Really Squeezing it In

Tuesday
Was again tak puas that I didn't get in any form of workout on Monday. I remember that I was pretty busy doing stuff but what exactly it was, I have no clue. I knew that I had an all day camp out to conduct some research on Tuesday from 8am to 1am the next morning so I was a good boy and fell into bed at 10pm, much to the astonishment of Denise. Alas, the battle was not won as I woke up at midnight with that distinct wired feeling. After half an hour of tossing in bed, I decided to take matters in my own hands and popped one of Denise's motion sickness pills. Half an hour later I didn't know what hit me. Fast forward to 6am, bright eyed and bushy tailed in my living room, in my underwear, I

Warmed up for about 20 minutes with some ginga's, balancas and fintos and maybe 100 basic rotados of all shapes and sizes. Stretched it out a little more ... damn core and back are really tight these days, or maybe I'm just paying more attention to them. I dunno.

Proceeded to bang out:

• 50 press ups
• 100 crunches
• 30 ponte push ups

repeat 3 times

Finished with a long cool down stretch. Felt good and ready for war. With the Rocky soundtrack playing in my head.

Wednesday
Damn 17 hours of sitting on your ass really does something to your body and mind. Haven't had a desk job in so many years.... I really forgot about that zombified fried feeling. Not good. Managed to get in some decent shut eye and woke to for my morning Celeb class.

This class is progressing pretty well, the students are interested to learn more and always have lots of questions. I've taken to showing them some situations and possible responses to broaden their capoeira horizons and they seem to be enjoying it. Usually start the class with a decent length warm up to wake the body up combining warm up, joint mobility, static and some dynamic stretching as well.

Strength work:
10 press ups,
30 sit ups
30 ponte push ups.

Line drills:
Ginga and ginga strengthening exercises ~ 10 minutes
Movement in ginga to block opponent's role

I chilled after this and gave them some partner work for the last 25 minutes of class

After class continued my routine at the personal training area. Still working on body weight calisthenics:

Dynamic stretch
Core stretch

Ponte walkover x 10
Ponte walkover w/ legs together x 10

Handstand push up to saudacao x 10
Saudacao switch legs x 10 ea side
Repeat 3 times

Finished off with a static stretch with emphasis on core and lower back.

What Happened to My Weekend?

As usual the days are running together. Had a pretty full on weekend.

Friday
Bantus Capoeira Malaysia's 5th Anniversary roda. Pretty awesome roda primarily cos there was so much new energy coming in from the peeps who are training at our other little venues i.e. True Fit, Celeb, Monash, Sunway, Taylors, Shell, PW, WMAC, and Bom Brazil. Very proud of the work done by the seniors. They have really shown consistent commitment over an extended period of time which I feel is very rare for capoeira groups. In groups outside of Brazil, most of the time you will see the mestre or instructor who is running it just staying there at the top and his students will kinda some in waves and cycles, maybe leaving one or two super senior students to assist him. But I really think we have something special going on here in Bantus Malaysia and I'm very proud to be a part of that.

Back to roda commentary. Some nice games with lots of good energy followed by a quick samba de roda. After roda officially finished some of us were not satisfied with our roda time and proceeded to play some angola. Felt good... haven't played angola in awhile but I feel that unlike regional, I never loose the feel or the timing even tho I play it so sparingly.

All in all a good nights work!

Saturday
Had a demo for a college charity event and I'm sorry to say but, I was not too happy with the organizers. Had only two requests, 1 - Give us a shaded area, 2 - No pressure to start or stop, we will do things on our own time. Organizers stuck us in the blazing noon sun. They called me 5 times in the morning and when I got there, every 5 minutes they asked me when we are ready. And to top it all off, they stopped our roda when we moved to a more shady location after our brief formal show to continue, even tho I had asked them permission before hand. Sigh......

I had already downed some Fast Twitch so I just went to the gym to work it off. And work it off I did:

Super long wamrup and core stretch

Barbell bent over row (back stretch in between sets)
90 lbs + olympic bar x 3 reps x 5 sets

Squats (lower body stretch in betweeen sets)
140lbs + olympic bar x 3 reps x 5 sets

Weighted dips (chest stretch in between sets)
35lbs x 3 reps x 5 sets

Total body stretch to finish off

Sunday
Light stretch and warmdown at Celeb class

Young, Dumb and Willing to Run

Decided to do some cross training by playing a round of squash with my old friend Wai Keat at my alma mater - Bukit Bintang Boys' School. Managed to locate my squash racquet after some rummaging in the apartment, packed up and jumped in my Satria that I haven't driven for two weeks.

Coming back to BB always makes me reference my student days when I used to spend hours playing squash in these courts. Feel the vigour of youth! Found Wai Keat in one of the courts and started the whacking some balls. Felt good and strong but my alignment was pretty off, sending balls spraying in every direction. The idea with squash is you are supposed to hit the ball straight along the wall to the back corners and then run back to cover to middle of the court, alignment is everything cos if you are a little bit off, your ball will ricohet off the side wall and float out to the middle of the court where your opponent will happily play a drop shot and you will start scrambling.

As we started I was still feeling around for my game and stuck to the basics, everything to the back, nothing fancy. In squash there are tons of shots known to Malaysian squashers as char koay teow where you avoid hitting the ball early and fake one way then at the last minute flick it with your wrist for a lob, boast, drop, or drive to wrong foot your opponent. Its almost malandragey in the body expression and cunningness. So like the cagey veteran I am, I avoided char koay teow for the first three sets until I got my bearings, sticking to the basics. After I got my groove, I started experimenting with my old arsenal of favorite shots.

