Happy Halloween Gym Rats! I'm sitting home right now wondering why for the third year in a row, I have gotten no trick-or-treaters. I happen to live in the IDEAL trick-or-treating neighborhood where you could hit 70 homes in one loop yet year after year not a single ring to the doorbell! The first year I lived here I bought a massive bag of candy, anticipating hordes of costumed children at my doorstep all night and was beyond disappointed by the time 9 o'clock rolled around and I decided it was time to give up and turn the front door light out. Last year I thought the chance of a visitor was too slim to bother buying any candy and I was right, no one came. Tonight I gave up entirely and guess what...nothing. Again. Oh well, at least I don't have a bunch of candy to tempt me to the dark side tonight haha. Halloween does happen to be my all time favourite holiday but more for the costumes than the candy. Well, maybe for the gummy dots...and the flavoured tootsie rolls...and just about every form of chocolate...but, I digress. This year I celebrated this past Saturday and dressed up as a ballerina. I was very proud of myself having made a pink puffy tutu all by myself haha. I can't lie, I was tempted to wear it to the gym tonight. I mean, it is technically work out gear, but I'm glad I didn't because I didn't see a single other costume there! Boring gym rats :)
Anyway, tonight I had a solid mid-week sweat sesh consisting of some light leg moves, core, and spinning. I had planned to do a maXtreme routine tonight but I wasn't a fan of the crowd over in the stretching area where I've been doing my maXtreme workouts so I decided to bag it and do my own thing. The weight area was nice and empty tonight, well, compared to yesterday anyway. I don't know what was going on yesterday; perhaps it was because Hurricane Sandy set everyone's schedule awry on Monday but it sure seemed like every member of World gym decided to come at 5pm! It was easily as bad as the New Year's resolution crowd. Ughhh cue the January gym nightmares tonight!
I didn't want to do a serious legs sesh right before spinning (been there, done that, baddd idea!) so I opted to focus on glutes and calves rather than quads and hams which needed to preserve their energy! First I did 3 sets of 20 barbell plie squats with raised heels. Sidenote: these would have looked awesome in my leotard and tights haha. Next I followed these up with 3 sets of 12 calve raises on the standing calve machine. Then I moved on to abs and did 3 sets of 10 standing leg raises. I was pleasantly surprised to feel my abs kind of sore from yesterday's workout. Usually it takes a lot to feel anything in my abs so it must have been the extra hard concentration I did on the incline crunches or maybe the extra risers that did the trick! I then moved back to legs and did 3 sets (each leg) of 10 on the standing glute press machine and finished up my routine with 2 sets of 12 leg raises lying on a bench with a stability ball held between my feet. I have a touch of obsessive compulsive disorder (self-diagnosed) and not doing a third set to match all my other moves was not in the plan but the 5pm spin class was emptying out so I had to make a mad dash to get my favourite bike!
Spin class was great tonight with an instructor I really like as well as a good heart-pumping playlist. I've been sticking to my 2-3 class max per week rule and my quads are definitely thanking me, allowing me to train legs during the week without serious muscle fatigue like last month. There's something about spinning I noticed today that just eases my mind and allows me to clear my thoughts kind of like a massage or a bubble bath does. It's really the only hour of the day when you can just let your mind wander and you are guaranteed that no one is going to bother you. If I were a physician or a therapist I would prescribe spinning to anyone undergoing stress, anxiety or any other related symptoms. It's funny I was reading the quotes on a lululemon shopping bag the other day and one of them says "Stress is related to 99% of all illness". I couldn't agree more! If only people had more initiative to be more physically active, I think we would have a muchhhh healthier society.
Okay so I think I've been rambling throughout this entire blog entry (what's new?!) so I'll wrap it up. I'm already planning a back / chest / core routine tomorrow which I started to design while in my spinners-zone haha. Happy Halloween and happy gymming everyone. Throw out that extra Halloween candy and hit the gym hard tomorrow. That's my "doctor's" orders.
Anyway, tonight I had a solid mid-week sweat sesh consisting of some light leg moves, core, and spinning. I had planned to do a maXtreme routine tonight but I wasn't a fan of the crowd over in the stretching area where I've been doing my maXtreme workouts so I decided to bag it and do my own thing. The weight area was nice and empty tonight, well, compared to yesterday anyway. I don't know what was going on yesterday; perhaps it was because Hurricane Sandy set everyone's schedule awry on Monday but it sure seemed like every member of World gym decided to come at 5pm! It was easily as bad as the New Year's resolution crowd. Ughhh cue the January gym nightmares tonight!
I didn't want to do a serious legs sesh right before spinning (been there, done that, baddd idea!) so I opted to focus on glutes and calves rather than quads and hams which needed to preserve their energy! First I did 3 sets of 20 barbell plie squats with raised heels. Sidenote: these would have looked awesome in my leotard and tights haha. Next I followed these up with 3 sets of 12 calve raises on the standing calve machine. Then I moved on to abs and did 3 sets of 10 standing leg raises. I was pleasantly surprised to feel my abs kind of sore from yesterday's workout. Usually it takes a lot to feel anything in my abs so it must have been the extra hard concentration I did on the incline crunches or maybe the extra risers that did the trick! I then moved back to legs and did 3 sets (each leg) of 10 on the standing glute press machine and finished up my routine with 2 sets of 12 leg raises lying on a bench with a stability ball held between my feet. I have a touch of obsessive compulsive disorder (self-diagnosed) and not doing a third set to match all my other moves was not in the plan but the 5pm spin class was emptying out so I had to make a mad dash to get my favourite bike!
Spin class was great tonight with an instructor I really like as well as a good heart-pumping playlist. I've been sticking to my 2-3 class max per week rule and my quads are definitely thanking me, allowing me to train legs during the week without serious muscle fatigue like last month. There's something about spinning I noticed today that just eases my mind and allows me to clear my thoughts kind of like a massage or a bubble bath does. It's really the only hour of the day when you can just let your mind wander and you are guaranteed that no one is going to bother you. If I were a physician or a therapist I would prescribe spinning to anyone undergoing stress, anxiety or any other related symptoms. It's funny I was reading the quotes on a lululemon shopping bag the other day and one of them says "Stress is related to 99% of all illness". I couldn't agree more! If only people had more initiative to be more physically active, I think we would have a muchhhh healthier society.
Okay so I think I've been rambling throughout this entire blog entry (what's new?!) so I'll wrap it up. I'm already planning a back / chest / core routine tomorrow which I started to design while in my spinners-zone haha. Happy Halloween and happy gymming everyone. Throw out that extra Halloween candy and hit the gym hard tomorrow. That's my "doctor's" orders.
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