Today just so happens to be my thirteen year training anniversary! I have been training in the martial arts for thirteen years and it is absolutely amazing what experiences I have had and the accomplishments and struggles I have had in that time. Some may say it is more than what most people have, and I am grateful for it all.
Today was also my last training session for the summer with Charlene. She looked at me and said "Okay, what do you want to do?" She knew I wanted to see how far had come, and if I had was happy with the improvement I wanted. We did five different things today, starting with the pull up.
When we started our training sessions two months ago on July 5, I tried to do a pull up and could not do ONE. I just hung there as I struggled to pull myself up, which I failed to do. I remember thinking, oh no...I cannot believe how far back I fell. I was really upset, but Charlene only said "Great! Room for improvement!" So that made me feel better. Then she had me do them today. I did nine full pull ups before the body began to fight me! I was thrilled!
Then we went over to do one handed push ups, which I have never done before in my life! Well I did 10 one handed push ups on either side. And you know what, I felt I could have done more, but we were only check pointing where I was! If you remember from an old blog post, Charlene made me do a whole workout of just push ups, and I always had a poor attitude with push ups. Poor attitude meaning, I hated doing them! Well she has given me the confidence and motivation to continue doing them and to push myself even more with different types of push ups in my own training in this next upcoming year! I was so happy I did a ONE HANDED PUSH UP! Ten on each side, and never done that before!
Another particular push up I could not do two months ago was a push up doing down and then springing up onto a medicine ball. When we first did this, I did not have the courage of my convictions to do it at all. I was afraid my face would hit the floor first and failed at doing even one. Today I did three sets of 15!!!!!!! Woo hoo!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was on cloud nine!
Then we bench pressed, another new thing I did. I never bench pressed before and Charlene started me out with just the bar which is 45 lbs when I started just so I could get the idea. And may I note, she is fantastic and fair at building me up. When I rocked a certain way with an exercise or didn't fully extend my arm or whatever the case may be, she wouldn't count it. She was giving me a very fair assessment of where the bar was for me, metaphorically speaking.
When bench pressing I moved up to 65 pounds and we kept going up by ten. As of today I did 95 pounds, 3 sets of 10, which I am very happy with! I told Charlene I did not want to become this big buff meathead, but did want to build up my chest a bit and cut it up a little and she did just that. Then the last exercise she chose which she thought I struggled with and those were "the dips" where I put my knees on a platform and I press myself up and down, working my back and triceps. I dipped against 40 pounds, so I was lifting the other 107 pounds of me. I think that is how she explained it.=P
So I am going to try to enjoy my Labor Day weekend. September is the start of a brand new cycle for me, and Charlene will be mentoring me in a different way. But I am eternally grateful to Charlene for helping me get out of bed in the morning, giving me the motivations and momentum I have been needing, and for pushing me physically and setting the ground stage for me to move forward. Thank you Charlene for the ONE thing I enjoyed this summer!! (BOWS)
Yours in service,
ANDREW TRENTO
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