Second Program: Week #4

Week 50: Second Program - week 4 out of 15

Week settings:

• Area of focus: Cardio-Strength
• Number of training days: 4
• Limitations: none
• Last week feedback: "Hard, but ok"

Training:

• Monday: Dione standard (29:07*) +[bonus: 10 straights pullups (00:31*) & 10 Toes to bar (00:51*)]
• Tuesday: Gaia strength 6/10 (24:08* -First time)
• Wednesday: Venus standard (17:09* -PB)
• Thursday: boxing training
• Friday: Poseidon standard (04:51*) +Metis strength 1/3 (01:11* -First time)

Statistics:

• 2'556 points
• 76 minutes

I setup week #4 so that the difficulty remains similar to the previous week. As the saying goes: "once bitten, twice shy". After the 15K run assigned to me last week, I wasn't going to select "Far too easy" any time soon...

The week turned out to be fairly mild.


It started with Dione. My poor performance (~29 mn vs a ~26mn PB), clearly showed that I'm not back in full-shape yet. It gave me a good sweat, but it remains one of the basic workouts. It not outstandingly difficult.
I added a few extra pullups as I feel that it one of the area where my performance decreased the most. Followed by a few Toes to bar (I wanted to test if I could do this move and unlock it in the "advanced skills" menu). This new exercise is actually not that bad. What surprised me is that I expected this exercise to mostly target abs, but it turned out that it's mostly demanding for the shoulders (and you don't want to lose your grip while head-down!)

The only notable session was on day #2. At first I had just seen that I had to perform Gaia 6/10, assuming it was the standard version. I didn't thought much about it (why worry about a partial standard workout?) As I was ready to perform the workout, I noticed that in my program was the strength version.

My main memories of the 2 Gaia that I had performed a few months back, was that I was soaking wet upon completion. Well, strength Gaia take perspiration to a whole new level...


As usual with the new Freeletics program, the difference between standard and strength workouts is that the climbers are replaced by froggers and jumps by high jumps. Gais is no exception. The only novelty is that Gaia's unique standups are replaced by standup-jumps.

These standup-jumps being new, I wondered how they would go. Well, honestly if you already master the standup technique you shouldn't worry about these. The extra jump require a bit of additional energy from your tired legs but nothing unbearable.
What you should worry about are the 30 reps of high jumps. The full workouts has 10 rounds. That's 300 high jumps.
This time, I didn't complain that I was assigned a partial workout...

Usually I always try to perform workouts at max intensity and each time I get a good sweat. But overall, my cardio recovery is relatively fast (muscle soreness is another story). But this is one of the few workouts, which leaves me laying on the ground for a while to recover my breath.I'd say this is harder stuff than Kentauros.


Anyway, days 3 & 4 were not very hard. I actually was asking myself if the week was intentionally less difficult to recover from week #3 and may be as a rest before week #5. Traditionally week #5 is made of Hell Days.
We'll see...