I promised the new moms out there some workout advice and a few posted routines to help kick start your fitness program. In an effort to cover all areas of fitness, we’ll talk about cardio and weight training this week. Next week, we’ll tackle an aerobic recommendation.
Ideally, you should schedule a workout time for being 9 a.m. For most of us, when we work out first thing in the morning, we get our exercise in and we are less likely to be distracted from completing the workout later in the day. For new moms, you should have consulted with your ob-gyn before you begin any fitness program and hydration is important both for moms who are nursing and moms who aren’t.
Try to nurse before you do your workout or use the breast pump to express milk to avoid any breast discomfort or leaking during the workout. We’ll consider this a first workout for many of you who are getting back into the routine after having a baby, so we’re only going to workout for 30 minutes, you can mix and match this 30 minutes as you like, but 30 minutes is the goal.
Cardio Workout
Equipment of Choice: The Treadmill or the Sidewalk
Your treadmill workout will be 18 minutes length.
Prescription (18 Minute Walking Workout)
Stretch out lightly, spend about five minutes stretching your calves, your feet and your back. You’ll want to relieve the tightness in your muscles. Be sure you are wearing some comfortable, supportive shoes before you begin.
Because today is a starter workout, you won’t be playing speed games. You’ll want to find a comfortable pace for yourself between 2.0 and 2.5 and just walk for 18 minutes. If you are not using a treadmill and are instead heading out for a walk, set your watch so that your walk takes you on a course away from the house for 9 minutes and that will take 9 minutes to return home. If the weather is agreeable, you can take the baby with you in his or her stroller.
Take 1 minute after the cardio to take deep, cleansing breaths and remember to hydrate throughout the workout and you are ready to begin 12 minutes of weight training. You’ll begin with a couple of cans of vegetables to do bicep curls and triceps lifts. Do 3 sets of 8, alternating back and forth between both sets of muscles.
Next up are walking lunges. Find a long stretch of open space in your house and start by taking one long step forward with your left leg and bending the knee slightly while keeping your right leg straight. Then bring your right leg up to your left leg and take a long stride forward with your right leg and bend it slightly at the knee. Repeat this 20 times for each leg and you may very well need to turn around and go back the way you came.
This is the end of your routine for the day. We’ll save core-strengthening workouts for a couple of weeks from now. Try to perform this workout 3 to 4 times this week, with a day of rest between each one to give your muscles time to recover and heal.
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Post-Natal Fitness: So You Just Had a Baby….