fitfool

Thanks to all of you who offered advice and tips on how to work up to doing pull-ups. I work from home and the pull-up bar is in the doorway of my home office. So I kept trying stuff on the bar whenever I walked by it. I tried a mishmash of the various suggestions I could do. Lots of bent-arm hangs, slow negatives (jump up and then lower myself from bar) and assisted pull-ups whenever my boyfriend was around to help push me up over the bar. At the gym, I focused on the Gravitron (for assisted pull-ups and dips), lat pull-downs, and any machines that said they helped make my back stronger.

And especially thanks to all you women who posted that you could do a pull-up (and even several of them!). It made it seem that much more possible with enough work. (http://community.livejournal.com/gymrats/1831348.html)

Questions:
1. My body just folds up when I try to lift myself up. Is it trying to doggy-paddle its way towards a kipping pull-up?

2. Does it make it easier to do a pull-up when my legs come up too? I need to concentrate to try to keep my waist straight and if I do so, I can only do one at a time so far. My boyfriend's legs come up naturally straight so he ends up in an L-shape when his chin is above the bar.

OK...maybe it's not a big deal for some of you but I've never been able to do two pull-ups in my life. I was so happy about it that I called up my sister to boast. Her husband picked up the phone.

Me: Oh Hi! I was calling to brag to my sister but I can brag to you too.
Sister's husband: Ok...Go ahead. Let's hear it.
Sister (noticing the anticipating-big-news tone in his voice): She's getting marrried?!

My sister got on the phone afterwards to congratulate me for the pull-ups too (though I don't think she was as excited as if I had gotten engaged)

Cross-posted to gymrats

Is it a sign of old age that when I had originally written down my target dates, I looked up the wrong age groups because I had forgotten how old I was? I would've passed all three areas if I were in the 32 to 36 age group. But alas, as a member of the 27-31 group, I didn't pass the 2-mile run. I can't really blame my age there...I haven't run since my last PFT update in December when my watch died. I guess I'm really motivated by being able to collect data and if I can't measure it, I can't get myself to brave the cold. But I said I would join in this challenge from

marathoner452 so I got my watch battery replaced and timed a 2-mile run today. The track was covered in 1-2 inches of snow so that slowed me down a bit. And I've lost my endurance too...I had to run/walk it and my lungs burned and my ears hurt from the cold. Enough excuses. The good news is that I did more pushups than I've ever done. Still no sign of defined biceps but at least my muscles seem stronger. And my situps have improved a lot too. The final breakdown?

Two-minutes Situps: 70 situps --> 87 points
Two-minutes Pushups: 42 pushups --> 83 points
Two-mile run: 21:03 --> 55 points (needed 60 to pass)
Total points: 225

I think I'll have to try again in a few weeks so I can pass all 3 sections.

( links to the standards for the different age and gender groups )

I ran 26.2 miles to get here

Image hosted by Photobucket.com

That's what it says on those mylar blankets they gave out at the end of the marathon. I wish I had thought to grab more since people were dumping theirs all over the place. I was messing around in Photoshop and spliced my leg onto a backdrop of those mylar blankets they give you at the end. I like how "I Ran" shows up in this cropped version.

And I did run today. I'm joining

marathoner452's challenge to try to meet the standards at the 70th percentile in the Army's Physical Fitness Test. (Want to join? She's writing about the PFT Challenge in her journal.) 2 minutes of sit-ups, 2 minutes of push-ups, and a 2-mile run. We'll test ourselves March 1, 2006. So I needed to go for a run since I've been very lax in that part.

Relatively warm (for winter) in the mid-30s. Sidewalks icy. Tennis courts have so much ice that they look like skating rinks. The gates to the track had been padlocked. Looking on the other side, I could see that someone had cleared out one lane on the track and there were other footprints in the snow there. So I climbed over. Only 2 icy patches on the track. I did the first half mile in about 4:20 but then my watch stopped working. It's been acting nuts for the last few weeks. I kept a fairly steady pace but I'll assume I slowed down and estimate the time at 18:00. My running needs more work.

Total:
- est. 18:00 2-mile run
- 60 sit-ups
- 40 (real) push-ups

This past weekend I scanned through over 28,000 pictures in the Lost-n-Found section to see if I could find any more pictures of myself from the marathon (my race report in a previous post). I did pick up one more of myself and got to play detective and matched up about 3 dozen other unidentified runners (based on clues like partial bib #s, names on shirts, and country flags) and sent those in to Brightroom. Even if they don't buy the pictures, I figure they'll at least look at them and I got a little thrill every time I matched someone up to a bib #. Exciting to scan through those pictures. Lots of great handcycle pictures (their bib #s got blocked by the handcycle cranks) and I got to see a bunch of the costumed runners.

Some highlights:
* One of the Achilles Team members (with TWO prosthetic legs)
* save-the-rhino
* the Blues Brothers
* Spiderman
* Superman
* a wizard
* Handcycles headed uphill
* in full firemen gear
* Emotional displays: Exultant | overwhelmed | mission accomplished | content, with kids | fighting on | disappointed
* And if you're into ogling physiques, the warm day exposed a lot of skin (here and here and here).

Here's the link to the lost-and-found gallery of pictures: (all pictures in this post came from Brightroom)
http://www.brightroom.com/lost_photos.asp?EVENTID=7803

Oh and some of you run with the Reservoir Dogs, right? Do you know this person?
Photo ID# 7803-5980-022

And another question...the bridge that the firemen are on...which one is that? I didn't like it and neither did my feet. Oww.

Short Version: I did it! Finished with a chip time of 4:42 on a warm and humid day.

The rest is really long behind the lj-cuts. I'm pretty happy. I can imagine trying to do this again some day (though not soon).

Champion Chip timing device; picture from NYCM website

( Getting to the Start at an Ungodly Hour )

( Waiting for the race to start )

( The Start of the Race - Staten Island )

( Brooklyn )

( Queens )

( Manhattan, first time )

( The Bronx )

( Manhattan, second part )

Hooray! I won! I won!

Want to see some more pictures? Go to this post.

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Adventures in the Kitchen and on the Road

Entries tagged with fitness

Brag Post: Two Pull-ups!

Army Physical Fitness Test - good/bad news

I Ran.

NYC Marathon Pictures from Lost-and-Found Gallery

2005 New York City Marathon - Race Report

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February 2014

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