A little background about my personal fitness. I ran cross country in highschool, but I'd be lying if I said I was exceptional or that I took it really seriously. I went into college eager and ready to have a great time, fitness was certainly pushed to the back burner with the steamed veggies while the bacon and sausage were roasting in the front. I went into college a extremely lanky 6'3 165 pound bean pole. By the end of my freshman year I was rounded out around 185. I had taken a weight training class for gym credit so that kept me modest and the protein in Long Trail Blackberry Wheat may have been helping me. Sophomore year was another story, I found myself in an interesting place in my life, with a carte blance dining hall and weekends filled with drinking and dominos I ballooned to 215 pounds. So in the course of two years I gained 50 pounds. Lets be clear here though, at 165 I was wayyy under average, so all in all I gained 25-30 pounds that my body certainly did not need. Complimentary to the workout I will be discussing in a little bit, there was something hillarious that changed my life. I don't know if it was my
desire to be fit again, or some kind of homo-erotic tendancies coming out, but when I saw the movie 300 (jacked guys half naked) I went to the gym for 14 days straight. I picked up running again and was crushing everything I could in site. I can't say that I stopped partying, but when my friends were gorging their faces in breakfasts burritos, I was running 2-3 miles on the indoor track and then lifting afterwards. I brought myself down to a fit 180 and have been doing well sense...**....Fast forward two years, I have maintained being in shape with some fluctuations in weight but going to the gym is certainly a common occurence for me. I'm graduating college and have been crushing beach muscles with J-mwenz. I liked being in the gym, I liked training with others, and I truthfully felt I could be a good teacher or coach for others. I take a course and pass the NSCA CPT exam (National Strength and Conditining Association Certified Personal Trainer) I will discuss more of this in later posts. Last night I had a realization that although I'm in shape, I may be pushing clients to a level that I may not even work at. So I decide to really push my self, "The Spartacus Workout." Not based on 300,(actually a t.v. show about Spartans) but it is a workout designed to get a Spartan body (duh). I am now one session through, out of 24. The workout consists of 10 stations, 60 seconds at each, 15 seconds in between, and 3 sets of the whole circuit. I was way to close to puking after, and I tell you, I am in pretty good shape right now. Practice what you preach. Crush what you teach.
. As you can see the picture from Ahnold and his buddies, it will get you very strong, but again, just dont do this exercise, unless you want to and fine, who am I to stop you.
. As you can see the picture from Ahnold and his buddies, it will get you very strong, but again, just dont do this exercise, unless you want to and fine, who am I to stop you.
. Exercise 7, as seen to the left, is a side lunge dumbbell touch. Not only are you doing a lunge, but you need to have the dumbbells tap the floor. I find it virtually impossible to not cheat when doing this one.
ONLY cheating myself. Exercise 8 is alternating dumbbell rows in pushup position. This is one of those "fun" ones where I definitely realized my core is being pummeled. It is difficult to not cheat and roll side to side to assist with the row. It is very satisfying to do though. You realllly feel it working. Ladies is lifters too. Crush it all.
