Higher Expectations

So I decided to start my own body group focused on female marines. I started it because I’m tired of my male counter parts coddling and saying "pretty good for a female" or something akin to that. I don’t want to be pretty good for a female physically, I want to be pretty good for a marine and sometimes a male marine. You know what I mean? I guess my inspiration was a Gunny I had back in Okinawa named Gunnery Sargent Chapman. This lady was a beast when it came to PT and at one point ran a 300 male pft, which is a perfect score and hard to do!However she was not like this overly muscular person! Think figure model physique. And beautiful for her age (she’s nearing her 40s now I think). But she was amazing! A realy motivation and made sure not to give any slack to any of the female marines in our unit. If anything she expected us to do better than the males because we have a "higher pain tolerance", so it means we can push our self twice as hard if we simply put our minds to it than any male. She did not accept excuses! For this I loved that woman! But now I’m in the US and all I keep hearing is "good for a female marine" or, "it’s because she’s a chick", and sometimes though they mean well they defend the females by saying "she’s a female dude lay off!". I’m tired of that ****! Yeah I’m a female, so what? Does that give me an excuse for not being able to do a fire man carry of a guy 20 lbs heavier than me? No, especially when the guy that weighs less than me and is twice as skinny is getting his ass chewed for not running fast ENOUGH in the fire man’s carry. I know they mean well, but they really have to stop, and the only way I can make that happen is by proving that I can dish it out just as good, or better than my male counter parts… maybe its just my aggressive streak, but what ever it is, it’s pissed me off enough to want to try twice as hard to do something about! I love my male marines, but it’s high time they figured it out : I don’t need another big brother.

That’s right ladies and gentlemen! I finally got one complete pullup! No kipping (meaning kicking or swinging my legs) involved! With no assistance! Oh yeah! The funny thing is, it wasn’t due to any weight lifting, or arms workouts really. It was due to the least expected exercise (for me anyway) ever! Jump roping! That’s right! I only started jump roping a few weeks ago, and have only done it three times! Before that I was running and doing some mild weights, and honestly have been being pretty lazy since my pft. I did absolutely nothing because I was in a big, humongous slump! However, I decided I’d at least do SOMETHING if not lift weights or run especially since the work section hasn’t been PTing either. So, about four weeks ago I pulled out the Spped-Rope Jump rope I had bought my husband for his birthday (along with  a bow flex bench and adjustable dumbells) and used it. I only last for ten minutes before I was completely exhausted! After words I did some light weights using my husbands workout equipment, and then, again, attempt jump roping. Once again, I lasted only ten minutes before I had to stop. The next day I couldn’t move my legs further than three inches before they were screaming at me. As a result I didn’t touch the rope again, or do anything more than a few crunches in the morning, until two weeks ago. So, there I was, jump roping again. Surprisingly though I did not get winded until about 15 minutes, and not exhausted until I hit twenty minutes! I was absolutely surprised that my endurance had doubled so quickly! So much so I did a couple sets of push ups after words and a few crunches when I only intended to do just the jump roping.

After words, we had our first section PT since our pft. It turned out to be nothing too hard. More or less a workout on your own or play football thing. So I jogged a few laps, not wanting to rip my claves any more than needed for the long work day, did some squats and lunges and a few flexed arm hangs. Then, as we were all about to leave, my Sgt. says to everyone "If Stallings can get one complete pull-up, we can go!" Now I was surprised. Nevertheless, I climbed on the metal pull up bar with half ripped tape covering it’s ruggid surface, hung, and then up I went! I got to about a inch from getting my chin over and had to kip. I was so surprised I had even managed that! Not too mention everyone was happy they were allowed to go home, of course ^.^

Afterwards, a few days later, I did another twenty minute jump rope workout, and then today I did another though today it was only for about 17 minutes honestly. Then, I saw my husband using the irongrip pull up bar we had just in the doorway of the computer room and I thought to myself, why not? So, I got on the bar, and went to a dead hang. Then, as if it was natural for me to, I pulled myself up and got my chin nearly two inches above the bar! No kiping involved! I went back to a dead hang, and tried again. THis second time I had to kip, but despite that, I was absolutely estatic! And, as you can see, I still am! Wahoo! Take that anyone who said I could get that one pull up! My new goal? 3 perfect pullups! Wish me luck!

Alright. So I’m finally done with my month long leave. I visited with family, gambled, had a wedding ceremony, and spent a lot of money. Within it all, I only managed to fit in a few crunches here and there, and a few pull ups. Now, here I am at Camp Pendleton, CA. We’ve finally gotten housing and are working on getting furniture and the basics and finally, it is time to get back on the excercise horse. I weighed in at Battalion the other day at 147 ibs. That’s, I think, two pounds heavier than when I left oki. During leave I’ve been taking Hydroxy Cut Hardcore to make up for the lack of exercising. So, I figured I gained more than just two pounds and the pills help cut some of it out. End result? I have a shit load of stuff, excuse the language, to make up for. Now that we’re semi settled in we can get back to a normal workout schedule. Hopefully. Wish my luck! Woot!

So. We finally made it back to the states woot! After about 20 hours of waiting in airports and flying. Right now we’re in Detroit. About four blocks from the infamous 8 mile where my husbands family lives. It’s not exactly what I pictured it to be, but then again he never really described his home. It’s nice though. Family is sweet and all. The only thing that really sucks is getting used to always being in 60 degree or higher weather to the 28 and below they’ve got going on here. It’s a slow transition. To say the least I won’t be doing any runs during my stay here. But I’ll be doing lots of abs and arms (mostly in the form of push ups and crunches until we get to cali). Well that’s my up date for now!

