A Sensitive Subject: Weight-training
I’ve spent the last 10 hours working as staff at the Tough Mudder. I raced it last year in October and it was the hardest thing I have ever done. After doing it once I don’t really feel like I need to do it again lol. But let’s go back in time to last week on Thursday.
We had a tough HIIT workout. Just the usual. I had to push myself and do the shuttle run with a 40 pound sandbell on my back. It really isn’t hard when you put it right between your shoulder blades and hold it over your shoulders (a trick I learned from TK) rather than propping it up on one shoulder. Basically you run down to a certain point then you have to shuttle backwards back to the start. I was looking over my right side and ended up tripping over a sandbell that was on my left side, flying through the air and landing on my left wrist and butt cheek. I gotta say it hurt like hell, but I got up and shook it off. I continued working through the sets.
After the workout I iced my glute on and off for a few hours and took some arnica. I was limping by the time I went to bed. My plan was to take it easy the next day but when I woke up I was fine. It is amazing what the vegan diet can do for recovery of injuries. I wasn’t even bruised. Since I was feeling good off to Beyond Fit I went for weight training day.
If squats or lunges had been on this day I may have skipped it just to give me buns some more time to heal. Thankfully, we had deadlifts, t-bar row, and bench press. The reason why weight training is a delicate subject for me is because I feel like a wimp. Many of the gals at BF lift way more than me, sometimes almost double (!!) so I get a little bit defeated. But then I have to remember that I haven’t been doing it as long, or as consistently (bad girl), and I’m petite. 5’3, 108 pounds can only lift so much! So I try to focus on what I’m doing and continue to add more weight each week. Chad does such a great job of pushing my limits. He watches, says to me “that looks too easy” and has me add more.
Since I missed Monday I threw some pullups and dips into my workout. It felt strong except the dips were pretty hard without a band. I’m pretty embarrassed of my lifting numbers but I’m going to go ahead and post them so we can see my progress! We do 5 sets of 5 after a warm up set.
Pullups – purple band, one set with no band
Dips – no band
Deadlift – 115 lbs
T-row – 45 lbs
Bench press – 70 lbs
Squats (down to tire) – 95 lbs
Reverse lunges – 73 lbs
I can’t remember the rest of the exercises we do at Beyond Fit so I will get those to you later. I also do weight training on my own and soon will be training with Austin twice a week. He has me doing a totally different style of training with different machines and hand weights. Chad does super heavy weight, low reps. I will share my other weight training sessions with you too!
All I know is that I feel amazing after lifting heavy, I can feel the body fat falling off and the muscles are starting to appear. If you are a woman DO NOT be afraid to lift heavy. The more strength you build the better off you will be and you won’t get bulky!! Your body will burn more calories while resting and muscles are sexy! 😉
What I would love to hear from you is what your experience is with heavy lifting or weight training. How long did it take you to build up to where you are now? How many times per week do you weight train? How does it make you feel?
