Today's warmups were a little annoying. Mostly because, instead of the usual 3 warmup sprints at full speed, we had 6 or 8, I lost count. Sure, they're short sprints (40 yards), but I was trying to beat the other people in my group. That goal required going more than just a fake 100%. It required a full 100%.

Fortunately, I beat the boys I went up against that I had my sights on. I am so happy the A.R.T. are so effective for me: I can finally run again!

So, the workout was 5 rounds of:

20 push presses
100 jump ropes
20 squats with rope overhead
100 running jump ropes
20 stability ball roll ups

Push presses are done with a barbell. The barbell is rested in front, across the chest, standing legs apart, knees slightly bent. Drive the hips up, creating the momentum used to move the barbell up into a press. Pull the bar back down while bending the knees again. The motion is fast.

The first set of jumping is a normal quick jumping rope motion.

The overhead squats are done with the jumprope held overhead, being careful to keep the rope pulled tight, chest up, looking ahead.

The second set of jumping is a running jump rope, with high knees. Kris is very good at this type of jumping. I? Quite less so.

The last exercise is an ab workout: with both hands on the floor, facing down in a pushup position, put the stability ball beneath your feet, resting on your shins if you want an easier exercise, putting just your feet on the ball for a harder exercise. Roll the ball forward by pulling your knees close to your chest, keeping your shins/feet on the ball. Roll back out to the starting position. That's one. Do 20.

I finished 3 rounds, but had to leave to shower for the train. Which is a little tragic, but I have all the equipment necessary to finish the other 2 rounds at home. I'll finish them tonight.

This afternoon, as I was thinking of wrapping up work, Andy IM'd me with the single word question, "Train?"

A dozen reasons why I didn't want to train up to small groups ran through my head: I had cones I wanted to take to practice since we never seem to have any; I had discs to take since we never seem to have enough; I had warmups to deliver to teammates, even though DanO picked up 10 for the team, thereby reducing my load to 2 for today's practice; I already had my car for the day, I'd have to pick it up later; there isn't a train station within 100 feet of the fields, which is how close I can park. All sorts of excuses not to train, but not really any valid reasons not to train.

So, I packed as minimally as I could, as we'd be running from the station to the fields, a half mile run plus or minus, left twenty minutes early, and went to catch the train. Tragically, I spent the whole train ride talking about me and my failings as an ultimate player these last few years, instead of, oh, I don't know, talking about him. Yeah, that would have been better.

Once we stepped off the train and jumped over the tracks, all while thinking, huh, wow, this is a crazy silly station with a bizarre layout, as we weren't crossing the tracks illegally or unsafely, Andy prompted, "Jog?" Uh, I guess if we're going to make it to practice on time, hustle starts now, and off we went.

About a quarter mile into the run, Andy asked me, "Do you run regularly?" I thought the question odd, but answered, "I try to, yes," then asked, "Why? Am I slowing down already?" We were running at a nice clip, faster than I would have run on my own, more his pace than my pace, but I didn't think I was yet struggling to keep up. He commented, "No, you're just not breathing hard."

Huh, what do you know? No, i wasn't, but, dang, that was the nicest compliment I've had in a long time. Maybe he'll stop flustering me as much.

This weekend at Mom's house, I picked up the copy of Outside magazine that was on their coffee table. I used to subscribe to the magazine, but stopped when I realized that Jon Krakauer wasn't writing for the magazine any longer. His were the stories I read even when I cared very, very little about the subject, as his writing is so engaging it made me care about the subject. Few are those talented writers.

The issue I picked up was an anniversary issue - 20 years or 30 years, something like that. In it, it had a large number of quotes from previous issues. The one that caught my attention when something like,

"A person cranking out 7 minute miles never learns how to move his arms and legs fast enough to run a 6 minute mile."

"Huh. Yeah, I guess that's true," was pretty much my thought when I read it. It reminded me of a conversation with Keebler from 5-6 years ago. We were talking about team workouts, which the previous year had included a lot of stadium runs. Keebler commented that one season past, the person designing his team's workouts was a big fan of stadium workouts, having the team run multiple stadium training runs in a week sometimes. At the end of the season, Keebler said, he was in shape, sure, but not really ultimate shape, "I could run stadiums really, really well!"

Both thoughts made me think, yeah, you play like you practice. Until I started playing ultimate, I fairly much abhorred exercise. I dodged recess as a kid, preferring to stay indoors hiding out in the bathrooms reading when everyone else was outside playing. Even junior high and high school when I ran track, it was more because I was supposed to ("Sports or a job, those are your choices," was the rule in the house), not because I wanted to (well, until someone told me I couldn't, then I wanted to, of course). Yet, in high school and then in college, I approached athletics as I approached academics: all I had to do was complete the activity, and then I'd be better. With schoolwork, if I read the material, did the exercises, and finished my homework, I learned. There wasn't any extra activity, just do the work. I figured sports were the same: if I ran the track workouts, I'd be faster in the meets.

