Weights question

[Thea]

Hi! I have a question for you Cathe, or anyone else out there who could offer some advice. I have done rotations with the PS series before, but not gotten the results I wanted. I am pretty sure that this is because I haven't used heavy enough weights. My question is, in the PS series for example, how do you know if it the weight you're using is heavy enough? With the amount of weight I've used in the past, I've been fatigued, but felt that I could probably be lifting a little more, especially for my legs. I guess I'm just not sure HOW fatigued the muscles should be. I would really like to gain some more muscle and defintion as well as burn some fat.

I have one other question....Is it bad to do cardio on the days I do PS SLA? What if the cardio is in the evening and I did the leg work in the morning? I would like to do a rotation with the PS series with heavier weights but also keep up the cardio (about 45 min 5X per week). I was thinking of doing each PS tape 2X per week. I am a pretty experienced exerciser--about 3 years and 2 of them with your tapes Cathe. Sorry this got so long! I'd love any advice Cathe or anyone else could give me! Thanks for taking the time to read this!

Thea

 

[carochan]

Hi Thea,

I'm not Cathe and I'm not a fitness expert, so this is JMHO. I can't remember who said this (could it be Cathe?) but your brain probably fatigues before your muscles do - i.e. even when you think you are fatigued, try a few more reps until you physically can't continue. I think this means that you shouldn't just feel tired during your last few reps - your muscles should be exhausted, possibly shaking (like Cathe's during those sit and stand squats!) and unable to do more reps.

As for doing cardio on leg days, I asked a similar question re: doing spinning on leg days a few days ago and Cathe said that it really depends from person to person. You might want to check out her reply: http://64.225.138.194/dcforum/CatheForum/3412.html

What I got out of it was that it's not necessarily bad. I do find it's hard for me to do plyometric jumps sometimes because my legs are exhausted, but it should be okay to do some cardio.

Good luck!

Caroline

 

[Thea]

Thanks so much for the advice! I was definitely not shaking when I finish my sets with the weights I was using! I think I will try adding weight a bit at a time and see. I am almost positive that I need to add at least some. Thanks for letting me know about your spinning post too. I will experiment for a few weeks and see if doing cardio is undermining my leg work. Maybe I'll keep the cardio shorter on the days I do SLA. Thanks again for your quick and very helpful reply!

Thea

 

[Cathe Friedrich]

Hi Thea! I think you are going about this very wisely. Good luck with everything and keep me posted. And thank you Caroline, for linking to that post. I was just thinking of doing it before I saw that you had beat me to it;-)!

 

[Thea]

Thanks for your support Cathe! I started a PS rotation this morning with BBA. I added some weight and it really made a difference! I probably could have added more for the back segment, but I was really pushing it during the biceps segment! I wasn't able to do all 10 negative curls, but like I took your advice and made it work for me! Thanks again Cathe and Caroline! I will be sure to keep you posted!
Thea