Workout Wednesday: On The Grind Early This Morning

I woke up this morning around 4:30. I’m not sure why. I have been sick for nearly a week, and I have been seriously exhausted. Nevertheless, my body did not care, and chose to wake up anyway.

Now, ordinarily, I would watch something on my laptop until I got bored and fell back to sleep; however, this morning, I remembered that my gym actually opens at 5 a.m., so I would be a good little athlete this morning and get in a workout a few hours before an early work event (and the chaos that is an average day for me).

The most important thing for me to do when making a trip to the gym is to come in with a plan. So, once I decided that I would go to the gym, I started brainstorming what I wanted to accomplish. I tidied up my room, brushed my teeth and hair, and got dressed during my brainstorm session. Of course, I am a snail when it comes to moving in the morning, so it took me about 40 minutes to go through this process. Ridiculous.

I grabbed my gym bag and all of my essentials, retrieved my workout journal from the car, and headed over to good old Washington Sports Club.

On my walk there, I discovered that other humans are actually willingly awake at this hour. This idea was absolutely absurd to me, but I was a little proud of myself for joining their ranks this morning. It was weird to see no stores open — especially the Whole Foods. There was only one car in the parking lot that I have to cross to get to the gym, and she was definitely illegally parking, because she was headed to the gym as well. Holy smokes! They don’t tow people at this hour?!

I was expecting the gym to be empty, since none of the classes start until 6:30, but I was mistaken. While the locker room and cardio area were sparsely populated, there were tons of people using the free weights! There were personal training sessions, groups working out together, and single people in the zone. I was impressed by these early morning people. WORK!

It took me a couple of minutes to find a good spot to go through my lifting program (see below). I don’t like to have to do too much machine swapping or walking around the gym floor once I find a spot. If I can find one little corner where I can do everything, that is the ideal situation for me. Does anyone else do this, or am I the only weirdo who doesn’t want to interact with others or share at the gym?

I went through my program, which took me about 45 minutes, then began my short walk back home. I saw plenty of people heading into the gym, and the Whole Foods still wasn’t open. Dang! I also had time to think up some events the Silver Spring City Sports could host since they are three doors down from the gym. They, like everyone else, were not open. They never seem to be open when I need them to be. :-/

Overall, I was proud of myself for getting my butt up and not doing a marathon of Real Housewives of (fill in the blank), which was my original plan. It’s too bad the gym isn’t open 24 hours. That might really help with my insomnia (and my shameless reality TV addiction).

What do you do when you wake up hours ahead of schedule? Are you a morning person? Are you a morning snail like me? Is there a store in your neighborhood that never seems to be open when you want them to be? The nerve!

Check out this post for more information on how to complete the workout!