A glimpse into a workout

This entire video is only a brief clip of one of my workouts.  Regarding the circuit, I did 5 rounds of that circuit and with the kicks, another 20 or so minutes on top of that.  Please let me know if you've got questions.  Like & Share this post.  

Fight or Flight!

Cardio, the villainous monster that we all hate!

Why I hate cardio and love lifting weights

I freaking hate cardio.  It's not really the feeling after that I dislike, but mostly the process.  Now, there's some amount of cardio that I love, and it's boxing and Muay Thai, but most of your "conventional" cardio like running or cycling or swimming I find to be extremely boring.

Weights, on the other hand, don't lie to you.  Now I'm not talking about hitting up some biceps curls or some machines, I'm talking real weights like squats, deadlifts, overhead pressing, and bench press.  The weights are either "I can do" or "I can't do," when you make the attempt.

Cardio, in the conventional sense, is drawn out and honestly not very exciting.  I used to love running and honestly I have some great memories running with some very awesome people.  Sadly, I just don't enjoy that action anymore.  Swimming is something that I can do to survive, but not for fitness.  Honestly, I just like the ability to not drown.  Cycling hurts my butt, so enough said.

When you lift, it's short and sweet.  Yeah, it may suck something awful at the time, like sets of 10 squats, but nevertheless you can hit it and quit it.  In the end, you keep adding weight to the bar and see what you can do.  Honestly, being able to lift over 400lbs is much more satisfying than bein
g able to run a mile at all.

The best application of both cardio and strength is in combat.  Muay Thai and Boxing both highlight strength and cardio by being able to strike hard and often.  This is a thing that anyone at any age can go ahead and do and in addition to your normal fitness goals with it, it helps to reduce stress.

Obviously, I'm an advocate for the martial arts and combative
.  I believe that in addition to improving your fitness that it helps to improve your life in general.  Combine this with weights and I think you've hit a gold mine.  

Training the fluffy pillow

As I had talked about in my previous post, I'm a bit fluffy, not fat, but fluffy.  Could I be smaller?  Yes.  Could I be bigger?  Yes.  The difficulty is not the exercise component for me, it's predominately the diet.  For this post, however, I'll be going over training considerations as well as what my personal weekly exercise load looks like.

I used to love to run.  When I got out of the Marine Corps, one of the things that I can honestly attribute to defining me was running.  I liked lifting at the same moment in time, however, I did spend a considerable greater amount of time hitting the trails or the street.  This was therapy for me and I made some wonderful friends while I performed this action.

About 2 years later, I got into lifting and Muay Thai, which became the new therapy for me.  Honestly, this has been something that I look back upon and realize that it was at this point that my life changed towards where I am today.  I love lifting and I love Muay Thai, they are both therapeutic and they both will tell you when you're doing something wrong.

I bring this up because it's pivotal to training the fluffy pillow.  Since I would be considered predominantly an "endomorph," I can lift heavy weights but also need a fair amount of aerobic training to include to keep the fat down.  4 days each week I get about 2-3 hours of boxing either by actively coaching (donning the mitts and moving with my participants) or sparring.  So with that consider it my "aerobic" time.  I also lift anywhere between 4 hours and 6 hours per week, depending on the program of which I'm running.  So that sums at about 12-16 hours per week of activity.

I also average over 12000 steps per day, something that may at a desk job fail to receive.  So in addition to all of the training that I get either by participating or personal, it's a large amount of daily activity.

In reality, this is probably what keeps me from being obese.

For my body time, some serious lifting, as well as some serious aerobic training is vital to keep someone such as myself healthy.  I thrive with both and many I know with similar shapes do as well.  It's just I have the privilege of incorporating everything as part of my work, unlike many others who are stuck at a desk.  Not only am I impacting my physical health, I'm mentally under much less stress than my peers in other positions.
You don't have to be a personal trainer to enjoy this type of training.  All you need to do is partition time out of your day, likely every day, towards some form of this exercise.  Some in the morning and some later in the day would be perfect in many instances, but not all.  Evaluate your priorities and your body type, and if you find that you're like me and hold a little extra fat then lifting and intense sports may be right for you.  You have nothing to fear.