Kaia: Fit Test

Today was the inaugural day of the Kaia F.I.T. Winter Brik. I don't really know what "Brik" is. I'm not sure if it's an acronym. Maybe it stands for "Bootcamps Really Intense Kousin" or "Bring Rubbers In Kase." But maybe it's just the foundational building block for the whole Kaia program. I'm surprised how awake I felt after not sleeping all that great. I was so exited for this morning that I kept waking up through the night to check the clock because I didn't want to oversleep.

I started with the 2 cups of water John would always try to get me to drink as soon as I wake up. Of all the things he has ever asked me to do, that one if the most difficult. I can see how critical it will be while I'm doing this. Maybe it will even train me so that I continue doing it on a regular basis! Wouldn't that make John proud.

When I did the 5k on New Years Day I only wore a thermal wicking chest. I was still pretty frozen even with all the layers I was wearing. I decided today to wear full length thermal wicking shirt and pants under my layers. That made all the difference. I was able to warm up and keep my heat and not feel chilled. Score!

First round with Carry:
We did 2 parts of the fitness test. For my semi-randomized group of people dressed in black we started with squats, jacks, high knees, sit ups (I did crunches are those the same thing?), and push ups (on my knees). We repeated the cycle several times and recorded our best numbers. I felt like I really gave it full energy and I was proud of my effort.

I remember back to "the beginning" (aka May 2010) I could barely walk a mile without extreme pain. I couldn't do a single regular jack and did a modified version with one foot because of the pain in my ankles and legs. And I couldn't do a single push up. Now I can do jacks-- and that is very exciting for me. The day I was able to overcome the force of gravity and get my ass airborne was a very exciting day. Since then I've been able to do a little more over time (as long as my knee cooperates). Some days I have to back off of the jumping when my knee is swelling, but I seem to recover easily with very little pain now that I know how to pay more attention to what my knee is telling me. I don't know what the time was for these... I'll have to check. So my first round numbers:
Squats: 19
Jacks: 25
High Knees: 17
Sit ups (crunch style): 20
Push ups (Darrell style): 10

(really?!? I don't remember doing 10!!! OMG! I did them Darrel style I think-- as best as I can remember- going down till my upper arms are parallelish and pushing back up-- I hope I did them right. As I got fatigued I would go farther down and really have to struggle to come back up. I'm sure I didn't really do 10 that sounds freaking impossible! wow that is some sort of kickass milestone to start out with!)

Second round with Robin:
...didn't go all that great. I consciously know that my work over the past 6 months has really been cardio focused. The most strength I get is in Turbo Kick when we do sculpt or at the end part of the class. So it's not surprising that the movement exercises that require more strength and coordination are very difficult for me. Something to improve on, right. I do want to work on my muscle strength more, especially in my upper body, and very especially in my abs. I remember starting Turbo Kick- when we would do abs, I could only do feet-on-the-wall-abs- and I never really ever got sore. My sister had the same experience with her ab work, there was a long delay before she noticed soreness. I've only recently begun to feel REALLY sore after ab work. It was at the beginning of December when I noticed feeling more sore and that I'm able to at least attempt the ab things everyone else in class is doing. I can't usually quite keep up or do them for the full duration (although I try with every ounce of energy to) but I can at least do them until I'm seriously fatigued or hurting now-- and I feel it the next day. I think maybe my ab muscles were so weak that it took 6 months to get them primed to be able to really do the work. Whatever the case may be, my abs feel very noob to the process and will be a focus for me. Also my arms, I have been really focusing on working my arms by pushing myself with adding weights when we do high lows in Turbo, by adding weights in the beginning of class, and by grabbing a heavier weight when we do arm work. I can see the difference in going from 0 to 10 pushups! I am going to keep this up and really work on arm strength. I want Jessica Biel's don't-fuck-with-me-arms. So my round 2 numbers... don't laugh at me!

Squat Thrusts: 7 I think... (before I got confused about what we were doing because everyone else moved onto another exercise. I kept catching myself wanting do to burpees... it took me SO long to learn to do one that it's programmed into muscle memory now... it's also easier on my knees so I think my knee tells my brain, "Burpee please!")

Show-boarder: 6 I think... (before I got confused- AGAIN- and everyone else moved on.)

Skier Abs: 4.24 minutes to complete the requisite number- I don't know how many that was- maybe 15.

I don't know if we did something else. I was honestly feeling pretty lost, confused, and inadequate during this part. I tried to keep bringing myself back to the exercise at hand in between panting on my hands and knees and feeling confused about weather or not I was supposed to complete the exercise to the end or move on with the rest of the class. I'd be wiling to do this part of the fit test again with some clarification so I can have a good baseline to compare against. I did so bad that I know there will be progress to be seen here. (I know, bad is a judgment. Maybe it's best to say I didn't do as well as I would have liked and was confused about the direction. I really did my best and worked on not beating myself up and not giving up. So that is a star for me.)

Oh and did I forget to mention that we did this outside in a park at 5:30 in the morning? The high for today is 34 and the low last night was somewhere around 10 (deg-F). So you can imagine how cold it was pre-dawn on icy grass!

So after that I signed my properly dated death waiver and went home to quickly change for work. For the next 6 weeks I'm going to be a sweaty worker since I don't have time to shower before getting to work at 7 (or as close as possible to 7). Thank goodness I already went through the whole dripping disgusting discarded defilement, perspiration pore purging, blackhead buildup breaking-out, seeping synthetic soiled sweat, oosing oily oughta-be oleoresin phase. Whew!

I know my abs are going to be hurting later... yay! My arms also feel a little noodley, and I think my upper arms and pecs will be feeling it later for sure. If I didn't have to go to Reno tonight I would totally hit Turbo Kick later. That will hopefully be my fun double day workout. I don't feel worn out or used up... just really hungry and wobbly. I have to do my schedule-- once Total Fitness gets the calendar up I'll plan out my month.

Now I'm just waiting around for SNACK TIME!

Yarrr!