Pool session today. 15 laps. Did 5 laps of breaststroke, 5 laps of backfloat, and finished with 5 laps of sidestroke. Warmed up treading water for 5 minutes. Good on the body. Getting it prepared for swimming. Good on the shoulders and hips. Prior to that I was at the park with my puppy again. Did some running around. Feeling good. Glad I was able to take this Friday as a day off, but still able to get outside and swim around a bit. This weekend looking forward to more of the same. Then Monday will be my next session in the gym. Lower back, exactly a week ago now when I did the heavy pulls. The heavy deadlifts. Felt like I tweaked it. Just didn't feel right. It's certainly improved. I can feel it a little bit. I'm going to continue to work on it. I actually have a Black and Decker buffer pad machine/tool. Designed for buffing your car, but use that for your bigger muscles. Like your lower back, glutes, just loosen it up. Feels good. Just 2-3 minutes. Overall excited for the weekend and I'll check in on Monday.

Keeping this short and sweet. It's Thanksgiving. Went outside for a nice two mile walk. Feeling pretty good. Tomorrow will do an hour of active recovery. Mixing in some yoga and light stretches. Continue to be outside. It's been so nice.

8th session in the gym. Feeling good. Did a dynamic warmup, broke a sweat. Started with deadlifts. Lowered the weight, improved the form making sure that things are engaging properly. Now that I'm getting back in the gym I can tell some of my muscles are firing better - especially in the glutes, hamstrings, and posterior chain. Did a lot of glute activation. Took ankle resistance bands and did a side shuffle. Then bring the band up to your knees, go on your back, and do glute bridges. After the first circuit my glutes were awake. Second circuit was a lot of whole body movements. One was a resisted band pull - just call it the woodchopper where you go from low to high. All these are coordinated movements where you're getting explosive power from your hips and going all the way through. You're not arching your back, or overemphasizing it. You're just making sure that you finish. The last movements I finished with were a little upper body and core. Did pull ups and dips. Something like a pull up is working upper body, but it's a good stabilizer on the core to finish with. Tomorrow will be Thanksgiving. I don't have anything officially planned. Might do a little light active recovery. Friday will be a bit different. Don't have a session in the gym, so splice in an active recovery day. Then take Saturday and Sunday off. I'll still try to record tomorrow, but if it doesn't I'll catch it on Friday.

Went swimming over my lunch break. Did 10 laps. Felt good. After I got done actually ran outside with my puppy on a playground. That's always fun. Four legs are faster than two. He's only 5 months old so I can still out run him a little bit, but it's getting close. Tomorrow I'll be in the gym again. Anticipating more of the heavy strength movements. It's not the slow heavy strength. For example, like what I did on Monday. You load 185lbs on the bar and do a pause box squat with a really explosive drive upward. It takes a lot of energy. I'm fatigued right now, sore, and stiff. This is why I have a trainer. I know I have somebody there. They're going to help me show up in the best way possible. Overall feeling pretty good, aside from the fatigue. Looking forward to a good nights rest. Not even 9 o' clock yet. So it's my earliest log yet. Check in tomorrow and see how it goes.

7th session in the gym. Little condensed. Had 40 minutes to do the full workout. Did 1 circuit, repeating the movements 4 times. First movement was weighted pause box squat, then doing an explosive tempo up. Second movement was getting on the turf, doing double legged bounding for distance. Just five consecutive bounds. Third movement was taking a 20lb med ball and doing a rotational twist and powering through using my shoulders and hips to throw it at the wall, catch it, throw it, and keep going. I did that 4 times. Definitely by the 4th set I was feeling it. Just kind of as a finisher, did 1 circuit of 3 movements. Those were lighter reps. Overall, I can tell my lower back from doing heavy pulls really hurts where it isn't that good sore. It feels like I did too much weight. And maybe not even too much weight, but I just didn't do the movement properly. I feel bittersweet about being able to do what I was asked to do, which was lift and pull these heavy weights. But now in retrospect, I need to make sure my movement is dialed in. If I did this week over week I would not like how my back feels. Good news is I feel like I'm recovering here. I'll get back in the gym on Wednesday. Then with Thanksgiving on a Thursday, Friday might be mixing in an active recovery and taking a little longer rest this weekend. Tomorrow I'll get in the pool. Overall feeling good. Kind of crazy how fast I'm already in week 3 here. Only 10 o' clock. Still would like to get in a better routine with sleeping and recovery. That's always kind of a balance game depending on what's going on with lifestyle factors. Looking forward to the week. 

