I wrote my first Yelp review of, what else, Pulse Fitness Bethesda. Let me know what you think.

Laura

Trivia Cycle was full today so again I rode the teacher’s bike in the front of the class. This time I was a little quieter than when I wrote Leader of the Stationary Bike Pack and I was prepared that people would naturally be watching me for pacing etc.

Usually I stand up as the tension gets higher so I can reduce strain on my knee with the patella injury, but today I tried to stay seated more. Bad mistake. I felt like I was pushing my knee with too much pressure, instead of keeping to the modification that has been working for me for years. I lowered the bike’s tension and focused on increasing my pace instead, thereby relieving any knee strain while still setting a visual example for my classmates.

My first cycling class a few years ago was all on low tension, under the advice of my dear friend, Jessica. She signed me up for the class after I mentioned that I wanted to get into good enough shape to take up cycling. Well, Jessica isn’t one to support wimp-ism, so she signed me up and coached me though. “No one can see how much tension is on your bike. You don’t have to increase the tension just because the instructor says so.” With Jessica beside me I made it through my cycling class – which was a full hour! That was four years and 27 lbs ago.

The Spinning brand bikes at that gym didn’t move side-to-side the way the RealRyder bikes do at Pulse and I had trouble increasing the tension at all without feeling stress on my knee. Pulse was just opening and the side-to-side motion gave a softer feeling for my knee while I increased my strength. Interestingly, I had a hard time standing up while pedaling on the RealRyders at first when I could stand on the more stable Spinning bikes. Within a few months I could stand on either bike and Lisa called me her, “Most Improved Stander.”

My knee issue is from a fall almost 17 years ago, causing a somewhat uncommon injury. Most knee issues are related to the meniscus (the cushion between your upper and lower leg), or the ACL (an important ligament in the knee). I slipped on uncarpeted stairs hitting just under my kneecap, causing the cartilage behind my patella to erode. I had surgery, taped my knee, and wore a knee brace over the next few years trying to stop the damage but nothing really worked. I felt some relief with annual hyaluronic acid injections (Synvisc, Hyalgen, etc.) but my orthopedic surgeon said I would need still knee replacement in a few years. “That cartilage isn’t coming back,” he said.

And then Jessica opened the door to cycling for me.

And now I have no (zero) knee pain on a daily basis.

And now I am no longer a candidate for knee replacement surgery!

In my experience, strengthening the muscles around my knee through indoor cycling has giving my patella just enough room to stop the bone-on-bone rubbing, thereby stopping the knee pain.

I still can’t kneel on that knee so I constantly make adjustments in Pilates and other classes. For example, one nice stretch in Lisa’s classes is cat/cow, where you position yourself on the mat on both your hands and knees, then alternate between arching and rounding your back. I simply stand up and put my hands on the wall to do the same stretch. You can see Lisa demonstrating cat/cow in her Blizzard video starting around time 2:30.

So, my point is that you need to find out what works for you, for YOUR body, and don’t let peer pressure make you do something you know will be a problem.

You do you.

I passed my stress test! This is a relief because I was stressed about it.

Well, obviously.

There’s been some concern among my Doctor Group about my Blood Pressure (BP) and Resting Heart Rate (RHR). I was given 1 month to lower my BP, which I did, but then my RHR was high for unknown reasons. This mystery led to scheduling today’s Stress Test with the cardiologist.

Lisa-the-Trainer from Pulse took her responsibility very seriously and has been encouraging me … (what’s the opposite of “gently”?)… to do more cardio, especially leading up to today’s test. I can’t prove it but I suspect this is the reason she added a second tabata sequence at the end of Sunday’s Trivia Cycle. I mean, when has she ever before said to the class, “Oh! I forgot, there’s one more song, just one more.”

FYI, tabata is a four-minute cycling sequence with a series of eight intervals that are 20 seconds all-out push, and then 10 seconds of rest. It’s killer and Lisa usually shortens the tabata classes by a few minutes because it is so hard.

But I can’t prove anything.

Anyway, I’ve definitely seen improvement cardio-wise. I did the cardio intensive Triple Threat class Sunday before Trivia Cycle, for a total of two hours (120 minutes) of high intensity cardio. According to my FitBit, my working heart rate dropped during the training from an average of 145 the first hour to an average of 130 the second hour. And before you say I was phoning it in, you try doing tabata after 2 hours of high intensity interval training (HIIT).

