Vacations can be tough on your fitness goals. I just got back from a short vacation, where there wasn't much time for exercise. Outside of a 3.5 mile outdoor hike, I haven't exercised for an entire week. Part of the reason is that I'm trying to get out of the habit of over training. A little rest every now and then is a good thing and can help prevent injuries.
Today I thought I would share with you some of my workout strategies, starting with today’s “Return from Vacation Workout”.
I had enough rest and it was time to return to my normal work out schedule. Because today was Easter Sunday, I knew that my local gym would be open for only 3 hours today and that I would be busy visiting family in the afternoon and evening.
Because of the time limitations from both the gym schedule and my schedule, I decided to workout in my home gym today.
Before I left on my vacation, I used some exercise time for packing time, so there were a few shoulder exercises that I needed to do for this workout. Also, I haven’t done any kind of leg exercises the entire week. And outside of 1 brisk walk, I didn’t do any cardio exercises last week.
So my plan was to do the following workout:
For the shoulders (4 sets each):
• Arnold’s with dumbbells on the BOSU
• Side raises
• Front raises
For the legs (4 sets each):
• Squats with a barbell and power rack
For abs (5 sets each):
• Hanging abs
• Twisted hanging abs
For cardio (40 minutes):
• Precor 5.21si Elliptical Machine (Cross-training mode, resistance 20)
With this plan, I was able to workout the shoulder muscles that I hadn’t trained in 2 weeks. However, I desperately wanted some variety for my shoulders. I’ve been doing the same shoulder raise exercises using dumbbells and the BOSU for months now. It was getting boring. So I decided to use my cable machine for the side raises and front raises for this workout. Because the cable machine provides constant resistance, I had to use a much lower weight than I would have used with the dumbbell. But even at the lower weight, the cable machine shoulder raises were challenging.
Squats are a great leg exercise and work most of the leg muscles. If I could only do 1 leg exercise, squats are my first choice. So I felt this was a good leg exercise for my “Return from Vacation Workout”. My legs should be sore for at least 2 days, so I’m happy.
I hadn’t done hanging abs in a few weeks, so that’s why I chose that particular ab exercise.
I prefer the cross training mode on the elliptical machine because the changing ramp angle targets a great variety of leg muscles.
Listening or watching something you like while you exercise is an important motivator. I like listening to audio podcasts when I workout with weights, because I don’t want a TV distracting me while I train with heavy weights. For my exercise entertainment, I listened to a Podcast on a Bose iPod sound system during my strength training routines and I watched a Brisco County Junior DVD while I was on the elliptical machine. Since one episode of the show is about 40 minutes, that’s how long my cardio workout was.
Overall, it felt great to work out again. I’m hoping that by sharing my workouts with you, that you might get some ideas that will work well for you. Do you have some workout ideas or questions about working out for me? If so, send me some comments. Let’s learn from each other.
Have Fun, Be Fit!
“Functional Marc”
