Beef it up!

No, this is not a blog about eating beef because anyone that knows me knows THAT blog would just be laughable (haven't eaten beef in over 10 years).

This blog is about beefing up your workout routine. Here's what I learned recently...

I love running every morning but I sometimes feel like its not much of a challenge anymore or I just need something to shake up my routine. I like doing workout videos at home but there's nothing like an early am run and no workout video will replace that.

A friend is taking a 5:45am Boot Camp class every morning. It's an outside, month long, 5-day a week, class that kicks your butt. They run around the local park using everything from curbs, to parking deck stairs to the jungle gym to work every muscle in the their body. They had a "Take a Friend" day recently so I was able to attend for free. I loved it!

However, I don't have the extra $200 a month it costs to take the class. Shucks. But I was able to take some important lessons home with me for free. I've started adding things like push-ups on the park benches, tricep presses on my neighbors retaining walls and curb steps (stepping up and down the curb really fast). These short, quick changes in my routine make the run more interesting, workout more muscles and make my heart work harder....Everyone wins!

I know it seems silly that I had to take a class to learn to do these things. After all, I have done practically every work-out video known to man (or woman, in this case) and could probably teach a few classes myself, but it never occurred to me to translate these various routines to outside.