Arnold Recap

Let me just start by saying that this was an amazing freaking weekend! It was long as hell, but it was seriously non-stop fun. Thursday morning I was up early to train hams and do cardio, then it was home to shower and pack up some last minute stuff and head out to the airport. I got into Columbus around 7:30 that night, hitched a cab with some guy from BSN who was on my flight, and got checked in to my hotel. My roomie was already at the amateur pre-judging, so I shot over there to meet up with her and a couple other people to see one of our friends compete in figure (she looked awesome, too!). After she was done, we headed back to our hotel to meet up with some RX'ers in the hotel bar. By the time things wound down, it was nearly 2am, and we were finally off to bed. We had to be at the booth Friday morning by 9:30. We would have been on time, except for the fact that the shuttle from our hotel took us on a Tour de Columbus on it's way to the Expo, and we wound up being almost 30 minutes late.

I know this is going to sound so cheesy, but my first day at the Expo felt a little surreal. Since this was my first time ever at the Arnold, I was just soaking everything in. There is so much going on, and even the most focused person (me) couldn't concentrate on just one thing at a time. In fact, it was a little overwhelming for me when I was walking around the Expo during one of my breaks on Friday. Anyway, I worked until about 5pm on Friday, and then my roommate and I went to train at a MetroFitness a couple blocks from out hotel. It was pretty empty when we got there, but by the time we finished training, it was completely packed and overloaded with douchery. I trained arms and then did 30 minutes of cardio afterwards. I was actually able to get in a decent workout, considering that I always have a hard time training when I'm completely thrown out of my comfort zone or schedule. Since I knew Saturday would be a long day, I tried to get to bed a little early that night.

Saturday morning we were up and at the Expo by 9am, and the people were rolling in before we knew it. Things were a little busier on Saturday, but it wasn't nearly as bad as what I'd heard people tell me about from past Expos. My feet were soooooo sore by the end of the day, and I was just exhausted. After a little power nap, I was up and ready to go again, so I had dinner with a few other people and then it was back to the room to get ready for the afterparty. Let me tell you, I was dreading putting on 5 inch heels on my already sore and swollen feet, but a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do. The afterparty was absolutely nuts. I really can't think of any other way to describe it. Maybe I'm not the best judge of these things, since I don't go out much, but as far as I'm concerned, it was crazy. I had a blast though and was surprised that, when the lights came on around 2:30am, I was still ready to keep partying. But knowing that I had to be up to work again on Sunday, I headed back to the hotel, and still didn't get to bed until nearly 4am.

Up four hours later to get ready to go back to the Expo to work until 3. Pretty much everyone at the booth looked and felt like something out of Night of the Living Dead. Despite dragging complete ass, the day went by pretty quickly, and when 3 o'clock rolled around, I was actually a little sad about leaving. Not only did I meet some great people and make some great new friends, but I also was lucky enough to have gotten a lot closer to some people who I spent quite a bit of time with over the weekend. So, off to the airport I went and finally walked in my door at 11pm last night.

As fun as this weekend was, it totally kicked my ass. I think it's going to take me a whole week to recover from it. And it's not like I have a quiet week this week either. On Thursday, I have to drive up to Albany to go to court for a stupid speeding ticket, and then on Saturday, I have to drive down to LI to go see Mike for my back. I'm starting to forget what the inside of my apartment looks like.

Quick note about my training/dieting...this week is going to be a bit of a transition week for me. Obviously, I'll keep up with my training, but I'm going to kinda wing things with my diet and cardio. I'm going to add some carbs back in (probably just oatmeal in the morning) and do no more than 45 minutes of cardio at a clip (not sure how many days, but probably on most days). I ate pretty well over the weekend at the Arnold. I would say that I strayed from eating clean 3 times...I had a burger/fries on Friday night, two drinks Satuday night at the afterparty, and then another burger/fries before leaving to come home. Otherwise, I was able to eat according to plan, which was good. This morning, I trained delts and chest and did 45 minutes of cardio. I was going to train legs, but my feet hurt so bad that there was no way in hell that I'd have been able to handle the weights.

Alright, looks like it's time for bed for this girl. It was a long, amazing weekend, and I couldn't have asked for a more amazing time.