Testing the waters

Since I've run into some overuse injuries lately, I've decided it's about time I started cross training and incorporating more strength workouts into my marathon training plan. 

I've got the biking thing down, but that really only happens on nice weekends, so last weekend I tested out this fun new workout a friend recommended. 

(source)

A few of us signed up for a Sunday morning class at Burn's Valencia Street location and we were all pleasantly surprised at the 55 minute long butt kicking session. Burn is basically boot camp meets pilates meets random strength training classes you've taken at your local gym. Throw in a super enthusiastic instructor and a good playlist and that's my kind of class!

We did a ton of squats, some arm work with weights and then we spent some quality time with the pilates springboard (which I soon discovered is more challenging than it looks) before jumping into ab work. Let me just say that I was already feeling jello legged and sore 30 minutes later...and I was crazy enough to bike to class! Needless to say, I popped my bike onto a bus on the way home!

I'm still shocked at how sore my abs were - it hurt to use the salad spinner that night. HA! That being said, I'm going back for more. I love the sweat and jello leg feeling. The hurt that hurts so good. I love. Even if it had me hobbling like a fool the next day at work...

After this extremely successful pilates(ish) experience, I decided to schedule a private pilates reformer class with a coworker that is training to be a pilates instructor. I think part of me thought it would be similar to the Burn class...just lower impact?

Coworker is a great instructor; she's super patient and informative (I tend to ask a lot of questions). I felt the burn as we worked on my triceps, abs and some splits, however, it wasn't the burn that lasts. I walked out of there feeling like I got a solid hour's worth of stretching and I will say that my IT band, hips and hamstrings were feeling significantly looser than when I walked in. However, I didn't feel like I got a workout in. Is that weird?

I think I'm one of those people that needs to huff and puff and sweat buckets. I mean, let's think about yoga - the only kind I'm willing to do (and enjoy) is Bikram...where I sweat a ton! Is it any surprise I preferred Burn over regular pilates? I'll give regular pilates one more shot before totally scratching it off my list since this was my first time and I'm going to chalk it up to getting acclimated.