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Cardio’ing Virtually

Crappy winter weather, injuries galore, and a global pandemic have lead me to working out on my cardio equipment in my basement more this year than in years past. A social butterfly with many running and cycling friends to choose from, I can also hold my own on solo runs and rides… outside. Bring those bad boys inside and it’s an entirely different story. I’m not alone in thinking a treadmill mile is equal to five miles outside, and spinning? Indoor time in the saddle seems to go on forever.

Enter multitasking. The one positive thing the coronavirus has done is to bring us together virtually. Zoom happy hours with friends in the spring led to FaceTime chats over the summer. Tie either of those together, or just chatting on the phone, with sitting on an indoor bike and the time flies by. I’ve now extended my cardio workouts to watching my church service virtually – the only difference between sitting at my kitchen table and sitting on my bike while watching church is that my legs are moving.

Now, if only I could fold laundry while working out!

 

Overview of the Week

Before discussing each day’s workouts, here’s an overview of my workouts from this past week. Scroll down for daily details…

 

Sunday

During the mid-afternoon I hopped on my spin bike (affiliate link) for a faster than usual 10-mile ride. I normally ride at a level 10, but decided to push a little harder keeping the level between 11 and 12 giving me an average speed of 18.6 MPH.

As soon as I finished my ride, I got on my treadmill (affiliate link), called my mom, and chatted for two miles at a 16:59 average pace. After my walk, I stretched for 10 minutes.

 

Monday

Other than lifting for just over an hour, I had a pretty low key day. Bill, on the other hand, took much of the day off from work to celebrate his birthday and rode our spin bike for 2.5 hours.

 

Tuesday

With overnight temps well below freezing, I opted to wait until later in the morning to run to avoid any mishaps on black ice left over from the previous day’s snow/freezing rain melt. It was 11:45 AM before I was free to get outside to run, and at 51°, I was glad I waited. The breeze ushering in a warm front was starting to kick up, but with running on our circle (trails were still snow-covered), at least the wind was at my back half of the time. I finished my 5K run with an average pace of 9:27. Once inside, I treated myself to 10 minutes of stretching and later in the evening 10 minutes of foam rolling.

 

Wednesday

Wednesdays are for stairs, at least that’s what I’ve been doing for the last few weeks and this was no different. As with past weeks, my strength training included three laps of stair-running-intervals between each of the first ten supersets giving me thirty roundtrips on the stairs.

At 10:30 my friend Betty stopped by for a walk. It was 54° when we started our 5K walk (19:36 pace). It was breezier than I expected and even in capris and a light jacket I got a little chilly. It’s amazing how much more my body warms up when running versus walking.

Later in the afternoon I took a little spin on my bike in the basement (15 miles at an average speed of 16.8 MPH). The temperature outside would have been fine, but there’s still snow in places on the trail and I didn’t want to risk not dodging an icy patch in time and crashing.

 

Thursday

I finally trusted the street to be clear of black ice with the temperature at 43°(feels like 39°) and headed out for a breezy predawn run at 6:15 AM. Having not run in the early morning for several weeks, I was surprised how early the sun came up and that I finished in the daylight. During my 5K run I picked up recycling all around the neighborhood that had blown out of recycling bins and did my good deed for the day. I had to stop my watch a few times while running around grabbing boxes and bottles out of the street or front yards and that may have been cheating, but believe me, there was no resting as I bent and scooped. I finished my good deed run with an average pace of  9:27.

Later in the day I stretched for 10 minutes and foam rolled for 10 minutes.

 

Friday

With no early morning clients, I started my morning a little later than usual and enjoyed an hour plus strength training session interspersed with fast walking intervals. Later, as with most Fridays, I got in 15 minutes of total body stretching during the stretching segment of the balance and stretching class I teach.

 

Saturday

Like most recent Saturdays, my morning started with a 25-mile ride (16.7 MPH average speed) on my spin bike while Zooming with blogging friends Darlene, Liz, Kim H, Kim G, Coco, and Renée and then some bonus FaceTiming with Kim H. I followed the ride with a 10-minute lower body stretch.

 

Here’s What You Might Have Missed

In case you skipped checking in on my blog this past week, here’s what you missed…

 

Questions:
  • • Do you have any hints of spring where you live?
  • • Do you multitask while doing cardio inside?
  • • Did you run in a race this weekend? If so, was it live or virtual?

 

And that’s my rundown… Have a great week!

 

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I’m linking up with Deborah at Confessions of a Mother Runner and Kim from Running on the Fly for their Weekly Run Down. Be sure to check out not only the hosts’ posts, but those of the other great bloggers joining in on the fun!

 

Disclaimer:  This post contains affiliate links which means if you click on the blue product link and then make a purchase, I will receive a small commission for referring you. You will pay no more or less for the product; however, Amazon will show their gratitude for my referral by paying me.