Therapy and Leg Day- Opportunity

Therapy Day-

     Today I had therapy for my leg. I was finished with therapy for awhile but I was at a point where I was allowed to go further into exercises such as jumping and I had no idea where to start. Going back to therapy has given me a better baseline to know what I am actually capable of doing. It has helped a lot and I am very happy with the decision to go back. Having someone telling you what to do and wanting to push yourself to the limit in their guidance is a very good way to reach your full potential. This brings me to an important tip.

Choose a Workout Partner Who Motivates You

     If your current workout partner isn't motivating you to
                 1. Go to the Gym  2. Work Hard 3. Stay Focused.
    you need to pick a new partner. There are people out there that better suit your goals. Pick someone who doesn't let you skip a workout you had planned. Pick someone who doesn't just want to talk to you the whole time instead of doing work. Pick someone who is better than you to ask for a little help. If you lift with someone who can lift a lot more than you, strive to be them. Different people offer different incentives of being their workout partner. Weigh the options and pick the best one for you.

      Therapy today consisted of-
       
       10 minutes on the Elliptical
       Walking lunge with medicine ball twists
       Resistance Band Back Pedaling
       Resistance Band Karaoke Drills
       Resistance Band Side Shuffles
       Leg Press Until Fatigued
       Balance Exercises
       Step ups- Right leg Left leg up then Right leg Left leg down
                  As fast as you can for about a minute.
       10 minute cool-down on the stationary bike



    Today I locked in the privilege to work with my high school football team in the weight room and I am more than ecstatic about it. Just being in the weight room that I love the most made me jump into a group and start lifting with them. While I was in there I got a text from a teammate that said "Raider Pride til You Die" and I would have to agree. I miss being in competitive sports and this is an opportunity to stay in touch with the program that gave me so much as well as help out the next generation.

Revival- Comeback

Revival-Rehab

  

             I am back. I've been away from this for far too long and I've been waiting for the right time to get back at it. For the last 6 months I have been rehabbing an ACL reconstruction and meniscus trimming. I had been living injured for the 2 months before I had the surgery, hoping that I wouldn't have to have my second ACL reconstruction of my life and it would just heal by itself. It didn't heal.. So I am still on the long recovery back (congrats Adrian Peterson for being a much better healer than I am). Knowing the things I learned from my first blown-out knee helped me dramatically to stay in better shape and in a better frame of mind. My first injury is what started the slow spiral to my 40 pound weight gain. I was determined to not let my body take that kind of abuse again. 

          6 months later, my right quad is still about half the size of my healthy left quad. This is the driving force in my workout plans currently. I have to be very careful still with my cardio. I just received the okay to start jumping a few weeks ago. While I am allowed to jump, I am not allowed to cut athletically yet and won't be cleared to play any athletic sport for a couple of months. This is a byproduct of a second ACL reconstruction as well as a byproduct of having a cadaver graft for the ACL which takes a little bit longer to heal. 

        My workout plans now are based on Upper-body switching off with Lower-body each day taking rest days on Wednesday if I feel sore and resting the majority of Saturdays and Sundays. I am currently doing all of the upper-body muscle groups every day that I work upper-body and the same for lower-body. I am working in modifications each day so I never do the exact same workout two days in the same week.

        The majority of my training has been molded into sets of 6-12 depending on the day with 2-3 sets of each workout. A lot of my lower body workouts I have been doing single leg variations of exercises so that my body is unable to try and cheat and let my healthy leg take the most of the weight. I also try to work a little bit extra in my right leg to try to catch up as much as I can. 

        Today was an upper-body day, and I am in a different gym for the summer and I'm starting to get into a good routine in this gym. Going to this gym means there is less free weights and more machines. I try my best to do as many lifts on the dumbbells as I can. Before the last month I had not used dumbbells as much as I wanted to. The only thing I am really missing for free-weights is being able to bench. There is something about having a good bench-press Monday that just makes life seem to have a little extra color in it. I just have to work my muscles in a different way and, to be honest, this isn't too much of a bad thing. It gives me a chance to confuse my muscles. 

         My workout today-

                        6 Minute warm-up on the stationary bike

                        

                        3x8 Dumbbell Shoulder Press

                        3x8 Pull-ups (use assisted pull-up if a guy was on it forever and you had to do it last instead of second in your workout..tsk tsk)

                        2x20 Dips (close to failure)

                        3x8 Bicep Curls

                        3x8 Lat Pull-Down

                        3x10 Tricep Pushdown

                        8 minutes on the Arc trainer 1 minute intense intervals 

         Sometimes all you need is a little prod of inspiration to get you out there working to improve your health. This blog had been such an inspiration to me knowing that people were reading what I did in the for my workout each day. This made me excited to create new workouts to try and test out.It gave me the prod that I needed to work that little bit harder. If reading my blog can give that inspiration to a single person, I would be overjoyed. I may have a new body part in my knee, but I'm still the same person who wants to be the biggest help that I can be. I am more than willing to respond to questions in the comment section. I would actually be overjoyed to know that I could be of some help. So please, do NOT hesitate to comment.