Pump up the Iron. Really? reALLy. (Part II)

“Now do not let me down girl…push it..push it like you are really mad. Common…all the way to the 120 yards…now pull it…do not let those legs rest…pull it…now back…two more laps…do it…” My personal trainer Micheal Solomon was yelling at me. My legs were sore & tired. I had just finished squatting 95 pounds, sprinting three 40 yards with 25 pounds weight in less than 11 seconds each time on woodway (a kind of treadmill, but I am tied to the machine on the  back of the belt that goes on my waist), mountain climbs & box jumps back to back. Then I was pushing a 120 pounds weight across the room and pulling it back using the sled weight to 120 yards total. I was pushing through my pain…Mike had increased the weights but I was doing it much better than a month ago..with much stronger strides…with more power. This is how my Friday training with Mike goes and that’s not the end of it. “It’s Friday Ladies so better be ready. It’s going to be tough today…” Every Friday Mike reminds me and my training partner AnnaMaria of what we are about to endure that day. AnnMaria makes workout lot more fun for me. She is a good friend and with her fun talks and cheers the treacherous routines become  fun.

Mike says I have become much stronger these days than when I started. My uncertainty with self weight training and my strong obsession with weight training lead me to Mike for personal training. A football coach and a personal trainer, Mike is a trainer with passion in what he does. I truly love him for being my trainer.

When I signed up for my sessions with Mike, he asked me what my goal was. I told him that I wanted to be lean, get toned and be able to run. Run better and faster. And the only thing he had told me then was “You have to get strong”.  He explained to me that weight training is what I had to incorporate into my training routines. I had to build muscles so they could be my furnace in burning the calories; making me strong and giving me a toned body that I wanted. Three days a week, a upper body, a lower body and the total body; I workout with Mike. Sometimes I wonder why I pay so much to go through the pain I grind myself through 😉 I am not kidding – it’s not easy. It takes a lot of motivation and determination. The other three days I run. 6-7 miles on the weekdays and 10-11 miles on weekends. Working out with Mike, I have come to understand weight training has to be done the right way. The wrong moves could end up in injury and have no benefits no matter how long you train. If you can afford it, I would definitely recommend getting a personal trainer and learning the right way of doing things. Any given day I would trade-off my luxuries, my fancy clothes and my dine-outs to pay off for my trainings. From squatting with only 45 pounds, I can now squat 95-100 pounds. Mike says I am stronger to use more weights, but he thinks I should build up to it than jump on it and get hurt. Today I can feel more power in my legs. I can run longer and faster. I can do 8 continuous pull-ups in 3 reps (before I started weight training, i could hardly do 2 pull ups), bench press 75 pounds  and I can see more muscles than fat in my body. From being in the obese category in the chart of body fat % about 10 months ago, I am now in the fitness category . So far I have lost 9.5% of my body fat; and that I call a great accomplishment. Here is a really good site for formulas that help you calculate body fat % if you want to do it on your own.

I had struggled to get the results that I wanted for the past 2-3 yrs. With Mike’s personal training sessions incorporating weight/strength trainings, in just 3 months I am already seeing the results that I have always longed for. So pumping up iron really works. Really 🙂 [Still not convinced? More to come…]

Just a few suggestions on picking up a personal trainer.

1. Do not get intimidated by anyone.
2. Do not sign up for the sessions with just anybody.
3. Ask to look at their credentials.
4. Ask for free trial session to make your evaluation.
5. Visit the gym and watch how others are trained. I have seen trainers in session who look more interested in chit chatting and filling out the workout log than actually training the trainee.
6. Do not buy a whole package in the very beginning. Try few sessions with a few trainers and see who can actually challenge you and meet your expectations.
7. Never be afraid to ask if any training routine is questionable to you.

Good luck.

