Daily Archives: February 14, 2011

My elusive pull up

I really considered somehow tying this post to Valentine’s Day, but try as I might, I just can’t bring myself to publish any of the following titles.

  • An ode to pull ups
  • Oh pull ups, how do I love thee?
  • My love – the pull up

It just gets campier from there.

I wish that the pull up was something my husband could give me — all tied up beautifully in a little box — but it isn’t.  It’s something I have to give myself… AND I have to work for it.

I haven’t been doing as much pull up practice as the other stuff.  It’s been so cold that I haven’t wanted to go outside and jump on the bar.  But starting Saturday, I refocused on my goal — an unassisted pull up.  The above photo was taken at the end of a skills session for challenge participants.  Among the items we worked on — pull ups.

I really wanted to get my first one there at the skills session.  And I’m just a few inches away.  But no pull up.

Awww… sad.

I felt discouraged the rest of the day, which no doubt contributed to my major meltdown Saturday afternoon.

I’ve been working toward an unassisted pull up for the past two years.  TWO YEARS!  OK, OK — so pregnancy set me back a little.  But I’m back to where I was pre-pregnancy, and I’m ready!

There are less than 3 weeks left in this challenge.  I’m going to focus on pull ups and handstands.  Maybe one day I’ll get pull ups like this:

Running from lunges

I dreaded Sunday’s endurance workout.

I remembered it well from last year.  Pam and I had met at Lamar MS.  It was chilly and spitting.  And I remember feeling like I was going to keel over.

So heading out to Murchison to meet Beth and Stephanie was a little nerve-racking.  I was dying to get out — away from the baby who needed to sleep yet refused to allow herself to fall asleep and so she was crying.  A LOT.

An hour to go and torture myself?  OK. I’ll take it.

4 rounds
Tabata walking lunges (4 sets of 20 seconds work, 10 seconds rest)
400m run
Rest (1/2 time it takes to run the previous 400m)

It turns out my dread was unnecessary.  While this WOD was certainly no cake-walk (mmmmmm… cake), it wasn’t as dreadful as last year.  Pregnant Cindy and running did not get along.

The really awesome news?  I ran all of the 400′s in under 2 minutes.

Results:
Round 1 — 1:52
Round 2 — 1:48
Round 3 — 1:53
Round 4 — 1:52

Total WOD time — about 19:35

I’m sooooo happy with those times.  I stayed consistent.  That’s what I’m going for.

Now to just knock a few more seconds off my time.