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Since I last wrote, I've been doing a bit more of the P90X inspired workouts. I had been hesitant to start full bore into it, primarily due to my persistent knee issues, but also due to the fact that from the reviews I'm reading, I just might not quite be ready for it just yet.

And I recall with painful clarity what would likely happen if I start out with something too much too fast. Every time I take a step.

So I've been kind of noodling around, doing smaller version of the workouts, making sure I don't take off more than I can chew. Where the exercises use only bodyweight, I've been probably doing about a fourth or less of what I'm probably capable of, and very gradually working my way up. Where weights are called for, I've been taking it very light. I've also been avoiding the Plyometrics, the Cardio-X, the Yoga-X, and the Kenpo-X - all to avoid further damaging my knees.

But then I read something that made me change my mind a bit - at least with the Plyometrics, I've read that there are versions presented that have lower impact for those with bad knees.

So it sounds like I have less of an excuse to continue completely avoiding them.

I've done the shoulders and arms workout, basically doing various shoulder presses, biceps curls, and triceps work - but only one complete circuit (including the bonus round!). I've also done the Abs routine, and am slowly adding to the reps I do of each exercise. And I've done the Chest and Back routine again, but again with a very limited number of reps, and only one circuit.

I'll probably continue this approach, and try the other workouts I've been avoiding, and then probably launch into the grueling 6 day a week schedule.

It seems my hundred pushups plan as well as the couple of pyramids I did over the last few months at least has me to the point where I'm not sore after these workouts.

And the physical therapy that I've been doing seems to have adequately prepared my core muscles for the "Ab Ripper X" routine. At least the abbreviated version I'm doing.

I go back to physical therapy Monday so they can check in on the progress of the healing of my knees. They're slowly getting better - I can usually walk without limping, and I seem to be able to get up and down the stairs pretty well. But there's a few movements that seem to still jack up the pain so I'm nearly gasping with the suddenness and sharpness of the pain.

Pretty soon I'm really going to have to stop procrastinating and take some measurements so that I have more than just general "get rid of the fat" goals I can shoot for.

So it seems I'm going to wait a while before I can start running again. At least, I hope it's only a while, and not forever.

I think my biggest problem was being on pain medication for my back while I started becoming a bit of a runner. Naproxen sodium masked the pain of my back, and most likely my knees. And then the prescription ran out, and I didn't feel like being on pain medication anymore, so I stopped taking them. And then the knee pain starts. But instead of being just gradual, it hits me like a ton of bricks. And the knee "damage" probably just started because like with most things exercise related, I did too much too fast.

C'est la vie.

My physical therapist seems to be helping me work through the recovery, but it still seems slow.

But that certainly leaves my upper body free for abuse.

So I started doing a little something inspired by P90X, and a fairly decent follow on to my recent spate of push ups and chin ups. I can't really launch into the full P90X program due to my knee issues. For now.

It's been a few weeks (already?!) since I even did my pyramids, so I took it a little easy and did a few each of standard push ups, military push ups (narrower hand position with elbows tucked in next to the body), wide push ups, decline push ups, diamond push ups, and dive bomber push ups. Everything but the standard was a nice challenge, because I had never done them - and honestly I wasn't sure if I'd be able to do them, because I knew that a few of them were tougher than the standard. Yet another reason why I didn't do very many.

I also did a few each of wide grip, overhand pull ups, regular chin ups, and close grip overhand pull ups. Again a fun challenge - I had never done the overhand variety, and thought they'd be substantially harder and possibly out of my reach. But they weren't :)

I also did a few latissimus dorsi, rhomboid, and rear deltoid lifts with light dumbbells.

I'll probably be a little sore from this for the next few days. But maybe not too bad.

As far as my knees, I'll be taking it really easy, alternating compression (from cho-pat straps) and icing, and some easy stretching and very light leg extensions and leg curls.

So I ran again last night, hoping that my physical therapist was right - that I ought to be able to continue my run/walk routine without doing anything Bad to my knees.

