No Pain, No Gain? You’ve Got to be Kidding Me.

I thought this was supposed to get easier. Not easy, but easier.
The goals were set, the strategies were laid out and the schedule was made. 
The only thing left to do was to get out there and run, sweat, and make salads.
So why did I only manage to get out and run twice last week? What broke down the plan so early in the game? What went wrong?

Bootcamp. That’s what happened.

I took a bootcamp fitness class last Tuesday, and spent the rest of my week in recovery. All my muscles were aching. No, aching is not the right word. My muscles were screaming at me, scolding me for causing them so much pain. Even muscles I didn’t know I had were hurting. And I’m a kin grad; I know my muscles. 

I spent most of last week struggling up and down stairs, so running wasn’t really a viable activity.  This humbling experience, did however teach me two valuable lessons.

1. Know your limits
I’ve participated in intense fitness classes before, and was reminded why I stopped taking them in the past.  Some masochist coined the phrase “No pain, no gain” but I think it has to be the right type of pain. I would describe good pain in the days following a tough workout as ‘stiffness’; a gentle reminder that you’ve been neglecting those muscles for too long.  Any pain that dramatically interferes with daily activities is not the pain I’m looking for.  I definitely got the hint that I’ve been neglecting specific muscle groups; I think I’ll find alternative ways of working them out from now on. I would love to be able to continue the bootcamp workout, and work out with less intensity, but the pace of the class is set for the larger group, so my pace may disrupt the flow of the group.

2. Know when to push yourself
This lesson may seem to contradict the first one, but a little bit of pain or stiffness is good.  With exercise, there’s a plateau effect. What this means is that you can’t do the exact same workout every day for years and expect to see drastic changes in physique overtime. Our muscles adapt quickly and become more efficient, so to continue to see improvements in strength and physique, you’ve got to continually challenge yourself.  Let me use an example.  If I run the same distance every day, at approximately the same speed, after a few weeks, I’m not going to get any faster or slimmer from running. To break out of the plateau, I can run faster, run a longer distance, run uphill, or a combination of these.  The important thing to remember is to know when to push yourself, and know how far to push yourself. It is pretty clear to me that Bootcamp pushed me too far, so if I’m ever brave enough to return to the class, I’ll try to scale it back a bit. 

Keep these lessons in mind on your own journey to fitness and hopefully they’ll be much less painful than mine.