inspired by yelena, i made my exploratory run today to find a good route. it wasn't bad, thanks to mapmyrun (usually these things are slow and meandering). did 3.8miles in 33min. under 9min mile pace without any pain. well, at least without any pushing pain. i did get some lower back stiffness from the cold, and my knees were stiff too, but not anything bad. the whole run is on concrete. not much i can do about that, i think, unless i want to start doing loops around mudchute park.

i'm surprised i managed the distance and the pace without any cardiovascular or leg fatigue...i haven't done a long run in a long time. i guess maybe frisbee is keeping me in ok shape after all.

jon and i have embarked on a 6wks to 100 pushups challenge. to be honest, it's not so much a challenge as an experiment. some guy on the internet has come up with a plan that he says should make me able to do 100 pushups if i follow it faithfully. so let's see if he's right. we've done 2 days of it, and so far so good. i think next week, when he expects me to do 3 sets of 25 pushups, we will hit some snags. i actually don't know what the plan is...jon has a sheet of paper, and he tells me, "now do 12!" and down i go. wish me luck!

i finally did a fitness assessment with a trainer at pure, which translates into a lot of wasted time and a couple of cool facts about myself. and by cool, i mean cruel. according to their nifty machine, i'm only supposed to eat 1400 calories a day! how the heck does anyone survive on that?!

i weigh 63.5kg, am 166 cm tall (OVER 4'5 thanks very much, so all those times i was put on the short line? mistakes), bp of 110-70, resting HR of 70. now comes the really interesting stuff (ha!).

my left arm is significantly stronger than my right arm (something like 4 cm larger in circumference). except that i'm right handed, and i'm almost positive that my left arm is the first to fail if i benchpress, etc. could rowing on the left of the dragonboat made that big of a difference? it's mostly core strength anyways...but when the trainer made me do assisted chinups, i could definitely feel it more in my right arm...not sure if that's b/c i use my right arm more, or if it's b/c it's actually weaker.

he also said my upper body is stronger than my lower body. THAT, i don't believe.

i'm below average on body fat, above average for muscle, most of my fat tends to sit around my waist (according to the hip-waist ratio)--he thinks it's b/c i don't do enough core work, i think it's because i'm shaped like a boy (so i have no waist to speak of...or maybe i have no waist to speak of b/c of my hip-waist ratio. chicken, meet egg, meet chicken).

the guy hinted a lot about me running more so that i could lose some fat and some muscle. i think he wants me more feminine. i could care less. 1400 calories my ass.

blargh, spinning=leisurely bike ride this morning. i couldn't bear to push myself...i think my pain tolerance in general has declined. b/c really, what's the drive? my quads were the limiting factor. quads and calves...so heartrate didn't go up much at all. i couldn't pull with hammies b/c flexing the ankles on the upstroke hurt the calves too much. blargh blargh blargh. i guess it was still better than nothing, but i wonder if a longish run might've done just as well. and to add to the guilt factor, i took the last spinning pass, so jon didn't get a bike, and of course, the class was full, so brad had to kick a girl out to let me in. i'm not saying i was the biggest slacker in the class...just that i should've done more...

so sore...first dragonboating practice saturday totally wore out my lowerback/core. by the end, it was hard even to hold the oar on the paddles up call, but i did manage to hit some sort of rhythm. afterwards, brunched with arati+her parents, and then hiked the twins in 80min. i felt like the uphills were super slow/harder than usual, but i think the times are actually ok. we also ran into linda+hubert in the middle, so spent 5 min or so talking to them (we were on the downhill, so i don't think the rest is relevant). it was definitely a completion=success hike. sunday, disc'd on uberhard fields...first competitive practice so ran some throwing drills (i'm in dire need of them), and then scrimmaged. it's hard to hike/run without your lowerback. today my calves and lowerback are both still sore...so i'm hobbling around the office in heels.

ran intervals this morning. nothing spectacular: 3min warmup (around 10-11 kph) then 8 reps of 1:30 14kph, 1:30 9kph for a tad more than 5k in 27 min. i was tired by the end, but not that tired, which means i coulda/shoulda done the runs on 15kph. it seems i am in awful cardio shape, but my legs are holding up really well. i never once hit lactic acid, but i was gasping for air...it felt like my lungs couldn't get enough o2...which i guess isn't that surprising given i've just gotten over bronchitis and i'm still coughing up random bits of phlegm (mmm...yum!).

disc last night was fun even tho we lost by 2 or 3 pts, which is not bad considering we had 6-7 guys and 3-2 girls to their 5 or so subs. i think we might've won had we played 5-2 the entire game like we were supposed to. instead linda made some wuss call that we should play 6-1 so their girls wouldn't have to be savage (she was tired of covering me--her words, not mine). i caught some pretty sketchy things (almost no spin, but also no wind), and threw some really bad stuff...paulie came down with one of my blades in the endzone, but i had a ton of turns (causing the first break right off the pull, putting up a stall 9 turnover, etc etc). BUT i also had 2 layouts--1 for the catch, but it was more of a going for a low disc, hitting the ground on my back to protect the catch than a full extension. the second was a full extension on a zippy deep throw, i had it in my hand but couldn't hold on when i hit the groud (hand first, which is a bad policy if you want to not drop the disc in that hand). i'm excited b/c i rarely layout, especially not at league. now i just have to get my throwing confidence back.

we did spinning this morning after a month away from the gym. despite the 12km, 2:17 adventure race from sunday, my legs felt very fresh, once again proving that the only things the adventure race strained were my knees. i also suspect that my bike was weaker than normal. the last couple of times, my base was at 5 (feels like freewheeling) with 8 feeling a bit strained and 11 as my base for standing (supports my weight). everything this time was 3 gears up--so i actually managed 20 at the peak of the hillclimbs whilst keeping the pace (80-90rpm). anyways, i was thinking...for ultimate, you can always sprint the end (or the next) regardless of how tired you are. for crosscountry, we could always sprint the end. you never regret it afterwards, promise.

my core strength is shot to pieces. i was trying to work hamstrings on the pb (where you lie on your back with your heels on the ball and pull it towards your butt), but the thing kept wobbling all over the place. i did not look graceful. something to work on.