But sadly, it seems that is not the case.

Or perhaps I'll feel better tomorrow or the day after.

Regardless, I'm having a lot of trouble walking around today, especially descending stairs.

Not good.

At any rate, I had been having fun charting new routes for running.

Here's where I ran last night:

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It's about 2.56 miles according to Google maps, but my Timex GPS says 2.698 miles. Of course, my Timex GPS suggested that I was running at 11 mph, too. So I'm still not sure how much faith to put in its measurements.

I was concentrating on widening my gait/stride/stance/whatever. So I was also jogging a little slower. All of which seemed to really fire up my tibialis anterior muscles. The ones near the front, but to the outside, of my shins. Which is fine - normally at physical therapists, if I get a really good fast pace going on the treadmill, I feel some lactic acid buildup in those. Fine, I'm probably just hitting some muscles I don't hit that often.

I got home and stretched, and then iced my knees. You know, as a preventative measure.

But then I woke up today, and I'm just having a lot of trouble moving around.

So I think I'll hold off on additional running for a little while. Because I need to be able to walk.

:(

I'm taking a break.

Yesterday I was fairly sore. A little too sore. More sore than I thought was reasonable.

In fact, I had to do a light jog to cross the road on the way to work this morning and my knees kind of hurt. So I started googling.

I thought maybe I had patellar tendonitis based on the pictures and descriptions there - the inside of my legs below my knees was hurting. Right on the big knobby part of my tibias. The tibial tuberosity? Something like that.

Maybe, maybe not.

So I made sure I talked to my physical therapist about it, and he determined that perhaps I was doing the whole running thing a little wrong. Like, here I've been running along on sidewalks and park paths, when in fact my feet are so in line that I could've been running on a balance beam or a tightrope without any changes to my gait. Which probably isn't a good thing. Which was most likely irritating my knees.

I had to run a bit for him, both the bad way as well as the 'right' way, and it felt OK to be running, but later in the evening I was still feeling pretty stiff.

So I figured I'd just play it safe and hold off for the night.

Tomorrow's another day.

I didn't do a single solitary thing yesterday. Walking was enough.

My quadriceps and gluteals were so sore from those crazy walking lunges that I had trouble just moving around. Yesterday. Today I just felt a little stiff. I was also (a little surprisingly) sore from my last pyramid set. All considered, resting on Tuesday was probably wise.

Physical therapy today was fine - my regular sadist was out, so today I just had a physical therapist who I guess had pity on me and basically had me do a lot of stretching, and showing me a few new core exercises.

Which left me plenty of energy for running this evening!

I did the 9 intervals of 60 seconds jogging and 90 seconds brisk walking, and I kept careful count of how many times I got around the park - a little over 5. So after mapping it out, I see I travelled about 1.81 miles. In 22.5 minutes. Which is an average of 4.8 mph. Roughly.

Same boring route:

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Assuming all my jogging and walking speeds were constant with each other, and assuming I was walking about 3.5 mph, 9 sets of intervals made up 1.81 miles. Each set made up about .201 miles, or 1061 feet. Walking at 3.5mph for 90 seconds should be about 460 feet, which means I ought to have covered about 600 feet in a minute. Which is about 6.8mph.

So now I know about what speed I'm jogging. With a lot of assumptions thrown in there.

Continuing on this line of thought, at that pace I might be able to run a 5k (which is about 3.1 miles) in about 27 minutes.

August 27:

Back to the physical therapist today. Today they did something to my back - it felt like they were trying to dislocate my shoulder blade. But it sounds more painful than it was - it was primarily just a weird feeling. They also had me do a bunch of shoulder stuff, and some triceps stuff. Which I'm hoping won't get too much in the way of...

Push ups: Week 5, column 2, day 2. 17 then 17 then 16 then 16 then 14 then 14 then 12 then maxed out at 20. Rested about 45 seconds between sets for a total of 126 in about 7 minutes, give or take.

