West Hills Walk/ HHA / SIU/ S&6P / S&L

[Guest guest]

How's that for a string of acronyms! This afternoon I walked up into the West Hills at lunch and it was a magical hour.  It was misty out, but not raining.  There were some trees with bright red winter berries and I kept thinking Santa Claus had to be around the next corner someplace.  The West Hills is where a lot of large manors / mansions are.  It's not far from the city, yet quiet.  Got some great hill/glute work in and also a set of steep stairs.

Marc (brother in law), Steph (sister) and Marina (friend) were over for the Monday night workout at Studio Lou Lou!  We warmed up with Hip Hop Abs - Fat Burn Cardio 1.  It was the second time for Marina and I on that one so we were able to get into it a little more. Steph made some funny comments and moved along even if she got lost.  Marc really worked up a sweat and got into it - I am so proud of him!  My favroite " get busy " move from Ab Sculpt was in there, and there's this fun " Walk of Shame " move where you walk to the side for 4, lean over and do a little rump shaka - love it!!  Shaun T I think wins my aerobic workout sweetheart award.  He just makes my heart smile!

Next was Debbie Siebers' Start it Up! the 25 minute version, to start off this 2 month long rotation.  Overall it was easy (for me) save the shoulder work - with no weights at all you hold your arms up for most of the standing exercises like in ballet and they were burnin'!

Here is what you do:warmupplie squats with jack armstoe touchesplies with lateral bicep curlsplies with tricep lateralsalternating reverse lungesknee liftsalternating front lunges with bicep curls

plie squats w/jack armsplies with chest flystoe touchesbreak - reach arms up and over, then across the body like in the warmupstanding side crunchregular squatsfront kicks with side tricep extensions

narrow stance squatsfront kicks with triceps againwide stance squats22 pushupsabs & stretchWe didn't do the abs and stretch because we went straight into Slim and 6 Pack, which is an 11 minute abdominal workout.  Again, compared to Turbo Kick abs, these were kind of easy for me, but harder than the Body Pump and Body Combat abs for sure.  However, I am used to having to teach this stuff.   The others were definitely struggling.  Once again I'm super, super proud of Marc because I could tell it was strenuous for him but he did every single crunch!  WAY TO GO, BRO!!!  HIGH FIVES TO YOU!

Lastly, we did Slim & Limber.  This workout is truly a treasure - all of her stretch workouts are in my opinion! It's 15 minutes long and quite thorough.Tomorrow (Tuesday) is the Big Day for me - I have Leg Day with NOEL!  I'm stupidly happy about this, I feel like I'm coming home, dippy as that sounds.  It's not just the workout - it's also the experience, the atmosphere at Fitness that I miss.  I will certainly review it tomorrow!  I can't wait!