As mentioned in a previous blog post, I have started going to the gym with my friend Steve to do some strength training. It’s not something I did last year whilst marathon training, but I keep reading about how important it is to be a successful runner, to tone your body and to keep healthy. All the people’s blogs that I read seem to do a fair amount of weight/strength training, so I should get in on the action!

My first weights session was a couple of weeks ago and I had NO idea what I was doing. Steve had designed two workouts for me and spent a while going through what each exercise was and what weight level I should use. Our next session was early on a Saturday morning and I was feeling bit ill (no, not hungover!) and the gym was pretty empty so I used the opportunity to have a bit of a photoshoot (sorry Steve!) to help me remember the exercises and to put on the blog, obviously.

I felt far more confident going into my weights session on Monday; confident of the exercises and confident that my body would perform and not buckle.

We started with a very short warm up on the cross-trainer (elliptical) then stretched but definitely not for long enough, need to work out some good stretches to start a weights session with!

Exercise                   Set 1            Set 2             Set 3          Reps

Bench Press               20kg           20kg            25kg           10
Bent over barbell       15kg           17.5kg         20kg           10    
Dumbell shoulder       5kg              6kg             6kg            10
press
Barbell lunges           15kg           17.5kg         20kg           20
Barbell squats           15kg           17.5kg         20kg           10
Tri pushdowns         13.75kg      13.75kg       16.25kg       10
Barbell curl               12.5kg       12.5kg         12.5kg         10

Sit ups  12reps  3 sets  
Leg extension sit ups 10reps 3sets

The lunges and squats really pushed me and my legs ached on Tuesday and Weds!