Category: strength

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Impromptu Backyard Workout

Normally after Shark Boy and I get home from daycare/work respectively, we have about 20-30 minutes to kill before dinner is ready.  He likes to be outside so we often take walks to the park or he rides his glider bike around the neighbourhood.  It’s an opportunity for me to be slightly active, in that I walk with him (occasionally running to catch up), but it’s not exactly a workout; I’m still in my work clothes.  I dress casually, but I’m not in suitable shoes for running and I get hot wearing jeans in summer (or Indian summer) weather.

Today I tweaked it a little though.  Shark Boy had asked to play in the backyard this morning, and we had to get him to daycare (and me to work), so nothing doing.  Still, he jumped at the chance to get out there this evening.  I promised to join him once I changed to shorts and a t-shirt and grabbed a few extras.

Knowing time was short, and that situations with kids were fluid at best, I didn’t have high expectations for my workout, but the truth was I was still sore from a Gravity Machine workout the day before, so anything that would break a sweat without being too gruelling was welcome.  I’d grabbed a jump-rope and a 6lb medicine ball that we got for my wife a while back.  I hadn’t put on shoes, but hoped I could jump rope in the grass.  That didn’t work so well; the rope slowed down in the grass and threw off my timing.  Next time, I’d wear shoes and do it on the patio.

The medicine ball was more appealing – I haven’t used it since we bought it, but I’d found a good set of exercises here.

 I started with their ‘Log Toss’ and simply threw the ball into the air.  That way, if Shark Boy wanted to get involved I could simply claim that this was *my* ball and he was welcome to do the same with one of his.  Our backyard has plenty…

It was a great move for explosive power through the legs in the squat portion, along with a swing in the shoulders, much like some of those kettlebell moves you see these days. I did about 10.

I moved into Medicine Ball Slams.  These always scared me because I worry about what happens to the floor or walls that they’re used on.  Most demonstrations seem to occur in industrial spaces with cement walls.   That’s not like my house or my gym, but I figured our lawn was up for the abuse! 12 to 15 reps of this (I wish I’d kept better count, but the kids distracted me!)

I paused to grab a picnic blanked and bring the Lightning Kid out to watch us play.  Then I lay down beside him and did some crunches while holding the medicine ball above me.

Papa, that’s not how you play ball.

Before Shark Boy finally demanded my attention, I fit in about 14 pushups while alternating the ball from hand to hand.

We’re signing Shark Boy up for a Kids-of-Steel Duathlon, so I thought I’d try getting him in mental shape for the idea of racing; I know he’s got the fitness, endurance and iron will, I just hope he doesn’t get confused or overwhelmed.  Anyway, I challenged him to race across the yard.  With my longer legs it wasn’t that challenging or that much fun for either of us.  Then I gave him a head start halfway across the yard, and did a sprinting charge complete with “I’M GONNA GET YOU!” and monster sounds.  That ramped up the fun and sweat!

To round it out a little before dinner, I managed to get the Lightning Kid involved too.  I ran a little (fairly slowly) while carrying him, and also some lunges with him on my shoulders.

Shark Boy gets in on the lunging action

While I couldn’t tell you how many calories I burned, I broke a definite sweat and had great fun with my boys.  I’m motivated to try this kind of thing again, in fact I’m motivated to get back into training for the off-season.  Thanks boys!

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Alternative Workouts: Gravity Machine

My wife has been taking a Gravity Machine class at Goodlife Fitness, and invited me to give it a try.  I’ve been sorely lacking in any strength training, and I love to try new exercise methods so I gave it a try.




The class started off with a 15 minute session in the Spin studio; most triathletes won’t turn down an opportunity like that, and if you’re in dire need of more cycling work, it’s even more true.  After breaking a sweat and getting the muscles primed up, we were ready to hit the machines.

The instructor, Kim, made sure everybody was getting settled into the machine properly; it’s easy to imagine the sliding mechanism crashing or pinching something if you use it wrong.  It was a small class, so the overall feel was like a semi-private personal training session.  The workout progressed through the body, starting with wide stance squats, then progressing to single-leg squats (which I’ve read is one of the best strength exercises for runners) then moved on to upper body work.

Pulling the cables down to make the slider (along with your body) go up was probably my favourite exercise as it worked the same muscles used on a freestyle swim pull.  The cables give you solid resistance throughout the movement in a way weights can’t, and though there are cable machines in most gyms, I find it hard to get them set up for a complete range of motion, and to be honest, there’s always someone else using the cable setup.  Speaking of complete range of motion, I ended up shortening some of the pulls to avoid the top end of the range; I’ve been advised to not do exercises with weights directly overhead, that range seems to always aggravate old shoulder injuries.  More upper body work followed, with us pulling ourselves on the slider using rows, and bicep curls.

A lot of the exercises had core work thrown in on top in the form of a crunch or glute bridge at the end of the motions, but we had an explicit core workout to end the session, which we did upside-down (though at a very shallow angle).  Hanging like that feels great on your spine, and extension/traction is a common form of treatment for lower back pain, so that was a bonus.

After the session, Kim (having noticed my good form in spinning and my triathlon t-shirt and figuring me for a triathlete of some kind) showed me other exercises they use to work the swimming stroke muscles.  These were shoulder pulls while facing down, but also with an oblique twist to emphasize the core.

