There was a lot (a lot!) of exercise that happened this past weekend. Saturday morning was my long trail run, which turned out to be longer than I'd anticipated. It was not that the overall distance was more, I just ran farther than planned. See, I discovered that everything was taking more time that I had in my schedule, and with a hard deadline of 11:30, I had to be as quick as possible. Instead of running just 3.25 to 3.5 miles, I ended up running 4 miles on the trail, and another half mile or so on the road heading home. I'd like to applaud my legs for handling all those hills and still having enough spiz to tackle a little pavement.
I'm still working on running consistently up hills. They are exhausting. I push myself as far as I can, and then go ahead and walk for 30 paces or so to take a little break. As the months go by, however, I fully expect that it will become easier and I'll be able to tackle the inclines without feeling a need to collapse.
After this intense morning workout, I found myself walking all over Golden Gate Park in the afternoon. First it was to, around, and from the Academy of Sciences. Then it was at the other end, by the beach, and getting slightly lost trying to find the bison paddock. I had energy enough, it was just that my feet were becoming incredibly sore. Thanks for keeping me supported, feet!
Sunday involved a 9 mile hike around Lake Chabot. If you have the opportunity, I highly recommend this hike. It goes from pavement to dirt roads (shared with bicyclists) to narrow trails and back again as you wind all around the various nooks and crannies of the lake. Some of the elevation changes are challenging, but they're typically fairly short. When you don't get sweeping views of the lake and sky, sometimes reaching out to the bay, you get stretches of eucalyptus, ferns, and native wildflowers. There is no drinking water along the trail, but there are outhouses.
I went straight from this hike over to Alameda, to show a couple friends of mine how to use the weight room in their new apartment complex. I'm hardly a certified personal trainer of any sort, but I feel comfortable in showing friends how to do the basics in order to feel comfortable as a woman in a weight room. The equipment--squat rack, cable machines--were older than I'm used to, but the principles are, of course, the same. While I wasn't lifting heavy for the purposes of demonstration, I did show off once I found the pull-up bar on the squat rack. Almost two complete chin-ups! I also left them my copy of The New Rules of Lifting for Women, because Alwyn's workouts are really good for beginners and the techniques are very well explained and illustrated.
This morning, I couldn't just give myself a rest day, because it would throw off my driving schedule. I went to the gym as usual and took things a bit easy, mainly doing basic arm-centered lifting techniques. Push-ups, seated cable rows, shoulder lateral raises, lat pull-downs, and crunches. Then lots and lots of uncomfortable foam rolling to combat the weekend of delightfully excessive walking. :)
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