Squash is a bit like life, you can't run full tilt for every ball and you can go around smacking everything. Sometimes you give him the point cos he hit a damn good shot. Sometimes you touch, lob, flick, just to keep the ball in play so you can continue the fight. But you always need to watch the ball and your opponent. Capoeira has actually helped my squash game. Think I'm actually better now than when I was training 3 hours a day 4 times a week in school. May have had more energy back in the day but I choose being a cagey veteran any day over my old headless chicken style.

Also quite fun to talk pseudo business scenarios with Wai Keat in between points.

4 Days Since My Last Blog - That Was Fast

Wow, can't believe I haven't updated this sucker for 4 days. Just went by like that. Ok, searching thru my patchy short term memory, lets work backwards

Wednesday
Bom Brazil
3 x 10 meia lua - 50 press ups
3 x 10 queixada - 50 press ups
3 x 10 armada - 200 sit ups
Warm down

Tuesday
30 minutes warm up and line drills

Alternate d/b shoulder press
25lbs x 10 reps ea side
30lbs x 8 reps ea side
35 lbs x 8 reps ea side
35 lbs x 8 reps ea side
35 lbs x 8 reps ea side

Single arm d/b row
35lbs x 10 reps ea side
Back stretch
40lbs x 8 reps ea side
Back stretch
45lbs x 8 reps ea side
Back stretch
45lbs x 8 reps ea side
Back stretch
45lbs x 7 reps ea side
Back stretch

Lunges
45lbs x 8 reps ea side
Lower body stretch
45lbs x 8 reps ea side
Lower body stretch
45lbs x 8 reps ea side
Lower body stretch

Beautiful Day at the Park

Had very enjoyable domestic day today. Ran some errands, had lunch with a good friend and came back to take a sweet afternoon nap. Woke up with that well rested feeling, downed some Fast Twitch and bolted to the Kiara park.

After a thorough 10 minute warm up and stretch.
Ran 1 big round and 1 small round (about 3.3 km) in about 15 minutes
Followed that with 3 x stair sprints
And an all out sprint - walk - jog for one small round (1.1 km)
2 sets x 10 reps drop jumps at the warm up area
Attempted some pull ups but was not feeling it so proceeded to the dipping area
5 sets x 8 reps dips
150 abs
20 au half twist jumps (not tucking just yet)
long warm down emphasizing core flexibility

all in all .... a good day of training

Recap continued

Wednesday:

10am
Woke up pretty fresh and went to Celeb for class. Did a circuit warmup and stretch to wake the old muscles up. Some basics in the miror and demoed some partner work. Bread and butter tempo na base from fuga, tempo lateral ground work followed by intro to queixada tempo compasso. Cool down and stretch.

Wanted to continue in the gym but had other commitments so took a quick shower and steam and off we go!

8pm - 9pm
The girls could handle it so jumped straight into a circuit with basic moves with Edna and Seow Peng. Followed by a stretch and then we went straight into partner work as they looked pretty tired. Meanwhile I busted out 50 press ups, 30 ponte push ups and 200 sit ups while they did basic kicks and negativas. Polished up some of their moves, cool down stretch and call it a day!

Friday
6pm
Wah feeling dem lou hung today..... went to park w/ Woei. I felt ok until I pulled my right oblique doing au virado. Doh! That = end of floreio at park session. We mucked around a bit and did some lou hung positioning drills for like 5 minutes before we decided that this was not a day for serious training. I think the deadlifting is tightening up my core, esp my right oblique .... I feel much stronger but at the same time my right leg doesn't get the extention it used to towards the back especially. Will address this in the next month with more scorpion like stretching.

9:45pm
After running around doing some work came back and was dem dengki about the failed training session at park. Stretched for 45 minutes and banged out 150 press ups and 200 sit ups... ok la not so dengki now.

The next question is... what should I have for dinner? Feel like just foraging thru the pantry here. Since Denise ain't around I will most likely just stand in kitchen and eat whatever collection of semi healthy foods we have. Peace out!

And we are up to date..... yes I like this

Weekly Recap

Cyberspace is definitely more reliable than I am. Hopefully, I'll remember my blog address. Ok lets recap the week in training

Monday:
Not feeling too well and not enough heads so skipped acro today. Too bad..... Really looking forward to working on that lay out and arabian. Squeezing in as many new movements before real lou hungness sets in.

8pm to 9pm
Did my usual warm up at Bom Brazil some line drills and a cool down. Efficiency is the name of the game.

10:30pm to 11:15pm
After some run around and procrastination, went to gym with JC. Did my current favorite workout.

Lotsa jumping jacks, squats and lower body stretches to warm up.

Deadlift w/ ample rest between sets
90kg x 6 (including bar)
100kg x 5
100kg x 4
100kg x 4
100kg x 2
95 kg x 4

Incline bench
60kg x 5
60kg x 5
60kg x 4
55kg x 4
55kg x 4

Weighted chinups
5kg x 5
5kg x 5
2.5kg x 5
2.5kg x 4
2.5kg x 4

Forearms died before anything else actually but i love this workout.... about 40 minutes including a good core stretch at the end. Chups