Exercises to Remember

It snowed again this past week - the storm started on Thursday and lasted all day Friday. But it was slow and steady, light snowing without too much build-up. So, a nice storm. Today, when I got to the park for parkour it was mostly empty and looked like a winter wonderland. We spent class today climbing over things and swinging. One of the exercises was climbing down faster - which I got really fast by falling and landing on my back! Fortunately, there was all the fresh snow to pad my fall, and so I was totally fine. Then, just to make sure I couldn't do the move, I fell in exactly the same way again. The first time everyone was all worried, the second time they were like "did you learn nothing?" It was a good exercise because it had us moving our hands down first, then our feet, which is a little counterintuitive for me. You were meant to move hand, hand, feet. So you at least have two points of contact (not zero, which is not helpful.) Definitely something to practice.

Then we did underclings, which was fun. And, I actually was able to grab the bar from moving a bit, scrunch up my core, swing my legs through, and arc forward. Another one to work on.

For physical therapy we've moved to doing the Jane Fonda things standing up, with a band on the legs. But, they still need to be slow, and not to be too high. We also added bent knee monster walks. I have a tendency to point my feet to the side, but they have to point straight forward to be effective.

My nephew bought one of those bearded lizards and now he has to order cockroaches delivered to his home. That's just weird. For some reason the cockroach supply was low, so he had to get canned crickets.

Snowmen!

We did some good exercises in parkour that I want to remember - some fun and some that I think will be good for me. One was going up the handicapped ramp with hands on one metal bar and feet on the other, in an upside down V. Very tough on the arms (my weakest part!). I couldn't get all the way up, which made me sad. Definitely will work on that one until I can do it. We also did some jumping on the logs and I got all freaked out because there was snow on them, and a line of people behind me. At the end of class I finally brushed most of the snow off, and then I did it 3 times. But, I was annoyed with myself. And, we climbed on the shipping container and made snowmen. Which was pretty fun :)

For my PT exercises we added supermans, but only one leg at a time, slowly, and making sure that my hip is on the floor. And, really it's just the leg that I'm lifting, not the arms. When I really focus, I can feel my pelvis on the floor as my leg lifts, which is the right way to do the exercise. Also, we did the leg lift standing up - stand on one foot, lift the other to the side without leaning to one side or dropping the hip. It's super easy to do them with leaning and dropping the hip, but without, so hard.

At the end I am meant to stretch for 30 seconds on each leg x 2 - hamstring stretches. Which makes sense since my hamstrings are so tight!

I really notice how doing these exercises carefully makes a difference over doing them willy nilly, as it were. It makes me wonder how much more I could get from yoga if I did it more precisely. I'm going to do a little work on yoga form to see if I can make some improvements. Probably starting with updog, since I never really get a good stretch with it.

First Day of PT Exercises

My new physical therapist did not approve of 20 minutes of squatting. I mean, I regretted telling her that I did that yesterday because the reaction was intense and time-consuming. She had some good points, I think she was right, and honestly it wasn't my favorite activity - except that I did prove to myself that I can do crow.

Anyhow, my first two PT exercises are:

1. Bridge pose. Pressing my back flat on the ground then gradually rolling up to a point where my body is in a straight line. Then, slowly rolling down vertebrae by vertebrae. I've done bridge a million times before (always hated it) and I can now say conclusively that I was doing it wrong. Apparently, it's not about flinging your butt up as high and fast as possible, it's more subtle, and intense. I wonder if I do everything in yoga wrong? Later we will add in lifting one leg without dropping the hips and rolling down - which is hard.
2. Leg lifts lying on my side. Like Jane Fonda, but smaller, smoother lifts where the range of movement is only about a foot. This works the spot on my leg where I have a hip dip that I hate so much. Then, the same thing with the bottom leg.

I'm to start slow and do each exercise once a day, 20 times. I think I can do it.

More Skiing and Parkour

I decided to take the day off on Friday so I could go up to NH and spend the day skiing on a little bit bigger mountain. It's been a kind of crappy few weeks (except for the new president/VP, etc, that's been awesome) but I feel like I have to get out in the world a little more, as safely as I can. I figured a Friday of skiing would be pretty safe - not crowded lift lines or slopes. I was a little nervous about the weather because it called for snow showers and potentially rain, but it seemed like it would be OK, and so I decided to go for it. And I was so glad I did!

I went to pat's peak, which I like because it has longer beginner slopes, it's not too long a drive to get to, and you can get a discount voucher from rei. It was a perfect day for skiing - right around 32 degrees out, snowing - but big soft beautiful flakes, and not too many people on the slopes. I didn't haul myself out of bed to get there for the opening, but I started skiing around 10:15, which I was quite pleased with. I started with the long green circles and did several runs. There's this one area that always made me nervous last year, but this year I actually loved it! It could be because of the new snow, and therefore less ice. But, after a while, I realized I could probably do some of the blue squares - and I did! I was pretty psyched with myself - they were kind of similar to the black diamond I did last week. I'm getting a little more comfortable going faster, which I think is key to going down the steeper slopes. Also, the fact that there weren't that many other people was helpful, because I didn't have to worry about steering as much :). I did about six blue squares, including one that I had looked at last year and been sure I would never do! Now I'm addicted and want to go more.

I was at parkour today and we did this really fun activity where we jumped from two feet, turned 180 degrees in the air, landed on two feet on a curb, and then either held it or jumped off and headed back where we came from. Since I used to figure skate, this was actually an activity that I could do, and really enjoyed. And I thought I should practice more because it looked kind of cool. I realize that I should write things down so I remember what I want to practice. So, adding to the blog list - parkour stuff to remember. After we did our breakout sessions for practice, we did endurance where we squatted for 20 minutes without getting up!! OMG that hurt! I made it for about 7 minutes just squatting and then my leg was killing me, so I did some crow pose (which I was pretty psyched about, because I was having trouble with crow recently. But, I guess given the option to continue squatting or do crow, I was able to get it back...) At about 10 minutes I had to plank and down dog for about 30 seconds. And I crabwalked around for a bit. But I didn't stand up, which was good. Nevertheless, I will not be practicing that on my own.

Speaking of down dog, Saturday in parkour we practiced side kongs, and one of my classmates said that she thinks about getting her butt up like in down dog when doing them. And, that really helped! I think I'm super close to doing side kongs - I can do it physically I'm pretty sure, it's just mental. One day I will just forget or not thing about it, and do it. Also, it's on my practice list.

Oh, and also, my knee has been really sore and I'm worried that I will do something that really hurts it, so I went to a physical therapist who said that my tendon is strained and that my knee cap isn't tracking right because I don't use the big muscles in my leg right, partly because of my big toe. And, we will work on it with some boring stretches. And, we can fix it!