Chin ups: Week 1, column 3, day 2. 12 then 12 then 10 (these are getting pretty tough) then 9 (yeah, not too many more, but then I still) maxed out at 8. Barely. Rested about 90 seconds between sets for a total of 51 in about 8 minutes.

And then I noticed that I'm somehow out of Ensure™ bottles, which I was using as a post-workout protein shake. I was pretty sure I had some left. So, it appears that someone absconded with them. It totally couldn't have been me that took the last one and forgot about it. So I had to resort to some yogurt, which - now I'm not sure if it's the brand, or what, but - didn't taste all that great.

August 28:

Physical therapy today. My physical therapist is a sadist. The first half wasn't so bad, pretty much the standard stuff - treadmill, arm bike, stretches, light abs, shoulder, and gluteal work. But then I had to be in a pushup stance and walk my hands up onto a step and then back down. 30 times. And if that wasn't bad enough, then I had to hold a plank on a stability ball for 30 seconds. Twice. And then a set of stability ball roll-ins - uh, it says on that page that they're an "advanced" exercise? Sheesh. Let's not forget that just the day before, I did some triceps pulldowns in physical therapy and then went home to do 126 pushups. And boy, are my arms tired. No desire, motivation, or energy to do absolutely anything at home afterwards.

August 25:

Went to the physical therapist again. They're really tearing up my shoulders and back. Which is good, because that's what they've determined I need help with. I still had a lot of back pain from my work day - the CTA, my stupid Herman Miller Aeron chair (how this thing is supposed to be comfortable I'll never know), adjusting my desk, trying to sit with good posture, and then the CTA ride home all did a number on me.

So about that chair. I used to only slouch at my desk, reclined in my chair, etc. But that's bad. Even though it feels so good. So I'm forcing myself to keep my chair upright, legs and hips at around 90 degree angles - but something's not quite right. It feels bad, even though the Aeron chair is supposedly one of the most ergonomic chairs out there. I guess. Sure doesn't seem at all comfortable to me. Then, I realize that my desk is too high. So I brought in some allen wrenches to lower my desk. Did that, and now my arms are at a more appropriate angle.

But now there's another problem. My monitor height. Which is easy enough to fix, but the issue there is that it's a giant 30" monitor - so it's hard to get it to a height that feels right for the majority of the things on my screen.

It's pretty pathetic - nice chair, decent desk, nice monitor, but it feels like hell on my body.

At any rate, after physical therapy, I thought I'd be feeling pretty beat up - especially with the work on my core muscles (including my lower back) - but it's actually a little energizing. So energizing, in fact, that I felt really ready to jump right into...

Push ups: Week 5, column 2, day 1. 35 then 28 (oh wow, these are really hard today) then 20. I collapsed about 4 times near the end of the last set. Each time I collapsed, I rested at most 2 seconds, and did another 2 before collapsing again. I have no idea why I couldn't do these today. 80 in the course of about 4 minutes. This is the worst I've failed in ... well, ever. It was my triceps that gave out. I think I'll give 5-2-2 a try on Wednesday. But I'm thinking I'll likely have to redo this week.

Chin ups: Week 1, column 3, day 1. 10 then 10 then 8 then 6 then maxed out at 7. Rested about 60 seconds between sets for a total of 41 in about 6 minutes. Fairly tough, but I did it. And hit the target, even on the max out set.

Then I went back and did another set of 20 pushups. Which amazingly enough felt OK. I didn't quite max out, but stopped a few shy of it. Then I typed up most of this entry (starting from the push ups section - not quite the whole thing :) and then did another set of 30. So now I suppose that 130 in about 30 minutes, or so. I forget when exactly I started. After another brief rest and after I chugged down a protein shake, I briefly considered doing some more. But I thought I was pushing my luck.

