Lately I've been experiencing what is commonly known as a plateau. I catch myself doing the same workouts, lifting the same weights, grouping the same muscles and running for the same amount of time at the same speed. When I try to think back to the last time I made a change in my exercise regiment I am astonished to think that nearly 4 months have gone by with no variations! Am I maintaining my physique and overall health? Yes. But I have seen no improvements to my bod and frankly, aside from changing my music selection, I'm getting pretty bored in the gym. Last week I walked into my gym, took one look at the rows of treadmills, stationary bikes, elliptical machines and StairMasters, turned on my heel and headed out the door. There is a small ally behind my gym that has no traffic and is the perfect distance for sprints. I lunged my way down to the wall where the ally turns and lunged backwards to my starting point. Legs-a-burnin' already! After I felt warm enough for the serious stuff I did my sprints. I went full bore straight for the wall. I keep my upper body leaning forward and try to stay light on my feet. I ran backwards to my start point. After about 20 minutes of this I was pooped but I felt so good. I felt like I had given myself a new challenge to increase the intensity of my cardio workouts, especially since I can't bare the thought of increasing the duration!
Today I bought a jump rope. Let me rewind quickly to one year ago. I'm with my trainer and eager to tackle anything he throws at me. He hands me a jump rope. A little self consciously I give it a try. Whack to the back of the head! Try again. Smack! One more time. It comes around and hits me in the ankle and I nearly trip. At this point I'm done. "I can't do this. I'll do anything but jump rope". That was that, we did everything but. Back to the present, why am I buying a jump rope? Finally, after a year I am ready again for the challenge. But this time I'm doing it in the ally, just in case I repeatedly trip and smack myself with the damn thing. Surprisingly not! I'm remembering the techniques I was taught in elementary school. I'm using my wrists, not my arms and jumping slowly at first with a small jump in between while the rope swings around. I LOVED it. I was panting like a canine in heat after about 20 minutes and feeling like I had done some serious done an hour on the StairMaster. Upon researching further I realized why I felt like my whole body was on fire. Skipping rope burns a whopping 143 calories every 15 minutes for a girl my weight! If you don't think that is significant look and see how many calories your treadmill reads after 45 minutes. If it has been since elementary school since you've swung one of these bad boys I recommend picking one up. I bought mine for $10 at my gym and I'm not stopping until I can do a double under and maybe not even then!
-Whitney
