Finally… My 9 Week Results

At the beginning of the 9 Week Challenge there were eighty, that’s right(!), eighty participants that decided to take the challenge to better themselves and see what they could do to improve their health, strength, nutrition etc.  Here we are now at the end of the 9 weeks and where oh where is everyone?!

I refuse to even mention the excuses made by the people that wanted to do the challenge – but didn’t.  And I refuse to mention the reasons why some fell off the wagon and couldn’t treat their bodies well for 9 weeks because those who know me know; my # 1 pet peeve is negativity! I had a broken foot for gawd sake!

I didn’t meet one of the goals that I had set for myself, but gosh darn it, I am still proud of the results of today’s testing and had I not kept plugging away at training… you know what would have happened?  First and foremost, I would have let myself down!  I would have let my students down and I would have been a depressed mess.  Exercise keeps the mind, body and spirit strong!  Aren’t you worth it enough to take care of yourself the best you can?  You’ve only got one body.

Okay…  Enough preaching.  Here’s the dirt:

Original weight: 140.4 lbs,  End Weight: 135.4 lbs =  5 lbs weight loss

Original Chin Ups: 13,  End Chin Ups: 17 = Increased by 4

Original Push Ups: 60, End Push Ups: 66 = Increased by 6

I have to state right here and now that I was sorely disappointed in the push ups at first because my goal was 75.  The flexibility in my toes is really bad right now and it’s painful to do push ups with both feet down.  My goal was 75 because I’ve done 72 push ups in 60 seconds.  I figured that I should be able to do at least that in this challenge.  What I wasn’t taking into account was that you cannot pause between your push ups in this challenge; you have to have a steady flow of movement… With the 60 second drill it is simply how many you can do in the allotted time.  So?  Maybe not quite as bad as I initially thought, it’s an entirely different way of doing the drill.

I am going to put together a much different challenge for the Fall.  And in hindsight, I will not allow the participants to go so long “unchecked”.  I think that next time the participants should have frequent re-testing to keep them on track.

Do I deserve the new T-Shirt I’ve had in hiding?  Did I do well enough?  Looking at the “after” photos, I think so, yes! I’ll have to get Joey to take a photo of me in “THE SHIRT” so I can add it to this blog…

Congrats to everyone that has come in for the re-testing!  The increased strength, sensible weight loss and toning looks great on you all.  You’ve done yourselves proud and your body good!

Cheers to that!

 

A Workout of a Different Sort

I’ve had a very pleasant interruption to my “regular” training recently and thus the reason for having been remiss in writing and updating my blog.  I’ve moved!

Packing up a spacious two bedroom apartment lived in by two people that apparently collected a whole lot of “stuff” over the past few years, was quite a chore!  We moved from an apartment into our very first home together (a cozy 3 bedroom townhouse), and it literally felt as though it was a house move into another house move! It’s a huge task when both legs are functioning properly… It’s even worse when one leg is out, but the move is done and most everything that we wanted unpacked is unpacked and all is well again…

I had taken some photos of the mountains of boxes that I packed and maneuvered around by hopping on one leg, but they really weren’t that exciting to post.

Hard to believe that we are already at the end of the 9 Week Challenge!  Testing will take place Sunday 10:00am – 2:00pm and again on other dates TBA.  It will be great to see where everyone is at.  I myself am finally back to walking too!  Now it seems crazy that it was a whole 56 days ago that I broke my foot.  When I was in the midst of teaching and training by hopping on one foot or utilizing my crutches it seemed agonizingly slow.  Now I’m thinking “where did the two months go?!”

And of course, with the Challenge now coming to an end, I’ll have to decide shortly what will become of this blog…  But that will have to wait for another day!  Today was just an update on where I have been, soon I will be updating on the successes of myself and the others and then we’ll go from there.

Got to admit that I’m already thinking of ways to improve upon this current challenge and will be dreaming up an even better one for the fall!  Isn’t it great to push yourself and see how far you can go, no matter what falls in the way of your path?  I think so.

I’m not certain that I’ve earned the right to wear the new T-Shirt that I talked about in an earlier post.  The goal was to get in the best shape possible, even though injured, so that I would be able to wear my cheesy (but fun!) shirt with pride  

I will see how the conquering of the testing goes and how well I do.  I can’t just break out this little reward for myself unless I feel that I really deserve it. You’ll know what I mean when I finally unveil the shirt… Lol.