Morning workout

If you're new here ... where the heck you been???

Just kidding. Howdy and welcome!

I resurrected my fitness blog a couple weeks ago when I decided to try out my friend Shawn Francis' three-month pole vault conditioning program. (https://team-hoot.com/) At the time, I was suffering from some fairly serious come-and-go pain in my left knee, but I wanted to spend this summer kicking my physical fitness up a notch, and so I started the program a few days before an appointment with an orthopedics guy.

Some of the workouts were fairly tolerable, but other exercises were extremely difficult, due to the pain, but I did the best I could that first week, and then the doc pronounced some normal wear-and-tear in the knee joint, at least one small bone spur, and some osteoarthritis. One of the recommended treatments is an ultrasound injection, and I said, yes, I want that. 

By the next day, tremendous relief. That was last Friday, and orders were to completely rest the knee until Wednesday, before resuming any type of high-impact exercise. I decided to extend that a little farther, and give it two weeks before easing back into any leg workouts. So far, so good. Except for an occasional twinge -- not really painful, but mostly annoying -- the knee is so much better.

I'm looking forward to getting back on the runway and trying some vault drills with a take-off leg that doesn't hurt like hell. Maybe I can start making some progress again toward my goal of clearing that 10-foot bar.

So, today, I headed to the gym for a strictly upper-body workout. I started out hanging from a high bar for 30 seconds, stretching a little bit, then hanging  for another 30 seconds. For you non-vaulters, high-bar work like you see gymnasts do when they perform, is an important part of pole vault training. I'm not strong enough to do much of anything on a high bar, but that is going to be part of my focus throughout the summer. 

Yesterday, I did either 30 or 36 knee raises hanging from the high bar (can't remember whether it was five sets of six, or six sets of six), and today, it was just grabbing on and hanging there. If you've never done it, it ain't so easy.

Then, I did some incline bench press, alternating sets with some bent-over barbell rows. I like to combine push and pull exercises. I did some machine shoulder presses, seated cable low row, dumbbell pullovers on a slightly inclined bench, dumbbell press, triceps press, dumbbell curls, side laterals, front laterals.

That was it for today. I used to plow through an hour-and-a-half, two-hour workout with the weights, no problem. Now, I'm trying to remember that I'm coming up on 63 years old; not 33. 

If you want to read a really good book about an old dude who took up pole vaulting at the ripe ol' age of 60, click right here and take a look at "Finally Fit." Please and thank you ... 

All right, that's it for today.

Remember, it's never too late to achieve a dream.

Hasta mañana ...