Crosstraining For The Win!
I’ve been pretty active this past week and I am getting more comfortable with it, which to me, is just awesome!
I took my second Turbo Kick class last week Monday at the Mililani 24 Hour Fitness. I wasn’t going to go because I was starting to get really nervous just thinking about it, but a friend of mine convinced me to go. I am pretty glad I did. The Mililani 24 was larger than I thought it would be and it looked like they had a lot more cardio machines than the main one on Kapiolani. They even have a 25 meter pool!
The place was packed too. It was a little unnerving simply because all of the machines, cardio and weight, were so close to one another. It looked like you would bump into someone if you got off a machine wrong.
The Group X class room was twice as large as the one in downtown and quite a few people took the class as well. I was pretty happy with the room the class was in simply because even though there were a lot of people there, you pretty much didn’t have to worry if you were going to kick someone in the head when you did a kick.
I made it through an entire class too! Yippy!!! I know some people walked out simply because I was in the back row and the back row thinned out a lot before the class was halfway through. I did remember to wear my heart rate monitor and I am still wondering how accurate it is because it said that I burned – get this – 1500 calories!!! 1500 calories!!!!!!! That is CRAZY!!! I mean I know my heart rate got, I would say, dangerously high a few times when I was really pushing it, but at least I knew when I should tone it down.
I really enjoy the class, but I don’t know if I should continue taking them until I get into better shape. I feel great during the class but I feel like such crap afterwards and it’s taken me at least a day to recover after. Of course maybe I wouldn’t have this problem if I took everything down a notch while I was actually doing it, but it’s hard not to get into it.
Other than that I did go to the beach a couple of times. Going to the beach has been interesting. I mostly use a kick board when I go now because I get shoulder problems, (ugh, the joys of aging). I don’t know if it’s kismet or coincidence but the latest issues of both Shape and Self have had articles about aquatic exercises – with a kick board!
These images are from Self -
They called this one the Kick Board Climb. It’s basically just a set of knee ups in the water. It really isn’t that difficult, but I was really feeling it in my abs. I think it has to do with stabilization in the water. It is a lot of fun though and I would kind of use this as a warm up before I swam a little.
This was called the Water Taxi. This is also a lot of fun because you are basically just sitting on your kick board and you propel yourself through the water using your arms. You are also supposed to be kicking, but it just seemed awkward. I would try to make it to the second life guard stand doing this, but man, it was just killing my triceps. I would go maybe, just maybe, half way between the life guard stands and then have to kick my way there.
This was called Surf’s Up! and it was the hardest one for me to “get.” With this one, you need to stand on your board and once you’ve done that, bring your legs up and down. Eventually you are supposed to work on doing this with one leg.
This also had me laughing the most out of all of the ones I tried because for the life of me, I just had the hardest time trying to stand up on the board. If I did get on it, not 20 seconds later I would be falling over on my back because I lost my balance. I did kind of “get it” the second day I tried it and I was also actually able to do the one legged ones too.
During the week, I also did Cardio Party from Turbo Jam.
Turbo Kick is definitely more intense than Turbo Jam. The intensity not only comes from the more complex combinations, but also because there are no breaks between the segments. In case anyone was wondering, my 1500 calorie burn mentioned above is probably not typical. There is no workout out there that can tell you that you will burn x amount of calories by doing this workout since there are so many different factors when it comes to total calories burned. My total calories burned is probably abnormally high because 1) I am very overweight and 2) kind of out of shape. Someone in really good or average shape will probably burn 1/3 to 1/2 of the amount of calories I burn during these workouts.
I also did something tonight that I never thought I was ready for. I took a live yoga class at the downtown 24 Hour Fitness place. I, again, was going to chicken out, but Fred called and was like “you’re coming right?” Yea, that was motivational. Heeheee. I promised him I was going to take the class with him, so I couldn’t back out when he called. I got there like 1 minute before the class started too.
Oh man, it totally kicked my ass. I was pretty familiar with most of the poses because of the various yoga videos I’ve done over the years. But, taking a live class is pretty different from a video – in a good way. I was able to do most of the poses and I did modify whenever I needed to. The only pose I was not able to do was the bow pose.
I just do not have the flexibility right now to be able to this. Plus, I have my apprehensions about this because I pulled a back muscle the last time I did this. Well, that was a couple of years ago, but still, it makes me a little nervous.
I really need to invest in a new sports bra too. I have several that fit me perfectly well, but, how do I say this? Well, there were several times during the class where I felt like the girls were gonna pop out and say hello. Doh! I think I need something with a little more support and, ahem, coverage.
I should be going to the beach again on Tuesday and I will be working on mastering some of those kick board moves some more. If all goes well and I don’t chicken out, I am planning on taking a water exercise class at 24 Wednesday. I am pretty curious as to what kinds of exercises we’ll be doing.
I am still refusing on checking my weight for now and I still haven’t taken any measurements yet. Doh. I really should measure myself though.
1 Comment July 31, 2007
