Not sure about you, but whenever I see any of these three commercials. My mind just goes a mile a minute with

- Boy do I feel out of shape just watching those people (and I’m not out of shape)
- Have I, Did I workout today, If not then I’m heading back to the gym
- My bad shoulder starts to ache

What IF I did not go on my trip, I would be closer to/at my goal weight
IF I was not recovering from a shoulder injury, where would I be in my fitness goal
What IF I was paddling on another team, would that help me get closer to my goals
IF only I was that much closer to my goal weight
I cannot let stress run my life

Sure, I was hoping to be a lot closer to my goal weight by now but at least I can see it in sight and I know I am a lot stronger then I was and my endurance level has improved. But at the same time I’m happy that my shoulder is allowing me to do more with it, ex. I am able to increasing the weights at the gym and even being able to paddle on both sides (of the boat) which has made me very happy, I hated being only able to paddle on one side .

The plan is now to get more focused and use yesterday’s weight in as a benchmark for how far I’ve gotten and how close I am to my goal weight. Now to make sure I don’t fall off that diet like I did last week (thanks to a ex)

With the weather being so nice, I decided that after practice I’d go to a local high school track to work on some sprints but when I got there the place was placed. Came home and bought out some cones to do some sprint drills. I hope I didn’t damage the grass

Fast forward to Sunday, I spent the afternoon in Whistler as I was taking part in Whistlers Sliding Centre’s public bobsleigh ride. It was something I have always wanted to try/do but wasn’t willing to spend money and fly to Calgary to do it. We all sign in and get weighted with our shoes/jackets and try on helmets. After a quick intro we get dropped off at the novice start (curve 7) meet our drivers and climb into the sleds. I’m not sure who got the fastest time/speed but all I know that the sled I was in, got up to 127.8KM/Hr and it took us 43 seconds to get from the novice start to the finish line (9 curves later). I’d definitely do it again but maybe next time as a push athlete/brakeman were I don’t have to see where I’m going ..

The other day I got there a few minutes early like I normally do, and I noticed my trainer shuffling a deck of playing cards at the personal trainer desk area. At first I’m thinking he might have some free time or something been clients. So after my 15 minute warm up on the stair climber. He met up with me afterwards to mention what we were gonna do for that day.

As he explains instead of doing four sets of 15 reps per exercise, I’d be doing whatever number he pulled from the deck of cards so anything from 1-5 was 11-15 reps and 6 to King was 6 to 12 reps though if he pulled a Jack of spades it was the wildcard and it meant I had to do 20 minutes on the stair climber with the increase the speed by 5.

It seems like its gonna be a simple workout, you think as it’s just four things with so many reps etc.. But the non-stop movement between doing crushes and hamstring curls with the exercise ball, step ups on a plyo box and a few chest presses on the machine. I felt like I had the wind kicked out of me, I mean I barely had time to breathe before I was back doing step ups again or doing crunches against the wall. But thankfully I only had to do the “wildcard” once and it was near the end of the session. But at the time I was back on the stair climber I was cursing at myself because I warmed up on the stair climber. Do have to say he kicked my butt hard!

But what doesn’t make you weaker makes you stronger!

PGN written in the sand

Near the end of the trip, we did find ourselves at a different beach almost every day. It was really nice to be able to enjoy the summer like weather by doing something other then being stuck in a building sightseeing and or drive from point A to B to C all the time. Since I wasn’t really keeping up with my dryland training (crunches,jogging etc) I just used going to the beach to be my dryland training with some swimming, I also mixed it up a bit by doing some body surfing when I wasn’t able to rent a bodyboard.

Some of the beaches we went to were jammed packed with people and others had barely anyone on them which was quite nice as your not always dealing with huge crowds. We did a lot of our swimming when we were traveling along the Eastern coastline/Indian Ocean. I do have to say it was really nice to be swimming in a warm ocean for once. Having brought my Chawel towel with me on trip, I found that changing on crowd beaches a lot easier then having to wait to use a change room.

My Best Friend and I, after a few hours of swimming

An afternoon of Body Boarding

The last time I ventured to the Oval was for a paddling clinic before the 2010 Olympics and on Sunday I was given a chance to take part in a BC bobsleigh/skeleton talent camp.

Right around the mid paddling season point, I came up with this goal/fitness challenge of taking part in a talent camp, if I made it sweet if not I was able to make it that far. The original goal was to enter one next year but after a few bobsledders I know egged me on to do it this year. Do have to say that it was a great learning curve and now I know what I need to work which would also help with my paddling.

It was really nice to be part of a small group of 8 (12 people signed up though) people instead of a huge group of 30+, this way you aren’t waiting around to long. Being the only female who took part did suck as I wasn’t really able to gauge myself against my own gender and all the guys having true track backgrounds which also didn’t help but at least they didn’t laugh at me.

