Circuits

Headache, sweating, dizzy, nauseous... it must be circuit training night!
I did 2 sets of what they called "Athlete Circuits" which I found in a Health and Fitness magazine years ago. While I was training for the fitness tests to get into the fire brigade, I used to do these once a week. Being a bit of a wimp and remembering the pain, I haven't attempted these since 1999...until tonight.

Now, don't get me wrong... reading down the list of exercises you think it doesn't sound so bad until you actually attempt it. The order is Jumping Burpees, Tricep Dips, Squats, Press Ups, Trunk Curls, Back Raises and finishing off with a killer set of Pyramid Stair Running (which in my house involves 169 steps per set). So, you start a stopwatch and every 30 seconds you switch to the next exercise until you get to the stair running where this is done as fast as possible. You then have a recovery time (in my case it was 2 minutes today...I used to only have 45 seconds recovery once upon a time) and then you do it all over again.

So, I managed 2 sets today (I used to do 3 sets) and I had to do the press ups on my knees, but hopefully that will change in time. The sweat was literally pouring out of me and when I did some stretches afterwards I looked like I'd stepped out of the bath I was so soaked. I have to admit that half an hour later while writing this, I am sat in front of a fan still unable to cool down!

So, for people used to circuits this would no doubt have been a walk in the park, but I found it quite tough. I look forward to being able to handle the 3 sets again. I have to admit, I didn't think I'd even get through the second set today, so it went better than I thought it would.