New and Improved????

So I'm trying to mix up my workouts a bit. Matt set up one of his older bikes on the trainer for me (got me a "girl" seat and everything). My stationary bike is a recumbant and I didn't realize how different the motion would be.

First off, let me say that I didn't do a lot of bike riding growing up. My childhood house was on a steep hill (probably about 12% or so) and it just wasn't a great place to go bike riding (unless you are a freaky bike rider who enjoys going up short, but extremely steep hills... like Matt). So this whole bike riding thing is weird. I've never actually ridden a bike with hand brakes. I also probably haven't been on a bike in over 25 years.

So the position is weird (this is a road bike, so the handlebars put you in a hunched over position), the seat is uncomfortable (I really don't like my body weight to be resting there... thank you very much) and quite frankly, it's hard work.

However, it is hard work. That is good. I use a different group of muscles to pedal on the real bike than I do on the recumbant bike. It takes more effort and my muscles are getting sore (we won't talk about the super tight hamstrings... I didn't stretch afterwords, so it's my own fault).

Just don't expect me to start racing anytime soon. It might be nice to get comfortable enough to go for rides with Matt, but I don't think that this is going to be my magic bullet. It's a nice change up and I like a variety in my workouts and I've noticed that I do like a bit of a challenge. I HATED working with Yourself!Fitness when I first got it. I couldn't keep up with her, I couldn't get a lot of the steps, and we won't talk about how off beat I was (you have to go thru my archives for that one!) Now I feel like a pro with her.

Speaking of such, she did up my difficulty when I re did my profile. I'm doing much more advanced steps this time. Which is good. However, I still don't know how she expects this workout program to be "weight loss" focused. I did the flexibility on Sunday, 30 minutes (as per her recommendation) and she had me burn a whopping 124 calories. That's not enough to "maximize my workout for weight loss". Yes, flexibility is important, but I won't lose weight unless I burn more calories than I take in... and I can only remove so many calories from my diet. I'm still using her, and I will continue to use her, as I can't argue with the results of her weight lifting regimine, but I definitely need to supplement her with more cardio. So that's why I'm using the trainer, the treadmill and the recumbant bike. At some point, I may even see some weight loss again.