Workout Notes Plus A Week of Running

I’ve had the Asus Transformer 101 Tablet PC for more than two months now but I haven’t used it while running on the treadmill (or on the road, ha!) until two weeks. On the first try, I started with a 10 minute walk then started jogging gingerly because I was still recovering from the thigh injury I suffered the previous week. I didn’t feel any thigh pain so I continued. Ever since I found an app for the local newspaper, it’s been so much easier to scroll the pages, so the initial run which lasted for 35 minutes turned out okay as far as reading and scrolling went. A second try a week later at a slight faster pace went well too. So how did it feel compared to a netbook? Well, other than the touchscreen scrolling as opposed to the arrow keys on the netbook, they worked out pretty much the same.

I rarely use the rowing machine more than 5 minutes at a time because I find it boring. So far, I haven’t found a way to read while rowing  so what I do is turn the TV on to the news and also turn on the captions. I usually do a circuit of rowing, spinning, and recumbent cycling. Somehow, last week I zoned out on the rowing machine and lasted for 15 minutes before hitting the other two machines. As far as the perceived effort went, I think repeats of 5 minutes each on the machines for 2 or three sets had better aerobic effect than 15 minutes straight on each. But that’s just me.

I don’t know what all the hullaballoo is about H.I.I.T. and Tabata. In the mid-70’s in college while taking my Physical Education degree, we already learned about circuit training which wasn’t even new by then. H.I.I.T. and Tabata are basically good old fashioned circuit training renamed.

 Ever since I started weight training in 1979, I’ve always used the suicide grip when doing the bench press because that was the way I was shown to do it. I didn’t even know it was called that until two weeks ago when I was searching for suggestions on how to do the bench press more safely without a spotter. The suggestion was not to use the suicide grip and since then I have wrapped my thumb around the bar. At first it was difficult to complete my usual number of repetitions because it felt awkward. After a few tries, I had to reposition the bar on my hands a certain way and it seems to work better.

If I were to believe my bioelectrical impedance weighing scale, I lost 1% body fat by sitting for 30 minutes while on the computer, but only lost half a percent after a half hour workout on the spinning bike. Nuts!

In other exercise news, after I did the unplanned run on Easter Sunday, I was able to do three more runs the week after. They were only very slow 45 minutes to an hour - twice on the treadmill and once on the road, but nonetheless, I’ll count them as runs. Based on my recent running history, that's plenty.

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