Last weekend before Christmas.

Saturday was a day of rest. Well I say rest, it wasn’t very restful to be honest. I didn’t go to the gym is what I mean.

Sunday I had to go though. I am conscious that Christmas is less than a week away and commitments around this holyday will keep me from the gym (I think my next and only chance before 2009 will be Christmas eve). Coupled with the fact that I am going to be eating inordinate amounts of food I had to put a big effort in.

Today’s damage report. My Trapezius muscles ache, these are the muscles across the top of the shoulders and behind the neck. My Calves ache. My biceps ache. And I had a very large blister on my right foot that span the distance between my second and fourth toe, which when cleaned up and removed, revealed a second slightly smaller blister underneath.

I started out with the rowing machine for 20 minutes, I briefly interrupted myself by heading over and turning down the gym stereo a touch when the coast was clear (there is a big Staff Only sign on the door, and I’m not staff!) because it was so loud I couldn’t hear my own music, or in this case a podcast about the nature an origin of new strains of virus.

Reading back that paragraph it makes me sound like a bit of a bore but it was an fascinating podcast and the gym sound system can get impressively loud.

Anyway, 20 minutes of rowing machine at level 2 (and the biological mechanism by which Ebola jumped the species divide) for a warm up.

Abdominal exercises.
Side crunches. 2 sets of 15 on either side. The plank twice to failure. And 2 sets of 15Twisting sits.

Free weights.
1 set of 15 sitting chest curls with the 5kgs. 1 set of 15 reps of arm curls resting on the knee with the 5kgs. And then the same set of exercises with the 7.5kgs.

Triceps push down. 3 sets of 15 at 7kgs.

Leg press. 3 sets off 15 at 59kgs.

The banned machines.
Lat Pull down. 3 sets of 15 at 32kgs. Chest press. 3 sets of 15 at 27kgs. Shoulder press 3 sets of 10 at 23kgs.

It was about now that I hit a wall. I had been in the gym for a little over an hour and suddenly everything seemed really hard work. I had been checking my pulse every now and then since I arrived and I had pretty much kept it at or about 100 – 120 without much in the way of a break. I had a few minutes rest.

Back to it, I continued with the back extensions. 3 sets of 15 reps at 72kgs.

Arm curls. 3 sets off 15 at 18kgs.

Then 40 minutes of cardio.
Treadmill. Intervals at 7mpm for 20 minutes quickly followed by the cross trainer in intervals at level 6.

This took me nicely to 12 o’ clock. I headed pool side to discover that it was deserted. Goggles on I then swam solidly for half an hour before finally sinking into the Jacuzzi to relax.