Week 3, I’m feeling really strong and felt great when I went for my PT session. This was a great week for building confidence as I got a personal best doing the deadlift..
The key thing for me to focus on this week is making sure my diet is correct and that I eat enough protein and carbohydrates. I’m embracing the protein shake culture and make sure I have one after every workout! I’ll also be staying away from the “bad” carbohydrates such as bread, pasta and white potatoes and instead make sure I’m getting enough of the “good” carbohydrates such as oats and blueberries.
The warm up started with the foam roller which felt fantastic on my muscles. I followed this with leg and hip swings doing twenty on each side.
· Sumo dead lifts.
I started with 5 reps of 40 kg. The weight was then built up, with rests periods in between.
TIP – Remember to breathe in, and look up to keep the spine straight.
I was lifting more weight than I’d lifted before and I think this was down to my technique and breathing while doing the move. I got a PB lifting 65 kg! Once we started to increase the weight, I would only do one rep each time. When I couldn’t lift any heavier, we then started to reduce the weight back down to 40 kg and finished off with five sets of five reps. This was a great exercise to really work into the glutes.
· Assisted pull ups & red band walking.
For the assisted pull ups, I was using the purple band to give me extra support. I needed to remember to keep looking up (look to where you want to go) and focus on squeezing my shoulder blades together. I did four pull ups before going to do the red band walking.
I only used one band for the first set, but for the next five sets I used two red bands to make it harder. To do this exercise I stood on the red bands, crossed it over and pulled it up to my chest height. I then bent my legs slightly and took side steps to about half way across the room and back again. You can really feel it working your glutes. After each set I had a little rest and some water before carrying on with the pull ups etc.
· Bum lifts (X10), DB lifts (X10) & side arm raises. (X15)
Lying with my back on the floor, knees in line with my hips and my heels on a box. I pushed against the box with my heels and lifted my bum off the floor and squeezed. I held for three seconds, before repeating the movement. I did this for ten reps. I was finding this quite easy, so next time we added on a 10 kg weight plate to make it harder.
DB lifts, started with 10 kg dumb-bells in each hand and then increased it to 12.5 kg. Lying face down on the bench, I lifted the weights up and held for three seconds, before repeating the action for another ten reps.
This was followed straight away by the side arm raises. I was using the lightest dumbbells which weighed 2.5 kg. I was lying on the bench so I would only use my upper body strength for the exercise and not my lower body.
Progression photos
Front
Back
Side
Weight in stone.
Week 1 - 10.2
Week 2 - 10.1
Week 3 - 10.2
Stats: In inches. There has been very little change in my measurements from week 1. My hips have got smaller by 0.2! and my left thight has gone smaller by 0.3! No change to my arms, bust or waist.
Right Arm - 11
Left Arm - 11
Bust - 36
Waist - 30
Hips - 36
Right thigh - 20.6
Left thigh - 20
I'm pleased with the progess I'm making so far. I can definately see changes in my body and I'm started to get more muscle definition in my arms, stomach and legs. It will be intresting to see the progress over the next few weeks.