I’ve also lowered my resting heart rate from 94 to 89 in the 3 weeks I’ve been working from home, which I attribute to both the increased cardio and decreased stress, although it’s still too far from my baseline of 60. The 10,000 steps per day goal associated with all FitBit enthusiasts is also likely a favorable factor.

So for the stress test, Nurse Sandra attached little stickers all around my chest, two on my sides, and briefly a few on my arms and legs. Some of the places were ticklish, so I giggled. Sandra said some people cry from fear during the stress test, poor things, which I can understand. I calibrated my FitBit measured heart rate to the readout on the computer, finding them to be perfectly in sync.

Dr. Stevenson came in and explained the process. He told me about his FitBit step count and his issue keeping up with his wife’s count, (“my stride is longer”) while I jogged on the treadmill. Yes, my heart rate went up but my BP stayed normal. In the end, The Dreaded Test was over pretty fast and not nearly as hard as a typical gym workout. Dr. S pointed to the little spikey lines on the computer and said, “you’re heart is showing a normal, healthy response to stress. Based on these results, you can exercise as hard as you want to.”

Yay!

Don’t tell Lisa.

This week I lowered my resting heart rate by a daily average of 4 beats per minute (bpm) in three days of exercise. I know this because I started using a wearable health-tracking device.

Pick the Bit

I bought a FitBit Surge this week in conjunction with starting a new contract working from home. After asking friends who work from home, one of the most common comments was “I just don’t move for hours.” “How do you know?” I asked? The answer was to get a wearable.

So I ran to the Apple Store to look over the Apple Watch (as it turns out, not called the iWatch because that just sounds creepy.) I loved the big clunky Watch, especially how it integrated seamlessly with my iPhone and other Apple products. I could text! I could talk on the phone! I could HEAR my phone ringing even if it was in my purse or pocket!!

Then I went online and read zillions of reviews of Apple Watch and the family of FitBit products. I finally decided on a FitBit Surge because it’s more fitness focused, more accurate, and better at tracking the resting heart rate.

Tuesday through Friday

I ordered the FitBit Surge on Sunday, along with the associated scale, and I was at home when the FitBit arrived Tuesday. I didn’t open it until the end of the day, then slapped it on my wrist on my way to Pulse where I hopped onto an elliptical and waited for the steps to start adding up.

But they didn’t. Turns out the elliptical doesn’t register as steps, although my heart rate was tracked diligently. Same issue with the weight circuit in Tuesday’s Bone Builder class. I didn’t expect it to track MELT but by that point I was feeling like my FitBit didn’t get me at all. I fiddled with the settings overnight. Unfortunately Wednesday’s spinning and rather difficult Pilates were again not reported in my steps. At Thursday’s one-on-one training, Lisa asked me to stop looking at the FitBit before I fell off the elliptical. It wasn’t counting any steps.

Satur-Data

By Saturday, my FitBit had been diligently collecting information for three days even though I was still figuring things out. Kara came home for Spring Break, just in time to help me configure the specific activities. Once these were set, I could enter the exact time and date of the prior workouts, thereby aligning the heart rate and steps to the appropriate activities. I added Elliptical, Spinning, Pilates, Weights, Circuit Training, Workout, and Walk.

The first thing I noticed was that my heart rate during exercise was going down steadily. Hurrah! My FitBit connected with some friends who apparently walk waaaaay more than me. I was so frustrated Saturday by my lack of steps that I marched in place for 4000 steps while watching TV. Remember, I’ve been exercising, just not doing step-worthy activities.

My resting heart rate has been a concern of my doctor for the past several weeks. I usually measure about 60-70 at appointments but started registering around 100 bpm lately. She sent me to a pulmonologist who is currently running me through tests. He hasn’t found any root cause but suggested “we may need to do some conditioning,” meaning, “for the love of gosh, woman, do some cardio!” So I’ve increased my cardio dramatically, under the watchful eye of Lisa-the-Trainer … and now also watched by my FitBit.

On Thursday, my resting BPR was 94, Friday was 92, and Saturday was 90 with 1-2 hours of cardio each day. At this rate, my rate will rate ok soon enough!