Cardio, plyometrics, and bodyweight movements

Had an eclectic but fun day today.

Started with a nice warmup, then some cardio. Today, basically, decided that for 5 songs I was gonna just try and keep my heart rate up. Essentially, this equated to me jogging flat or downhill parts of my path, and then walking up hills or when I needed a break from jogging. Not to hard or crazy, just tried to keep my heart rate nice and elevated for all of those 18-20 minutes or so. And, when the 5th song ended I was still about  half mile from home so I got some bonus walking time in, which never hurts.

When I got home, I did a little more warming up and then did some plyometrics. I did 3 clapping pushups, followed by a broad jump, vertical jump, and tuck jump - 5 rounds with whatever rest I wanted in between. Felt good! I was just thinking that I have always wanted to incorporate more jumping into my programming - it makes sense to me that it would be very positively correlated with strength, speed, and athleticism to be able to jump well. It was fun. Clap pushups were less explosive than I wanted them to be, but I guess that's the point of doing them haha.

Finally, did some bodyweight exercises. After yesterdays somewhat sorry display of benching, I felt like I needed more pressing work. Pushups have never been a great thing for me, ever since I started gaining weight, so perhaps dedicating more energy to them would really pay off in terms of muscle gain and athleticism. Also, I have always blown at pullups haha so I need to start doing them more, period. So today, did 8 rounds of 2 chinups, 8 pushups, with a moderate amount of rest. Actually felt really good! Chins were with really strict form and genuinely weren't too hard, and the pushups were also with strict form and were fairly easy. On the last set, I pushed myself and got 4 chinups and 20 pushups. Not bad. Definitely I think doing more of these very basic movements, at my size, with strict form for lots of volume, will probably pay off really well.

So, fun, experimental, and productive. Really loving the changes I have made, I feel happier, I'm having more fun training, and I think I am going to make WAY better gains. Lets keep at it.