I deserve a high five. Seriously, I do. Two big accomplishments this week. In my last post, I showed a picture of me doing a trapdoor deadlift with a 45-pound weight. Well, check out this video. I’m now lifting 65 pounds. Plus the bar was two, maybe three inches lower than before, giving me more range of motion. It felt so good.
I’ve been working out with personal trainer Andy Wight, from AW Strength & Conditioning since January. In the first post that I wrote, I mentioned that he liked using a ladder to improve balance and coordination. I was thrilled that I could manage to do some basic steps without tripping. Now he’s got me doing several different patterns and there’s a good reason why. “We’re not always moving straight ahead,” he explained. “Sometimes we step to the left, step to the right, back step — that sort of thing. If we can incorporate that into the training, it becomes more of a real life scenario.”
In other words, it’s training my brain and my body to react quickly to new movements — such as if I were to stumble or step off a curb the wrong way. In fact, I put things to the test in this video, when I almost tripped. Caught myself, though!
One thing I enjoy about the training sessions is that I don’t have to do the same things every time. I’ve worked out in gyms on my own before where there were rows of machines. I loved the workout, but sometimes I got bored because I did the same exercises over and over again. I may not be repeating the same exercises during each session with Andy, but I am repeating the movements.
“We squat, do a dead lift hinge, a pushing motion, pulling motion,” he said. “We do it every time, but we may not do the exact same movement. One day we may do a regular goblet squat and the next day we may do a single leg squat. It’s still a squatting motion, but it’s a different exercise.”
And during every session, Andy adds something that takes me even further inside my discomfort zone. Today he had me push a 225-pound tire across the room. Three trips. Lifting 65 pounds was exhilarating. Pushing 225 pounds? I don’t even have the words to express how great it felt.
“This is one of those best bangs for your buck,” Andy told me. “It incorporates everything. You’ve got to be able to engage your core, use your legs to push, stabilize with your arms and your shoulders. At the end of it, you’re going to feel out of breath, your heart’s going to be racing. It’s going to cover everything.”
When I asked him how I did, he said, “This is a good accomplishment, this is definitely a huge milestone. It’s a really big improvement from where you started to where you are now.”
So, I’m not only feeling stronger, I’m feeling proud of myself. Anyone who wants to give me a high five, I’ll take it!
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