Thor, Korra or Wonder Woman.

[Pickled]

Hi all!

I decided to become fitter after watching a Wonder Woman cartoon last year and deciding I want to be more like an amazon. I have also recently taken inspiration from watching the Avengers and wanting to be like Thor as well as Korra from the Legend of Korra. Yey! I find watching programmes with actions and fights puts me in the mood for exercise!

I have spent the last 10 years of my life being anti-exercise and living a sedentary lifestyle - spending most of my free time on my computer and playing videogames. I have always been a healthy weight and I generally eat healthy meals but I also love to snack on junk and drink alcohol quite a lot!

Since Jan 2012 I decided to make a change and have slowly begun to make exercise a habit. I began by doing body weight exercises everyday after work, then once that had stuck I bought myself a barbell for my home and began doing a starting strength routine (which was something I had always wanted to do but was too afraid to start). I have seen good results with this and I am gradually getting stronger despite not having a bench or a rack (carrying my weekly shop home from the supermarket has never been so easy). I have recently joined a kick boxing class (as this was something I did briefly in my youth) and I now attend twice a week. I suck at it (everyone has to start somewhere) but I enjoy it and want to want to improve as much as I can. Kick boxing has given me new fitness aims - I want to improve my stamina, my co-ordination and my flexibility.

At the moment my average week looks like this:

Monday: Weights

Tuesday: Kick Boxing Class

Wednesday: Weights

Thursday: Kick Boxing Class

Friday: Weights

Weekend: A mixture of body weight exercises, walking and kick boxing practice at home.

My next step is to incorporate yoga or stretching in there somewhere to help improve my balance and flexibility.

I also need to work on my diet but I need to isolate one thing I can change - maybe reducing my junk snack to one a day rather than having 2-3 junk snacks. xD I do love eating and drinking though!

I also acknowledge that I need to attend kickboxing classes that involve sparring if I ever want to be competent at it.

Any advice to achieve my aims is appreciated!

Thanks for your time. It is good to speak to people who are into fitness as all my friends and family are very much anti-fitness!

[Pat G]

Pickled, too active to stick in a jar!

As long as you're not burning yourself out with too much work i say keep it up. Strength training means a stronger core and legs for your future kickboxing championship bout.

Incorporate stretching into your weight sessions, after you've finished stretch out while the muscles are warm and tight. That'll let you get looser for your kicboxing.

One food change at a time is easily manageable, but don't sell yourself short, you're more capable than you think you are in that department.

[StevenChristianAmendola]

The Legend of Korra is a fantastic program.

[TeaKwonDo]

Another Korra fan, welcome aboard! She's totally my inspiration too, for getting in shape and learning killer bodyweight moves.

[Mixy-Chan]

I myself would love to try weight trainng of some sort...that will probably never happen in the near future....though I have a year round free membership at a gym....that might have what I need. I kick box too during the school year someone teaches it..I go when I can but work and neck spasms reduce either not going at all...or lasting an hour...my necks doing lots better sense I started being a bit more active!

Good luck

I agree my friends are anti fit along with my family...who did not like the 140 dollar shoe purchase...