Last Day

Today was my last day of the winter tour with team Activedge...a word of thanks to Brian and Meredith for opening the gym up to me when I'm home...I really appreciate it and wouldn't know what to do without it!

Today's work:
Mid-day light lift to work on form and prep for the upcoming meathead CNU lifting sessions.
Bench warm up, and went for max, failed at 175 lbs (all-time max) so will go for 165 with the team this week and build from there.  Not bad considering I weigh my lightest ever right now at 139 lbs...cut a lot of weight to get my body fat down and endurance back.  Then I went ahead and did the Grenade workout I designed from last year:
100 jump ropes, 40 dynamax ball squats, 20 burpees - repeated 4 times.  Hit 11:45, which is about a minute slower than my all-time record of 10:52.  Finished with abs and DB curls.

Headed back to the gym in the evening for its inaugural TRX training class designed and led by BD.  Went through an hour of full body work on the bands and then decided to give the Grenade one more run.  Jacob wanted in so we hit it all-out.  I took absolutely no breaks and pushed it hard...got done at a very good 8:30.  Jacob finished at the exact same time but no comment as to where he was in his counting haha...anyway glad for another solid winter tour...time to head back to school tomorrow morning.

Ending Summer on Top

Thursday- last running stage of the summer tour with my fitness test. Tyler joined up with me and Brian to run the two mile out and back hill section of the Washington Duke trail to mimic my upcoming fitness tests for soccer next week. I held pace with Tyler until 1/2 mile to go and needed to back off- fully tapped after having the past few weeks off healing up the leg. Posted a respectable 12:40 (much faster than I posted at this time last year before pre-season) so I don't have much room to complain.

Today I said my goodbyes to Meredith and Jacob at the gym. Mer- your intensity, wisdom, wit, and hugs will be greatly missed in the coming weeks. Thank you again for all you have done for me this summer...our tours roll until they converge again.

So Brian and I jumped in the car this afternoon and headed west to the Sauratown Mountains to conquer our last summer 2011 ride. We parked about 6 miles away from the base of Sauratown Mountain itself (a rating Category 2 climb at the Tour de France), unloaded the bikes, and had at it. We hit the base of the climb with 4 miles to the summit, in the heat of the day at a 19% grade. What were we thinking!? I had to get off the bike twice just to lower my heart rate for 30 seconds but I am proud to say that I made it to the top. We had a great time and I couldn't think of a better way to cap off my summer- standing at the top of a mountain after a lot of hard challenges. I am so thankful to have Brian as a mentor and friend and it was fitting that he was waiting for me at the top with a smile on his face. I can't even begin to thank him enough for all he has done for me this summer (let alone in the past 3 years) both in and out of the gym. I will miss him a lot as I head off to school.

Ended the day with a nice dinner with the family and Nana and Pops. I will miss them so much and I look forward to hopefully coming back in September to help them celebrate their 50th anniversary. In the meantime- tomorrow I pack...Sunday I head back up to school.

Run/Lift Thurs

Good morning track work with the team this morning. Quickness specialty consisting of various step starts, Z-drills, stadiums, and 4 sets of 30/60/90 yard sprints. Went all out and thankful to have BD there to coach and Kelsey to keep me sane (as always!)

Followed up work with a good lift at the gym. Full body self-design:

Incline BB bench- warm up set of 8, 7 reps with 50 lbs, 7 with 55 lbs, and 4 with 60s. Thank you to Jacob for spotting. Combined with Jump rope and Russian twists with plate on the decline.

Lance DB step ups 3x6 each leg, combined with 3x8 NG chin ups

3x6 BB standing split press combined with 3x8 BB RDL

Finished with 3x10 plank to pushups and 3x10 back extensions on the ball as well as 3x10 each leg of calf raises. A good day on grind...fun Friday tomorrow.

Thursday Adventure

Adventurous to say the least. Almost all AE athletes were involved in some way or another. Very proud of the team and it's efforts today!

Began the day with a very challenging morning track run design by BD:

Warm up, then 400 M hard.

Rest, then 200 M hard (under 30 sec.), 100 Jog, 200 M shuttle (in 40 sec), 300 M hard back to start line (under 48s sec.), repeat 3 more times for 4 total sets. End with a 1:09 400 M. Congrats to Kelsey for a PR at 48 sec on the last 300 sprint!

Then pushers lift with Chad:

Incline BB bench combined with overhead DB tricep curl

DB slight incline flies combined with leg raises (w/ ankle weights)

Plyo (clap) pushups on BOSU ball combined with SA seated DB press.

Then an ambitious 62 mile ride call by Brian, who also invited Chad, Morven, Peter, and Jacob along. Sounds more like a tour than a workout.

After 20 miles Jacob backed out with stomach problems and needed to get to his afternoon shift. Leg cramps began setting in for Chad, Morven and Peter did well to hold their own pace, but BD and I realized that this was going to be a long day. After Jacob left, BD and I took turns pacing Morven and Peter while the other stayed behind at Chad's pace. He was a trooper. In 107 degree heat index I would have wanted to quit but he kept pluggin. At mile 42 BD and I realized what was supposed to be a 4 hour ride was turning into 6. We sent Chad, Morven, and Peter ahead at their own pace and planned to catch them a few miles down the rode. Then disaster...BD's rear tire blew. So did the spare! No choice, disengage tour. Thank you Meredith for picking us up! And it was nice to see Morven bring Peter and Chad back a few hours later, their tour complete! A landmark achievement by Chad and team AE. As for Brian and me? Just glad to be done with all of that!