Irritable Bowel Syndrome Message Boards

... thought I would poke my nose in anyway! Hee hee.

I have gone to see a personal trainer lately (and thanks to Christmas will be going again soon, hopefully Friday!) and asked her some of the same questions you asked so I thought I would share what she said.

The first thing is about frequency... She told me that to see good, and fairly quick results I should be in the gym 3 times a week. That is 3 times doing both cardio and strengthening exercises. She said that I should try to get in some activity on two other days -- either set cardio (running, walking, aerobics) or just trying to make sure I am more active throughout that day so I am getting my heart rate up.

She said that cardio is super important for losing weight, and also for a healthy heart! Jenny (Chinagrl) wrote a post a while ago with the number of minutes she was encouraged to do cardio over the week and she could break it down in different ways, as long as she got that number of minutes in. I will try and find the post for you and let you know what that number of minutes were.

A friend of mine who is on a national sports team (so works out like CRAZY) says that strengthening exercises are always better without the big machines than on them. All her trainers have her doing a lot of exercises with the Body Ball, free weights, and exercise bands. She has noticed MAJOR results since she started focusing on this way of training.

I agree 100% with what Shell said about the elliptical. It burns loads more calories than the other cardio machines at the gym, and it doesn't bother my knees like some of the other ones do.
AND about the circuit. The circuit is cool 'cause it's fast. The circuit at my gyms are all machines, but they have a whole wall of "success stories" of people who have been using it as part of "The Zone" (where they combine the circuit with the zone diet). Alternate between the machines and short periods of cardio until you do all the machines. Takes like half an hour, your whole body is done and you've done cardio too. I think that eventually you'd need a better program but I think it is a good way to start.

Aerobics classes are great, especially the ones that mix cardio and weights... the last one I did left my muscles in agony for like 3 days, but at least I know that meant it did what it was meant to, hee hee!

Hope this helps, good luck at the gym!
--Steph

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~~I'm not crazy, I'm just a little unwell-I know right now you can't tell~~Matchbox 20
IBS-D,pain.

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