My Favorite Workouts

I go through phases.

Phases where all I want to watch is Gossip Girl all hours of the day. Phases where I part my hair in the middle. Phases where I make 2 smoothies a day. You know…that kinda stuff. And I go through phases with my workouts, too!

From age 2 to age 17, it was like all my body knew how to do was dance. I dabbled in soccer, gymnastics, and volleyball, but dance was where you could find me if I wasn’t in school or sleeping. Because of that, I grew to love exercises that strengthen, tone, and condition.

Senior year of high school it was Pure Barre, freshman year of college I fell in love with PiYo and TurboKick at the rec center, and then if you read my blog at all last year, you know I was Zumba-obsessed. Summer of this year, I was running non-stop to train for an 8 mile run, but after I hit that goal, I felt a little burnt out with my long distance runs.

Then I realized, I just had to switch it up. When you love your workout, you’ll want to do it, and it won’t be a chore.

So I’ve been doing all sorts of new workouts here and there and I thought I’d share what I do!

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I’ll start off by saying that if you’re wanting to get into group fitness classes, my top 3 recs are Zumba, barre, and yoga. I haven’t done any of those in a while, but I’m planning on popping into a few classes at the rec center here and there for the remainder of the semester.

My workout routine, as of late, is just to get my body moving 4-5 times a week. Some weeks, I end up working out 6 days a week. Before you start to think, “Oh wow she’s so fit! I should work out every single day!”, please note: Sometimes I honestly just go to the gym to kill time! Haha. I live alone and when I have the whole day lingering out in front of me with an open agenda, sometimes it makes more sense to go to the gym before or after class for something to do.

I used to compare myself to girls who were in the gym 24/7 and it was so bad, so I don’t want anyone to do that here! 

So I normally just pick a portion of my body to focus on and go with it. No workout plan. No guide. The school gym can be crazy crowded or not-so-much, so I never know what exercises I’ll do until I get there and see where it isn’t crowded. I think of it as a form of intuitive living: I eat when I’m hungry. I eat what my body wants. I workout when I find it fit. I do the exercises I feel like I can do that day. Simple ?

Gym workouts (aren’t as scary as they sound!) 

For a typical gym workout, I like to circuit train. When I was about 12 years old, my dad took snuck me into the weight room with him at the Y and showed me how to do all the different machines. What I like to do (either by myself or with a partner) is to do one set on one machine and then switch to a different machine.

I’ll do maybe 3 sets and just do as many reps as I can until I fatigue. (When your muscles start to get really tired, push yourself to do 2 or 3 more, then call it quits!) 

This makes it fun to go to the gym with my sisters. We pick out 3 machines (or 2 machines and one bodyweight exercise) and make a circuit. For example, Clara may start out at the leg press, I’ll be at the abductor, and then Caroline is doing jump squats. Then we rotate and continue to do so until everyone’s done each exercise 3 times! 

I like this because I never stop moving and my muscles keep switching it up. It’s good for keeping your heart rate up, too.

Bodyweight exercises are my jam 

When I was in dance, our classes were an hour and a half long. This is because we had about a 30 minute warmup. We didn’t just bend over and touch our toes and do some jumping jacks – nope. It was choreographed. We had a song for squats, a song for abs, a plank song, and more. So my sister, Caroline, and I are really used to bodyweight conditioning and it’s kinda our go-to!

I love curtsy lunges for legs, tricep pushups for arms, burpees, jump squats, mountain climbers, and really anything that burns. I watch Cambria Joy’s workout vlogs on Youtube and follow @rocamoon on Instagram for inspiration. There’s a lot you can do with just bodyweight or minimal equipment!

Working on them abs

I love training abs. It’s the one area where I actually have some strength, so I feel like I can really push myself. (I’m pretty wimpy on upper body. Can’t do 2 pull-ups to save my life.)

My sister got me doing this ab circuit where you do 3 different types of crunches for 1 min of each and then you hold a 45 second plank. I did it with her and was like, “Ok, that wasn’t so bad!” And then she told me you have to do it 3 times total. ?

For those crunches, I love table top crunches, V-ups, and scissor kicks. Super hard, but super good.

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And just to show you, here’s a sample of what my week may look like with workouts!

Monday – rest (I have a weird class schedule this day, so sometimes I just take it off.)

Tuesday – upper body circuits till I’m tired (arms feel like noodles) then 2 mile run on indoor track

Wednesday – 3 mile walk/hike on the trails (I like one workout a week to be outside for the Vitamin D!)

Thursday – 20 minute cardio warm-up (Arch trainer or elliptical) followed by lower body circuits till my legs feel like jell-o, abs and butt (aka donkey kicks)

Friday – rest (Fridays are a big work day for me because I try to get a lot of work done, so I can have a relaxed weekend) **But sometimes when Clara gets home from school, she wants to go to the gym, so we do a shorter workout.

Saturday – gym with my sisters!! We do circuit training and have smoothie bowls after. 

Sunday – gym with my sisters again! Work whatever we didn’t before 🙂 

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Like I said, I don’t really stick to a plan. Some weeks, I’ll workout 3 times a week, sometimes way more. Sometimes most of my workouts are in the gym, sometimes they are mainly outside. Sometimes I don’t go to a group class for a month, and sometimes I do several in a week! I base it off of what I’m feeling and what my friends feel up to doing because I love working out with friends/my sisters.

Sorry this post was all over the place, but I guess that is an accurate representation of my workout routine! Let me know if you have any fitness related questions and I’ll answer them. 

X,

Cristina

P.S. Need inspiration? Follow my Fitness and Health Pinterest board!