What do you do at the gym?

[charley27 164]

I'm 4 months out. What do you do at the gym? Cardio, what type? machines, what type? How long? I'm only losing like a pound a week right now, so I'd like to speed it up.

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[Gungirl1385 63]

I use to have a trainer and I do weights first cardio last. I do a 10 min warm up to get my heart going then I do Mondays legs finish with running on and off for 20 mins Tuesday all cardio elliptical 30 bike 30 Wed warm up then arms and back Thursdays cardio and then Friday core and back

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[busybeebug 415]

How fit are you now? You may benefit on 1 or 2 sessions with a trainer. They can help you gauge where you are physically and help you find the right plan to follow. A lot of gyms around me give one free session. I think planet fitness has trainers on staff that doesn't cost extra so you ask as many of times as you want ( within reason)

[Dub 9,922]

What do I do at the gym ?..........

I'm not sure there is a classification for it, but it goes a little something like this......

* Show up. This alone is more than I used to do. With that alone.....I'm improving over the old habits.

* Grab a towel from the bin. Gonna need it. Sweat is good. Means work is being done. Better grab two on some days.

* Walk through the gym and get on the elevator to get upstairs to cardio area. Yes....I just said elevator. My knees don't do stairs really well at the current time and seeing me walk up the centrally located open staircase would be the thing that makes people laugh so hard they'd hurt themselves. So....elevator up....while getting earbuds in and music decisions made.

* Find a treadmill facing whatever it is I want to face....lots of natural light in there....I wanna find one without glare on the onboard TV. Gotta enjoy watching ESPN, Fox, CNN and such with CC text on while I'm getting started.

* 5 mile walks with an incline are my goal...provided the knees don't lock up.

* When that's done I'll feel pretty warmed up to go back downstairs and do some lifting on lift days. I've been using the machines more than free weights due to the range of motion being safely programed in. I'm nursing a blown shoulder and another abdominal hernia coming back.....so safe range of motion is much appreciated.

* Every now and again on non-lift days I'll hit the treadmill and then get on the heavy bag after treadmill. What I should be doing is more cardio on elliptical, rowing machine or recumbent bike......but a few minutes on the heavy bag with the right music is enough to really finish things off nicely.

Point is.....do what makes you feel good and work within your limitations. Seek the council of someone knowledgeable there to help get you acclimated to the various machines and proper form on lifts and strategies on timing, cardio and above all....INJURY AVOIDANCE !!!!

Beware the so called trainers. I've seen all sorts in this field. My current gym has some exceptional trainers who approach things with a good, safe, effective and wholistic approach with their clients. We hired one for my son. He was very good. Covered what to do in the gym and in the kitchen. He had him on recommended diet. He also had the degrees in nutrition and exercise science to convince me of his legitimacy.

My last gym......not the same quality of trainers. Their credentials were how well they fit in their "Staff" shirts. The exercises I'd see them run clients through were highly dangerous and very inappropriate for their beginner needs. Injuries were common.

The key to the gym is to lock in to a way of doing things that you enjoy, is safe, productive and helps keep your interest. It can be an oasis from the rest of your life.

[Kristin7676 32]

I am 10 months out and still have a hard time with this. I GO to the gym 5-7 times a week, walk 4 miles at lunch during the week and on the weekends I hike or kayak. While at the gym I do a warm up on the treadmill, then do the 30 min circuit (planet fitness) on Tuesday, Thursday, and Satuday. Monday and Friday I do abs and Upper body Wednesday and Sunday I do abs and lower body. I am at the gym 45 min to hour. Problem is I am only losing 1-2 lbs a week, some weeks none at all but not gaining. Some people say I am not eating enough for the amount of exercise I am doing, some say I need to change up the workouts. I just started seeing a new Nut and plan on get a trainer in the next couple of weeks. I have 20 more lbs to loose to reach my goal weight. Want to get there before my year anniversary. I think it is a lot of trial and error and what works for you

[charley27 164]

I am only losing a point a week ish. Im only 4 months out, I should be losing more. I see a new nutritionist tomorrow so hopefully she will have insight?

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[BigViffer 3,544]

I think a better question is what do you want from your visits to the gym? Are you only looking to lose weight? If so, then you want to maintain your muscle mass and then exercise in a sustained cardio mode for 20-30 minutes.

Maintaining muscle mass can be done with pilates, Zoomba, and just about anything that causes you to move your body weight. You won't build any muscle and you won't gain any muscle endurance, but you will maintain mass and gain respiratory endurance in those type of classes. Whether it is a treadmill, elliptical, strider, row machine, stationary bike, or whatever, the only thing that matters is keeping your heart rate in the cardio zone. For me, that is as little as 130+ bpm, for some it is much higher. If you aren't breathing hard and dying of thirst, you most likely aren't burning as many calories as you think.

If you are only walking on the treadmill or leisurely pedaling on a bike, you are just a little better than your basal metabolic rate. Don't get me wrong, this is better than where we were before! Even doing this and keeping to your strict diet you will lose weight.

On the flip side of this, if you have been killing it at the gym for the past month you may need a break. Take a week off and let your body heal and rebuild some of the muscle tissue. Then go back with renewed vigor.

Me personally, I have put my old gym routine on here before. It shouldn't be hard to find, but it isn't really beginner friendly.

[theantichick 2,204]

I can only afford to see my trainer every other week. We're still trying to figure out the line between no progress and sending my auto-immune into a flare with the weight training stuff. I've flared every time we've worked out. I think I'm going to have to insist that we back off how much weight we're doing on each of the machines. He's going pretty easy on me, but he is having me push to where the muscles are shaking by the end of the 3rd set each time. I don't know how to judge what's going to be enough weight to keep progress moving (even if it's at a snail's pace) and what's going to be too much other than the shaking point seems to be too much.

Anyway, he hasn't given me "homework" to do in the meantime except to try and keep up the cardio 3+ times a week. I haven't ever done weight workouts except for rehab after surgery, and then they gave me VERY specific instructions about which machines, how to increase the weight, how many reps, etc. So I'm clueless as to how to build a program that I'm doing in between visits with the trainer. Having never worked with a trainer before I'm not sure what I should be expecting from him. Having never worked with someone with auto-immune arthritis, I'm sure he's not sure what to do with me.

Any advice from the gym vets here on how to proceed? I signed a year's contract for the training hoping to motivate myself to stick with it, but I need to find out how to use it most effectively.

[Gungirl1385 63]

A good train her will work with you on that and not over push you. I have band knees and no balance on my right side From A dirt bike injury so my trainer would have me do lunges with a balance bar. And squats with the bench between my legs to touch my butt on. All these worked great. If your trainer isn't working around your injuries sounds more like a meat head then a trainer.

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[theantichick 2,204]

My situation is a little more complicated than just an injury. I had a knee re-built in 2008 and I have a couple of restrictions for it, he's working with that, no problem. My situation is that the activity that seems OK at the time starts a system-wide inflammation flare that causes extreme fatigue and all over joint and body aches for several days. We haven't had enough sessions to work out the right level of resistance, and figure out what I need to be doing in between visits.