I am the same age as Kate Beckinsale, 46 years old.

The other day my husband showed me a video of Kate being stretched by her personal trainer.

She was ridiculously flexible. Her leg could go in any direction all the way to her head or the ground. She also looked really amazing too. Every area of her body was thin, toned and hard. My husband joked that I should look like her since we are the same age. I just lost it on him. First, in the video it clearly showed she gets professional help. If I had a personal trainer working with me everyday, I think I would look better too. Second, the personal training was obviously in her home gym. I have a bike, jump rope and one yoga mat to work with. Kate had an entire home gym with every equipment piece she could ever want. Third, I bet she has a chef that makes her meals. The fitness expert works with the chef pushing what should be in her diet. That way she is getting the right amount of everything to lose fat but gain muscle. I eat my weight in pasta since it is cheap and easy to make. I make meals for my husband and three boys. I have to do it after work too. That brings me to my last point. Kate Beckinsale’s job is to look good. She has all day long, everyday really to work out. I have to find time in between work and taking care of my family to do it. How dare my husband compare the two of us!

Nutritional Counseling

For a long time I thought this one guy at the gym was a total know it all.

• Anytime I was working out I saw him working with another person.

He seemed to be instructing them how to lift weights, do crunches or run on the treadmill. It annoyed me to no end that the guy kept interrupting people’s work out. I then realized that my gym offers personal training and the guy is their fitness expert. He works with anyone one on one that wants instruction. I felt bad for silently judging him for a year. Turns out the guy is helping people who want help around the gym. I then decided I wanted to give it a try. I figured I knew how to properly work out, but it would not hurt to get a little feedback. The fitness expert was amazing. He didn’t just let me work out and give me pointers. He totally took over my fitness routine and revamped it. I was introduced to totally new work outs and worked areas of my body that I never had before. I also was chastised for not properly warming up or stretching before going on the machines. The fitness expert took that whole hour and crammed so much information in it. I actually do a once a week private training class with him now. I like having a day where he controls what I do. I always get a new drill that I can incorporate and it is fun having a partner working out with me.

Workout planner

I like that every inch of me is hard as a rock

When I was a kid I used to take gymnastics classes one to two days a week. As I got older I became more serious about the sport, had more time and also had more money to work on it. I have two folding mats that I set down everyday in my carport to work out. I do some form of gymnastics based workout seven days a week. Now that my work outs only consist of tumbling, I have noticed a difference in my body. Tumbling is an all over body workout. I work my arms when I do handstands. I work my shoulders for back handsprings. Back tucks work my ab muscles. My legs get wrecked when I do front handsprings or cartwheels. My body has slowly changed over the years. It seems like every month I notice something new. One month I realized that my shoulders were a little broader and my arms were bigger. Another month I noticed a new ab definition around my belly. This month I noticed that my butt is basically non existent. So much of my work out requires my butt muscles. I am doing aerial cartwheels, which requires the entire body to be launched airborne with no hand assistance. My butt really helps me on that one. I use a lot of butt muscles doing standing back tucks and two foot take offs. I don’t really mind the loss of my butt though. I like that every inch of me is hard as a rock. It is super exciting when people see me and ask if I am a professional athlete.

Group Fitness Training Classes

She worked on ab muscles so she can sit up easier as well

My parents could not be more opposite. My mother is an academic with a high profile job. My father works as a certified fitness expert at a personal training gym. My mother makes the money, my father looks good. There are times where the two of them are appalled by the others behavior. Recently my mother got totally mangled on a work trip. She got a little dizzy in the hotel bathroom and ended up rupturing her spleen. She had to be rushed to the emergency room. It was quite a scare for our family. My father then realized my mother got so injured because she was not able to properly catch herself when she started falling. She ended up hurting herself really badly because she basically did a free fall. He was totally shocked that she could not fall over and catch herself in a push up. He made my mother work every morning on falling with him. It was just like she was in his personal training gym. They had a time, a goal and worked on it in pieces. My mother started doing push ups with her knees down and catching herself from a kneeling position. Then she did assisted falling with my father and push ups in the proper position. Her private fitness class slowly turned into learning how to roll and tuck her head properly. She worked on ab muscles so she can sit up easier as well. It was a good thing for both of my parents. My father got to be the expert and my mother now has safety techniques so she won’t hurt herself again.
Fitness coahing

I used to be a horrible runner.

I had the stamina to run ten miles, but my speed was horrible.

I was averaging around 10-12 minute miles, which is pathetically slow. I usually was fighting a side cramp the whole time and my inner thighs would get a horrible rash or breakouts on them. For a long time I just stopped running all together and figured it was something I was not naturally good at. My friend then roped me into doing a semi-private physical training class with her. At the beginning of class we pick a goal. Usually people want to lose a certain amount of weight or want to bench a certain weight. I decided to pick running faster than a ten minute mile. I figured that my body could not go any faster, just longer. The personal trainer took my goal to heart and worked my butt every class. I did not realize it but my trainer noticed right away the issue was my strides. When I ran, I ran from the knee down. I did not separate my legs and reach with my feet. The personal trainer had me doing tons of drills simply teaching me to open up my strides. Once my strides started getting longer, I was covering more distance quicker. I also noticed that my inner thigh redness issue was gone. The sweat was no longer trapped between my legs and irritating me. I felt way more comfortable and even had less side cramps running longer. I have not timed myself yet, but I know I am doing better than 10 minute miles.

