start low and run high. This time I reversed it and so I had to do the climb on tired legs. Feeling a little sick.... but good.