Except that I didn't really care about being faster in the meets. There was the mental aspect of sports that I ignored. Just because you do the workout doesn't mean you'll be better, faster, stronger. It just means you're able to finish the workout at the effort level you finished the workout in.

These last few years, though, even through injury, I've realized that it's not about doing the workouts, it's about doing the workouts well, and doing them with the maximum effort I can. It's about pushing myself harder than I thought I could. It's about pretending I'm Lisa and I can run forever. Or pretending I'm Kris and can run relaxed. Or dreaming I'm Adam and can run like the... Oh, wait, no, I never have that dream.

It's about moving my arms and legs fast enough to know how to run a 6 minute mile. Or, in my case, catch a Smith huck.

Kris had commented to me a couple weeks ago that perhaps the reason I was oddly injured this last month (with the quad pull and achilles strain) was because I didn't have enough fitness base, having missed the first part of the season because of my hamstring injury. Perhaps now that I could run again, most pain free, I should consider putting some miles under my feet to gain some of that fitness I was, perhaps, lacking. Instead of going to track recently, I've been putting those miles under my feet.

Last night, however, I went to track. I had both Megan's keys from Monday night, as well as the team's warmups, and wanted to share the Mischief love with everyone. How could I not go to track. The sub-8 minute mile warmup should have clued me in that this was going to be a hard workout.

My times were consistent in the various sets-of-four we ran, but my effort level to maintain those times went up considerably with each run in a set.

At the end of track practice, my legs were, as Beth described so well, jelly.

My heart rate, however, went from over 180 to around 120 (124) in the minute wait between measurements, though. I might not have been able to catch my breath, but my body was doing its best to recover quickly. Those miles have been helping out more than I realized.

So, with last night's track workout, I was pre-tired this morning. I was so late getting up out of bed that Kris figured I wasn't going this morning. Not that I blame him: jumping out of bed at 6:28 with an "Oh, shit!" for a 6:30 departure (which we missed by 15 minutes) doesn't exactly convey "I'm ready to workout this morning!"

We arrived near the beginning of the warmups, thanks to Kris' drive-like-the-wind (pronounced with a long I) mentality, and mostly warmed up with the group (of all men - what's up with the women in the morning classes? Where did they all go? Almost seems like the only ones coming now are friends with Kris and me).

The workout was 5 rounds of:

5 weighted burpies
10 20 yard shuttles
15 pushups
20 situps
25 kettleball swings

A burpie starts in the standing position. Squat down like a frog to put your hands on the ground in front of you. Thrust your legs out behind you to move into a pushup position. Do a pushup. Thrust your legs back into a tuck position, then spring up into squat jump. The jump isn't a tuck jump, just a regular squat jump from a lower position than normal.

A weighted burpie is one where you hold a weight (a ball with handles, a weight plate, or two dumbells) in your hands and do the pushup off of them. When you stand to jump, thrust the weights overhead as you keep them in your hands as you jump.

The shuttle sprints are down and back is 2 sprints. Work on the first few steps being very aggressive and quick.

Pushups are any way you like them: from the knees or from the toes.

Situps are normal, full situps.

A kettleball is a big lump of lead with a handle on it. They're very popular right now as a workout weight, having a large handle that enables you to swing the thing, killing all small children within your arm's length. A kettleball swing is one done from a slight squat, the weight in both hand, held between the legs near the knees as both arms are straight. Thrusting up from the hips, stand up straight with the weight over your head, then back down to the squat position. That's one swing.

Kris managed all five rounds this morning. If I didn't have a train to catch, and a shower to take before that train ride, I would have gone for five rounds. Instead, I had to stop at four to dash to the shower. The routine seems to suit me well, with the train ride down a nice chance to catch up with writing. I'm enjoying the routine.

If only my laptop would stop freezing up, I'd be more productive.

I swear, we have ice cream fairies in this house. How do I know? Because every time I open the freezer, there's ice cream there. Not only is there ice cream there, but it's ice cream I didn't buy. Not only did I not buy the ice cream, the ice cream is in flavors I know Kris wouldn't buy, because he either doesn't like them, or can't eat them. He'd never buy vanilla. He can't eat the double chocolate fudge swirl with almonds and chocolate covered pecans, as he can't eat the nuts. And the peach combo? Not his style.

Yet, there they are. Ice creams galore. More than I can eat in a day. Which is saying something.

I think my fairies have names or something. I heard one of them murmuring something like "Mirabelle" or "Megan." Might have been "Mark" though.