With Mike

From here          …To here

Pump up the Iron. Really? Part I

Those pumping irons in the “weight section” of the gym – working out on their biceps and triceps and their quads, glutes and hamstrings and their core they always looked like the dedicated bunch to me; who were truly working their ass off in dire desire to change the way they looked. They looked like the true ” workout-holics”. Grunting through their pain and still going for more reps; it always amazed me at their will power. As I took my strides on the ellipticals, my eyes still grazed through that corner where the power work was in session; hoping to get glimpses of the moves – how the pros (I thought) would do it. Weights always intimidated me. I had no clue how they could be used and the big secret is that there was no way I was going to let myself be humiliated by picking up weights and doing it all wrong in front of that many people. No way. What if I could not pick up them up? What if i dropped them before I even picked them? Which weight would be right to start with? How about my postures? How would I know if I am even doing it right? The unsure world seemed too scary for me. And the voice inside my head said “Nope, you do not want to bulk up and look like a man.” Deep inside I believed that weight lifting would turn me into a masculine frame. But I had to try it once.
Since I was obsessing about weights too much, I decided to sign up for a group resistance class. Looking back at it now, it was more of an aerobic class incorporating weight training in between – mostly squats and lunges. The first day of the class wowed me. I sweated big and I felt worked out for sure. In sheer excitement I decided to go for a few more. There were way too many people in the class and the instructor just did not have enough time to eye everybody for their postures. And well I cannot blame her fully as I did not dare to camp in the front row of the class.(Then perhaps she would have got a better view of me to correct me). I always made sure I got a spot on the last row. I did not know if it was the weights (40 pounds including the rod?) or my posture, I ended up with bad back pain which gave me enough reason to not pursue the class.
One of my friends who is BIG into weight training constantly told me that I HAD to do weight training if I wanted to see true results. She vouched that “Body for Life” worked and that she had learned all the weight trainings proper postures and moves from the video clips that they had on their website. After eying her toned arms, rock tight abs and lean and muscular physique there was no reason for me not to believe what she sworn by. She had enough prove (or should i say more than enough?) to stand her ground. You see what I am talking about? 😉

And she was right about the website. The information and the workout demos were there for sure. But it just did not workout for me. I was too worried and scared to try big weights and I did not want to get hurt. The two thoughts chained me down. There are some who do not think too much and dive into what they want and there are some like me who think a lot even to dive into something they really want. But today when I look back, I do not regret that I did not dare to.  Because that is how I discovered the world of personal training. [More to follow…]

Foam Roller for relieving muscle tension

Let me share a secret about my new found love – foam roller. It is my $25 dollar investment that has proven to be worth every penny that I have spent on it. Ever felt muscle tightness or muscle tension before and after workout? Try doing some foam roller workouts and you might find a difference. For me it has proven to be a very good sports massage tool. Because of various reasons including not enough stretching after workouts muscle tensions might happen and Foam roller softens and releases that tensions and pain such as IT band syndrome & shin splints. It also improves flexibility and range of motion. One of the good articles on foam rolling is here. YouTube has plenty of videos demonstrating the foam roller exercise.
After my every run and every resistance trainings, it has been one thing that helps me release my muscle soreness/tenderness/tightness. Who knows it might help you too.  🙂

Pieces of Puzzle

Ok I got to admit that I look forward to my Saturdays runs. They are different than my usual weekday runs because they are in the woods- in the hiking trail and boy I love them. I had to miss one last week 😦 because my hubby was biking the MS Ride in JAX and I was home with my two kittens. I did not want to find a sitter to leave my kittens that early in the morning. So yes…I love the trail runs but yes the kittens come first. 🙂
This is the trail we go running into

I go to the trail runs with my neighbor/friend Beverly and her trainer Jose Martinez. The first time I went, I just wanted to try out how it felt to run in the trail. And now I am addicted. For me the trail runs are intoxicating. We run early in the morning. There is so much to marvel and enjoy. The peace. The nature’s beauty. The ups and downs of the trail. The roots of the tress running to the ground. The birds making their first move – chirping. The shuffling sound of the leaves and my own heartbeats. There is magic everywhere in the trail. Sometimes when we run it is dead dark. Once we ran in the moonlight and witnessed the sunrise as we completed the run. There is no PR to be set. There is no rush. No vehicle noises. Just us and the other enthusiast runners. It is amazing how dedicated people are. There are people there up and ready to run even when we are there at 6 in the morning. So far on Saturdays we usually have been going for 10 miles and I  know that will change soon to longer one. I am looking forward to that 🙂
It’s been a little over a month that I have joined Beverly, Greg (another of Beverly’s friend) and Jose. We have now a new comer in the group – our neighbor/friend, Jay Kumar. Yes…we are working into turning the whole neighborhood into running freaks. 🙂

