Active living

I've signed up again for another set of sessions with my personal trainer last Monday. I have to do this. If I don't sign up for a PT, I'm pretty sure I won't be going to the gym anymore. At least this way I'm forced to do my sets! I did four sets of the whole routine Sir Jon showed me. We're supposed to do 8-10 sets of the whole routine, but I only did 4. Puyat eh! Haha couldn't do anymore. The triceps exercise was painful!

Boxing
Rach has been inviting me to join her and her friend Nikki to go boxing on either Wednesday or Thursday night at Elorde gym near Shaw boulevard. So finally, I did try it out earlier. Slept whole afternoon, drove to Shangrila first to buy my own hand wraps (boxers wear this for added padding I think, before you wear the actual gloves). Generic brand hand wraps were supposed to cost around 200 pesos, but in Toby's Shang, they only had the branded one, which will cost me 495 pesos!! Unfortunately, Shangrila only had Toby's. They didn't have any other sports store, and I didn't want to borrow some used hand wraps from the boxing gym, so I ended up buying them.

I tried a one session for beginners. And my arms and shoulders are already aching. I'm pretty sure it'll ache more tomorrow. It was fun though. You have a trainer, who's your sparring mate as well, and you get to punch the hell out of everything you can hit on. Very good stress reliever indeed. And now I know how to do jab, straight, hook. Medyo nalilito pa, pero masasanay din. I'm thinking of going back next week.

And the best thing about boxing, right after boxing, I had one of the best bbqs there is. It's a eatery called Ihawan ni Speed. Reminds me of La Salle days when we used to eat at those small eatery cheapy place. Yummy.

Badminton
I've also been trying to kick start playing badminton again. My parents play every Wednesday and Friday nights so I try joining them at least during Fridays. I play a couple of games only since I need to wake up around 4 am for work (ugh!).

Running
Of course, running! I've been into running since last year, when I was in Canada and some friends from Canada persuaded me to try and run a 5km race. And then next thing I know, I was running a 10 km race around Stanley Park, under tremendous heat (hindi na bumalik yung kulay ko pagkatapos ng run na yun)!

After finishing last week's 5km run - roughly around 35 minutes, I have two more runs to look forward to this coming October. The Pink Run on the weekend of October 17, which I'll be running with my hs friends, and which I'm probably not going to take as seriously as I want to. And the Adidas King of the Road run the following weekend, which I will attempt to get to < 30 minutes time for my 5km. Disadvantaged ata ako, ang liit ko, smaller strides! haha  

Being Active
Initially this gym thing started out because #1 I didn't feel good about myself and #2 I had to find some distraction. But now, it's more of getting fit now and what I realized was, when I started going to the gym, I'd thought I'd be more tired for the day, but in fact, I actually have more energy now. Compared to before when I needed to sleep for almost 10 hours just to get me through the day (night shift work). Now, I can manage my time and do a lot more, and not feeling tired all day long. Good effects! And I even lost weight and gained some muscle. Not bad at all!

The running, boxing and badminton are really good sports to play every now and then. It's different from the usual routine in gym, which is good! These activities are something to add energy to my life. It makes me happy and energized. You get to interact with different people and have fun at the same time! It beats having to just sleep the rest of the day away or bum and do nothing right?

Hope my friends start living the active lifestyle too! And I hope this isn't just a phase for me. I hope to continue it as much as I can.