Oh Dear ...

You may recall that yesterday I blogged that I had been stung by one of our bees, but that it hadn't swollen up too much? It seems I spoke a tad too soon!

This morning I woke up, grabbed my glasses and put them on. That's not right; I looked in the mirror to see the right hand side of my face had swollen up alarmingly. Never mind, it wasn't sore and I was confident that once I got up and started moving around the swelling would go down. Another mistake. By the time I got home this evening the swelling had increased; my eyelid was flappy and the swelling was such that the arm of my glasses had left a trench in the swelling. The swelling now stretches from the side of my mouth, up my cheek to my forehead and back to my ear.

I'm sure I read that red wine helps such things, so ... :-)

Hopefully tomorrow will be better.

The bells, Esmerelda, the bells!

General Update

After Wednesday's efforts I made another trip to the CrossFit gym on Thursday for another excellent session, I'm certainly getting stronger and my body shape is changing slowly.

On Friday I had to drive to Leeds and back to collect the kids for half term; it was also the Friday prior to a bank Holiday so the traffic was quite busy, and we got stuck in one of the many incidents on the M1. This made for a long and tiring day and no doubt contributed to me waking up on Saturday feeling quite poorly; aching muscles, very bad headache and all-round general malaise. I ended up doing something I haven't done for a very long time, and lay in bed until early afternoon while my family brought me hot drinks, medicine and eggs & bacon (not all at the same time, of course).

This clearly worked and I felt much better on Sunday, and after a walk on the seafront and seeing the USS George H W Bush (see above, apparently the most powerful warship in the world) anchored in The Solent I headed off for another CrossFit session. Afterwards, I cooked dinner for the family and enjoyed a couple of glasses of red wine. Sunday dawned not that bright but I was up early again and Mrs TM and I headed off with the dog to see the USS George H W Bush; the dog wasn't at all impressed. When we got home Mrs TM wanted to have a look at her bees so we took the lid off and whilst Mrs TM did whatever beekeepers do I took notes and photographs. And got stung on the side of my face for my troubles! Fortunately my previous history of bee stings means that I no longer have an adverse reaction to them so am not currently looking like the Elephant Man.

We were supposed to be having a family day out today but our daughter was complaining of feeling unwell with symptoms remarkably similar to my own of Saturday, and when she threw up her breakfast (that I had cooked!) we decided that going out was probably a bad idea. So I headed off to the CrossFit gym instead for another excellent session!

I'm now sitting comfortably after a long soak in the bath and a very pleasant dinner (cooked by me) and a gorgeous fresh berry and yoghurt pudding (prepared by our eldest son) with a glass of red wine. The side of my face is still sore and my shoulders and arms hurt. Isn't life great?

Fitness Test & CrossFit

After the hard weekend I've had a couple of easy days and today I had my annual fitness test. I wasn't sure how I would do with my change of training regime but the results were actually not too different. Light blue on the MSFT (same as last year but a few extra shuttles) and dark blue on press ups (60) and sit ups (58); both of these scores represented small improvements on last year.

And tonight I headed off to the CrossFit gym; the session was very simple, as many rounds as possible in 20 minutes of:

5 pull ups
10 press ups
15 squats

No weights involved, just bodyweight. This is actually a very hard session as the fatigue accumulates. For me, it was the shoulders that suffered most, making the press ups exceptionally difficult as the rounds built up. In the end I managed 14 complete rounds and the 5 pull ups of the 15th. I expect my shoulders will be very sore tomorrow!

Train smart folks.

Seven

Seven exercises; seven reps; seven times.

Easy!

Handstand push-ups
Thrusters
Knees to elbows
Deadlifts
Burpees
Kettlebell swings
Pull-ups

Another tough session but I felt great afterwards; my fitness is still greater than my strength.

I fancy a rest day tomorrow.

Bull

Today's WOD, going under the name of 'Bull', was extremely tough. Two times through of:

200 double unders (or 600, yes, 600 of normal skipping)
50 overhead squats
50 pull-ups
1 mile run

Age makes one wise and I set myself a reasonable weight on the bar that I could manage 50 reps of overhead squats. Many others found them selves taking weight off as the WOD progressed. I'm afraid I can't tell you what weight I used, but I confess that there was one lady there squatting more than me! As for the pull-ups, I ended up back on the blue band again; I'm not yet capable of 50 reps on the purple. But I will get there. The run was OK, I tried to keep pushing myself but on the 2nd set a truck went past me going in the opposite direction and the draft from it almost stopped me in my tracks! I put another effort in and made it to the end in a little over 40 minutes. Absolute nails session.

Train smart folks.

WOD-tastic!

Today's WOD was short and sharp:

3 x (400m run, 21 kettlebell swings and 12 pull-ups).