Now the waiting game begins as I wait for my results.

How was your long weekend?

Comment for a Cause (C4AC) is back for it’s 3rd year. C4AC is my way to raises funds & awareness. This year I’ve picked Right to Play as my charity of choice. Each comment this site gets equals $1 that I will be donating at the end of the month.. Don’t forget to keep up to date by subscribing to my rss feed

Since signing up for pilates as an extra workout routine I’ve noticed that I’m more flexible then I thought and it’s helped improved my rotation with a longer reach when I’m paddling. I’m kicking myself now because I really wished I signed up for a class when I moved out here two years ago instead of the other day since the gyms out here are over priced and aren’t well kept up. With that being said I’m really pleased with my outcome so far in the class, can’t wait to see the full results by this summer when the classes end.. I just wish it wasn’t so pricey

Other then that nothing much else is new other then I can’t wait for this Saturday, the boat I paddle on is in our 2nd regatta of the season.. I’ve never been on a team that’s been to it so this is gonna be fun and interesting I just hope that the weather gods bring out the sun instead of pouring buckets of rain like it did last Saturday.

With that being said I think it’s time for bed and I’m please I get to sleep in tomorrow since I don’t have to get up early and cover a route.. YAY!

Comment for a Cause (C4AC) is back for it’s 3rd year. C4AC is my way to raises funds & awareness. This year I’ve picked Right to Play as my charity of choice. Each comment this site gets equals $1 that I will be donating at the end of the month.. Don’t forget to keep up to date by subscribing to my rss feed

For the last while, I just found heading to the gym or even working out at home isn’t doing for it for me anymore.. It just feels like I’m doing the same boring thing over and over again even if I changed something. So after a lot of thought and googling I found a pilates studio that’s about 15 minutes from my house, so tomorrow morning (err in a couple hours) I’ll be taking in my 1st pilates class (signed up for 15 weeks). I’m looking forward to be working out in a different way and not be waiting in line for a treadmill or the weights.

My goal isn’t to have a killer beach body by the summer but to be able to compete the skill tests that you need to do if you want to join the national bobsledding team. The one part of that test I’m NOT looking forward to is the running since I’m not a runner, no matter what if I truly try out for the team or not, I see this as a great cross trainer for my paddling.

What’s driving you to your fitness goal?

Over the years I have wished we had one out here for the longest time to help spice up our training, as well who wouldn’t want to be indoors paddle instead of being outdoors being hailed on? (Been there done that, no more thanks). A paddler friend of mine from Montreal told me that I should attend one of their indoor paddling practices anytime I want to head out east.

Now I can say we finally got a paddling tank out west! That’s in one of the 2010 Olympic venues buildings that worked along side with a Rowing and Paddling Centre and they designed a paddling tank inside the building, for their rowers and us paddlers (dragon boaters, outriggers and other canoeists). It’s got a boat structure of an 8 person skull or a 10 man canoe/dragon boat (dragon boat team normally has between 20-26 people).

Thier website did not have much information about this paddling tank and even in the email I got back from them saying no more then 10 people in the room. So there goes my idea of having 10 people in the structure and rest of the team on the edge of the deck.

On Saturday I was offered a chance to be in the first dragon boating paddling clinic being that was put on by my coach, in the clinic there was only five people in it so we got more one and one time in the hour that we had then we would have if we had a full boat of 20 paddlers out on the water doing the expect same thing. More pictures on flickr.

It would be interesting to see how much will be changed in the paddling tank once the Olympics is over. I know they will be putting up the mirrors then and adding a video system but not sure what else. A few of us noticed when we first stepped into the boat structure that there wasn’t anything for our feet to go against and if you weren’t careful there were lag bolts sticking up from the corner of the bottom. Hopefully that gets fixed or looked at.

Now we got to wait until April before they re-open up their doors again to the public.

If I had to rate this venue out of three out of five paddles. As not 100% finished and its more of a rowing tank not a paddling tank but it is something.

I’m thinking about take up land paddling (a long board with a kahuna big stick) as my cross trainer this off season instead 6man outrigger, I’m looking forward not having to travel an hour to/from get to practice especially on those crappy nights.

It may not be the correct stroke that I do but from the videos I’ve been looking at, you can get a lot of good top arm drive, the whole body gets a workout and just think about the balance one can get from that too. Using this and my other core exercises would for sure help strengthen my core muscles that I lost due to the surgery I had back in April.

I want to be on the A boat next year, which means there is a lot of work a head of me to do.

What do you do the spice up your exercise routine?
Would you use a sport to strengthen another sport?