befabulo.us/t-tapper

Goals, or 5 Mar 08 Workout Report

I am cranking away on my 3-a-week T-Tapp commitment.  Haven't screwed up yet!  If I can just keep this up, who knows what kind of results I might get.  Might be AWESOME.

I've further clarified my goals for my exercise commitment for the Take Yourself Seriously Challenge.  T-Tapp three times a week is the basic goal, and if all I manage is three 15-minute workouts, so be it, that's fine.  But ideally, this is what I'll do each week:

• At least one Total Workout (which, in my world, usually means Tempo)
• At least one workout that includes floor work
• One workout that's just Ladies' Choice, whatever I feel like doing that day

Today I took the Ladies' Choice option.  I was grumpy, I've been grumpy all day, mostly because I didn't sleep well.  (I was trying to be extra efficient, and I'd started a crock-pot full of barbecued turkey, leaving it to cook all night.  But for some reason kitchen smells are very strong in my bedroom, and the scent of the turkey kept me awake.  Ridiculous.)   So today I decided to do the most fast-paced, sweat-dripping workout I own: Mini-Max 3.

The Mini-Max workouts are out of print, replaced by the Tempo series, but I'm still fond of the few Mini-Maxes I bought on my first go-round with T-Tapp.  Yes, they move fast -- the exercises are done at much faster clip than on Tempo videos -- but sometimes I WANT fast.  Mini-Max 3 gets in what I consider to be the "greatest hits" of the Total Workout, all the most important moves, in a mere 24 minutes.  Lemme see if I can remember... PBS, Plies, Reach Scoops and Jazz Twist, Bun Burners instead of The Box, TTT, Lunges, Balance (some of it double-time, eek!), stretching, a double dose of 10-rep TTN, Runners Stretch and Gymnastic Stretch.  There were more Bun Burners in there somewhere, too.  This isn't a workout I do all that often, because it is more difficult to hold good form when you're moving so fast, but today I felt more like a sprint than a slow jog.  I needed to burn off the crankies, and I think it worked.

This means that Friday is Floor Work Day.  I thought about doing floor work after MM3, but no.  That second set of 10-rep TTN kills me; by the second set I could swear my legs weigh 100 lbs each.  There is no way I'm going to talk myself into doing straddles after that!

3 Mar 08 Workout Report

I am quite amazed at how sore I was from Friday's workout.  All weekend long I could feel it, particularly in my inner thighs.  That is NOT a bad thing.  Who doesn't want firmer inner thighs?

The best cure for soreness, if you ask me, is to just keep moving.  So at 11 this morning, when I had an unusual and auspicious combination of a quiet morning at work and a miraculously undemanding stomach*, I did T-Tapp to Tempo.  (Tempo, as it's usually called for short, is the regular Total Workout but done with less instruction and interruption, so it gets the same workout done in about 15 minutes less time.)

I've done this video so many times, I didn't come up with any new revelation to share with you.  My only thought was, "man, I need to get that new Tempo disc ASAP."  The version I have of Tempo is the old one (from 2000, maybe?) on VHS, because it's a relic of those long-ago days when T-Tapp workouts were only available on VHS.  And because I've done it so many times, the tape is actually wearing out.  I noticed today that there are a lot of black lines flitting across the screen that are a sure sign that the tape is nearing the end of its useful life.

I have never before in my life worn out a workout video.  I'm feeling oddly proud of this accomplishment.

The new DVD release of Tempo is called, I think, Tempo 2, and if I'm remembering what I've heard correctly, it contains a newly-filmed version of Tempo at the basic/rehabilitative level and Tempo Intermediate, which is the same workout but with 10 reps instead of 8.  I need it.  I need this new DVD badly.... and if I'm lucky, it won't take me seven years to wear it out.

*One of my biggest hurdles to getting workouts done is fitting them into my eating schedule.  No, really!  I don't want to do a workout too soon after eating; I'd rather wait about an hour to let my food digest.  I certainly don't want to work out if I'm hungry, either.  I have mild hypoglycemia and I get light-headed (and also EVIL) when I'm hungry.  But the window between food being digested and getting hungry again can be a very narrow one!  I lucked out today, though, and I think it's because I had some protein with my breakfast.  Gah, I KNOW all these things, but somehow putting my wisdom into practice isn't the easiest.

29 Feb 08 Workout Report

I've decided that for at least the next two months (the duration of Moxie's "Take Yourself Seriously Challenge") I'm going to post after each workout.  It'll give me some accountability, and will also serve as a record of just what I've done.  Also, quite a few of you have asked me what my workout routine is... well, now you'll have it, in classic Summer TMI fashion.

Ooh, here's another reason to post workout reports: I really like to mix n' match my T-Tapp workouts, so if I post about my wacky workout combinations, it might give you ideas for new things to try when you start getting bored.

Today's workout was a new combination for me.  I did:
PBS (on my own, meaning not with a video)
T-Tapp Broom from MORE
About 5 minutes of SATI-style stepping (on my own)
Ladybug Floor workout

Actually, I'd never done the MORE broom workout at all, so any other workout I appended to that one would automatically be a new combination.  My only exposure to T-Tapp Broom was the killer 15-hour workout Teresa put us through in Safety Harbor in October... ok, ok, it was only three hours, but it WAS a killer.  It was the only workout during the retreat that I didn't complete.  I slunk out the back toward the end, mere moments before my right shoulder would have fallen off.

Once again, I underestimated how intense I'd find a MORE workout.  In Safety Harbor, we were doing a lot of SATI stepping and other exercises with the broom, but on MORE you hold the stance with your lower body while doing arm exercises and T-Tapp Twist stretches.  My legs were shaking by the end.  It is NOT easy to hold the stance, not if you're really making an effort to keep knees bent and pushing out, big toe lifted, ribs up, butt tucked, and back pushed flat.  Just standing still in the stance is a workout, so adding the up-and-down arms with the broom had me huffing and puffing.  That, for the record, is a GOOD thing.

I hadn't intended to do the stepping in between Broom and Ladybug Floor, but my legs told me they wanted to do it.  Really helped push out any built-up lactic acid from holding the stance.  Aren't my legs clever?

I'd planned on doing Hit the Floor after Broom (I'm trying to do floor work at least once a week.  My body responds really well to T-Tapp floor work) but I decided to do LB floor instead because my hips felt a bit rusty, and LB Floor gives an amazing stretch to the hips and thighs and groin.  I feel much better after doing it.  Even if those straddles are torture!