:Marina’s Training Blog

Posted by mashutka on August 12th 2008 to Uncategorized Digg! this story.

Since the beginning of the zone, I put my bathroom scale in the garage not to see it and to avoid the temptation of weighing myself over and over again. So, when I was out to work today, I decided to give it a try. My weight has shifted by 14lb in the negative direction… I was shocked. I actually thought it was a fluke, tried it again. 4 times. yeap. still the same number. On the other hand, it could have been much better if I had the ability to exercise as well… Since last Friday, I have been waking up at 3.30am in the morning because of excruciating pain in my back and my right leg… My physical therapist suspects an SI joint inflammation at this point, because my symptoms have completely changed from being good old disk problems. The exercises I was doing to alleviate my disk issues seem to have aggravated the SI joint even more. So we removed all of the exercises, and I am left with two stretches I am supposed to do on the right side only to correct the shift. I am off to see my general physician to figure out a way to sleep better, and to get suggestions as what can expedite my recovery…

I spent last night watching crossfit workouts on youtube… I miss it.  

No Comments

Posted by mashutka on August 03rd 2008 to Uncategorized Digg! this story.

I am writing this as I am eating my before the bedtime snack - pina colada cookie with sweet cheese. Yes. After spending the last several years learning about the bad and the ugly of dessert, I have been having it for the last (almost) 7 days and my tummy has been getting flatter every day.
The first 3 days I was pretty hungry between the meals, but I don’t anymore. I don’t crave anything. I don’t miss anything. I eat the food that is freshly prepared and portioned ahead of time. The only challenge I find with this is being in a social setting. For some reason all, and I mean it, ALL social occasions involve eating or drinking of some sort. So far, I have been successful avoiding most of it, but I wonder how long can I last.
My back is still in a pretty bad shape, so I have been swimming most of the days, sometimes twice a day to get some exercise in. I am pretty nervous about it, as I have a long vacation planned in the end of this month, and my flare ups usually last 6-8 weeks. Keeping my fingers crossed for a quick turnaround.

3 Comments

Posted by mashutka on July 30th 2008 to Uncategorized Digg! this story.

I haven’t had coffee (or any caffeine) in the last two days.
I haven’t had alcohol (well, with two cheats of having very little wine) since the beginning of June.
How come I am still alive?

So, I have been on the Zone diet since Monday, and here are a couple of observations

1. I get hungry for my meals. Something I haven’t experienced for a very long time, the feeling of hunger. My guess it is the 30% carbs in each meal that is doing it. I have been so protein and fat heavy in my diet, that 30% carbs is very unusual.
2. the meals are small, really small, the intervals between them are short. Currently the schedule looks
7.30am - Breakfast
11.30am - Lunch
2pm - Snack 1
6pm - Dinner
9pm - Snack 2
3. The overall the calorie intake based on my height/weight/goals is 1500/day, which I honestly can’t say is a lot in a 40:30:30 ratio. When I was almost carb free, I felt full on 1100.

No Comments

Posted by mashutka on July 27th 2008 to Uncategorized Digg! this story.

This week wasn’t a good one. My back injury has flared up (it has a tendency to do so once a year), and eliminated plenty of my daily physical activity. I have pretty bad impulses of pain going down my right leg, and I feel numbness around some part of my toes. The PT who has been able to “fix” me before is out for a month, but I am hopeful the person filling in for him is just as good. I tried going to the chiropractor, but I have been feeling consistently worse with each of the three visits, which proved me once again that chronic pain and chiropractors are rather incompatible.
At the CF I am trying to stay away from bending with heavy weights and deadlifts. Hoping I can still go on and recover at the same time.
Exciting news for tomorrow (which is in 7 min, btw) - I start the Zone.

1 Comment

Posted by mashutka on July 22nd 2008 to crossfit Digg! this story.

C: What do you want to work on today?
M: Lunges sound good.

3 gym lengths of lunges
20 back extentions
24 squats
4 rounds.

That was Monday. I walked out with my legs shaking. Little did I know I won’t be able to peel myself off the bed this morning. I try to go for short walks every 2-3 hours, and hope tomorrow is a better day!

No Comments

Posted by mashutka on July 21st 2008 to Uncategorized Digg! this story.

All the great things start on Mondays, don’t they?
I decided to start a fitness-only blog, separate from my over-crowded personal blog on livejournal, where I tried to write about what I’ve been up to for a closed group of people for a while now. That blog however was mainly concerned with my obsession of loosing weight. And then I got tired. No, don’t get me wrong, I still want to loose weight. But I realized (thank you, Heather) that I will never be “done” with it. So, I decided to switch gears and concentrate on becoming a better athlete instead. The road to making the switch was long and had lots of switchbacks, but thanks to the awesome coaches (Heather, Carrie - thanks for making my mornings hell) I am yet again on a straight path.

I started training at CFES with Carrie in June, and then I met Christine, who trains at the same time I do. Since I have known her, she has been putting on a disappearing act. The athletic boundaries that she crosses under Michael’s coaching are making me jealous:) So, I asked what was she taking doing to achieve that. Turned out she’s in the Zone. I am so inspired that I want to do it too!

I am so curious what happens to me next

3 Comments