I’ve only had one training day this week so far and I’m OK with that, it’s been nice lounging while I get stuff for school and the OWL Photography Club ready for upcoming events. The training run on Monday was good but I think it was a bit in the direction of overreaching because for the whole run, my calves weren’t so happy. I had a nice run on Saturday but did not massage my calves enough to work out some of the muscular tightness and that hurt my progress on Monday. But, it was also humid as hell, literally. When it wasn’t raining, the humidity was creeping up the barometer; I believe it topped out over 75% by the time the sun went down. Needless to say, I hated it. But overall, the workout itself was great.

**Warm up**
Slogging through a bunch of puddles to the rec center (yes, I count this! You try lugging 15lbs of books through puddles wearing flip flops and wet pants!)
5 SEAL pull ups
5 toes to bar
Dynamic stretching

**Workout proper**
3.93mi in 55mins, slow run to keep in Zone 3 (didn’t really work), ran about 85% trails

**Cool down**
5 more pull ups
5 more toes to bar
Static stretches
Grip exercises: 3 mins of plate grip forearm rotations, 25lb plate. This was harder than I expected, the 35 plate was worse. By the end, I could barely even hold the plate.
5 more super slow, super strict pull ups with extended hang-out between 4 and 5 to really tax the grip.

Frankly, I had to cut the run short because of my calves and the fact that I after mile 3, I was having trouble keeping my heart rate under control. After a two minute walk, I must have run 20 feet and my TRT shot from the 130s to 187 in an instant, that’s when I stopped for good. I’m not 100% sure what it was that was causing erratic heart rates but I know it had to do with my calf soreness. After that, I just went to the Campus Rec Center to cool down and try to get some dead lifts in.

Well, that didn’t work because all the Delta Bravos were hogging the racks, mostly to stare at themselves in the mirrors while doing bar curls with 10lb bumpers. I must have hung around for about 30 minutes before I gave up the quest and got my stuff. However, the grip work was fun but excruciating. Not only was the weight itself rather heavy, the rubber coating didn’t like my sweaty grip all over it, so it was more of a fight against time than grip failure. Maybe I’ll hit the gym this weekend to get some weights in since I know Saturday morning, the gym is practically empty all day.

But if I go on an empty day, who will be there to see me workout?! Isn’t that the point of going to the gym?!

(PS – In my younger years, I was a true gym rat. I was at the gym 5-6 days a week for nearly a decade, punishing myself. I understand the lure of working out all those rippley muscles for the ladies, it’s why we invented gyms: to get ladies to go where men are sweaty and gross smelling)