My Favorite Workouts

I do some sort of workout every single day. Partially because I need it for my sanity, partially because I like to eat a lot of food, and partially because I am a competitive triathlete and like to do well when I race.

When people ask me what my favorite workouts are, I take all of this, plus my busy lifestyle, in to consideration. Therefore, my favorite workouts must burn calories, work toward racing better, fit in with my busy life, and most importantly release feelings of anxiety and overwhelmed that I feel on a daily basis.

People always ask me what is the best workout? I always have the same response: the best workout is the workout you will do! And typically, the only workout you will do, and stick with, is the one you love.

Here are my favorite workouts!

1. Swimming with ALL the equipment.

Swimming is my meditation. It calms me, silences the voices in my head, and always always makes me feel relaxed, but fully worked out, from head to toe. I love the way the water drowns out any outside noise and keeps my focus on counting strokes, laps, intervals, etc.

Even though I love swimming, I don’t necessarily like to swim hard. I do a weekly time trial to help with my racing, but my favorite type of swimming is a little of everything, using all the equipment I have. I have fins, paddles, buoy, band, snorkel, kickboard, and a parachute!

My ideal swim day would be about two hours of pool time doing 500 yards with each piece of equipment. I love swimming all four strokes, but only with lots of equipment.

I do like a small hard set, like 5×100 on 1:30 or a 500 time trial, as long as I have time afterwards to put on my fins and do a nice long easy kick set. And I always like to finish with 200 breaststroke, my favorite of all the strokes!

2. Stepmill.

The stepmill is that thing at the gym that looks like you’re walking up a down escalator.

I love the stepmill because even at level one I’m sweating my ass off! Even at a low level, stepping strengthens my legs, gets my heart rate up, and it makes me feel like I’m getting a great workout, especially if I have a race with hills in the near future.

One of the main reasons I like the step mill, is because I go slow enough that I can work on my phone while I step. I do about 50% of my businesses through my phone and I always have hours and hours of busy work I could be doing.

When I am on the stepmill, I can get it all done.

I typically alternate between focused work on my phone during recovery/easy intervals, scrolling through social media and doing busy work during my moderate Intervals, and then listening to music or watching a show during my hard or running intervals. That way I get a little bit of everything!

3. Teaching indoor cycling.

I love teaching indoor cycling because I love cycling indoors, I love deciding what the class will be doing based on what I need to work on, and I love getting paid to do it!!

If I wasn’t a fitness instructor, I would probably still have indoor cycling on my list for many of the same reasons why I like the stepmill. I can work while I’m getting my bike in and it all helps me become a better athlete. The fact that I’m the instructor and I can do more climbing when I have a race coming up with a lot of hills, or more sprinting and spinning when I am tapering is just a bonus.

And of course, it’s a double bonus that I get paid to do it!

4. Strength workout.

I admittedly don’t do a lot of strength training. I try to incorporate my strength training into my triathlon training by doing things like using paddles during my swim workout and using the stepmill as my running/walking workout.

I also love climbing hills when I’m biking outside, but that happens pretty much never now that I have a baby and rarely get outside to ride. If I do strength training, it’s with moderate weighted dumbbells on a fit ball.

I have a sequence I do where I start with chest flies, move on to bent over rows, then straight arm pullovers, shoulder press, triceps extensions, and finally biceps curls. I typically do about 15 reps of each and then give my arms a break for a few minutes while I do crunches and twists on the ball.

I also spend time working on my balance, seated and kneeling on the fit ball. I am fortunate enough right now to be teaching a “Total Body Conditioning” class once a week at the gym where I do this work out about once a month.

5. Aqua running.

I don’t do this work out enough since I have limited time in the water, I typically just swim. But when I am injured, sore, or recovering, I definitely make time for it.

I do both deep and shallow water running. I prefer deep water running because it’s a lot more intense. I run without a flotation belt and do intervals alternating hard and easy efforts. This keeps me from getting bored, plus I can only do hard sprinting efforts for about a minute at a time before I need to recover anyway.

I typically mix it up with some high knees, butt kickers, side running, and cross country movements to stretch out my legs In between sets.

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I just restarted up my weekly (or bi-weekly) newsletter where each week I post a workout alternating between swim, bike, run, strength, core, and flexibility. I have specific examples of all the workouts I mentioned today in my newsletters.

Here are some archives…

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Enjoy your workout!

See You Soon!