Womens Gym Routine: What I do In The Gym

Hello everyone, so this isn't really a post that I had planned and I'm not a fan of posting semi-naked photographs of myself on the internet (my Mum is going to kill me) but after posting my detox tips and tricks post, a post where I basically told you all what I’ve been doing to keep fit and get more toned (read that here if you missed it), I was asked by a lot of people to write about what I do at the gym so I thought it was time to give you a brief overview of what I’ve been doing at the gym (as well as sticking to what I said on my detox tips and tricks post). I felt the need to include photos of my progress because otherwise, it doesn't make it very believable but I really have toned up recently, I have a long way to go but obviously I want to share my journey with you. I just want to point out that I am not a dietitian or fitness expert, I have a very big sports background, I competed for my county in Athletics, gymnastics and have always been a keen sportswoman, I do have a lot of people around me who are nutritionists and personal trainers who have given me some fantastic advice along the way but this is literally just what I personally do at the gym, I'm not saying whatsoever that you should even do this or that this is the right or wrong thing to do... now we've got that out of the way, let's get toned!

I thought I'd start by showing you some photographs of my own progress (in no particular order). The first photograph of me in an orange bikini was taken before the photo of me in the blue fluffy jumper and I have to admit I have seen a huge change in my abs since taking the photo in my bikini.

I make sure I go to the gym at least three times a week so I wouldn’t say my gym going is excessive, it’s worth noting though that I’ve always done sports from a very young age, when I did athletics it meant training quite a few days a week, I used to do ballet, modern and contemporary dance as well as gymnastics and ice skating – I’ve pretty much tried my hand at all sports, so I’ve always had quite an athletic background and have always loved the gym.  So I’m going to give you a few tips which help to motivate me before I even get onto telling you what I do at the gym:

-       Learn To Love The Gym - The gym is something that you’ve got to learn to love, if you want to be in good health and good shape, learn to love the gym. If you really do hate the gym, go for a run outside. I personally don’t enjoy going on runs just because I really don’t push myself hard enough unless I can alter the speed and the gradient like you can on a treadmill. There is no reason to hate the gym, why hate something which is so good for you? I find that buying new gym kit helps! I also recently bought some gorgeous new Nike trainers which you may have seen on my Instagram and weirdly, having nice, new gym kit, makes me want to go more. So if you're a shopaholic, this is good news for you.

-       Music Is Your Friend -  I tend to just put an incredible playlist on my Iphone and I end up singing and dancing along so much, that I forget I’m even in the gym – music really does power me through those moments where I'm really about to give up.

-       Have A ‘Fitspiration in mind’ – Everyone has a different idea of what’s healthy/slim/toned/fit – It really upsets me to see so many people slating slim people on facebook ‘oh she’s skin and bones’ ‘she’s anorexic’ when realistically, she is just a slim, toned girl. Equally though, I don’t think larger people should be slated either – so that’s why I wont be the one to tell you what the ideal body shape is as there really is no right answer.I go to the gym with someone in my head who's body I’d be happy to have, my goal body, then, when I’m pushing myself for that final minute on the treadmill, it really helps me power through by thinking ‘think of her stomach oh my god’ – try it, it works trust me.

-       You Never Regret Working Out – Have you ever actually regretted doing exercise? No me neither. No-one ever says 'I wish I didn't go to the gym'.

-       The Hardest Part Is Getting There – Getting up and getting to the gym is by far the hardest part, once you’ve done that, it’s easy from there – no I’m kidding, its not easy, but I find the hardest part of my day is forcing myself to go to the gym, once I get there, I love it and I power through. It really does help if you have a 'gym buddy' I don't unfortunately so I've got to really push myself to go, if you have a friend who also wants to go, you can push each other.

So now we’ve cleared that up, it’s time for me to tell you what I do at the gym, again, I’m not saying that what I do is correct, or right, this is just what I do and the only reason that I’m telling you all is because so many of you have asked/emailed requesting this post so here goes!

My Gym Routine:

- 1 - Cardio -  I normally start on the wave machine – the real reason that I started using this machine is because every single girl who uses it, seems to have an incredible bum (haha oops). I can see why, as it really does work your bum. It hurts so much to begin with, you kind of move your legs in a floating motion really fast and I love using it because it really does hurt, 'no pain no gain'. When I first ever used the machine, I was pretty rubbish and couldn’t go for longer than 5 minutes, it actually killed my bum. Now, I put the machine to level 18 and run on it for at least 15-20 minutes at the start of every gym session. Interval training is known for being really good for the body, you burn more calories because you can keep going longer, I find this machine is really good for interval training as you can run on level 18 for two minutes and then bend down and hold onto the bars to just do your bum for the next two minutes.

If you don't have a wave machine at your gym, the cross trainer is equally good for your bum too and obviously I love the treadmill too, so you can do the same on either of these. I always run on an incline on the treadmill (usually 2.5/3) because it works you harder and it feels like it does my legs more, plus, when running outside you’ll never really be running on a completely flat surface. I run at 12km/h speed and usually run for 20 minutes, however, as mentioned before, interval training is good so sometimes I’ll sprint at 13km/h for a minute, then move down to 11km/h, then move back to 13 so on. 

I'm gonna break this down and make it a little bit easier, so generally, I do 10 minutes on the wave machine, then 10 minutes on the cross trainer and then I move to weights but then after about half an hour with weights, I finish with a quick 5 minute sprint on the treadmill. Sometimes, I will do a full 20-30 minutes on the wave machine, then move to the weights then finish with a 5 minute session on the crosstrainer just to mix things up a bit, it depends what mood I'm in.

