WEEK 2. 8 WEEK LITTLE BLACK DRESS CHALLENGE

 BELIEVE YOU CAN ACHIEVE YOUR FITNESS GOALS AND YOU'RE HALF WAY THERE. 
(And my belief is getting stronger and stronger)

WEEK 2

Hey Guys!

No feeling beats the feeling of a good intense work out and this week the intensity levels just kept rising. It's an indescribable feeling. When I do a good work out it feels like an accomplishment. Remember- most of my life I had very little sports/physical activity (I have a blog post on that I'll link below). The most being maybe the 1 hour of PE each week in school. So while I do get my days where I struggle I get more days where I prove to myself I am capable of having a fitness regime in my life. I never want to be without it. And I will continue on this road. No limits! If I had one wish it would be to start to train sooner. But I'm here now. And the timing feels right ;).

So this week saw us having one LITTLE BLACK DRESS CHALLENGE class because it was Paddys week! But we more than  made up for our festivities as Sean decided this week is we where doing BOXCERCISE again, only the intensity was cranked up a notch on last weeks class ;). ------Marvellous!! Right?.... Hehe.

After the usual body conditioning class I was feeling 'fairly' confident heading into the 'LBD' CHALLENGE class. On Sunday previous when we did our walk/jog it wasn't my best performance, not by a long shot. I had a bad day. We all get them days, even the best of athletes get them, as Sean (our instructor) reassured me. And 4 days later I hadn't done anything in terms of fitness (because of a combination of work and Paddys day took up all my time) but looking at it now I feel my body needed the rest and I think the rest paid off. I was dreading the warm up in the body conditioning class because I knew I would know from there weather or not I'll have a good workout but to my surprise I felt stronger than ever. Body conditioning went well then it was straight into the Little Black Dress challenge training session and as mentioned above tonight we where doing...

So our warm up tonight consisted of 5 minutes of jumping jacks, strides and back kicks (which I prefer more than our usual jog, but don't worry folks, there was running later in the class :D). Then we where onto the boxing. Myself and Yvonne (my partner in fitness ;)) got our pads and gloves and we where ready to go. 
First exercise- The person on gloves (me) blast it out for 30 seconds then sprint for 30 seconds, while the pad holders did jumping jacks, for 3 minutes in total. Then we switched. Brilliant exercise to get the pulse going! It's here where controlling my breathing really comes into play.

Next up- Arms. For 3 minutes we boxed it out while also incorporating push-ups. It went like this... We punched it out twice then did 2 push ups. Then we boxed it out 4 times then did 4 push ups, then we boxed it out 6 times then we did 6 push ups (Do you get the picture LOL) Right up until we reached 20. Then we traded our gloves and pads and did it all over again.

Then we moved onto legs. And like last week we did the SEMI SQUAT, HALF SQUAT, FULL SQUAT positions. If you can imagine a triangle and at the top is a semi squat and we blast it out for one minute then straight into the half squat position for a minute and then into the full squat position for one minute. Then we are back into a semi squat for one minute and into a full squat for one minute so on and so forth.... Then we switched over, and we do the entire squatting business again while blasting it out! My legs actually burn! I could feel my blood rushing through every muscle.  Especially having sprinted the dear life out of them on the previous exercise.

Then we moved onto the mats to workout our tummys and legs. You would think getting to work on the mat would be a relief but no! Sometimes this type of endurance exercise takes more out of me than any cardio. We hit our gluts first via lying on one side and raising one leg on our instructors count, then holding it in that position small pulsing on his count also (and it is quite a long count :D). We did both sides- TWICE! Then we did what I can only describe as donkey kicks LOL (I'll find out the exact terminology my dears) where basically we where on all fours and raised one leg up and down, again on our instructors count and also held it position small pulsing on Seans count.  Again, we did both legs twice :).

Then we hit our abs with situps and bicycles (I mentioned last week that I find the bicycles very tough but this week I found that bit more 'doable'- result!!)

And like every class at the very end we stretched it out high fived our partners. :)
I am really enjoying this challenge. More than I thought. Its my favourite time of the week! I'll be back next week with the details on next weeks classes. Next week is FULL ON! And I can't wait. ;) 


Much Love,
Amy xo