Yay! I did it! I achieved my goal for the Paleo Challenge: 12 (consecutive) Kipping Pull-ups!!!
Ok, so now that I achieved my goal for the Paleo Challenge, I’m officially cashing it in with the diet part of it. I was never super strict with the diet to begin with (hence, the peanut butter, French fries, cake, and wine), so I was getting super low scores every week and just not really into it. I hate putting labels on things and drawing lines about what I can and cannot eat. It’s just not for me, so I’m done with it.
I know I’ve been all over the place with what I’m eating and not eating (Project Get Better —> Paleo Challenge —> Enjoy Your Life), but it was only because I felt so crappy [insert colitis joke here] and just wanted to feel well again. The drugs weren’t working as quickly as I wanted, so I thought maybe changing my diet would help things along. Eating more of a Paleo diet definitely made me feel better and I think it helped my digestive system, but there’s no way to really know since I’m taking drugs now. (Maybe they just took awhile to kick in? I dunno.) At the end of the day, I just want to be healthy and happy, so thanks for bearing with me through my adventures with diets. Let’s hope it’s a thing of the past!
Workout
Last night’s workout was killer on the legs. Yowsahs! My quads were screaming for mercy during it!
WOD
EMOM 8:
8 BW Back Squats
Then,
Double Alternating Tabata:
Air Squats
Hollow rocks
Score = total hollow rocks
Rx: BW (bodyweight)
L2: 3/4 BW
L1: 1/2 BW
Beg: 1/4 BW
The WOD was EMOM (Every Minute On the Minute) BW (body weight) Back Squats. So every minute for 8 minutes, we had 60 seconds to do 8 Back Squats using our body weight. Body weight was the prescribed workout, so the majority of the class scaled down to Level 2 (3/4 body weight) or Level 1 (1/2 body weight). I went with 85-90% of my body weight, which was 115 pounds, and, boy, did it kick my butt!
I was okay for the first 7 minutesāāI rested briefly here and there on the 6th and 7th sets, but I didn’t need to rack the bar or anything like that. During the final minute though, I mentally checked out and the very last rep almost did me in. I got stuck in the down position and really struggled to get up. I actually sort of panicked for a second because I wasn’t sure if my legs would be able to get me up again. Thankfully, I survived and everything was okay, but, wow… killer quad workout!
The second part of the WOD was a double Tabata of alternating Air Squats and Hollow Rocks, so we did as many Air Squats as possible for 20 seconds and then rested for 10 seconds. Then, we did as many Hollow Rocks as we could for 20 seconds and then rested for 10 seconds. We did this for 8 rounds and counted the Hollow Rocks for our score. I did 91.
My quads were totally smoked after class!
After that workout, I knew my muscles would probably needed a little help with recovery, so I drank some BCAAs from GNC. The GNC Pro Performance RapidDrive BCAA 5000 is fruit punch-flavored and tasty, but it’s really sweet if you use the recommended serving size, so I often water it down when I drink it.
Dinner
Last night’s dinner was Spiced Mini Burgers with roasted broccoli and red potatoes. I added a teaspoon of curry to the mini burgers, which was a fabulous addition!
After dinner, I snacked on some grapes while catching up with our DVR with Mal and Murphy. (This week’s Parks and Recs and New Girl episodes were hilarious! Haha!)
Plank Challenge
A bunch of you guys said Wednesday’s plank workout was tough, so I hope your core has recovered and you’re ready for a time trial today! The goal is to beat your time from Monday, so try to squeak out those last few seconds. Feel free to leave your time in the comment section!
P.S. You still have time to enter my giveaway to win some probiotics from GNC! I’ll pick a winner this afternoon!
46 Comments
I’m glad eating more paleo (or the drugs) has helped you feel better – either way! I know what you mean about labels, I’ve been avoiding gluten and soy for a year now and at first I was SUPER strict, which made any kind of social event uncomfortable. Now I’m semi relaxed on gluten (I’ll take a tiny bit), which helps a bit, but I’m afraid people who know I’m gluten-free will judge!
HOLLER for achieving your goal, Tina!
And holler for always listening to your gut (ha) on your diet. Using intuition to guide our eating is what so many people overlook/discredit/misunderstand, and it makes me so happy that as an influential person, you’re showing how living healthfully really isn’t all that complicated — just listen to your body (for some, get back in touch with it first) and do what makes sense for you!
Congrats on the pull ups!!!! That is awesome! I feel the same as you about Paleo! I feel better when I eat it but I also don’t like to put a label on my diet because the second I do I start to crave everything I can’t have!
Congrats on the pull ups and feeling better! Winner all around! Have a great weekend!
congrats on achieving your goal!!
Like you, I am paleo-ish. I still include alcohol and sweet treats – in extreme moderation since i’m working on losing another 15lbs before January (going on the same cruise you went on!), but it has helped IMMENSELY with my digestive issues. I used to CONSTANTLY be bloated, have weird random pains, just generally feel yucky. ditching the milk and wheat/gluten has been super duper helpful!!!!! I still eat the occassional popcorn and brown rice, but its rare since i’m trying to lower-ish carb, still eating fruits and sweet potatoes/butternut squash pumpkin
let me just say ditching dairy and grains DEFINATELY helps the digestive system!
Congrats on the pull ups! And it’s been interesting to hear about the diet, it’s definitely intrigued me as someone who suffers from a whole heap of digestive issues! Glad you’re feeling a bit better! Here’s to bananas softserve peanut butter style to celebrate!
