Day 19
A while ago a friend asked me to help her lose some weight for her wedding dress. She was already very pretty and in quite fit, but she just wanted to tone up for her most photographed day.
We did a thousand gym classes a week and entered some 10km fun runs. Neither of us liked running, but the fun runs were good little short-term goals.
One day at work I was talking to a dude who was a totally accomplished marathoner, and he suggested that to train for longer distances, I should find a steep hill and sprint up it.
I was stunned, flummoxed, weirded-out... how good I get good at one thing but doing a totally different thing?
It didn't make any sense to me... if I wanted to run long distances, then I had to train by running long distances... ah, hello, that is super logic.
Anyway, the hill sprints punched us in the lungs so hard with their mega-intensity, we smashed out some hated 10kms and at her wedding when the music started, the church doors opened and everyone around me said things like "Aww, she's so beautiful" and "Look at her waist, it's so tiny", so victories all round.
This is lovely, but talk about ninja training dammit!
May I introduce to you.... our driveway.
It goes way up in the top right corner... it's about, ah, something something feet or like 150 meters and I guess 35 degrees.
Talking to 
Today, I tried to sprint up it 5 times. "Tried" because my heart was all explodey by half-way... and I was barely moving by the top. It's so steep that you feel like you're running on the spot unless you really, really push. It's a great exercise and I'm so lucky to have access to such a dramatic hill. I'm a lucky duck.
Today's exercises
Warmup
5 minutes of jump rope
5 minutes of Cross-trainer cardio
Death hill
5 hill sprints (also put the bins out... so, ah, + 1 weighted slow hill slog?)
Tendonitis eccentric exercises
15 pounds on the cable machine; pulling it every which way for 15 reps each.
Grip Strength exercises
Mixed it up today, played on my pipes, lache bars and climbing grips until the forearms felt pumpy/got too hungry.
Injuries & sore spots
Felt great today... not sore at all so was ready to punch all the hills.
Goals for December
Get back on track to all my tendonitis exercises
Beat that last rung on the double salmon ladder
Get the 14 foot warped wall (I used to do it easily but my technique was "cheating" so now I'm trying to do it properly but haven't got it yet).
Image provided by Google Image Search of 'Australian Ninja Warrior' and my phone.