Ice ice baby

Right now I'm in my sixth week here and have been sore in my legs every day during my stay.  At first I thought it was part of the program and would go away as the weeks progressed.  It didn't and my genius self finally asked a trainer how to decrease the soreness.  I should've asked this on day two.

He said to put ice on the muscles to help reduce the inflammation.  I started this last night and it appears to be better.  Right now I'm sitting here with a bag of ice on my quads.  I'll provide an update tomorrow about the icing.

I think that last week I mentioned that I've been on the beach hike every Tuesday for the past several weeks.  I was talking to the program director this morning at breakfast about the hikes and figured it out.  Starting from week two, I have either been in van four or van five.  She said that on Tuesdays both vans four and five are assigned to the beach hike.

So, guess what hike I did today?  That's right, the beach hike.  It started off the same as usual, then halfway through the first beach section the hiking guide pointed out that a pelican was hanging out with a flock of seagulls.  I really didn't care, but he said that usually pelicans don't like seagulls, so this was a rare sight.  I took his word for it and took a picture.

The good thing about this hike today was that we started early, so by the time I made it to the other beach section, we had a lot of time left before we needed to turn around.  Most of the group made it to the boat then turned around.

The second section of beach is in a crescent shape.  The boat is in the middle of this crescent and my goal was to make it to the other end of the crescent.  I was the only one that continued past the boat and one of the hiking guides caught up to me just before I made it to the other end.

Here's a picture from the other end looking up at Point Dume`.

On the way back, the hiking guide asked me if I've ever sprinted on the beach before.  I thought for a second and realized there wasn't any answer that would result in not doing sprints.  So we did some sprints on the beach on the way back.  It was a lot different than doing sprints on a treadmill or pavement.  It was like running really fast in slow motion.  The speed through the sand was slow, but my body was going full speed.

The afternoon classes on Tuesday are total toning, cardio intervals, and something in the pool.  I'll need to dedicate an entire post to explain total toning and I think I've already explained cardio intervals.  In the cardio intervals class, we have a total of four sprints of one minute each.  I decided to do the sprints on the Jacobs Ladder because I can.

Right now one minute is the longest I can stay on the Jacobs Ladder at one time, and I wasn't sure about the last sprint.  I can report that I made it through all 4 x one minute sprints on the Jacobs Ladder!!  It was quite a day and I'm ready for bed.

Closing thought for the day:  It seems like the theme for the week is sprints.  Yesterday we did sprints for 30 seconds in the gym.  Today's sprints were at the beach and on the Jacobs Ladder.  Throughout my life, every time that I've gone to the beach, I've never sprinted, until today.  The Jacobs Ladder is still difficult.