Getting November started right. Back in the saddle!

November 1, 2018, Thursday.

HY: T25 - Alpha: Total Body Circuit + ChaLEAN Extreme - Extreme Core Circuit + Free-Style Upper Body Resistance + 30-Day Pull-Up Challenge + TCF.

Normally I wouldn't be able to do a long workout on a Thursday because I usually have a night class to teach, but due to scheduling issues, I get today and next Thursday off. WOO HOO!!!  So I was able to start the month with a nice workout.

I am still in sort of a recovery mode so I have stepped away from Body Beast for a while to get some stamina and strength back to a level where I can feel justified in picking up where I left off back on September 1.  I had only one routine left to do to finish out the Bulk Phase of Body Beast and I was planning to start Phase Three of Body Beast when I came back from the US.  But as I explained in yesterday's post, that didn't quite work out and I ended up not doing much of anything for a month and almost no other workout routine aside from mostly tennis up until around this week.  So, with my Beachbody Coach starting a "November King of the Hill Challenge", and the fact that I have won most of those challenges since she picked me up as a client, I decided to get back into the game and give it a go.  I'm not really aiming for the crown this time, but I just want to get my consistency back and renew my inner motivation.  That is something that I have lost since my father passed away.  I'm still feeling not like myself and I still feel like I'm living in a haze so I'm going to have to work to at least go through the motions of working out this month.

Today was my third workout of T25 having first done Alpha: Cardio and Alpha: Lower Focus, I was debating whether or not to do Alpha: Ab Intervals, but decided on Total Body Circuit because I'm not pressed for time and I could really focus on form, range of motion, and time under tension.  I also wanted to work with more Eccentric movement to increase gains.  Alpha: Total Body Circuit is the only Alpha Phase workout that I wasn't able to do a straight 25 on the last time I went through T25.  And I think I have only done a Straight 25 on Total Body Circuit once since the beginning.  So I was a little interested to see how far I could go with it being in the condition I am in.  Long story short, I when all the way to about the 6:20 mark until my body just wouldn't move anymore and I had to take about a 30-second break.  But when the Burnout began at the 5-minute mark, I took a break after almost every other move, I was so spent.  And even though my room was a bit cool, the sweat was pouring from me.  The move that got me, Spider Push-Ups.  Then I had to stop between those and the first move of the Burnout with is the Shoulder Tap Push-Ups.  That is extremely BRUTAL doing two tough push-up moves in a row.  When the routine was finished along with the 3+ minute cooldown stretch, the 25-minute workout turned into 36+ minutes.

I did the ChaLEAN Extreme - Extreme Core Circuit again to burn out my abs.  Again, I didn't use any extra weight, but I got a huge burn.  I've got a long way to go to be able to get back to being able to use the 2kg dumbbells again.

I also wanted to get in some resistance training, so I found an upper body workout on Pintrest that had just 5 moves, so I did that minus one move, the Rows.  Reason being I just wasn't in the mood to do rows.  But the moves I did was Curls, Shoulder Presses, Triceps Extensions on a Balance Ball, and then Bent Over Shoulder Flys.  I did three sets of each move in a 20-15-10 rep progression and an increase in weight for each set.  Then I also did 3 sets of 5 reps of Wide Pull-Ups.  That led me to the 30-Day Pull-Up Challenge I also found on Pintrest.  It is a relatively easier one than I usually do, but this is baby steps to get back.  Today was only 1 rep, but I actually did a Chin-Up instead.  And that was in addition to the other Wide Pull-Ups I just did.

I topped the workout off with a nice series of Tai Cheng Flows, as usual for my workouts.  Today felt good.  I hope I can keep it going for this month and beyond.

In the end, I burned 911 kcals.  This is more than I would normally burn for this type of workout, but that just goes to show how out of shape I am.  I hope to get back to my old self in more ways than one.