I just met my trainer for the Evolution program: Tyler.
Gratuitous Fitcorp website shot of Tyler.
(yeah, that guy on the bench is not me... but I bet his triceps could crush a large walnut)
Todays's session was important, though it really wasn't a workout. I'd say the theme was "Laying the Foundation"... or "Things That Don't Make you Sweat." We started out by getting to know each other a little more, establishing some rapport. We went through a trainer worksheet that walked through previous experience with exercise, anticipated challenges, and short and long term goals for the program. When he asked for my workout history, I pretty much gave the full history.
My workout history? Hmmm... where would I start? Oh yes.... I was a fat kid. A very fat kid.
I used to be able to do this.
No, really.
It wasn't until I was about thirteen where I finally grew into my weight and began to realize that in all the P.E. classes I dreaded I was actually pretty good at running. While most of the kids would tire out quickly, I had enough discipline to pace myself--having the extra energy stores probably helped, too. Overall, I didn't really workout with any semblance of regularity until medical school. After my third year of medical school, I did research in Iowa for a year, but at the end of that year I got caught in kind of... sort of... an accident... It was only after a year of intense physical therapy that I even dared to enter the gym again. At that point I was extremely lucky to become friends with my workout-buddy, Jake (I'm pretty sure he's been working out ever since he was in the womb), that helped get me from barely being able to do a single push-up to being able to do 30 in a row without breaking a sweat.
Hey, it's Jake! Hi Jake!
I worked out with Jake for about 3 months and had some really phenomenal results. I then had to do a fair amount of travelling the rest of the year, so I continued to workout solo, and was able to keep my workouts pretty regular until my recent move to Boston. Now I'm ready to add another milestone in that history.
When we chatted about anticipated challenges, it really boiled down to one thing: INTERN YEAR. Fortunately, I've grown to make it a priority to weigh any and all intellectual and professional endeavors no greater than health and fitness goals. I used to treat my body like it was just a form of transportation for my brain to get from meeting to meeting, but I've learned to appreciate it for so much more and am committed to making sure that both my body and brain always learning and developing together. There's a lot of technical scientific reasons, but there really is a fascinating and powerful synergy between the two.
As far as short and long term objectives go for the program, I figured we'd make some specific ones once we start actually working out, but, in general, it would be a progression of increasing overall body strength and, especially, core strength.
After our trainer pow-wow, we did some functional movement assessments. We did some small tests to see what the range of motion was for different parts of my body and what baseline functional strength we were working with. Turned out I was in good enough shape to start an intense workout program. There were only two small asymmetries in range of motion and flexibility between my right and left shoulder by a little bit and between my right and left hip again by a little bit. Throughout the program we'll see if we can even those out, though it really won't be the focus of our sessions.
At the end of the session, we scheduled for the first real workout session. We've begun to lay a great foundation, and once that's done we'll be ready to build something incredible.
When we chatted about anticipated challenges, it really boiled down to one thing: INTERN YEAR. Fortunately, I've grown to make it a priority to weigh any and all intellectual and professional endeavors no greater than health and fitness goals. I used to treat my body like it was just a form of transportation for my brain to get from meeting to meeting, but I've learned to appreciate it for so much more and am committed to making sure that both my body and brain always learning and developing together. There's a lot of technical scientific reasons, but there really is a fascinating and powerful synergy between the two.
As far as short and long term objectives go for the program, I figured we'd make some specific ones once we start actually working out, but, in general, it would be a progression of increasing overall body strength and, especially, core strength.
After our trainer pow-wow, we did some functional movement assessments. We did some small tests to see what the range of motion was for different parts of my body and what baseline functional strength we were working with. Turned out I was in good enough shape to start an intense workout program. There were only two small asymmetries in range of motion and flexibility between my right and left shoulder by a little bit and between my right and left hip again by a little bit. Throughout the program we'll see if we can even those out, though it really won't be the focus of our sessions.
At the end of the session, we scheduled for the first real workout session. We've begun to lay a great foundation, and once that's done we'll be ready to build something incredible.
No comments:
Post a Comment