Mandi garam: Target areas

On Tuesdays and Thursdays I'm free after 11.30 AM. That's my gym time. On both of these days, I usually just wear sweat pants or dry fit pants, a dri fit sports bra, a t-shirt on top, a sweater, a pair of flip flops and off to school.  I pack my indoor sneakers inside my bag, along with a water bottle, a banana/bar and of course, ear phones. Maybe next time I can start bringing a towel so I can shower at the gym. I know my activities will be restrained when midterms, tests and group projects pile up and I have to stay back on campus. No me gusta.

My target areas are thighs, love handles, and arms. I don't have flat abs so it should be a target area too but I don't do any ab-focused exercises, at least not now. Maybe I should add that to my routine soon.

What do I do there? I run, I cycle, I do the machines, and I lift light weights with more repetitions. If you want to gain muscles, go for heavier weights. If you just want toned up arms, lighter weights with more reps shall do the trick.

I start with cardio. I run for about 20-35 minutes while watching cartoons on the screen.

Then I cycle for 20-45minutes on my favourite machine ever. The bike! I have a bike there that I call my own. It's nicely placed in that gym and I only cycle on that particular one. Picky kan? The best thing about this machine is it burns a lot of calories in a minute (way more than running) and it's got over 50 channels for me to watch. Well, at least the ones in this gym has. Last Tuesday, I was so into this People's Court show (a reality court case show). Right after the 30 minute show, I burned almost 300 calories with slow cycles.  That's just cycling. You run, you lift weights, you do squats, you do machines, you can burn more than 500 calories under 1 hour if you're consistent. I'm never consistent so it took me about 2 hours plus to get to that level. Especially when People's Court is on! I can't focus haha.

Another machine that I often use: the hip abductor. I read that this machine can sometimes be dangerous to your muscles: "Muscle isolation is dangerous because it causes undue stress on the joint involved in the exercise. Our bodies and muscles are designed to work in a synergistic way, not in isolated blocks." I should read more into this.

Live healthier

For me, each gym session would normally take 1 to 1.5 hours, 2 or 3 times a week. Except when there's People's Court I could stay for another hour lol. I do different types of workouts at home. You'd be surprised by the things you could use at home to replace exercise equipment. I love Jillian Michael's workouts and sometimes I just go on Youtube to change things up a little bit.

I eat big after each session. Preferably within 45 minutes (maybe up to 60) after working out. This period, known as the golden hour, is when the muscles absorb the most nutrients! I don't have the healthiest diet but I try not to eat too much oily food. I got rid of my junk food habit about more than a year ago. No carbonated drinks and avoid fast food. But it's not like I don't eat fast food at all. Once in a while, I call the pizza delivery, buy a box of deep fried wedges, bake cakes. Moderation is the key.

But it's easier here. You buy your own groceries, you get to pick what you want. Whether it's gluten-free or soy-based or organic or whatever. The cost of living is expensive so we avoid eating out to save up. You cook, you eat your own food, that's the best option. Coconut milk and red meat are my enemies now, sadly. They give me this terrible headache. It's my high cholesterol level that I need to fix before it gets worse. So I use full cream milk instead.

I 'inherited' this lifestyle from a friend and I think I just got used to it. It's really not that hard as I thought it would be. I mean, 2 or 3 times a week, 1 to 1.5 hours per session, that's not bad right? It's still hard to say no to a bag of chocolate chip cookies but it's all in the head!