Lover of trading, tacos, 3D/AR/VR, cryptos, and most things Japanese

Also known as, “How Bob Got His Butt Kicked”…

So I tried my first Zumba class today. Eleven o’clock on a Saturday, I was warmed up and ready to rock. I got there about 15 minutes early to stretch and warm up a bit before class started. As I stood there loosening up, the studio gradually filled with more and more women. I realized I was the only man. What started as about 30 other women gradually grew to about 70 by the first few minutes of class.

Lot’s of dancing, lots of movement. I felt like I had two left feet and immovable arms, trying to mimic the instructor on the stage in front. (I was in the back.) Still, I got my boogie on and did great for the first 10 minutes or so. Then we dipped into some serious quad straining movements and I started struggling. It didn’t take long for all the rhythm to disappear from my body as my legs screamed and I tried to keep step. And I didn’t know the dance moves. Looking back, I think I will focus on whomever is directly in front of me and mimic her steps rather than try to mirror the instructor.

I did get my boogie on, shaking my booty and rocking my hips in time, spinning around (often in the wrong direction) – no doubt about it, I am a total noob at this. We were doing lots of bouncy squats, lots of movement keeping the legs bent close to parallel, and I felt myself dipping less further down as we continued.

After 15 minutes, I was ready to roll up in a ball and massage my quads. I thought to myself, “There’s no way I’m only doing a quarter of the class” and pushed myself to keep going. But, after five more minutes, my legs were shaking so badly I decided to stop. I only lasted the first 20 minutes of class. Hehe

After stumbling out of the studio, I took about 10 minutes to stretch my legs and felt the lactic acid finally start to diminish. Legs are the biggest muscle group in the body and, as expected, burn the most when that lactic acid builds up. Clearly, my aerobic condition is lacking since my body couldn’t flush out the acid fast enough for me to keep going.

All that said, it was a fun class and I’m going to go back again. Next time I’ll see if I can make it to 30 minutes! I finished things up with a ten minute soak. Now, two hours later, my thighs are throbbing and twitching a little bit still.

Weight: 218.2

Cardio

Zumba: 20m
Soak: 10m

“Don’t quit, suffer now and live the rest of your life as a champion” – Muhammad Ali

Two days off and I was eager to get back in the gym. External obligations and scheduling issues, coupled with lack of desire, kept me from the gym for longer than I like. I missed two days’ worth of exercise, but I did go hard for the sessions before, and my body could use the recovery, so I didn’t fret too much about it.

I was eager to get in today and hit shoulders with some arms, and I leapt to it. I warmed up with dumbbell shrugs with 45s, then jumped right to going heavy. I wanted to see if I could hold 90s and keep good form on my shrugs – my shoulders are strong enough to lift the weights, my grip strength is my current weak spot. Gotta buy some straps. My hands didn’t give out, and I was able to do three sets of eight reps each with the 90 pound bad boys. I barely made it on the last set, the dumbbells were straining to fall from my fingers, but I cranked through. I did a flush set with 60s for 15 reps to end shrugs, then I went to barbell raises.

Since my grip strength was pretty shot, I stuck to the Olympic barbell only for the shrugs and did five sets of ten reps each. My medial delts were starting to scream pretty loudly, and I started to sense some binding in the shoulders, so I made sure to not push it too hard. I finished up with three sets of barbell curls, holding my upper arms stiff and steady, and focusing on contracting the biceps hard, keeping constant tension on them. Then I did some rope triceps pressdowns for three sets and wrapped the workout with some medball twists and a soak. A good session.

I didn’t want to go to complete failure and exhaustion today, because I’m doing my first Zumba class tomorrow, and I hear it’s going to kick my butt. That’s also why I decided not to train legs today, gotta save something for tomorrow.

Weight: 219.2

Shoulders & Arms

Dumbbell shrugs – 45 x 15, 90 x 8/8/8, 60 x 15
Barbell raise – 45 x 10/10/10/10/10
Barbell curl – 45 x 8/10/7
Rope tri pressdown – 60 x 10/8/6
Medball twists, 16# – 25/25
Soak – 10m
3735 + 2250 + 1125 + 1440 + 800 = 9350 pounds moved