BTW, it occurs to me that a few (or more?) days ago I mentioned something about "Oh, I don't need to do any ab work since blah blah blah" and yet here I am complaining about the abuse my transverse abdominal muscles are taking at the hands of the physical therapist. Suffice it to say that the crunches I was doing hardly hit all of my abs. Especially not the ones that are apparently weak. I'm doing little more than tensing the muscles and doing some leg lifts, and that's enough to make me sore.

I was sore the next day, so I skipped the kettlebell.

August 15:

I almost skipped today. I went to see the doctor, taking public transportation, and the bus was really crowded. Which made me stand the whole way. Which made my back hurt a lot more. Which is a little ironic, since I was going to the doctor to help alleviate my back pain. We also had another nanny interview, which made me not be able to rest my back after I got home. Long story short, my back hurt, and I wasn't sure it would stop hurting before I had to go to bed. But it ended up feeling good enough, so I went ahead and did my...

Push ups: 27 (oh wow, my inner upper arms are kind of sore today, but) then 21 (not so bad this time around, but still not great, but) then 21 (kind of running out of gas towards the end there, and) then 18 (oh you gotta be kidding me, there's another set after this?) then maxed out at 25. The minimum, I might add. Rested about 90 seconds between sets for a total of 112 in about 8 minutes. No idea how I got the max on the last set.

Chin ups: 9 then 8 then 6 then 5 then maxed out at 7. Resting about 90 seconds between sets for a total of 35 in about 7 minutes. Lisa went to bed early, so I had to move the chin up bar to a shorter door. So these were a little easier, since I let my feet hit the ground after each chin up. I wonder if I could have done as many on the taller door upstairs...

Wee bit of bad news about going to the doctor today. They weighed me, and my weight appears to be the same. Granted, this is just after a hearty lunch, and it was a different scale, and I was wearing all my clothes (which I haven't been at home), so this may not necessarily be an accurate reflection of my real weight. But I guess I was secretly hoping I had lost maybe a pound or two in the four weeks I've been doing this. And of course it's not pounds that matter - I would happily weigh 10 pounds more if it were all muscle.

August 16:

I got out on my bike. I had to hurry back, because Lisa had somewhere to go, and I needed to watch Matthew. So instead of the circuitous route I took to get there, I took as close to a straight line as I could. Also, I had completely forgotten that this weekend is the Air and Water Show along the lake, so it was really unwise to go down the lakeshore bike path starting around Armitage. It was wall to wall people, none of whom had any idea that people might be using the bike path for - you know, biking?

I really wish I had the opportunity to go a little further, because I'd really like to keep steadily increasing the mileage of my rides. And it's also been a few years since I've been down the Lake Shore Bike Path, especially further south than McCormick Place. But I did get down to Shedd Aquarium and Adler Planetarium.

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August 13:

I stayed home from work in the morning to take Lisa back to the oral surgeon, but I found myself with a little extra time to make up for missing kettlebell last night. So I did the three circuits, hopped in the shower, and went to the oral surgeon with Lisa. She's doing fine, BTW. The swelling has gone down a lot and she only has a little bruising on her cheeks.

Later in the evening, it was time for my push ups and chin ups. I plan to do week 4 day 1 column 3 for push ups, and I figure I'll try to do week 1 column 2 again on chin ups.

Push ups: 27 then 20 then 20 then 17 then maxed out at 23. Rested about 60 seconds between sets, for a total of 107 in about 7 minutes.

Chin ups: 7 then 5 then 5 then 4 then 5. Resting about 60 seconds between sets, for a total of 26 in about 6 minutes. I could hardly do the last two of the four and the last three of the last five. But I took a rest for a beat or two, then gave it my all. So I hit all the targets today, but just barely.

And I rested August 14th, too. And I swear it's completely unrelated, but I'm finally going to go to a doctor to see about my back pain. I really just wanted to go to a physical therapist, but they seem to only accept "patients" with "prescriptions" from "doctors" for physical therapy. I just don't want my doctor giving me drugs. Ibuprofen is about all I'm willing to take, but I can't keep taking it like I have been lately.