What Happens When Your Routine Gets Messed Up?

I was in a great routine:

• Sundays: Hoop and Flexy
• Mondays: Pole
• Tuesdays: Crossfit
• Wednesdays: Yoga and Pole
• Thursdays: Crossfit
• Fridays: Maybe a rest day? or Yoga
• Saturday: Sometimes Crossfit AND Pole

I had all the time in the world and I spent it working out.

And then it happened….

We moved…

(Ok there are significant positive points here, the main being that my hubby is back from deployment! Yay! Married people actually being in same zip code/time zone!)

I left a major metropolitan area, where I had my choice of pole studios, crossfit gyms, SO many things to try – for a much smaller city, where I did not yet have a job, or a car of my own. What’s a girl to do?

I improvised.

I was thrilled to discover that about a mile or so from our new house, within our little subdivision, there was a HUGE playground with……wait for it…..A CLIMBING WALL and monkey bar rings, and regular bars! A dream! I could play on the climbing wall (spoiler alert: it is superbly difficult to find two perfect “rocks” the perfect distance apart to do this):

I could do skin-the-cats and meathooks on the rings….I was a happy little poler.

One of the major benefits of certain crossfit workouts is that they rely heavily on bodyweight exercises and very little on equipment. One of my favorite Crossfit workouts to do on the playground is ‘Cindy’ – she’s one of the “girls”. ‘Cindy’ is AMRAP (as many rounds as possible) in 20 minutes of 5 pull-ups, 10 push-ups, and 15 air squats, making it the perfect workout to do here. Although, as I found out, it does feel a bit different doing pull-ups on the round mini-rings rather than the regular cage bars – other than that, it’s great! Other bodyweight-centric “girls” you could try, either at home or outside, include:

Angie (For time: 100 pull-ups, 100 push-ups, 100 sit-ups, and 100 air squats)

Barbara (5 RFT (rounds for time), 3 minutes rest in between rounds: 20 pull-ups, 30 push-ups, 40 sit-ups, 50 air squats)

Chelsea (EMOTM (every minute on the minute) for 30 minutes:

Nicole (AMRAP 20 minutes: Run 400 meters, Max reps pull-ups)

You can also use an easy formula to make your own Crossfit-style workout – choose the time component (AMRAP, EMOTM, or for time), choose your movements, and choose how long you want to do it!

Perhaps you have the opportunity to join a “regular gym”. If you’re like me, who is used to being able to drop her weights and have more barbells and cages than she can count, it was certainly a different experience. We joined the local YMCA and to my surprise, I am actually able to do a significant amount of Crossfit-y and weightlifting workouts (plus they have rowers, which is fantastic). The only downside is that there is an extremely limited quantity of equipment, so I usually have to edit my workout once I arrive and set what is available. If you’re like me and really really miss your box, you can go online and see what their WOD is, edit if you need to, and complete it alongside your friends!

I’m also still keeping up on those yoga challenges, which encourages me to stretch, particularly after my workouts at the Y. Again, space can be a limitation, but you can also stretch outdoors as well, or in that random empty bedroom in your new house that you don’t actually use for anything except the cat’s food (just me? ok 🙂 )

A month and half into our new adventure, I now have my own car, and was contacted by a local pole studio and invited to start teaching! I happily accepted and am so excited to start teaching again. Now that I have a “grown-up” job – aka a paycheck so I can now spend it working out – I plan to join a local Crossfit box as well! So just remember, if you find yourself in a new place, and you don’t know quite what to do, you can still get those workouts in and maintain until you find your new workout homes.

Stay tuned for more on my new pole home, Indy Pole Dance & Fitness, and my to-be-determined new Crossfit box!

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Lindsey Love

Lindsey Love is a Crossfit Level 1 Trainer, ACE Certified Personal Trainer, and currently teaches Pole and Flexibility classes at Indy Pole Dance & Fitness and Be You Fitness in Indianapolis. She is also a proud Army wife and fur-mom to Chip, an American Staffy, and Minnie, a well treated housecoat.

Latest posts by Lindsey Love (see all)

• “OMG STOP DOING THAT, or things this instructor wants to hammer into your head (but realizes you have to figure it out for yourself)” - November 25, 2016
• “Shake it off”: How to Start Incorporating Dance into Your Pole Class - January 1, 2016
• What Happens When Your Routine Gets Messed Up… er REVAMPED—Part 2 - October 30, 2015