Three days down
Again, this morning I pretty much popped right out of bed and got moving. I was tired, but I got a pretty good night’s sleep and was ready to start the day. I went to the gym and lifted for about an hour. Today was my light(er) day. I felt pretty good and feel like I’m getting stronger already on some exercises, like the squat. The weights that I’m using for the bench and deadlift are a little too heavy. For the bench I was supposed to do the following today: 5×185, 4×200, 3×210. I did the 185 set without any problems, but I couldn’t get 200 pounds up more than three times and decided to drop down to 195 for the third set, which I struggled with, but did. As for the deadlift, I can do the weights, but I can tell my form is suffering pretty badly and I’m worried about my lower back (which is a little tight right now). Depending on what my strength training looks like in the coming weeks, I’ll probably adjust the weights for those two exercises down a little.
I went back to the gym a few hours later to swim. In the hour, I did about 3,200 yards at a relatively comfortable pace. I did it in five sets – 800, 700, 700, 500, 500, with 60-90 seconds between sets. For the first three sets I just swam until I felt like my form might be breaking down a little and then gave myself a little rest. I was worried that I was swimming a little too hard for this base week, so I slowed it down for the last two sets and tried to focus more on form. By that point, I was more tired (obviously), so I’m not sure how clean my form was anyway. I also tried working in some good kicking, but I’m not convinced I was doing a very good job of that either!
Surprisingly, even though now I haven’t had a day off in nearly two weeks, I feel pretty good. I’m tired and a little sore all over, but I don’t feel like it’s really affecting my training or my life. On the other hand, the meat of this week is still yet to come – 90 minute run tomorrow night, tough swim Friday, long ride Saturday, brick on Sunday. But next week is a recovery week, so I can definitely push through this week. I’ve been eating like an absolute pig – which I feel entitled to do! Even though I’ve been training so much these last few weeks, I don’t think I’ve dropped any weight and still feel strong. We’ll see if I can still say that in three or five months!
Strength Training – January 31
Time: 1:00
Swim – January 31
Time: 1:00
Distance: 3,200