Coach W12D3 - Atlas (Standard)

 Atlas (S), 00:31:52 

Last training session of Week 12, and it's a workout I've never done before: ATLAS. In Greek mythology, Atlas was one of the Titans that rebelled and fought against the Olympians. After loosing the battle, Zeus punished Atlas by having him stand on the western edge of the Earth (Gaia) and hold up the heavens over his shoulders for eternity. That way he was kept apart from his brother Menoetius who was condemned to the tartarus. Atlas has been long time misrepresented as holding Gaia over his shoulders, when the myth clearly states that he is holding the heavens... The thing is, how do you represent the heavens? It's certainly easier to make a painting or a statue of Atlas holding the Earth!

Did Atlas, the workout, feel like I had to carry the weight of the heavens over my shoulders? Not really, but it is certainly was a complex workout, involving 6 different exercises which pretty much had me doing a bit of everything.

The workout starts off with a 2 km run. On Sundays the large avenue in front of my apartment is closed from 9 AM to 2 PM and everybody goes out to run, ride their bikes, roller skate, walk their dogs etc. I measured the distance online and I managed to run up 1 km and down 1 km the closed street, and finish in around 12 minutes.  I hate running so I think it's a decent time, but it can most certainly be improved. After that, I got back into the apartment and went on with Squats, Burpees, Climbers, Leg Levers (which are supposed to be straight but I had to do Hand Helped so, no star) and finally Jumps. Overall it went smoothly, up until the Leg Levers which put me a bit in a bad mood because I see and feel the limitation of still not being able to do them straight. I'm working on it though, that's what's most important I guess... My psoas suffers tremendously during the Leg Levers  so,  having to jump afterward is a BIG challenge.

Coach W11D2 - Dione (Standard) // The REAL Hell Week

 Dione (S), 00:48:36 

Since this is, for me, THE REAL HELL WEEK, I figured I'd train as much as I can while I can. Therefore, my general planning of letting one rest day in between training sessions went to the freezer and I decided to attack day 2 on Monday after work. I was hoping to have a nice and "easy" workout to bounce back and regain some confidence after the previous night Gaia's mental debacle. The Coach said on day 2 I had to do standard Dione + 100 burpees + 2 x 25 High Jumps + 50 squats. Just reading that long list made me tired... It sounded like a lot, and I attacked Dione with that in the back of my mind. 

I was surprisingly only mildly sore. I thought after almost 1 h of Gaia, I'd be crushed. However no pain did not mean no tiredness. My muscles were noticeably lazy, I was slower than usual and I had to struggle with some movements. It actually took me  +12 mins than my PB to finish the WOD!!! Dione is basically tons of Jumping Jacks and Burpees + Ab exercises (Sit ups and Leg Levers). I still have a rough time with the Leg Levers because my lower back bends if I don't put my hands below my butt. So, once again, no star for me! I still need to develop more ab strength to be able to really move my legs up and down while keeping by back tight and touching the floor. #WorkForIt. I feel like my legs are super heavy and I just can't hold them in place without bending my spine (which of course, makes my lower back hurt a lot, and that's not smart!).

The other thing I noticed this time around is that I woke up the next day with very tight and sore calves, particularly the left one. About a month and a half ago I received a big kick in my left calf during a soccer match and after that I've felt like that leg is still not back to normal. I took care of it after the blow, but it seems it was not enough. It's like the muscle is much more ready to cramp when the one on my right leg is still OK. And today, after all the Jumping Jacks, I'm still noticing that difference; left calve is very tight, has knots all over and hurts when I stand on the tip of my toes, while the right one is just a bit tight. I'm massaging it and stretching thoroughly to make it go away fast.

I was sweating and feeling very tired after Dione so I didn't do any the loose exercises. I thought to myself I'd leave them for an extra training day with just loose exercises. Looking in retrospective, of course I should have done them, but its easy to say that now. In that moment, I was once again weak. I'm absolutely convinced that if I had rested 3 minute I would have been able to do the loose exercises physically. It all comes down, yet again to a mental thing. Freeletics is testing me both physically and mentally, and this particular week it's definitely more a mental challenge than a physical one. So far, I'm not doing all that well... Guess I have found my biggest weakness!

Coach - W7D2 - Dione (Standard) + 1/5 Hyperion (Endurance) // HELL DAY 2

 Dione (S), 00:44:51 

 1/5 Hyperion (E), 00:03:44 

In my previous post I talked about how I had planned my training during Hell Week, taking into consideration I had soccer on Tuesday and Thursday. Hell Day #2 was supposed to be Friday but I had to postpone it until Saturday. The reason: during the first five minutes of my Thursday soccer match I stomped on the ball in an awkward play and bend my knee. It hurt but I kept playing because a) the game was just starting and b) I needed to test drive the knee. I managed to score 3 times in the following 15 minutes (to be fair, the other team was not good at all, we ended up wining 13 - 0) but since the pain wasn't going away I asked to be substituted. The league has a kinesiologist on the pitch who checked me out, ruled out a ligament injury -which was my main concern at that point- and "diagnosed" either a pulled calf muscle or tendon. Either way, he recommended rest and to apply heat if I was too tight or sore. I woke up on Friday and my knee was still hurting when I did some lateral movements and strength tests, so I decided it was wiser not to train. I took an over the counter anti inflammatory and got to work. With all the wall fixing and painting we're doing at the apartment I didn't rest per se, but the walking here and there, bending over, and standing on tip toes to reach the ceiling ended up being for the best because I woke up on Saturday with no pain and ready for freeletics.  

