August 13

Griff and I had a fabulous workout at PrimeTime: half hour on the treadmill and half hour on weight machines. I jogged 3.5 mph for 10 minutes. That is bookin for me. I found my legs to be tight 10 minutes into the half-hour and remembered one time discovering that if I go too slow I actually have a harder time loosening up. So I did some 4 mph sprints and settled in. Of course Griff is WALKING beside me at 4 mph with some hill ta-boot.

I showed him how to use the LifeCircuit machines, which are the simplest because you don't have to set your weight, it does it for you. I showed him how to keep his body square with the machine, told him form was the most important thing in weights because it helps you 1) maximize your workout and 2)keep from injuring yourself. I showed him how to decrease the weight if the machine set it too heavy. At one point he was struggling and twisting body and face around to lift and I repeated, Form is everything. Drop the weight until you can do it in perfect form. "But I did the last set at this weight."

"You need to set your weights so you can do all three sets at that weight. Otherwise, it's too heavy, and the amount of weight is not what matters--FORM matters."

At which point he looked at me suspiciously and said, "how do YOU know all this stuff??"

"I worked out 2x/week with a personal trainer for almost 2 years," he seemed surprised to hear from me.

I worked out with Deanna Jones about 10+ years ago, a good friend and lovely woman. She taught me a lot about listening to body and exercise, how to hold the bars so you don't get injured, and she was a freak about going into and out of a machine or weight slowly and deliberately. She said actually more injuries happen from carelessly twisting while coming out of a weight set.

She had me up to 13 miles jogging. I was about 40 pounds lighter then. She taught me to "shuffle," what she called it, and it was her belief that the slow jog is really good for your holistic system, that the pumping motion helps your digestive and lymphatic systems et al. She's not a scientist, I have no idea where she got these ideas. All I know is that I feel more stress from fast walking that slow jogging.

Sadly, Curtis' day was too busy and he didn't get to do his hour. He did walk to Kinkos and back, he said.

Lunch

tuna salad sandwiches

nuts and apples

Dinner

Spaghetti and cru d te

can't find that on google, have no idea if I spelled it right.