So it’s been a really busy last week. The husband and I have been getting ready for our PCS from Okinawa back to the states. It’s been hell. Between checking out and TMO I literally have to squeeze in a workout when I can if I’m not too bushed. However I managed to do it. I actually did a workout today, but I can’t put it in the workout tracker because I packed away my workout log book >.< Curses.  Ah well. I got my body fat calibrated today also, this time by the nutrition specialist at the gym. Now I don’t know how accurate the taping method one is vs the pinching thing that woman put me through (I felt like she was trying to rip the meat off my thigh!) but I think it was worth it. According to the pinch method though (and if the taping method was accurate) I gained body fat. However when she weighed me, I had lost weight. How does that work out hm? I half expected the body fat to be a little worse more so for the fact of my erractc workout schedule. But I didn’t exactly expect to loose weight and gain body fat. Ah well. Well hubby’s hungry guess we need to eat.

Since there are no selections in the workout  calander I’ll put todays workout here. As I said, I’m still pretty sore from my workouts from the previous days, so I took it easy today. All I did was 30 minutes on the Protocol Elliptical Machine. I burned, according to the machine, around 305 cals. So I’m feeling pretty good right now. Not as sore as I was before I began so it’s all good. I feel acomplished cause I really didn’t want to do ANYTHING today. Ya know? Ah well. Tomorrow’s my off day, to prepare for tomorrow.

So today we had to go to a mandatory training.  The training was not so bad surprisingly. Usually our trainings (or briefs) are about military security and proper decorum and suicide or sexual harrassment. This time, however, it was something most marines actually like. Exercise, supplements, and nutrition. Of course they also talked about the normal stuff (alcohol abuse, STDs, and suicide prevention). I actually learned a lot today though. Learned that no matter if you work out one muscle for thrity minutes or and hour it can only tare so much. Meaning the end result will be the same (in some people a difference but he majority the same). I learned that your body can only absorb about 13 % of the protien you take in from shakes and such so pounding down protien will only go so far. That you only take so much of a certain types of vitamins because the rest of it is just pissed out of your system (it can only absorb so much again). And some other stuff. Of course they also touched on things I already knew such as doing a full bend in the arms with curling (not just stopping partially), fat does not turn into muscle or vice versa, and eating six small meals speed up your motabolism. That’s just afew things. Nevertheless it was interesting. Now I’m debating on whether I want my off day from the gym to be saturday or sunday. Monday the section is planning to do a "Mirf" (think that’s right) run. Something about 1 mile sprints with 100 pull ups and 100 pushups in between. I’m not sure though. the Staff Non-Commisioned Officers’ (SNCO) are doing it for their SNCO Academy PT (a course you have to take when you pick up SNCO rank.. they’ve got courses for Sgts and Cpls as well). Its more or less a haze fest. So I’m dreading doing anything sunday, but I think I’ll be too sore to do anything too more (I hope not though..  I want to do arms and back!)

Okay so today at work one of the Sgt decided to pull his old "pull-up for downtime" routine. Basically the section working won’t get to sleep until they get however many pull ups/ flexed arm-hang seconds he chooses for him by the end of the day. The first time around he did this I had to hang for one hour. That is 3,600s. I got a total of 17 minutes before I said "**** it" I’ll pull a 24 hr. Well he pretty much did the same thing this time around too. Luckily I no longer pull security and work a desk job so he has no control over when I sleep. MUAHAHAH! But I did it any way.. And well, how much I suck was shoved into my face. By the time I left work I only had 151 seconds of hang time for the entire day. It was embarrasing. Alas I kept at it though, even though I felt like such a shit bag. After the first half of the day I took my "Admin Thirty" ( a.k.a. 2 hour lunch break). I walked down to the gym, though usually I do a fifteen minute run. I wanted to get my Body Fat calibrated and weighed, unfortunately the lady who does it was doing an aerobics class so I have to wait until monday for that information. Boo. So I went ahead and did my ab and back workout I had planned. Then I did a really slow jog back to the barracks. It was slow because my calves and shins were still in a lot of pain from the sprints and stairs we did for PT two days prior. By tomorrow though they should be fine so I’ll be able to do legs. Woot! Oh and I took some pics today. Yay! Now you can see my hopefully one day abs as they are right this moment.. Lol. Woot!

What can I say. I’m a sucker for blogs. So here’s my first one for Body Space. Between PCSing and Work I don’t have much time to exercise one my own these days like I want. But I’m making do. Luckily since exercise is required for work at least 3 times a week I’m not too worried. Granted to day was an easy day. For Unit Physical Training (PT) we did a few warm up exercises, stretches, and a couple of push ups. We sprinted down to the foot ball field and then.. played football. Yeah. Being female, well lets just say I don’t exactly get to play IN the game.. I more or less job back and forth while I watch the guys throw the ball to everyone else with a dick .Okay that’s an over exageration. They probably would have passed it to me, if I really wanted to play. I didn’t really want to play though. Not a big fan of two hand shove. Monday we did sprints and stairs so my shins are still suffering from that. My friends/co-workers say I just need new shoes probably. Which is more than likely what it is. I have high arches and all. Ah well. I had planned on going to the gym today, but I couldn’t do it on lunch when I usually do because I had to relieve the secretary for lunch  a half hour earlier, then work let out late, I’m in a bad mood, and I’m starving . So I’ll have to haze myself tomorrow. During lunch and probably in the afternoon after I pick my uniforms from alterations… Long day.. so yeah. I’ll try to post up some more recent pictures tomorrow also.