Week 5, already…really?! This means work,.Hard work and sweat. But you don’t get anything in life through sitting around on your behind and waiting for things to fall onto your plate, success comes from passion and motivation. Time to find mine!
In the past few posts I’ve commented on what each session involved, the food I’m eating and the work I’m putting in, but I haven’t yet mentioned how I’m feeling and whether I’ve noticed any change in my body. Well I’m happy to report I really am noticing a difference, even after just 4 weeks of endurance training. My arms are feeling bigger, my legs are definitely more solid and my whole upper back and shoulders seems to just sit better. I’m really noticing the difference, but the true test will be if others comment on the changes…watch this space.
This week I had my weigh in, my arm measurements have increased by 1.5cm, my chest by 1.3cm and my legs by 1.5cm. This has all been whilst working through the endurance phase, so puts me in good stead for the this month’s muscle building phase.
Week 5 introduced ‘the bar’, split across 2 days. The first day concentrating on legs, back and shoulders, and the second day concentrating on chest and arms. The most difficult part of the legs session was the squatting with the bar, making sure I kept my knees out and squatting as close to 90 degrees as possible. Getting used to the bar was tricky enough but then having to squat with the additional weight just added to the pressure. First week of muscle building was good, but I need to work harder on my technique of each exercise to get maximum effect.
This week also saw the introduction of let downs, which can best be described as the opposite to pull-ups. You jump up to the horizontal bar and slowly lower yourself down keeping the movement as controlled as possible. I managed 10 at a push, repeated for another 10 but these were hard…harder than I thought. More work needed on these I think.
Overall I’ve put on weight in the form of muscle, toned most main muscle groups and I’m starting to really enjoy the effort I’m having to put in to get the results I’m after. Who’d have thought how addictive this training could become!