6th training session in the gym. Overall went well. Usual warmup, then started with a circuit of 3 movements. Then did a second circuit with 4 movements. A lot of the emphasis is on the thoracic spine and upper back. Then getting my glutes firing and doing coordinated whole body movements. The one that surprised me today was single leg box jumps from a seated position. I'd never done that before. I could do it. The box height was set to 24", but it was challenging. My left leg is my dominant leg. I'm right handed. And when I switched over to my right leg it was just like uhh, ok. I was able to get the hang of it. I did three sets overall. Feeling worn out from the week. I could tell definitely from doing some of the heavier pulls from the ground. I don't know, it's not that I tweaked my back but that's as heavy as I'd want to go. Really need to make sure I communicate that on Monday, depending on how I feel, what I'm comfortable with. Good week 2. Days are flying by. Little late, Friday night. I was actually busy brewing some kombucha, getting that ready for the week. Took a little extra time. Looking forward to week 3.

Feeling pretty good overall. Got in the pool, like I did on Tuesday. Did the same exact thing. Swam 10 laps. First 5 were breaststroke, last 5 laps were the "chicken, airplane, soldier". I modify it where I bring my arms all the way over my head where I get the full sweeping motion.  It's just super relaxing. I tread water just to warmup and get my full body moving. 20 minutes in the pool felt right. Today, actually, looking at the clock, only 9:15 right now. Looking forward to a good night's rest. Tomorrow is my 6th session in the gym. Anticipating doing some new movements. Emphasis is a lot of strength building. Getting my body set and squared for what's to come. Not a push, push kind of day. Just a little higher on the reps and volume and getting comfortable with the weights and progressing. Once December comes around I'll be ready to go. Looking forward to taking the weekend and recovering. Rinse, repeat, and keep going.

5th session in the gym. Overall feeling pretty good. Took extra time to warm up. 10 minutes on the foam roller, 10 minutes on an extended dynamic warmup. Really wanted to make sure I was primed for a good workout. Started with a circuit of 3 movements. It was a full depth squat. Second one was an overhead medball throw against the wall, so you're exploding it up and letting it launch. Third movement was where I had my feet wrapped around an ab bench at a decline, then tossing the ball back up. Did that 3 times through, took the weight up each time a little on the squat. These aren't heavy, heavy weights. I think the heaviest I squatted was 155 or 165lbs. Second circuit did another set of 3 different movements. Then finished with a light cooldown. Overall, feel like the X factor here is to make sure my body acclimates to the pressure that I'm putting on it. Sleep goes a long way for me. I'm pretty sleep sensitive and the quality of the sleep definitely matters. Kudos for tonight, not past 11. Tired enough to hit the sack.

Swam 10 laps in the pool. Felt really good. Yesterday I did push jerks and can tell my lats are pretty tender. Didn't move a lot of heavy weights. It was just the motion of doing the correct form throughout the movement. I could really tell my back was stabalizing throughout. I look at that as a good sign. Energy-wise feeling tired. Would like to get more rest. Tonight, again, feels late. It's already 11 and I'll be doing a quick turn around waking up around 5:30 - 6:00. Those are things, though, with a new routine. Consistently waking up and going to bed at the same time is a big one for me. Having a puppy can throw a wrench in some of that. Wouldn't have it any other way though. I love it. Looking forward to training tomorrow.

Got into the gym this morning. Feeling the effects of last week still. Made sure this weekend to try and rest up. Had a good night's rest on Saturday. Sunday was meh. Woke up, still had a good pull to get after it. After doing the warmup felt pretty loose. A lot of the movements I did today were lower body. That's gonna be a theme - especially during the strength phase part of this. Wouldn't be surprised if the next four weeks is a lot of pulls, partial lifts getting the back and posterior chain firing. Overall feeling pretty solid. Going to get in the pool tomorrow morning. Stay the course with doing some active recovery and sprinkling in good stretches. Things that help with my hips. I can tell I'm short in the hip. No surprise there. I found out this summer, doing a lot of mountain biking. You do that a lot and your hips kinda scrunch down on you. Overall great day today. Looking forward to week two. Again, the format I'm using is Monday, Wednesday, Friday. Those are the days I get after it in the gym for an hour session. Then Tuesdays, Thursdays mix in active recovery. Then Saturday/Sunday ad lib, do what I want. Just make sure I keep moving. Testing this out. It'll take a little time to see how my body adapts, but I know my appetite has gone up. I stepped on the scale and weighed a few pounds heavier. Probably just a combination of food and water weight. Always kind of good to build strength back up and feel good while doing it.