My kettlebell has now increased to 20kg and pull-ups are now on the purple (thinnest) band. Hopefully, in another few weeks, it will be no band at all! I smashed through this in a little under 10 minutes and altough tired felt really good. It seemed that I was not alone in feeling good, and we agreed that another set of exercises was required, and eventually we settled on deadlifts and burpees for time. The first set would be 10 deadlifts and 1 burpee, and on each set the deadlift would reduce by one as the burpee increased. After finding the 65kg deadlift the other night somewhat easy I upped the deadlift to 75kg, completely missing the point that I had done just 21 reps the other night in groups of 3 reps, and tonight would be 55 reps! This was chuffin' hard, as witnessed by the pools of sweat that each of us left on the floor afterwards. Overall, an excellent workout.

Girls That Do CrossFit ...

Look like this! :-)

Cycling Seems to be Improving

I know I'm still some way off where my cycling peak was last year, but I seem to now be in that very pleasant place where I am really enjoying my cycling and I feel that I'm moving along at a reasonable pace. This evening I rode to the CrossFit gym for tonight's strength session, and once on the top of the hill there was a nice tailwind pushing me along at a fair old pace. So fair a pace, in fact, that the group of teenage scooter-ists (is that a real word?) were only travelling 1 or 2 mph more than I was! The looks on their faces were priceless! And I smashed my home to gym PB (41 minutes)!

The WOD was AMRAP in 5 minutes of 3 x deadlifts (65kg for me, a bit too light in hindsight) and 7 x push-press (32.5kg, probably just about right). I managed 6 rounds with 3 deadlifts and 1 push-press of the 7th round. After a few minutes recovery I had a very pleasant ride home, the wind was not too bad and with the downhill assistance I managed the return journey in 41 minutes. Proves how fast going there was!

Train smart (take note Roy!).

First BBQ of the Year!

Recovered the BBQ from the garage this afternoon, gave it a clean and fired it up - woo hoo! We had some burgers in the fridge so we had these with some cold chicken and a big pile of salad - delicious.

Check out Mrs TM's Bee blog - see Top Bees link on the right.

Monster CrossFit Duathlon

After a day off yesterday, and with the sun shining, it was going to be another CrossFit duathlon day, but with an added twist. Rather than simply ride to the gym I decided to take a detour, adding a whole bunch of mileage. I did in fact underestimate the distance and arrived 15 minutes late at the gym after a 1 hour 40 min ride, but fortunately they hadn't started the WOD. The WOD was a tough one - the Filthy Fifty. 10 exercises, 50 reps of each (box jumps, jump pull-ups, kettlebell swings (16kg), walking lunges, knees to elbows, push press, back extensions, wall ball shots, burpees (gotta love 'em), double-unders (skipping but 2 turns of the rope to one jump - I can't do this so had to do 150 normal skips)); I managed all this in just under 29 minutes. I then got changed back into my cycling kit and headed home. There was a bit of a headwind on the top of the hill and I was a little tired so the journey home took some 47 minutes. Overall a great day's training.

When I got home from CrossFit Mrs Turbo Man was opening up the beehive to see how the bees were doing. And they are doing really well. They have made a mass of cone, some with honey and some with brood, so hopefully we will have some of our own honey to eat before the end of the summer.

We watched the King's Speech last night. I'm a bit of a cynic when it comes to the film industry as I think most that are involved in it are a bunch of pompous, overpaid and talentless chumps, and so when the industry says that something is really wonderful I take it with a very large pinch of salt. We did, though, thoroughly enjoy it.

And on Friday he rested ...

I like Fridays. No phys and a relaxed view of eating and drinking!

Never Miss An Opportunity

I um and ah'd about riding at lunchtime today as the weather was looking somewhat ominous. But I'm glad I did as although it was a bit windy I stayed dry and had a good ride.

I was due at the CrossFit gym this evening with our eldest son, but he texted me just after 5pm to say that he had studying to do and wouldn't be going to the gym tonight. So, Woo Hoo!, I can ride to the gym as well! I leapt onto the Litespeed (this was a mistake, I'll explain later) and had a good ride to the gym; the wind was, unsually, in my favour on the way there and that certainly helped. The WOD for today was AMRAP in 20 minutes of (5 x chest to bar pull ups, 10 x wall ball and 15 x kettlebell swings). This was a tough session and I was hooped at the end. But I could not rest. The mistake in choosing the Litespeed was that it has no lights, and with the sun about to set I had no choice but to change quickly and head home. Quickly. But this time the wind was in my face and so it was a tough ride home in the fading light. But I thoroughly enjoyed it!

Tomorrow I take it easy. Rest well folks.

Oh The Pain!

Today's session:

5 x (15 x thrusters, 15 x bar-facing burpees, 200m run).

Thrusters. Hold barbell and do a front squat, as you stand up keep the bar moving straight into a shoulder press. I started with a 30kg bar but could only manage 2 rounds with this weight, and by the last round was struggling with a 15kg bar!

Bar-facing burpees. Squat down and kick legs out into the press-up position. Do one press-up. Complete the squat by bringing the feet back to the hands and stand up. Do a feet together jump over the 12" log in front of you You can twist in mid-air if you want, or land and turn round. That is 1 rep.

