Starting up again

“And my buns, they don’t feel nothin like steel”….one of my first thoughts of the morning (Hello Clueless!).  Last night I went to the gym and did my first “real” weights workout since, honestly, May.  And this morning when I got up; my buns definitely didn’t feel like steel; but oh my lanta were my hamstrings sore!

When we were engaged I used some of my tax refund to get 20 personal training session for the wedding and I was introduced to a circuit type regime of weight lifting…doing 8-12 reps on one exercise, followed by 8-12s of two or more different exercises.  All the of exercises focus on different muscles, so you aren’t working let’s say your biceps for 48 straight reps.  I am still sifting through my Women’s Health emails to decide on a my exact exercises, but last night I did:  bicep curls combined with leg lunges (love to multi-task), tricep extensions, one-leg “lawn mowers” (again multi-tasking while doing the arm exercises the one leg helps to strengthen your balance and core), medicine ball squats, shoulder extensions with medicine ball, “wood chops” on the machine, tricep dips and pull ups.  I pretty much used 7.5# weights for everything since I’m trying to ease my way back into this.  I also should mention that in my experience and reading, stretching and properly warming up is very important.  Pre-workout I don’t stretch at all.  I either run stairs or hop on a treadmill at a 7.5 grade incline at 3.5 speed for 5 minutes.  I used my heart rate monitor to confirm that I’m in the fat-burning or cardio zone to start lifting.  I stretch muscles as I go and then post lift do a nice thorough stretch of everything.

Last night as I was getting ready for bed I could already feel the soreness in my legs.  I can’t lie, sometimes I like that feeling.  When I’m sore, I feel like I was productive (although I guess you could be sore from pulling something too, but luckily that’s not my situation).  Tonight is cardio and abs.  I have a chiro appt after work so I’m still debating if I’ll go to the gym and run on the treadmill or if I’ll do cardio via Wii’s “Just Dance” (love this game! And using my HR monitor, I burn about 250 calories in 30 minutes; not too shabby, although it is less than running. Anyways, after having only run twice in the past month; I’m looking forward to starting to exercise again!