And the crowd went wild.....

Today, was a hard day at the gym. My warm up was 20 minutes on the eliptical doing short sprints followed by high level slow intervals.... next up 30 floors on the stair climber and then some stretching. 5 minutes to catch my breath, and get my hands wrapped and my trainer was there to start a boxing workout. I should have known when he started the session with a big smile and then tells me "I'm gonna kill you today" that it wasn't gonna be pretty - and it sure wasn't.

lots of punching the bag, followed by punching sequences on the pads. He was really pushing my to be faster and punch harder. He kept pushing and pushing and I really felt myself get into a zone. I was moving, and hitting, and ducking and slipping. I did a total of 5 x 3 minute rounds and although it was hard, I kept finding ways to dig deep - in the past I would have been telling myself that I couldn't do it.... now I tell myself positive things - you are strong-you are capable- show them what you're made of - show them what you got! My trainer pushed me right to the last punch - In fact my last punch - right at the buzzer was not the greatest- so instead of finishing on that note- he pushed me to to a perfect combo - and I did, full of power.

Oh, where did the title of this post come from? When I box it's basically in the general population of the gym. I find it funny that people just stop what they're doing and watch us- Like really for a long time - To me that is the greatest thing, and not in any type of conceited way. I've hid myself away from the world my entire life, trying to make myself invisible so that I could avoid judgment for my size. When I box, I am so comfortable being out there- actually it's not just comfortable dare I say it's confidence.Phew, there I said it - CON-FID-ENCE baby! It's so nice to see these people watching me and I don't see any judgment in their face, I see admiration and awe.

At the moment I am trying to concentrate on the how great I felt this morning instead of focusing on how freaking sore my shoulders are- haha.

OMG I think I actually saw it...

After mountain biking on Sunday, I am completely covered in mosquito bites and I'm just super itchy. There is one spot on my back, just behind my arm pit that was really bothering me tonight and I went to the mirror to see if I could see where the bite was, and that is when I saw it.

My eyes wandered from the itchy surface and settled on the way my arm and shoulder looked.... I am talking cut, muscular and strong. The muscle from my shoulder to my traps were so defined it was breathtaking. I literally stood there for about 5 minutes amazed at how amazing my arm looked.

This is just a bit of a reminder to myself, that I do have a muscular, strong body hiding under the layers of fat. This excites me and motivates me to really, really get my eating under control so that this new me can finally start to emerge.....

Here is a pic of my arm today, although it doesn't do justice to what I was seeing in the mirror. I am going to take pictures of my arm every month until the end of the year and see what my progress looks like. Is that king of weird? Since my final fitness test is to step into a boxing ring and fight, I though showing my arms was a fitting measure - what do you think?



Here is a picture of my arms from a few years ago:

The Dreaded Man Cold!

Ever heard of that term. Apparenlty men become whiney when they are sick.... well I am not a man (in case you didn't notice) but I am probably the biggest suck to be around when I am sick. I went to the gym Wednesday morning, wasn't feeling great but not too bad either. Came home and showered and was driving to work when the cold and flu symptoms hit me like a ton of bricks! I still have the head congestion, you know where your entire face hurts, and the runny nose and fever- blargh. I was supposed to go check out a martial arts gym with my trainer last night which I am pumped to go see but had to cancel, and I had to cancel a date tonight which I was so looking forward too..... ok ok, I will stop whining..... I just hate being sick. Hopefully I can get in a workout tomorrow morning.

So speaking about working out, I have been wearing my body bugg when I work out to calculate calories burned. It's a little bit surprising to see the calorie burn when I think about how hard I work out but it is also interesting to see most activities, with boxing being the exception, burn between 275 and 300 per hour. Here is how my last six training sessions stacked up against my CN Tower climb:

CN Tower : 1 hr 10 min calorie burn 310

Weight cycle: 1 hour calorie burn 275

Cardio: treadmill 1 min intervals at incline 15, speed 3.5 and lunges in between sets - calorie burn 293

Boxing : conditioning, wearing 40 lb vest 1 hr calorie burn 495

Weight cycle: 1 hr - shoulder back and legs calories burned 277.

Cardio: 1 hr bike 10 k lv 5, rpm between 80 - 90, treadmill intervals lv 15, sp 3.5, calories burned 410.

Wow, I just downloaded wednesdays workout and the bike and treadmill gave me a great calorie burn, this is something I will look at doing myself when I go.

