Adventures in Walking From the Couch to 5K - Chapter 4

It’s Friday evening and the boys have left with their dad for the weekend. AJ has the townhouse to herself and decides to do her homework for the training program. She goes to her goodie bag that she received at the training program the evening before. AJ pulls out the training schedule. She finds that today’s homework is stretching. AJ says to herself, "That is very doable."

AJ goes upstairs and changes into some comfortable clothes for her stretching exercises. She decides on a pair of black running shorts and a purple tank top. AJ walks back downstairs to the living room.

She grabs her stretching booklet included with the training homework. AJ lays it on the floor, sits down on the carpeted floor, and proceeds to read through the exercises. AJ takes each exercise out and lays them out on the floor and starts doing her stretches.

The first exercise is a squat with a reach. AJ stands up and places her feet wider than her shoulders and keeps her upper body tall. She proceeds to squat by sticking her butt back while keeping her upper body tall. When she gets to the bottom of her squat she reaches both her hands forward. AJ continues to do this ten times in a row and then takes a brief break to get a drink of water from the glass she has sitting on the table. She then continues for a second set of ten squats and reaches.

After AJ completed her squats she moves onto her second exercise that is the single leg shoulder press. She then stands on her right leg with the left foot a couple inches off the ground. Taking her left hand she makes a fist and presses her fist as high as she can. Her hip naturally is out a bit when she raises her left foot up and when she has her hand as high as she can press up her hip straightens out. She brings her arm down and puts her foot back on the floor. She repeats the exercise 12 times on each side.

For the next exercise, which is called rapid reaching, AJ grabs a small stack of books. AJ then stands on her right leg, bends at the hip and her upper body stays straight but falls forward. She proceeds to reach with her right hand to touch the books and then with her left, alternating between them. AJ touches the books with each of her hands 12 times. She then stands back up and changes feet and repeats while standing on her left leg.

AJ takes a short break after the last exercise to grab a drink of water. She looks down at the stretches and sees a yoga position, warrior ll, is her next stretch. AJ stands with her feet shoulder width apart and her toes pointed straight forward. She then turns her right foot to the right while turning her body to face the right. AJ raises her arms out to her sides and then bends her right knee to have her knee over her foot. She checks to make sure she can still see her toes. As she presses her feet apart she gazes over her right middle finger. AJ holds her position and takes four deep breaths. AJ straightens her right leg and then turns her right foot and body back forward. Then she repeats the exercise with the left foot.

AJ thinks to herself how amazed she is that she is doing these exercises. Her next exercise is the walker’s arms. AJ stands with her right foot forward, sucks in her stomach, and bends her arms at the elbow to a 90-degree angle. She moves her arms alternately forward and backward. AJ does this for 20 forward movements for each arm and then switches to her left foot forward.

When she completes the walker’s arms she looks down at her exercises and sees that she is on exercise six which is the plank. AJ thinks that it should be interesting to see how well this goes. She puts down the stretching booklet and gets down on the floor. AJ proceeds to get down on her hands while extending her legs out and gradually coming up onto her toes. She concentrates on keeping her back flat and her legs straight, her buttocks are in line with her back and legs, creating a plank-like position. She holds this position slowly counting to 15. She puts her knees down for a few second break and then straightens her legs again. This time she held the position slowly counting to 20. AJ takes another few second break and takes the position one last time and holds it, slowly counting to 20.

AJ then sits down after her planks. She is very pleased with how well she has done for the first time. Still seated she studies her next stretching exercise. Her next exercise is called superhero. This one looks really interesting as it requires some balancing. AJ puts down the stretching booklet and moves to get on her hands and knees. She makes sure that her hands are directly below her shoulders and her knees are a hip width apart. AJ then extends her right arm out front and her left leg behind her. She holds the position, slowly counting to 20 and then switches to her left arm and right leg. AJ does this five times on each side.

She completes her superheroes and moves on to exercise number eight, walking knee hugs. AJ puts down the exercise booklet and then stands up nice and tall. She then walks forward with her right leg first and brings her left knee up hugging it to her chest. AJ continues doing this alternating her knees and going forward one step at a time. She makes sure to keep her back nice and straight while she does this for ten knee hugs on each leg.

AJ's next exercise is the triangle. She stands with her feet a little bit wider than shoulder width apart and her toes pointed forward. She brings her arms up to form a “T,” turns her right foot to the right and then bends at the waist reaching her right-hand down to her right foot and turns her head to look up to her left hand keeping her arms straight. AJ takes five deep breaths and rises back up to form a “T” again. She repeats this to the left side.

Rising back up to a “T” after her left side and for the next exercise of revolving forward bend she bends at her waist to keep her upper body at a 90-degree angle, and she reaches down with her hands on the floor. Next AJ walks her hands over to her right foot and lifts her right hand up towards the ceiling and looks up to her hand. She holds it for 5 deep breaths and then lowers her hand and walks her hands to her left foot and lifts her left hand, looks up to her hand and holds the position for 5 deep breaths.

After she completes the left side of her revolving forward bend she stands back up and then gets down on her hands and knees with her shoulders over her hands and back straight to get into position for the downward dog exercise. She then curls her toes under while lifting her hips up and back as she straightens her legs. AJ holds this position for five deep breaths. She moves back down to her knees on the floor.

AJ gets up off the floor and takes a drink of water while looking down at the exercises to see that she is on her last stretching exercise of supine spinal twist. She reads the description and smiles thinking to herself that she is glad this is the last one and it is lying down. AJ lays down on her back on the floor. She brings her arms out to a “T”, brings her right knee up to a 90-degree angle and drops it to her left side. She then turns her head to look down her right arm to her fingertips. AJ holds it for 5 deep breaths and brings her right knee back up and lays it down next to her left leg. She then repeats with her left leg.

When AJ is done with her left leg and lays it back down she lays there for a few moments only enjoying her own thoughts of how well she did her first set of stretching exercises. After a few moments she sits up, picks up the exercise pages, puts them in her booklet, finishes her water and walks out to the kitchen to get some more water.

She returns to the living room where her goodie bag for the training program is, picks up a pen that was in the bag and puts a smiley face on the training program calendar for today’s stretches. AJ looks over the exercises that she completed. She thinks to herself, These are great exercises. I can’t wait to have the boys try these out with me. They’ll have fun.

With great satisfaction of her accomplishments thus far she goes upstairs and takes a very well-deserved hot bath.

Continue reading - Chapter 5