-      -2 - 'Girlie Weights' - Toning the bum and legs - I then move into the ‘girlie weights’ section, I call it this because at my gym this area is separated from the other weights section. I sit on the adductor, which does your inner thigh muscles – I used to just do loads of reps at 25KG as lower weights, more reps is the general rule for toning but then I decided that this was too easy and I wanted to tone quicker and still lose weight whilst using the machine so now I do 20 reps at 40KG, 6 times. I then do the abductor weight machine (usually next to the adductor) and this does your glutes/outer thighs (bum) -  again, I do this on weight 40kg and do 20 reps, 6 times. Depending on how I feel, I will just do a straight set of 100 reps if my legs can handle it, I do this quickly so that it gets my heart pumping and I can really feel myself burning calories. However, I'd say you benefit more from doing squats and lunges than just using these machines, don't rely on them as you can be pretty lazy on them.

-       - 3 - Leg Press – I move onto the leg press after I've done the adductor and abductor as this does the back of the legs and the glutes again. I never used to do the leg press but after seeing a photo of Amy Willerton using it, I realised that it’s probably very beneficial (and it really is). I do this at 50kg and just do 3 sets of 15 as this is quite heavy for my little legs – I don’t go to the gym to bulk up or lose weight, I go to the gym to tone what I’ve got. Sometimes I put the leg press to 25kg and do 8 x 20 reps at this weight.

-       - 4 - Onto the Matts –

-     This is where I really work hard and how I tone my bum (generally I go to the gym to make my bum bigger, firmer and build muscle). I move onto the matts in the open gym area and first I lay and do donkey kicks, I started doing these after seeing Jen Selter discussing them on Instagram, obviously it depends what you’re wanting to tone but I do these because I’m trying to make my bum more perky and larger, the more muscly it gets, the bigger it will look. I do 30 donkey kicks on both legs and then do the doggy hydrant, 30 to the left, 30 to the right. This 'Jen Selter' Butt guide will properly show you how to do them and it will explain the technique to you. My bum really aches by this point which is a good thing! I then do a thing which looks a bit awkward but you raise your bum up and down, tap the ground for not even a second and suck your bum in whilst doing it, I place a kettle bell on my pelvis whilst doing this as Blogilates, a fitness expert on YouTube taught me that this helps build the bum muscles.

-     Then I grab two kettle bells, the weights vary depending on what I'm doing but they're not that heavy, I make sure I’ve got a good song on, because this really hurts, and I then do kettle bell swings, firstly 20 using the lighter kettle bell, I then have a little breather and do 20 reps using the heavier kettle bell, this time I just stand in a squat position and come half the way up, then back down, some people call these 'duck squats' – this really hurts. I then go back to the start and do another 20 kettle swings using the smaller kettle bell,  then back to the heavy one and do another twenty whilst pulsing. I usually do about 80 squats per session, some are sumo squats (legs wide apart) and some are jumping squats (type the names into Google and YouTube to see how they're done). The best way to learn to do this safely and properly is to ask a fitness instructor at your gym, I was shown how to do this by a personal trainer, YouTube also has some good tutorials so I'm not going to show you any photos of me doing it or try and tell you what the technique is as I'm not trying to say I'm an expert, ask an expert and they will help so that you don't hurt yourself. I have seen a huge change in the size and perkiness of my bum after doing the above for a few months now and quite a lot of people have commented on it, if you work at it you can really see a difference.

-      Abs – I don’t do that much on my abs as I feel like everything I do do, does my abs without me realising. As you'll have probably heard, abs are made in the kitchen - you can read my healthy eating, toning and detox guide here which outlines what I've been doing to get a flat tummy and to get more of a toned body. I do however, do hill climbs, I do 30 of these really fast, I then do the bicycle and move to each side 100 times. I also tend to do about 100 crunches too – but again, it depends how exhausted I am from my squats. I also do oblique twists holding either a heavy ball or a kettle bell, again, 100 of these. Again, do a quick google image search to see what these exercises look like or ask a professional at the gym as they can show you the correct way to do them.

-     Personal trainers have told me that it's best to do the weights first and then finish on cardio, I personally prefer to do cardio first and my gym is always really busy so it's quite hard to get into the weights section but because of this, I  tend to finish on a quick sprint. I run on the treadmill on an incline of 4 and sprint at 14km/h and work my way to up 16km/h at the end of most sessions, if I'm mega exhausted, I put the treadmill onto a bigger incline (hill) and walk really fast on it. Don’t feel that you need to do this speed too, I do have sprinting and long distance history so I can run quite fast and have good endurance, a lot of my friends run on 10km, anything that works for you is great.

Above are two great things from Pinterest which you can do at home to tone up and they should hopefully show you some of the exercises that I've mentioned.

Please don’t hold me to this as I’m not saying that you should do this, or that this is correct whatsoever, but its worked for me and I would love to see your progress! I fly to Vietnam in just over 3 weeks so now it really is time for me to get working hard! 

If you're wanting some more gym inspiration, I am forever pinning good work outs and body inspiration on my body inspiration board on Pinterest here, this really motivates me! I hope that those of you who have asked for this post have found it helpful, if it helps one person then my job is done.
Also, please follow me on Instagram: emshelx - to see my progress as I always post fitness photos. 

What do you do at the gym? Share it with me! What do you find really helps you to tone? Have you found anything thats really made your bum get bigger or your abs get better? Are you going away this Summer and wanting to tone? Do you do similar to me at the gym?

Again, don't forget to pair your exercise with a good diet, read my healthy eating post here.

 Lots of love, Em x

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