Thursday 15 April 2010

Gym Time & Bag of Evil

Gym Ninja though that she'd blog earlier today seeing as she has the time.   As you had a luuuurvely blog about the inspirational David Alred yesterday, that bumped yesterday's gym workout blog to today. Not as inspirational granted, but hey, you have to read the faffy with the inspirational otherwise you don't get the pick 'N' mix variety of posts...oh and yes, that'd be a calorie free pick 'N' mix and the only type Gym Ninja will allow you to have!!!!

So yesterday was a weights-only session. Legs! Now weights only can go one of two ways usually in Gym Ninja world. Either amazingly hardcore, or decidedly nondescript, and unfortunately the latter won. Perhaps GN hadn't given herself enough time to prepare her mind for the effort? After all, she'd not typed up the inspirational blog post until AFTER the workout...

Road testing her brand new red bootleg workout pants (another bargain from FitPro) Gym Ninja plugged in her earphones and was just walking out of the changing rooms when a girl in a towel grabbed her arm.

"There's a woman stuck in the shower cubicle!", She announced, her eyes like saucers.

Gym Ninja stared back blankly. Was there some sort of vibe she was giving out that said she wanted gossip based on shower cubicles? Thanks anyway.....

"I mean, she's really stuck in there! I was in the next cubicle and obviously I can't go & tell a member of staff so can you?"

Ahhh, OK so NOW Gym Ninja understands why you shared this shower gossip. Okey dokey.

"Oh & by the way, it's the cubicle with the 'Don't shave in the showers' sign on it!" And with that, the girl in the towel walked off.

Riiiiiight. Gym Ninja walked to the Reception Desk.

"Er, not that I saw this myself", Began Gym Ninja, 'But there is a woman trapped in the shower cubicle apparently."

The Receptionist did the same 'why are you telling me gossip about showers' look that Gym Ninja had just done moments earlier.

"Apparently she needs help getting out so if you could send someone in to help her?"

The Receptionist then realised what was being asked of her and nodded.
See? Not too hard to do a good turn is it? With any luck it may get complicated and they'd need to get the Fire Brigade in with their big hoses...mmm. Happy days!

So after a warm up on the X Trainer Gym Ninja pootled on upstairs to begin her weights session, feeling a tad conspicuous in her red bootleg workout pants. Not ideal if you're having a shy day everyone!

Look!!!!!!

It's COWLASHES! She's back! The girl with the long thick black fake eyelashes? Remember her? Phew! Gym Ninja kind of missed her for a while. And so began the leg workout for the day. Squats, straight legged deadlifts, sumo squats, kick backs...a bit of a mish-mash to be fair. A brief gaze across the gym alerted Gym Ninja to a girl who shot back the most random eye daggars at her ever seen before from a stranger which was in itself, odd, but apart from that the workout was pretty bland.

But this lack of enthusiasm meant that Gym Ninja did then make time for an abs session which is rare in her world. Gym Ninja often wonders how her abs would look if she ever othered to train them specifially? Abs get a workout during all functional movements anyway. They work as Gym Ninja squats, lunges, deadlifts etc, so they are not neglected. But it'd be interesting. Maybe another attempt at Operation Abs is called for.......? Hmmm...

Gym Ninja clocked yet another new Personal Trainer at the gym. This was an older guy who looked very confident indeed...except was that a bad choice of uniform perhaps? The shirt he wore made it look as if he had rather a distended abdominal area. HAS he a big tum? Surely not? Must be the fabric and the cut of the shirt. Or a bit of wind? Maybe Gym Ninja needs to keep upwind of him? Or recommend a quality protein powder like Maximuscle as the one he uses must be causing all manner of abdominal discomfort and bloating....?

Anyway......a bland average workout session. Naff eh? Happens to the best of Ninjas. So, to brighten up the blog post Gym Ninja has attached a snap of some of the swag she purchased whilst at FitPro for her 'Bag of Evil'. This is secret code for the bag of equipment that Gym Ninja will use to train clients...mwahahaha!


So.....what's in this swag bag eh?

Well in the box is a deflated 'professional quality' BOSU. This is a 'Both Sides Up' device like half a swiss ball and can be used the curved side up or turned upside down and used as an unstable surface upon which to train. Oh and yes, you can train your ENTIRE body using a BOSU. Fantastic pieces of kit to have.

In front of it is a foam roller. GymNinja has since slied this in half as it was a tad long. Ideal for something called 'Self-Myofascial Release' which is NOT something you do with the windows drawn and the door locked! No, 'tis effectively a rolling pin for the muscles/facia surrounding the muscles to iron out knots. Use this prior to your warm up.

Then we have to the left a specialised tape measure and a bog standard stop watch and a peak flow measure. Then two different weights of medicine balls. There are 3 thick resistance bands and lots of smaller thinner looped resistance bands, all of varying resistance levels and very versatile. The eagle eyed of you will spot some bean bags (great for circuit drills) and a bundle of different length skipping ropes. The black thing is a mic belt and then there are a couple of books on med ball and resistance band work. 

This is added to the whistle, cones, resistance tubing, strength company kit, & chrome dumbbells set that GN already has. Exciting eh? 

Talking of the Strength Company, this is what GN got the other week. 




It may not look much, but it's an incredibly versatile piece of travel kit that allows a person to work their entire body using two levels of resistance tubing, plus a cardio belt and door loop which means you can attach the belt with the loop through a door and run against it, or suspend your feet above the floor to make press ups harder etc. The door loop is also an attachment site for the tubing too. All of this also gets thrown into the Bag of Evil

In fact, hell, Gym Ninja is off to fix the Strength Company stuff to the door so she can do some cable wood chops and crunches using the resistance tubing. May as well get Operation Abs off to a flying start..........

QUite possibly Gym Ninja will be off for a Spin Session later. It's much needed to take off the edge of tomorrow's back to work moment (boo hiss). See you all tomorrow then?

Gym Ninja