While I was skeptical of a machine-based workout, I think I’ll sign up for a few more classes and hope it pays strength dividends into my triathlon racing.  Plus, it’s an opportunity to workout with my wife; the couple that sweats together, stays together.  What strange/new classes have you done?

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Burbathlon Thoughts

Last week I got a chance to do not one, but two Burbathlons, and I tried a few new things.

On Tuesday the weather was warm enough for shorts (in March! in Toronto!) so off I went.  I had a water-bottle belt packed, but I’d been missing the bottle itself and I figured I’d hydrated enough in the morning to not need anything along the way… WRONG!

I found my mouth parched fairly soon after starting.  I ended up doing a little extra hill work with a climb straight up the Centennial Park Ski hill and another going up the service road (in addition to the hill that takes me out of the Etobicoke Creek Valley to the park, and the berm near Eglinton road.  I mixed in some squats, single-leg squats, push-ups, spiderman crawls and sprints (not necessarily in that order) into the overall run.  I also took the opportunity to start to prepare for the Spartan Race by practicing some jiu-jitsu rolls.

Jiu-Jitsu practices a lot of break-falling to avoid being hurt when being thrown, but at higher levels you can use them to dive over obstacles and land in a roll.  Unfortunately I’m so rusty that I was mostly practicing them in the grass from a walk.  Still, if I keep up the practice, maybe I’ll pull one off on race day.

For Friday’s workout, I swore I’d be better hydrated.  Pulling off random jumps and strength exercises (never mind jiu-jitsu rolls) with a bottle in the small of my back didn’t seem too comfortable, but it gave me a chance to try out a piece of equipment I bought last season with this sort of thing in mind…

 Salomon hydration packs seem to get good reviews (and I’ll write up and post my own soon enough)… I liked the idea of this one not only for hydration, but as a good way to have extra pockets for gadgets like my phone, camera, iPod, whatever.  Pockets are always hard to find on running gear, don’t you think?  I decided not to do rolls while wearing it though, since the hydration bladder might burst.

Speaking of gadgets, this was the first outing with the new Garmin Forerunner 910XT.  I’d lost my Forerunner 305, and I think I bought the new one out of some kind of bout of self-pity/retail therapy.  After the workout I joked with someone that my dirty little secret is that I’m only into multi-sport fitness for the toys. Yet another gear review post for me to write, but I will say that I got up and running with it without having spent a lot of time to set it up beforehand.

The other bit of gear I stuffed into the vest pockets was a skipping rope.  As I’ve mentioned before, I’m interested in some of the benefits barefoot/natural running has to offer without being willing to go ‘all-in’ on the craze.  This video really caught my attention:

What struck me is that he’s actually going pretty fast and his technique looks much closer to ‘normal’ running than most stuff I’ve seen.  I have real problems not heel striking even when I’m actively working on this sort of thing, but I loved the idea of using the jump-rope to implement the ‘natural’ stride, so I gave it a try for around 100m or so on this workout.

With the spring coming, I’m looking forward to doing more Burbathlon workouts, and maybe getting some of my own video to share.

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More Family Exercise

My main ‘go-to’ circuit/strength workout is the the Spartacus Workout from Men’s Health.  It doesn’t require much other than dumbbells, and I can get it done in around 40 minutes, though it gets me sweating and breathing heavily like anybody’s business.  Last time I did the workout at home, Shark Boy was having a nap, but the Lightning Kid (4 months) was ready to rock.  My wife went out for a run, so I was watching him. I managed to keep him somewhat entertained with the following modifications to the Spartacus Workout:

Mountain Climbers:

Push-up Position Row:

Lunge and Rotation:

He weighs 12 lbs… perfect!

And when I’m on the bike trainer, I let him watch me.  He seems to find the noise and motion of the spinning wheels fascinating.  The trouble is, if I find myself tiring, and the cadence backs off, he starts to squawk of boredom.  He’s like a little coach not letting me slack off!

The Lightning Kid is lying on the mat on the far side of the bike.

There hasn’t been much snow in Southern Ontario this year, but when we got some, we managed to take advantage with a visit to the Mansfield Outdoor Centre.  It was our first time out cross-country skiing since we grew to a family of four.  We didn’t get too much mileage in, as getting the gear and kids into the car, driving there, and still meeting somewhat of a sane nap schedule limits time a fair bit, but I’m proud that we’re still getting out to do one of my favourite activities as a family.

Shark Boy in the Chariot, the Lightning Kid in the backpack carrier.

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100 Pushups

Family demands continue to outweigh both training and blogging, but I did find enough time to discover the 100 pushup program.  I’m sure consistency is key, but it looks like several sets of pushups (with 1 minute breaks) 3 times a week.

I did the initial test today and I can do 32 push-ups; that sounds about right.  I’m sure I used to be able to do more than 40, but I’ve been away from exercise for a few weeks, and away from strength and push-up based exercise for longer.  It may not seem triathlon-centric, but Steve Speirs, the program’s creator is a triathlete and ultra-runner (and dad!) so I’m game too.

I’ll log and tweet my progress, and if I get to 100, I’ll be sporting the ‘I did 100’ badge here at Iron Rogue.

UPDATE: Things haven’t been going well, and I’m not keeping up with the workouts.  I’m not going to quit, but I ‘ll have to restart from Week 3 Day 1.