Personal Fitness Trainer

I went to a fairly large high school and wrestling was a big deal.

Our wrestling team always went to the championships and usually brought home an impressive title.

Since our town is used to us doing well wrestling wise, we had to train more and more. The school actually paid for training camps and other programs our coach wanted us to do. I remember every summer I had to go to the local body wellness center in town. The gym was a personal training one. I had to do a team fitness class two days a week with a personal trainer. The trainer always started us out talking about a proper warm up. We then learned about stretching all over. The trainer then began getting us into workout programs based on the weight we wanted to be at. As a freshman and sophomore, my training was focusing on bulking up. I had to lift weights, use battle ropes, throw a medicine ball and use weighted poles. By the end of the summer I would have more arm definition. As a junior and senior, my coach wanted me to cut weight. The personal trainer had me doing sprinting drills, tuck jumps and jumping rope basically the whole hour. It was a heart pumping, exhausting hour. I loved doing the training class though. It was the highlight of the summer. The guys on the team got closer, we all felt better about ourselves and cutting or gaining weight was no longer a stresser. The personal training gym took care of it for us.

Training methods

I got stuck being the coach for the middle school boys soccer team.

My son was not going to be able to play soccer if nobody stepped up to coach.

At the beginning, I knew next to nothing about soccer. I did not know how to run a team or to get them into shape. I started watching a lot of videos and reading up on soccer. I learned the rules and how to coach. I started the boys early in the summer by doing drills. I figured out quickly that nobody was in shape to do any of my drills. They could hardly run from one end of the field to the other. Soccer is a very cardio heavy sport and my team had bad cardio. Rather than just run them in a circle every practice, I went for professional help. My sister works as a personal trainer at the local fitness center. I conned her into taking my soccer team and teaching a youth fitness class. Since I am family, we got a discount on the cost of the kids attending over the summer. The whole summer my sister worked with the group of boys getting them physically fit. She worked on speed, stamina and balance. A big portion of the fitness class was about stretching and properly warming up before anything physical. She also did a lot of leg heavy exercises to tone up the boys. At the end of the summer my team looked like a whole new group of boys. They are also closer as a unit after doing a whole summer of working out together.

Core progression

My brother is 14 years old and a bit overweight.

He is starting to get picked on in school and lose confidence.

My family is a bigger family that has never thought about what we eat or work out. My brother desperately wants to get in shape, but nobody in the house can help him. I found online that there is a fitness center in our town. They offer group fitness class 3-5 days a week. As part of the class, you can take nutritional counseling too. I signed both my brother and I up. I am not totally happy with how I look. I also don’t know how much I should be eating in a day and what is bad for me. Mainly though, I don’t want my brother to have to go alone. I have a feeling he will be the only kid in that group fitness class. I want him to have a guaranteed partner if people split off. I want him to have another person motivating him. I also think it will be good for the two of us to bond. He can’t drive yet, so he has to rely on me for transport. I have the car ride there, the whole class and the drive home to chat with him. I think the two of us could have a good time with this. I am a little nervous working out in a group setting and getting a diet plan, but it is all good stuff though. I am hoping the two of us lose some weight.

Gym

I get a little crazy when it comes to working out.

My home gym looks like a personal training center.

I have any work out equipment a person could possibly want. I own a treadmill, elliptical, stationary bikes and a rowing machine. I also have a bunch of free weights, yoga mats and weighted poles. I even purchased battle ropes, a wobble board and punching bags to add a little fun to my workouts. I am a single woman in my mid twenties. I have the money and the time to make working out a priority. It is honestly the best part of my day. I feel rejuvenated, happy and good about myself after getting a hard workout in. The best part is no longer having to go to a gym. I used to attend group fitness classes and rely on a personal trainer. I was stuck with a time slot, day of the week and I had to pay for class. Now I am able to do everything at my own schedule. I can set the home thermostat to the temperature I want. I can use the bathroom and drink when it is convenient for me. I can also choose to do all weightlifting one day or skip it all together. The only downside is that I do miss the competitive edge of going to a gym. My fitness expert was great at motivating me and getting me to push harder and harder towards the end of the work out. Now I have to self motivate and at times, it is not that easy.
Health plans

My husband is a personal trainer and sometimes that is a good thing and other times it is not. A plus side is that he is always in great physical shape. I never have to worry about him totally letting himself go. I know he is totally healthy and hardly ever injures himself. The downside is that my husband is all over me about working out. I was not raised in a physically fit family. School was stressed way more than working out. I have a very high powered and prestigious job that has me away from home a lot. I make great money and I am proud of what I do. I put in some long, crazy hours which means that working out falls by the wayside. My husband is all over me that I need to make working out a priority. He either wants me to get up at 5am and put in an hour work out before my job, or to finish my work day at 6 pm and start my workout. I just don’t have that type of motivation. My husband is even making it easier on me. I don’t even have to go to the health and fitness center he works at. I don’t need to do a group fitness class or pay for private hours. He will teach me one on one for free and anytime I want. I just plain don’t want to after a long day. I am tired a lot, slightly overweight and feeling a bit depressed. I know all those things could be fixed if I was willing to work out.

Wellness and fitness