"What do you have under your shirt Amy?!"
It was a strange question, a bizzare question but, as I pumped out my kettlebell swings and upright rows, it was a question even I started to ask myself.
"Maybe you should eat less spinach!" He added.
As of today, I now do kettlebell swings with a 12kg kettlebell and use a 20kg for my upright rows. I would have tried a heavier one for my rows but the 20kg is the biggest we got. For the past few months I've been focusing on circuit training, setting up a series of 5-7 exercises and doing them in a timed manner, like 30-40 seconds. I love circuits but because you end up doing many more reps than a usual workout, you have to use a weight that is a bit lighter. Today I made the switch back to supersets and 3 sets of 12 for my training which, as I found out, meant I had to turn in my 6kg for a 12kg kettlebell.
To the average person and perhaps to even my fellow gym-junkies, this may mean little to them but to me it was huge. And to my Hulkies watching me, I definitely killed their preconceived idea of me being a cute litte girl. I was like a machine, dang it, a crazy force to reckon with -- I was on fire!!!
I don't have a fight scheduled and I don't know if I will even fight again for the simple fact that I am way to preoccupied with training our members. It's really hard to coach members all day and then find the energy and time to do my own training -- keep in mind that I work12hrs a day, 5 days a week and Sunday I work 7hrs. Hence why I've been leaning on circuit training lately. They're shorter workouts but require full power so they're quite intense and have proven quite effective too considering the switch from a 6kg to a 12kg kettlebell.
I miss the ring. Watching our members train constantly reminds me that I so dearly miss the ring. I specifically miss the anticipation of the fight and all the slave labor training and mental exhaustion I drag myself through to get to fight day. But perhaps this is a sacrific I have to make to keep my business going at the rate it is. I always assumed it'd be best for me to continue fighting but now my training focus really is on my members. The fact that I had even switched to circuit training says it all -- I don't want to interrupt or take away from our members. They are our first priority.
Now that we're on holiday hours because of the school year, these days my "free time" is very limited. It basically consists of two hours in the morning and 1-2 hours after work, depending how exhausted I am. Snickers has an extra day off so randomly I go into work an hour or two later on sometimes so that I can run errands or go running. These days we have so many students on vacation coming to train so we're quite busy earlier on in the day. Most of our members are done and out of the club by 9:30-10pm but we stick around until 11:15pm just in case any late nighters come out. I initially wanted to leave Hulk's early, at 10pm, so that I could go running but after a full day of coaching and being chilled to the bone in the club, the only thing on my mind at closing is getting home to my electric heated blanket.
I'm assuming there's about ten weeks until the Cheonan Lee Bung Jo marathon -- it's usually hosted at the end of April, early May -- and I'm beginning to ponder upping my anticipated half marathon to the full. Ten weeks to prepare? That is the question though. My pro star running friend once told me the key to half/full marathon training is getting in your mileage, pacing isn't the main focus, but are nine weeks enough to get in the mileage?
I've done a few half marathons and I don't care to go do a 10km again. I wrote it on my new year's resolution list that this year I wanted to do my first full marathon. Cheonan has two yearly races, one in spring and one in fall, I would love to run my first here in Cheonan, at one of the two races here, not only because it's my Korean hometown but because we're anticipating bringing a solid group of Hulkies to the races like we did last year.
My next question about full marathon running seems a bit silly, I'll admit it, but what the heck am I supposed to do during the full marathon?! Run, ok, but seriously. I can keep my legs running but how do I keep my mind focused on the event and distracted from the fact that it'll probably take me about four hours. Do I listen to music like I always do despite the fact that I always end up counting my songs and becoming discouraged and bored consequently. Can I call someone and have a conversation to get me through it? Nah... not sure if my tracking app would still work let alone my phone battery last. Maybe a book on tape, do runners do that? I remember when I was younger and Sunday night I used to listen to "Theatre of the Mind" on the radio. It's a silly question, I know and I admitted that, but how the heck do I mentally keep myself going for the four hour run? WOW President kept me focused for my last half but he is definitely not interested in running a full with me and even laughs at the notion of doing so. Anticipating doing the race with anyone I know was out of the question, that is until I thought of Black Skinny, my former teammate.
My mission -- convince Black Skinny to run a full marathon with me.
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