Finally, a fitness progress report..... Plank position- lol. when I started I could hold the plank position for oh about 5 seconds before collapsing in a pool of sweat on the floor..... Wednesday I did the plank position for 1 min 16 seconds yay!

Boxing and becoming an athlete

Well I boxed on Friday and had an amazing workout. I was feeling really good about the workout and how I was feeling. My trainer brought his camera in with him and taped one of the sequences. I didn't want to look at the video because in my mind I have a vision that I look amazing, cut like a boxer, strong arms and have perfect form. I know that is not reality, but that is what I imagine and my hope is that if I can see it, I will eventually be it -lol. So anyway I finally watched the video and was actually pleasantly surprised by how I look. Not great by any means, but really not that bad either. I am hoping to get a copy of the video and will post it here eventually.

I took Friday off of work and took my Nephew to my eye doctor to do his very last requirement to join the Canadian Armed Forces, and his vision is fine. He has completed all of the tests, all of the interviews and all of the paperwork and is official accepted into the army. He now has to wait until there is an opening in the artillery section which is now where you has decided to go. I am so proud of him. He has come such a long way and I look forward to watching him graduate from boot camp sometime in the coming year.

Finally, I went to my cousins house yesterday and saw lots of relatives whom I haven't seen since Christmas and it was so funny, and a bit surreal, that everyone now relates me to fitness. One friend of the family hugged me and then yelled out to everyone, "she just climbed the CN TOWER" while everyone cheered. My cousin and her husband were planning our upcoming triathlon and my cousin was asking me to help her pace herself in the pool, and another cousin, her husband, and her son, all specifially have me in mind to run a 5k race in June with my cousins son for crohn's desease as he was recently diagnosed, which of course I will do. It was just so strange and so wonderful to be looked at as an athlete, having my family look at me with pride and think of me as a bit of a role model for what can be accomplished.

Having a great weekend so far.... amazing date night on friday night, helped out a friend yesterday who was having a spa birthday party for her daughter, 1st communion party Saturday night and today, I am helping out my sister who is having a spa birthday party for my niece. I will be glad to get back to work tomorrow, just so I can rest!

One week until I climb- and last week in review

So by this time next week, I will be writing about my experience climbing the CN Tower. I feel very calm and confident about this challenge which actually is the biggest victory for me. I know I will make it, even though I know it won't be easy, I know I can do it, and this change of mind set is really amazing. This week at the gym I will be doing the stair climber on Monday, once again doing the equivalent of the tower..... Wednesday boxing (conditioning) and Friday the bike. Other than that I will make sure I am eating well this week, no eating out, no alcohol, and get lots of rest.

Last week was a disaster food wise, I think I ate out every night for a week. Luckily, my weight has not sky rocketed and I did try to make healthy choices at most of those meals.

Fitness wise, I am happy to report that I was able to actually spar with my trainer on Friday. He donned his boxing gloves and started teaching me blocking techniques. After getting clocked in the nose 2 times, I certainly understand the value of learning how to block punches. My trainer felt bad about connecting with my nose on two occasions (even though it didn't really hurt, but don't tell him that-lol) so much so that he texted me in the afternoon to see how my nose was..... I replied not to worry, I was fine...... and then added that the Dr. said the broken nose would heal nicely and the black eyes should be gone within a few days- hahaha, I am such a shit!

Personally, every thing is going well, I am enjoying the company of friends and looking forward to getting out and mingling a bit more as the warm weather approaches.

My next fitness challenge is.......

So this morning started out as a regular training session at the gym. We were boxing and working on punching combinations like we always do on Fridays...... and that's when it happened.....

My trainer said "you know what your next fitness challenge should be once you finish your triathlon" My first thought was I had two goals the 5k and the try a try and I never really though past those, so he said " we should put you in a ring for a boxing match" ***insert the sound of a needle scrathing across a record here***** whoaaaaaa, whoaaaaaa, whoaaaaa, wait a second, was I hearing him correctly???

So I stopped to ponder whether or not I was up for this challenge for a quick second (what was running through my mind was my favorite phrase "I can't" and then "your 43 fricken years old" way to old to box) and then a huge grin spread across my face and I thought "fuck yeah" I am up for this challenge!

So it is something on the back burner at the moment, just a new goal, simmering in my head. Just one more thing that I never imagined doing, that is now slowly taking form in my head as something that not only I think I might be able to do, but something I look forward to training hard for and possibly doing pretty well at, as well as a 43 year old with a wicked left hook can do anyway :)