Working Out is really Starting to Work Out

I’m pleased with my progress. My recovery between work outs is much quicker and we’re moving into a new phase of training.

First the recovering part. I rearranged my training schedule so I could add an extra spinning class on Wednesday morning. Wednesday morning training was moved to Tuesday evening and I got my second trainer Shawn. So now I have training Tuesday night and then a spinning class at 7 am Wednesday. Actually if you get there at 6:45 the instructor is already there so instead of 45 minutes of spinning you can get in a hour. His class is fairly challenging. After working out the night before I’d fell pretty wiped out by the end of the class .

Needless to say when I started this, I’d wake up on Thursday mornings and could barely get out of bed. But now it’s not that hard and in fact I have enough energy to go out for my morning walk. The reason for the quick recovery is that I’m getting stronger and it’s very noticeable to me by the level of energy I have on Thursday morning. Also I don’t hurt like hell all over the place most noticeably in my legs. Doing leg work during the Friday training session used to really hurt. Now not all that much now.

I asked Shawn some questions during Friday’s session (Shawn was filling in for Ed who was at a meeting). I asked Shawn if he came up with a different routine for each person or just did the same thing for everyone. He said each one was different. He said I seemed to like free weights and not machines so much (this comes from training with Randy and Ed). My workouts then concentrate on that. Shawn knew of trainers that did the same workout no matter who the client was. He said that was boring and didn’t help the client out all that much. He then added that there are a limited number of types of exercise that you can do for each of the muscle groups. A chest press is a chest press. The same type of action is used for the exercises even if the exercises itself is not always the same. You can do all sorts of variations on a lunge but at the end of the day it’s still a lunge.

I also learned the order you should do exercises in. You start with the legs because they have the biggest group of muscles. Then you can either do chest or back. It’s interesting Shawn likes to do chest while Ed does back. Finally you do arms. Shoulders you usually work in with back work.

The training is undergoing a change. The emphasis is going to be adding muscle mass. This means higher weight with fewer reps. The higher weight I started to encourage a couple of weeks ago. When either Ed or Shawn ask if I want to try a higher weight I’ve been saying yes. I figure we can lower the weight if necessary. I’m excited about the next phase of training.

The remaining part of the training regimen which is still not exactly where it should be is the eating end of things. My weight is holding between 175-179. I want to try and make 175 my ceiling and my floor around 170. I’m hoping to get there around the first of the year if not sooner.

I have to say I’m very pleased the way things are progressing.