The Fit Skool » Marc

Finding motivation to workout

Kelly @ The Fit Skool — Thu, 22 Jan 2015 14:17:07 +0000

Post written by: Marc – my weekly guest spot on TheFitSkool

So its early Thursday morning, and as I sit down to blog, I thought of my workouts so far this week. Instantly, a common thread between them came to mind…

I really didn’t want to work out or go to the gym before any of them.

Sunday I kind of had to drag myself to the gym mid day before football started and I became a waste of space. I didn’t work out at all on Monday and it had nothing to do with time. After a kind of hectic day at work, I came home and whole-heartedly planned on going to the gym once Ava was asleep. Then I got lazy, watched an hour of TV on demand with Kelly, and then convinced myself I should just stay home.

Fearing the same thing would happen after a long day of work Tuesday, I made myself go to the gym later in the night.

I made it there around 8:30 and knew any workout was better than nothing. After a quick 5-minute warm-up on a bike, I did a shoulder workout that I figured would torch my shoulders. Here it is….

SHOULDER SCULPT WORKOUT

Complete 3 SETS of the Below Exercises

Alternating Balance Shoulder Presses, 12/10/8 reps

Alternating Front and Side Raises, 12/10/10 reps

Seated Shoulder Presses, 10/6/6 reps

Seated Shoulder Fly’s, 10 reps each

Swimmers Press, 10 reps each

I also incorporated several high repetition rotator cuff and labrum exercises at the end using lightweights.

***Except for the seated shoulder presses, I used moderately lightweights and limited my rest time between sets. This kept my heart rate up throughout the entire workout ***

Examples of a few of the exercises:

Alternating Balance Shoulder Presses

Front Raises

Lateral Raises

When I left the gym on Tuesday night, the way I felt could not have been more different than Monday night, which lead me to this thought; sometimes it is doing the things that you do not want to do, that make you feel better at the end of the day.

You have to step outside of your comfort zone at times. Do the things that you have been putting off, or dreading, and once it is completed the sense of relief will far out weigh that looming feeling you had prior.

How do you motivate yourself to go to the gym?

In case you missed Marc’s first two guest posts, here they are:

Something new to The Fit Skool

NO Better time than now

NO better time than now.

Kelly @ The Fit Skool — Sat, 17 Jan 2015 18:54:12 +0000

In case you missed my first post check it out.

Getting back in to the gym and working out on a regular basis has been something I have wanted to do for a long time. I can honestly say that before just a couple of weeks ago, going to the gym and working out was not in my schedule at all. It would cross my mind throughout the day, but by the time I got home from work, it just wasn’t happening.

Let’s go back aways….. I used to work out quiet regularly for a period of time. Before Kelly was pregnant with Ava, and even during her pregnancy I would almost always attend Kelly’s bootcamp classes. I would go to the gym maybe 1 or 2 times a week on top of that, and with softball 1 night per week, I considered myself a highly “active” person.

In the last year+ (since Ava was born) – not so much. Between lack of sleep for a few months and a desire to spend time at home (when not at work) exercise took a back seat. Kelly’s bootcamp classes became a thing of the past, as I was now spending that time watching Ava, while Kelly taught class.

Luckily I have a rather fast metabolism, and with eating right, gaining weight was not an issue. But on an overall health level, I felt like I was failing. Besides walking Cooper, I honestly worked out at the gym 3-4 times in the last year. And even those times, I felt like Kelly was forcing me to go and not be so lazy!

Anyway, back to the present day. We are 2 1/2 weeks into the new year, and I have made it to gym a total of 9 times. I also started playing in a men’s basketball league 1 night per week (the only cardio I really do) and worked out 1 time at home with Kelly. I told myself I was going to try and work out 4-5 days/week, and after 17 days I have worked out 12. Not too bad.

I have been trying to mix up my workouts to keep myself entertained. Getting to the gym on weekends has been much easier than on weekdays, as expected, but I can’t complain. Currently my weekday workouts have been shorter on time and because of this, more total body and compound movement exercises. Weekends I have focused more on individual body parts in an attemp to regain some strength.

What type of workouts do you prefer? Full body, cardio based, or working on a single body part?

Post By: Marc Garofalo

Something NEW to The Fit Skool…

Kelly @ The Fit Skool — Thu, 15 Jan 2015 14:04:15 +0000

I will start off with saying; I’m not really sure how this blog post will turn out. You may like it, or then again you may not. It may be a little different than what your used to reading on thefitskool.com, but hopefully it will be a good thing in the long run. I can assure you that it will definitely give you a different view point, and in turn maybe yourself or someone you know will be able to relate. This is in fact the idea behind this whole thing.

3-4 months ago “this idea” came up, but nothing ever happened. Then WE discussed doing this about 1 month ago. I made excuses why the timing didn’t work. With Ava’s 1st Birthday party and the holiday season to follow, I put it off. I was trying to buy myself some time (I admit I am a procrastinator.)

Well, with the New Year upon us and resolutions to be made, I had no excuses. I was much more on-board and figured its time I give this blogging a try. Thanks to the support, knowledge and enthusiasm of my super talented wife, this will be my first, of hopefully, many “guest” blog posts.

Oh sorry. Did I forget to mention, this is Marc, not Kelly!

I will leave the trainer tips, the healthy recipes, and Ava & Cooper stories to Kelly. I will more or less recount my own adventures back into the gym while working full time. My hope is to just get back into a regular workout routine and I do not have any specific goal in mind. However, knowing myself, I’m sure it won’t be long before I am challenging myself in one way or another.

Check back Saturday for an update of where I am 2 weeks into the New Year!