By Request: How do I get back into workout safely (part 2)?

This month, I’m taking requests for things folks want to know about fitness (yes, please!  Ask me questions and I will blog the answers!).

I haven’t been exercising lately.  How do I get back into workouts safely?

 

Yesterday we talked about cardio.  Today we’re discussing weight training.

 

Once we’ve established a cardio base and a daily practice of exercising, we can add in some weight training.

 

Just like with the cardio exercise, we want to start small and work up gradually, continually checking in with our bodies to see how we feel.

 

Hiring a trainer (like me!) takes a lot of the brain work out of the process.  It’s certainly not necessary, but it does make things easy.  If that’s not the path we want to pursue, we have some choices.

 

One choice is to do body weight exercises.  The advantages here are pretty obvious:  we all have a body, so we have what we need!  A good basic body weight routine would include a cardio warm-up (something like jumping jacks or running in place), followed by exercises like squats, pushups, pullups, crunches, and planks.  It’s also a good idea to throw in a few balance moves, like single leg squats or deadlifts.  Three rounds of ten reps each is a good place to start.

 

Another choice is to join a gym.  Every gym has some combination of weight machines and free weights.  People who have never worked out before or who have specific restrictions might do best on the machines, but I prefer the free weights because they compel us to stabilize our own bodies, they allow our muscles to cooperate rather than work in isolation from each other, and they’re less boring.  Choose a balance of upper and lower body exercises and aim to bend everything you extend and vice versa (for example, we want to pair exercises like bench press, which involves pushing, with rows, which involve pulling).

 

Our first goal is to gain some endurance.  That means working with weights light enough that we can complete 12 to 20 repetitions.  When doing 20 reps is easy, we increase the weight.  Some people want to stay in the endurance phase (totally acceptable!), while others want to work on building big muscles or maximizing strength.  The big muscle group wants to choose weights that allow for 8 to 10 reps, and the max strength group wants to work up to the heaviest weight possible for one beautiful rep.

 

Go play.