Snow Day

Today we had a snow day.  Or, rather, we had a day off school and work because of snow that was forecasted but never actually happened.  So I spent a good part of the day being extremely lazy nursing a sore back and attempting to get some work done from home and cleaning the house.  When my husband came home early, he was ready to hit the gym.  We switched into gym clothes and headed down the road to the local YMCA.  I was pretty disappointed with my performance, or lack thereof.  At one point I had no problem pumping out 30 minutes on the elliptical machine.  Today I barely made it to 5 minutes.  It was a definite wake up call that I need to really step up the work outs to be able to get ready for this hike.  So I hit the weight machines and worked my arm and back muscled and my core muscles and my legs.  I'm fairly certain I won't be able to move tomorrow, but it's that good kind of soreness and stiffness that reminds you that you're working on a better you (at least that's what I'm going to tell myself in the morning).  After the weights, my son and I spent some time on the indoor track.  We walked and then jogged a little.  He jogged faster than I did, but as a competitive person, that was just more motivation.  I rewarded myself with a 15 minute soak in the hot tub. 

I've known that I would need to have a pretty extensive training plan to prepare myself for this hike.  My game plan, based on information I've gathered from books and websites, is to work all my muscle groups on the weight machines.  I'm especially focused on my core muscles and my back muscles because I'm especially weak in those areas and I think if I get those areas in shape, carrying a pack will be a little easier.  I'm also going to be building my endurance on the elliptical machine.  I've also read that Yoga is a good idea as it helps with flexibility and loosening muscles.  In the end though, nothing compares to actually getting out there and hiking.  The group I'm hiking with has plans to try to get in 1 day a week to hit a trail and hike.  We will eventually be adding our packs and gradually increasing the pack weight as we go.  The hope is that we'll all be in pretty good physical shape and the trip will be more enjoyable.