The thrusters exercise just about every muscle group, as do the burpees. This is a hard set.

Glad I did it, though.

Edit: Just found this quote on the web:

The Most Important Thing About The Thruster
If you don't feel a little nauseous after a set of Thrusters....you aren't doing it right.

Yet More CrossFit

Today's session was a beast! As follows:

21 reps of box jumps, power snatch (30kg for me) and pull-ups followed by 15 reps and then 9 reps.

And then, just for fun, we did 10 minutes AMRAP (As Many Rounds As Possible) of 50m sandbag carry (25m uphill; 25m down), burpees and kettlebell swings (20kg). Certainly felt like a good session at the end of it.

The good news is that I'm getting much better at pull-ups and I may be able to dispense with the band completely in the next couple of weeks. I've recently increased the weight of the kettlebell to 20kg so my skinny cyclist's uper body is clearly responding to the new stimulus, which I'm really happy with. I need to sort out my eating regime as I'm allowing too many 'naughty' things to sneak under my primal rader so I'm not getting the full benefit of my new 'strong' (again, it's a relative term!) physique.

Train smart folks.

To Bee or Not To Bee ...

We've got a bee hive (or, more accurately, Mrs TM has got a bee hive!):

First impressions are that they are very calm, and are quite happy for us to sit in the garden with them. They are currently very busy building the inside of their new home and we hope that we will have some honey before the end of the Summer.

Bike - CrossFit - Bike

Had a busy day at work so was unable to train at lunchtime. But not to worry, as tonight was another Bike - CrossFit - Bike session.

I rode moderately hard to the gym, and had to overtake a moped at one point that was taking up space in the cycle lane - what's that all about?

Today's session was 5 sets of (5 x power clean; 10 x front squats; 5 x jerk; 20 x pull-ups), with 90 seconds rest between each set. Being a weedy cyclist I was doing this with 'just' 35kg on the bar and I'm still using the thin, blue band on the pull-ups. But I smashed through the first set in 1 minute 27 seconds, and was particularly chuffed that I managed 20 pull-ups straight off; a first for me. No surprise that I slowed down after that, mainly because I was unable to do the pull-ups in one go and need to take a rest, and by the last set it was more than one rest! A damn fine session though.

And it was a very enjoyable ride home again. I fully expect to be very sore tomorrow!

All the best

Stress, Rest and CrossFit

Following last week's excellent training, I needed to take my foot off the throttle a little this week. On Monday I had to take 2 of our children back to school that involved some 10 hours in the car for me. Although not as physically stressful as a full-on training session, this is still extremely tiring and brings its own stress that requires a similar need to rest as the physical sessions. So on Tuesday I did an easy 40 minutes that included a warm-up on the rower, core, stretch and flex and finally an easy 10 minutes on the gym bike. And that was it. Today I hoped to get out on the bike but work intervened and I didn't get out. I did, though, get to the CrossFit gym for an excellent session. After a good warm up that included some interesting stretches, we did the WOD; 5 x 5 reps of front squats. The idea is to start at a weight you know you can do and to increase it until you max out. I started too light and so I ended up doing 7 sets and eventually maxed out at 55kgs. It's not a massive weight but it is more important for me to get the technique right at this stage; the weights will no doubt go up once I get this locked in. Once this was over we did an extra session, 15 minutes of a mixture of exercises that included lots of bodyweight exercises, kettlebell lifts and 100m runs. An excellent evening's work.

That Was Some Week!

As part of my new lifestyle I've stopped keeping a training diary so I'm not tempted to chase hours, but this has clearly been quite an intensive week for me.
Monday: Bike and CrossFit
Tuesday: Bike
Wednesday: Duathlon
Thursday: Bike-CrossFit-Bike
Friday: Rest
Saturday: Bike-CrossFit-Bike
Sunday: Bike-CrossFit-Bike
Today I took the Litespeed out and rode to the CrossFit gym; there was plenty of wind that made it a hard ride but I continue to be impressed by the wheels. They are just so smooth. Today's WOD was 4 x (100 feet of weighted lunges, 30 box jumps, 20 wall ball and 10 handstand push-ups (I'm not yet able to do these so have to do an alternative) and was chuffin' hard. Legs are now very tired and so I'm taking some medication to ease the pain. :-)

New Event - Isle of Wight Sportive 24 July 2011

I was browsing the internet this morning searching for a new cycling challenge to inspire me, and came across this one - it's part of the excellent Wiggle series of events so I know from experience it will be well organised and will take riders from the New Forest across to the Isle of Wight, do a clockwise tour of the surprisingly hilly island, before returning to the mainland and a short ride back through the forest to the finish. Naturally, I've gone for the 100 mile option, and I am already really looking forward to it. This should be enough to keep me motivated through the next couple of months.

As an aside, I know that Fast Daz is planning an IOW ride in mid-May and am hoping that I can make that as well, but I can't be sure just yet.

Must dash, have another Bike-CrossFit-Bike duathlon to complete!