Anna Said Knock You Out

It has been 5 personal training sessions in and I am already feeling and seeing results! Last night was incredible and the variety of exercises I was able to do without feeling I was going to collapse made me so happy.

After warming up, I told my personal trainer that I'd like to try the split squats again since my Tuesday session didn't give me enough quad burn. Then we moved onto bench presses. I don't know what the weight is but I know the weight was increased between sets. The final exercise in this circuit was a sideways hop/step on one aerobics step. That got my heart rate really up there. I did this rotation 3 times until I wobbled over doing a split squat.

My next circuit was trunk rotations with a resistance band. I like to call this gondola rowing. Then I did overhead presses which was pretty good but by rep 8/10 my poor left arm craps out and gets all wobbly. Next I used the fitness cable machine to work my trapezius by doing pullbacks. I liked this exercise because the stance is a good hamstring stretch and kinda gives the lower back a rest. 3 times with this rotation.

The final rotation was tough and fun. I used resistance bands to push forward - kinda like a standing push up with the bands being the resistance, not body weight (it was my idea to do this since I had been doing a lot of pulling exercises, I thought pushing would be good). The next exercise was a doozy because it worked a ton of muscles. I sat on a stack of step benches, pulled 25lbs on the cable machine while I stood up. My trainer told me it's like doing a dead lift but in a back friendly safer manner. The final exercise was awesome because it was a workout hidden in a stretch. I was given a 25lb grab bar, bent over, lowered it to my toes, and then straightened up with straight arms. It stretches the hamstrings and works the lower back.

All this took 45 minutes and I was pretty sweaty but functional. I was able to carry on a conversation the entire time. Plus, today my quads aren't hurting from the split squats! Which means that I ripped enough muscle tissue to actually create strength. Woohoo!