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I mentioned before that I had bought a LivingSocial deal for a month on unlimited group-personal-training classes. I thought this would be a good jump-start for me to get back into lifting post-surgery.
I found that I was able to re-gain my strength fairly well, and have no problems doing ab workouts now. The class was a combination of different things every day. The schedule went mainly as such:
Monday – HIIT cardio and leg circuits
Tuesday – Push/Pull day
Wednesday – HIIT cardio circuits
Thursday – Power days (power-cleans, snatches, push-press, squats..etc)
Friday – legs & abs
Saturday – HIIT Cardio and strength training
Every day was something different, and I was doing exercises I had never done before. I had never really performed any of the explosive exercises or used kettle-bells ever in the past.
When I started the class on July 29th, I had my body fat percentage measured, and it was at 23.25%.
When August 29th came, I was ready to measure my body fat percentage again. I had been noticing changes in myself, and my weight. I dropped 5 pounds rather quickly in the beginning, and then gained 3 back. This time around the machine read 18.5%.
I had to do a double-take, and really doubted the accuracy of the machine. There’s no way I could have dropped 4.75% body-fat in a month, right?
I don’t doubt that I did lose some. When I began the class, I had just come from two months of inactivity due to surgery-recovery, and I know I gained weight and body-fat and lost a bit of my muscle mass. Also, I wasn’t eating the best after surgery. I wasn’t eating junk food or anything, but I also wasn’t paying attention to my macros and ate a very high percentage of carbs.
When I began taking the class, I put my all into it. I went as often as I could (6 days a week if I was in town that weekend–and if I wasn’t I’d go to the regular gym), and didn’t half-ass any workout. I also started to really pay attention to my diet. I drank more water, I started the intermittent fasting, and I really cut back on my intake of carbohydrates. Also, there was a lot of HIIT cardio!
So surely all these factors contributed to the decrease in body fat percentage, but could it have really decreased 4.75% in a month?
Nevertheless, I really think the class was a great way to get me working out hard again. All of the HIIT cardio definitely helped me cut some body fat, and I am starting to see the cuts on my arms in my triceps and shoulders that I’ve been trying so hard to get. Overall, I think I’ve made more progress in the past month than I did in the 3 months leading up to surgery.
I definitely love the explosive exercises, I feel like they work well and will incorporate more of these types of exercises into my workout. I’ve been using this workout for shoulder-day. I’ll also be doing more HIIT cardio sessions.
I wish I had taken measurements and pictures before I started the class. At that point, I was too scared to look at the numbers because I thought they had definitely increased after surgery. I started taking measurements again and will start taking more progress photos.
Although I’m not too sure about the 18.5% being completely accurate, I am super psyched that I have made great progress and that I am actually starting to see progress in myself more. I even think I can start to see beginning formation of abs! Of course, my abs are my biggest problem area, and where I pretty much store ALL of my fat. But being able to see progress feels great, and is definitely motivation to keep at it!!