I had two workouts to do throughout this Hell Day. I started off with Dione (standard) which was still a bit hard but much better than on Monday. It actually took me 3 minutes less to finish so I was pleased to see such an improvement within the same week. I still had to do the Leg Levers Hand Helped, so no star. I think it will take me a couple hundred more HH Leg Levers before I can move on to the strict version. I guess it would be a good idea to practice that skill a bit on my free time...

#OntoTheNextOne 

The second workout of the day was 1/5 Hyperion (endurance). I had tried the standard version of Hyperion once just "for fun", so I did not record my time. Since doing only 1 out of 5 series of Pikes, Hand Helped Squats and High Knees seemed like a short workout, I decided it was best if I did it at once, right after Dione with just a couple of minutes of rest. As you can see by my time, it was actually a very short workout, but don't be fooled, that does not make it easy AT ALL.

The Pikes are what set you up to failure here. They are the escalated version of Hand Stand Push Ups and since they are already escalated, seem very friendly and easy to do. Believe me, those things are way harder than they look, specially if you don't have any shoulder strength -like me-. The idea of the Pike is to start with your hands and feet touching the floor, with your butt up in the air and the knees and torso straight, at a 90° angle. Then you have to bend your arms while keeping the knees straight and the torso as straight as you can, and get your head to touch the floor. From that position, you have to push up to resume the starting position. Something like this:

I got to do two Pikes right, and felt confident about them, but from the third on I hit an unbreakable (for now) physical wall. If I got my head to touch the floor, I would just "fall" and get locked in that position and simply could not get my body up... unless I bend my knees a bit and sort of did a kipping-like movement to give me some momentum to get up. It felt really weird to see myself really unable to perform the movement at all. I still need developing more strength to get to do these harder movements right. Thanks to that improvisation, no star on Hyperion either! I did finish fast because I thought it was absolutely pointless to keep trying to do the pikes the right way after a couple of tries, so I ditched the star and moved on while "kipping". Overall it was a not-so-hellish Hell Day,

Coach W7D1 - Dione (Standard) - HELL DAY 1

 Dione, 00:47:29 

It's the beginning of a new week of training and I was thinking I'd ask the Coach for only two workouts this week (after I'd told him last week's intensity was a bit high). I have been invited to play a mini soccer league during the summer holidays (February) and I have matches on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so 2 days of soccer + 2 days of Freeletics seems about right. Well, SURPRISE! The Coach informs me I get HELL DAYS this week. That means I don't get to choose anything; I have to do 5 workouts in 3 training days, and with a smile. AWESOME!

The instructions say:

Hell Days! That means three training sessions in one week – with maximum volume! You don’t have to do all trainings of one session in a row. You can do them throughout your whole day. Everything is fine as long as you do all of them at one day. Take at least one day off after every Hell Day. 

Don’t be frightened and don’t accept the excuse that you have no time. For most of you, even the hardest and longest Freeletics workouts do not take as long as a regular gym visit. Of course, you will get weaker from training to training. Push through it. But make sure to maintain good form and to stay hydrated. Hell Days are mainly a mental challenge. Stay strong, even as your body gets tired. Accept the challenge and give it your all!

So here I am, looking at this red screen that reminds me it's going to be HELL, still wondering how on earth am I going to pull this off. Luckily I'm on vacation so at least I don't have to go to work on top of all this exercise, and I actually can train on a morning and evening session. On the down side, we're fixing the walls and painting the apartment we moved in, so I still got very busy days and I'm end-of-work-year + "extreme makeover: the home edition" tired. 

I planed I'd train on Monday, Friday & Sunday + go to soccer on Tuesday & Thursday, and "rest" on Wednesday & Saturday... Considering I had trained on Sunday that means I'll be exercising 3 days in a row, then 2, then 1. What a week! I do accept the challenge, which I agree, is mainly mental, and I'll certainly give it my all. Wish me luck!

Hell Day #1 is only Dione. I did it in +12 minutes of my PB which is a big time difference. I felt my legs really tired from Sunday's 3x Metis debacle so that slowed me down quite a bit. I'm still incapable of doing the Straight Leg Levers (with the hands on the sides of the body) so I had to give up on the star and do them Hand Helped, putting my hands below my butt. I still have a long way to go, but I'll get there, hopefully sooner than later... Next session is Dione + 1/5 Hyperion. I doubt Dione will be any easier!