So far so good

Days two and three at the gym are complete.  Day 2 I opted for back, biceps, and abs along with my usual three mile walk.  Now normally I do various forms of pull ups and chin ups during my back work outs but that is just not a possibility yet.  After doing jack shit for nine months (and gaining 30 pounds in the process) pulling and chinning up anything besides food just isn't going to happen, so I had to make due with other exercises.  I took advantage of the various lat pull down devices spread throughout the gym and found a couple I liked that I could do varying grips on.  I also used a t-bar to perform wide grip rows, and mid grip rows, then moved to a cable machine to do my close grip rows.  To wrap up the back routine I did back extensions for my lower back, doing crunches on a decline bench right next to the apparatus after each set.  For biceps nothing fancy, just three different types of dumbbell curls (normal I guess you would say, hammer, and a modified hammer curl).  Just as my previous days routine all sets were 10 reps and completed four times.

Day three was a little trickier than the previous two, it was time to work out the legs.  Now as you know this blog chronicles my return to the gym after a very serious ankle surgery, and even though released from my surgeon's care I am not 100% recovered.  This limits the exercises I can perform and the amount of weight I can use in certain exercises.  To start things off I used the squat sled, I don't trust my ankle to do free squats yet, and it went ok.  My ankle was a little tight at the bottom of my full squat but it managed for the four sets.  Next I chose a more ankle friendly leg press, no complications whatsoever on this one.  After I rotated between leg extensions and leg curls, which provide no problems for me due to my ankle not having to move at all.  To wrap things up I did some walking lunges, and a three-way lunge routine my physical therapist showed me.  Hopefully I will be able to increase the weights used next work out.  I would like to note that I do calf raises every day, not because I love them that much but rather as a strengthening exercise for my ankle.

As I stated earlier each days weight routine is followed by a three mile walk with increasing incline intervals.  Due to ankle soreness I have had to dial back the inclines used but only lost a minimal caloric burn.  These walks are going fine and I am still close to averaging 1000 calories burned a day.  I am worried about today's walk after my leg work out and walk yesterday, not quite sure how the ol' ankle will take it.  On a side note I did add a 10 minute warm up on the evil evil elliptical machine these past two days.  Slowly but surely I am making progress towards my goal of someday jogging again, my poor neglected running shoes must be lonely...