Not everybody gets to run/train with a professional athlete. I feel proud getting the privilege to do so.
Jose is an engineer by profession. He has been training Beverly for her 300 miles run. Jose started running since 6th grade. In the process he has ran and won many track and field and cross-country races. By the time he was in his 10th grade, he had become a State Champion for 2 miles relay. He has ran the big meets at UNC, Wake Forest, Appalachian, NCSU, Florida, Virginia and South Carolina; winning in all of them when he was in 10th grade. He has also ran a lot of other big meets – Greensboro, South Carolina, Winston-Salem, Charlotte, always finished top 4 and winning some. He has coached a young runner who under his training became a runner-up at the State Cross Country Championship, Regional and Conference Champion two years in a row. He has also trained a coworker of his, who wanted to lose weight and who he says now is his best friend. His friend had never run in his life before. Jose started from ground zero with him, got him on a weight training as well as on a walk/run program. His friend went from not able to run to running ultra marathons (100 mile races) and losing more than 100 pounds. And to achieve such a height of successfulness is not an easy task. It takes lot of commitment and dedication from both the parties.

“Running is like a puzzle…” says Jose. It is simple as putting on your shoes and hitting the road; but no so simple if you want to run injury free for a long time. There are many pieces of the puzzles that have to fit in right to be able to run injury free. From eating, sleeping, mapping out the runs, building on to run longer miles, pre-run stretches, post-run stretches, right shoes, right strides, right body postures, taking care of the knees and legs after the run; every thing needs to be taken into consideration. The pre-run and post-run stretches are very important.
 Honestly, before I met Jose, I did not do pre-run stretches. Well…I had read about it – that it is important to do; but I had not weighed out the importance of it. After running the woods with Jose on Saturdays, I have been religiously doing my pre an post-run stretches. And believe me, it truly helps. Do not wait for an injury to show up to take care of your knees and legs. After every run, whether it hurts or not, give your knees, calves and shin a good ice treatment.. A packet of frozen peas will do the trick. Ice constricts blood vessels and decreases blood flow to an injured area, therefore reducing inflammation. It also numbs pain. At night before I got to bed I  massage my feet, hamstring, quads and my whole leg with a slightly warmed olive oil. You can warm the oil in a pan/in microwave for a few seconds. That’s how I prep myself well for the next day run/cross training/Resistance training. Do not know that Olive oil acts same like the anti-inflammatory painkiller ibuprofen? So go figure.
If you have never ran before, you should build up slowly. Infact, if you have never ran before you should probably start with good walk and then slowly into walk/run, walk.run. Then build up on that – run one mile a week and then next week increase the miles by 10%. . When you build up your run, you are less likely to get injured. The more you take care of yourself, the longer in life you can keep running. And that’s what I exactly want to do – be able to run even when I am in my 50s and beyond.

Meet my friends, Greg, Beverly and Jose & I. Picture taken after our usual Saturdays trai run.

Running Freak

The “Running Freak” bumper sticker on our SUV looks neat. I love it. In some way it actually rightly portrays me in what I have become today. It is a token from my recent Rock N Roll VB half marathon. My friends – Beverly, Sushma and Karma and I drove 4 hrs to VB from Raleigh to run the marathon. The trip was something special. We had a blast. It was girl friend times – lot of BS talks, laughs and jokes. There were more than 20 thousand people and to run among them – the experience was incredible. The excitement we had when we went to pick up our packages for the next day; it was unbelievable. We were all charged…the whole city of VB was charged. We were ready to Rock N Roll VB. In the run the next day Karma got carried away 🙂 The girl did not have patience to start slow. I have to tell you that she can run. She is a natural runner who can run competitively even without training. She completed her race almost 15 minutes ahead of us. Sushma and I completed our race together Actually we ran together – it was fun. We share a history about running and I have to write about how she got me into this running thing – it would not be wrong to say that she inspired me to run. Beverly warned us – “girls toward the last few miles I will be kicking dust in front of you guys”. There was no dust in front of us nor did we see Beverly- we finished it clean and strong. We finished in 2hrs 15 mins – that’s after taking off the 7 mins I spent on running to the restroom – my garmin watch paused the time for me ;-). She finished 15 minutes later than us. As she told us later that she was playing Good Samaritan – a running friend to one of the ladies running – who was on the verge of giving up & she gave her the motivation and inspiration to carry on and ran with her. Oh yes, she had her runner friend’s telephone number scribbled on her bib. I wonder when she had time to do that.

