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Well, they're right -- a well balanced exercise plan does feature more variety. That said, I'm a HUGE proponent of calisthenic-type workouts, and I think that
by bmelton 17y ago
Well, they're right -- a well balanced exercise plan does feature more variety. That said, I'm a HUGE proponent of calisthenic-type workouts, and I think that something like this is definitely more good than bad.
If you wanted to supplement this, without significantly increasing the difficulty, do something similar with situps on the off-days. If you're doing M-W-F for pushups, then do the same incremental workout with situps on T-Th-S.
Better still would be to add some walking to the mix. Walk a mile on Sunday, perhaps.
One other thing that I do to round out cardio (as I am also in horrible shape at the moment) is to start off each 'workout' session with jumping jacks. They're simple, easy, hard to screw up more than a little bit, and do a great job at getting you warmed up. Start with 10 or 20, and again, just keep incrementing upwards as they get easier. I personally would do jumping jacks (or jumping rope as they get easier) before every workout.
Regardless, good luck on your goal. Doing SOMETHING towards achievement is definitely better than doing nothing, regardless of how unimpressed your trainer friend might be.
- nekopa 17y agoI see it as doing something right now is more good than bad. I decided to get into this after I realised that I am currently doing a lot of mind work (trying to fix my weaknesses in Math and Statistics as well as programming) so I need to balance it with doing something with my body. You will see in my comment below that I am running and doing sit-ups too. I wanted to do something like squats or burpees, but I have slightly dodgy knees, so I am trying to strengthen them first before putting them under too much strain. (Note, I live out in the countryside here, so I run on grass which has less of an impact on my knees than concrete would. Oh, and to clarify, the trainer was happy I am doing something, and said she will help me balance out the training when I am finished with this 'habit-forming' stage. Thanks for wishing me luck, I know I need all the luck I can get right now as the program is starting to get tougher, but I am going to make it through. Cheers!
- bmelton 17y agoHaving done permanent damage to my knees on numerous occasions, I can definitely relate. 3 minutes on an elliptical is about all I can stand before my knees start to buckle, though I can easily do MUCH longer than that on bikes or treadmills (as they work the knees and surrounding muscles less directly.) If you're overweight, obviously, getting the weight off of the knees will help them tremendously too. And yes, I don't know how I overlooked that you were already doing other exercise tasks, so my apologies for needlessly repeating what you already knew.