New Rules of Lifting for Abs: Phase 1 complete

I had stopped strength training for awhile and found that my back was hurting on long runs, so I picked up the book The New Rules of Lifting for Abs.

I just completed phase 1 of the 6-month program, and man, it's brutal, but so effective. I've moved up substantially on all of the exercises, and I feel stronger.

Each of the workouts was completed 8 times over about six weeks.

Here's where I started and where I ended on each:

2012: The official goals post

As this is auto-posting, I'm getting back into a familiar routine.

While most of the world is sleeping in on Saturday morning, once again I'm up early. Before dawn early. I'm putting on my cold weather gear, packing a bag of warm clothes to change into after, and warming up the Fit.

I'm driving 40 minutes to join the long procession of cars turning into Thomas Worthington High School for the Marathoner in Training program (MIT). Jeff's going to gather all 400 of us in the gym to kick the winter season off. He'll call out "10:30s!!!" then we hit the Olentangy Trail, sun, rain, sleet or snow. We'll yearn for the heat of summer, just as we yearned for the cold of winter in August.

I'm going to stop with the "I must be crazy for doing this" posts. It's a foregone conclusion. We're all crazy in our own little ways. I just choose to blog about it.

All 400 of us share one same personality trait: We're all goal oriented, some to the point of obsession. The magic number is called a PR, a personal record, and each one of us is there because we're determined to beat it.

The PR could be a goal distance, for many first timers it's simply to run as far as you can, to the marathon or half marathon point. That was my ambition my first season of MIT, training for Cleveland. 

But once you complete that distance, you now have a time to beat. Some simply want to beat their time, others set a new goal time. I ran a 4:32 in Cleveland, and sought to run Columbus in 4:20. That was the number that was burned into my head in my second season of MIT. I smashed through that goal, running Columbus in 4:13.

New Rules of Lifting for Women Take 2

I started the New Rules of Lifting for Women program earlier this year, but abandoned strength training altogether when our mileage got really high. My friend Kim reminded me of it last week, so I decided to give it another shot, now that our weekday runs are back to 3-4 miles.

When I tried the program the first time, I made the mistake of using heavier weights right off the bat. The program starts with more reps and then decreases, and the weight is supposed to get heavier. Toward the end of the first set I would have had to lunge with 30 pound weights, and that was just asking for injury.

But, when your weekday runs reach 6-8 miles, it's not like you have much time for anything else, anyway!

I started with Stage 1 this week, and I don't feel like I did to badly. I was sore, but not to the extent I had last week when I was experimenting with a few other programs! I think, too, I started off with a reasonable amount of weight, so I have room to increase.

The thing I love about this program is that it is incredibly efficient. Each move works multiple muscles so it only takes a half hour max.

The nice thing about the Y is that the women's center has most of the equipment I need for this, so I don't need to wade through masses of muscley tattooed men to get a turn on the cross cable machine.

Here's what the first two sessions looked like. Squats and lunges were supposed to be body weight only, but that seemed too easy so I modified it.

TUESDAY: Stage 1 workout A
Squats 2 x 15 w/ 10 lb weights
Pushups 2 x 15 (I've lost a ton of upper body strength, these were hard!)
Seated row (cross cable): 2 x 15 @ level 5 (?)
Stepups 2 x 15 on bench w/ 5 lb weights
Jackknives on ball 2 x 8

FRIDAY: Stage 1 workout B
Deadlifts 2 x 15 @ 25
Lat pulldowns 2 x 15 @ 25
Shoulder presses 2 x 15 w/ 8 lb weights
Lunges 2 x 15 w/ 10 lb weights
Ball crunches 2 x 8

When the reps go down to 12 I'll probably keep the same weight on some, just because it will add up too quickly otherwise!

New Rules of Lifting for Women

I've been a little lost lately in terms of strength training, how much I should be doing, how much of it, etc... Mostly I just want to maintain where I am and build endurance. At least, that's what the marathon training books I've read say to do.

I was doing a little reading and heard good things about this book, The New Rules of Lifting for Women. I've gotten through the first two chapters and it makes a lot of sense so far. Picked it up at Barnes and Noble tonight, had a gift card to burn.

And, it doesn't make ridiculous promises like "in just 8 minutes" or "lose 20 pounds in 2 weeks" like, oh, almost every book on the shelf. In fact in the first chapter the book stated that the program was neither quick nor easy.

That little bit of honesty sold me on it.