The night before the run, we gals were at PF CHANGS. We wanted to eat good food – load lots of carbohydrates before the run. Before any good long run food rich in carbohydrate is very good as it gives energy during the run. For the very reason, pasta and spagetti are known to be runner’s diet. But no, we did not eat any pasta or spagetti – we went for rice entrees; a carb diet too. After almost an hour of waiting we finally got three bar stools – so it was four of us sharing the three bar stools, which added a kick to our fun.

Every one in the bar was literally looking at us and everyone in the bar was literally a participant in the next day’s run. The food was delicious. We were tempted to drink – so we ordered some red wine – now I do not remember what it was but it was good. Someone next to us, a runner for the next day too; advised us not to drink too much. He said “Ladies do not drink too much- it is not good to drink before a long run”. We thanked him for his advice and kept our cools with one glass each. Sushma ate a lot of red peppers which unfortunately caused her a lot of cramps during her run next day. Believe me, the spicy food before the run does not help at all. With all the soy sauce in the food and the spice in the food, I ended up drinking a lot of water throughout the night, which also proved to be not a smart move on my part. It made me run to the rest room during the run which took a good 7 minutes of my run time. Now when I think about it, I should have just relieved myself behind a tree. It was humid and hot.

The heat makes the body slow down that’s why it is said that to run marathons in summer, one has to practice the run in the heat – little by little so the body gets used to running in the heat. I had a misconception that a lot of water was good because it hydrated well and later I found out from a booklet that was in our pre-run goody bag (which we gals did not even think of going through before the run ) that drinking too much water actually makes you lose lot of your electrolytes and sodium from the body when sweating; which needs to be replaced back.That’s why people who sweat a lot, a pinch of salt before and after the run or salty crackers are recommended. Hey, but we all did our race under 2hrs 30 Mins and we all were very happy to have run the Rock N Roll VB. After the run, we were already planning to run the full one in February in Jacksonville, FL.

To keep the fuel tank up and the engine running for a long time, a well-balanced diet with a variety of carbohydrates, lean protein, healthful fats and well hydration is needed – it’s just one has to figure out how much is right. The little book in our goody bag had some really good information on Nutrition, re-fueling and re-hydrating during run. I wish I had read it the night before. But because of the trip, the red wine, the food and all the BS jokes all through out the day, we were worn out. All we wanted to do was sleep.

Here is a snippet from the book “Powerbar Playbook Series | Sports Nutrition for Distance Running” on Sports Nutrition Plan.This is by no means a dictation of how much exactly of what each one of you should be consuming. This is more a general conception. However it gives you a rough idea of what is acceptable.

I am grounded

“…Mom, you are so grounded – no workout for you for whole two weeks – it’s only fair. If you ground me for a whole week without any Wii, why cannot I ground you too?” My seven year old son Josh was trying hard to reason with me. He had a strong argument – for him it was a fair trade. I could not believe what I was hearing. I just looked at the kid. His eyes were playful and he had this crooked little smile on his face that I could not disregard. I let out a laugh which boosted him of his stance and with which he further declared – “yup…for whole two weeks.Then you will see how you will feel when someone takes away something you so much love…” WOW…my boy could grow up into a lawyer…he can argue his case. I was happy that he understood how important workout was for me. If only he had the power to ground me, you have no idea how brutally I would have suffered from the grounding consequences. I can give up my food but not my workout – no! He had played the right card but the move was futile.

Nope…I am by no means a fitness expert – not a nutritionist either. I am a software designer by profession (have been working for Hewlett Packard for the last ten years), “a good wife” ;-)and a doting mother of two. I love to workout. Running, hiking, biking, reading are my hobbies. I have a great passion for photography, which right now has been over shadowed by my desire to run. If I had more time that I could manage, I would probably become a good soccer player too. I love soccer and I think I can play it well. Ping – pong is another of my favorite game – the game of mind. I can play chess well, hit a sling slot pretty good and fly kites endlessly. I love to spend time with my kids and my hubby. It’s not easy to joggle everything with balance – there is give and take – some sacrifices. For all that is out there to do and that I want to do – 24 hrs a day is just not enough – It’s hard for me to get up at 5 in the morning to go for my runs – when I look at the whole family peacefully sleeping, I just want to pull the blanket over my face and sleep in. But I have to make a choice. I get up and I go – the first 15 minutes are hard. But once my legs warm up and I pick up on the speed, I rule. The moment becomes mine – there is no stopping. After the run it makes me feel good from inside – it makes my day – makes me more energetic and makes me feel as if I just conquered the world all over again.