Great job on your WOD!!
Your dinner looks so good, I love red potatoes with broccoli and some red meat š
Sometimes change of diet is simply not enough and that’s when you add in the drugs. I’m a dietetic intern so I totally understand and applaud you for going the wellness route first until it wasn’t enough. I can tell you’re feeling better because your tone in writing has definitely picked up. Life is too short to not eat cake anyway. Yay for feeling better!
So true about the cake! š
So glad to hear you are feeling better and congrats on the pull ups!! This WOD looks great! I may have to take some of it for today’s workout inspiration!
My ‘diet’ is all over the place sometimes too, it is definitely hard to find that happy medium that =s sanity! lol I love that pink work out top you’re wearing in the pic!
Big congrats on meeting your goal!! I need to try the plank challenge out.
Congratulations on meeting your goal! That’s so exciting!
Congrats on reaching your goal!
I’m currently laughing at “hairyman” on that score board for the Tabatas! Hopefully that’s a nickname?? LOL
Haha! Yep, for a girl too! š
Hope this isn’t too random, but this is a great post from stumptous.com (warning – don’t read if you don’t like PG-13 language):
http://www.stumptuous.com/rant-65-october-2012-pray-for-mojo
She doesn’t have the same health issues as you, but still had to suck-it-up and admit that there are things out of her control – accepting other forms of healing besides the usual (and pretty pervasive) attitude: “…If you just try hard enough it will all work out for you.”
Also, I just read about how difficult it is for women to do pull-ups so – wow!
Thanks for the link!
Loved this week’s episode of New Girl too! Schmidt is freaking hilarious…buying Nick a cookie because he was thinking of him. Too funny.
Hahahaha! So funny!
Congrats on meeting your goal. Best. feeling. ever.
Plank challenge: Monday 47 seconds. Friday 1:27 seconds. WOO HOO!
Congrats on meeting your goal. That’s awesome. Just did my plank and I increased by 20 seconds! Yay for progress!
The workout on Wednesday was rough! We have a poodle mix puppy who is about 8 months old. He thought it was so much fun to get under me and bite at my hair as I was trying to hold the plank! I went from 40 seconds on Monday to 55 seconds today!
Whoops, #plankfail. Guess I’m starting with the time trial!
Great job on the kipping pullups. I loved doing pullups, but mine were always assisted with a band. I will get to real one’s eventually!
2:00 Plank today. Beat Monday by 15 seconds.
The Kidless Kronicles
My plank time is still atrocious, but 10 seconds longer than it was on Monday! Yay!
Nice job!!
Congrats on the Kipping Pull-ups!! I just started crossfit last week and those look very intimidating to me right now but I’m excited to get there one day. I love New Girl, that show is ridiculous.
Congrats on meeting your pull-up goal!! I agree, Wednesday’s plank workout was tough. I only did about half of it and was wiped out. Still pleased with my results:
Monday: 40 seconds, Friday: 51.5 seconds…holding on for dear life and breathing deep to hang on, but I did it!! Yay for progress!
12 Kipping pull-ups in a row- thats bad a**! Its understandable that you didn’t completely stick to the strict Paleo diet what with traveling so much and going to weddings. Glad you’re starting to feel better though, sometimes drugs are necessary even if you really don’t want to take them. That’s what I look like walking down the stairs almost every day after CrossFit (there’s pretty much always squats involved in the WOD at my box).
Congrats on the 12 kipping pull-ups!!! I’m *thisclose* to getting one kipping, so I’m in awe of you. Nicely done!
Plank challenge results:
Time trial: 2:32
Today: 3:02
Woohoo!
Congrats!! You are amazing. Seriously, 12 kipping pull-ups!?!?!
Yay!! For reaching your goal š
Plank challenge: Monday 1:46, Friday: 2:11 š
So happy!! and the last 10sec we were singing to not give up š
Today’s plank = 2.45 up from 2.30 on Monday.
Nice job! š
no more diets?? sweeter words have never been spoken. š
i need to send you something in the mail, but I keep being a loser.
I beat Monday’s time by 15 seconds! I went from a 30 second plank to a 45 second plank – woo hoo!! š
Thanks tina!
Woohoo!
OMG I just checked out what a kipping pull-up is – you can do 12 of these?! You are my hero! Congrats! š
Wednesday’s plank challenge WAS tough but also AWESOME! It’s been awhile since I’ve really felt an ab workout (a CLEAR sign I needed to change things up) so I’m loving it! š
3:30 up from 3:00. So right about it being part mental! Goals are so necessary…
Nice job! I agree, it’s so mental!
Congrats on your kipping pull-ups…. what a bad-ass you are! And I’m glad to see you’re back to no diets. I understand the reason for trying different kinds to see what might better your health, though! I often think of Hippocrates’s quote, “Let thy food be thy medicine, and let thy medicine be thy food.” Of course, sometimes you just need drugs too and there’s nothing wrong with that š
That Wed plank workout was hard…. and I only did it one time through because I’m a lazy brat :/ Those up down ones are really hard! I think that’s an upper body strength issue… but I’ll do better next time! My time trial for yesterday was 2:05… 5 extra seconds… so I guess that’s motivation to do the full work-out next time!
Hi! I was wondering what medicine you take for colitis? I was diagnosed with UC about a year ago and my flare ups were down for a while but lately (grad school), I’m getting stomach cramps/pain again and didn’t know if your medication was efficient and if it kept the symptoms and pain at bay. Any advice would be appreciated, Thanks!!