Two Down

It's now been two weeks since I broke my elbow and that means that hopefully I've only got 4-6 weeks more to go! Not that I'm obsessively counting down or anything! This morning Drew and I headed to the gym together. I will say that I really do not love the gym. I don't know why. It's not even that I dislike working out. I think most of it is that now that the weather seems to be settling into being nicer all the time, all I really want to do is be outside.

However, I know that if I only walk outside for the next 4 to 6 weeks, I won't have done enough to have a chance at doing these upcoming triathlons, so I'm going to have to head to the gym - like it or not. Drew offered to show me his Arc Trainer routine today. I have never been a super big fan of the Arc Trainer, but he said that his normal routine was no joke and it would be better than before.

He was right. We did 2:00 at 20 incline (the highest it can go) and 50 resistance. Then we did the next 26 minutes at 20 incline and 100 resistance (the highest it can go). That was not easy, but it was nice and sweaty, so that was good. Then we finished up with another 2:00 at 20 incline, 50 resistance. I'll say that I'm still not in love with the Arc Trainer, but it was better than I expected. I realized right away that going to the gym isn't going to be easy. I'm not supposed to lean on the equipment or put weight on my arm, so I can't really hold onto the equipment with my left arm. Which makes me feel a little off-kilter on everything. Here are my final stats:


After the Arc Trainer, I said that we should do 4 leg lifts. I chose two and Drew chose two.
We started off with Leg Presses, followed by Drew's Torture Non-Lift (the technical term, I'm sure), then my choice of Prone Leg Curls and Drew's choice where I quit (again, technical terms).

Leg Press: 3 set of 10 reps @ 180 lbs
Drew's Torture Non-Lift:
(Right Leg) 15 reps / 10 reps plus 5 pulses / 10 reps
(Left Leg) 15 reps / 10 reps plus 7 pulses / 10 reps
Prone Leg Curl: 12 reps @ 50 lbs / 10 reps @ 60 lbs / 8 reps @ 70 lbs

The leg presses are pretty self explanatory, I'm sure. Drew's Torture Non-Lift was basically like doing lunges, except your back foot is elevated on a weight bench and then you do a lunge forward. That pretty much sucked. I also wasn't so keen on doing something where I had to balance. Mainly because I'm extremely afraid of falling and hurting my arm further. The leg curls were also fairly sucky. That machine is just not our favorite.

And then Drew's lift where I quit? It again wasn't really a lift. It was more of a body weight thing. We had to stand on this piece of foam and reach out with one arm and lift the same leg behind us. Ok, so, I can't really reach out my left arm and I felt really insecure balancing because I'm sooooo afraid of falling again at this point that I just quit. I don't even feel bad about it. Well, that's not true. I was upset at the time because I had mentioned before that I didn't want to have to do anything that required balancing. And I was upset because I wanted to do 4 leg lifts and we only did three. But, I don't feel bad about not completing that particular lift. I think it was a good choice in the interest of my arm.

After that we headed over to the spin bikes. I was able to nab one of the computerized ones (the other one was taken, so Drew just used a regular one). I chose the Endurance Ride, Level 8, since it's mostly flat and doesn't require a lot of out of the saddle stuff. I gotta tell you, it's not easy to ride a stationary bike with one arm. And it's almost impossible to try to reach to get your water bottle with only one arm and nothing else to stabilize you. But, somehow I managed to ride for a little over a half an hour. Not too shabby - here are the stats:


I think I could get used to this sort of workout routine, maybe alternating with 2-3 walks a week. I'll probably try to coordinate the walking with the weather forecasts and head to the gym on the cooler/rainy days. Hopefully it'll keep me in good cardio shape!

Arc Trainer
Time: 30:00
Distance: 0.82 miles
Pace: 36:35/mile
Calories: 348
Maximum HR: 181
Average HR: 173

Weight Training
Time: 37:13
Calories: 282
Maximum HR: 165
Average HR: 135

Spin Bike
Time: 32:26
Distance: 12.50 miles
Pace: 23.12 MPH
Calories: 327
Maximum HR: 175
Average HR: 159