Hurt So Good

3.5.2011 - Saturday at Leandro's private studio

Today is the day I cash in my "prize" for scoring the most inches/pounds lost in last week's weigh-in. Grossly over-estimating the traffic and parking, I arrive almost 40 minutes early for my semi-private 10:00 AM session with The Butt Master. So I sat in my car and listened to inspirational music to get me keyed up for my workout. The Theme from Shaft comes on and I start making up my own lyrics. It's a complicated butt, but no one understands it like Leandro. Al's Butt! I'm a huge dork. 

Tired of sitting in my car like a stalker, I decide to ring the buzzer at 9:45AM. Being early will show I'm eager. Or just annoying. Leandro greets me cheerfully and gives me a hug. I'm seriously so excited to be here. I mean, this guy trains Victoria's Secret runway models, and now I'm getting a free session with him! We head into his studio and I strip down to my exercise garb. The good thing about being early is, we get to have a talk about my specific body issues, what I can do on my own (in addition to class), and how I continue this when the great booty-reduction experiment of 2011 comes to an end in April.

He starts me on the treadmill doing these killer side shuffle thingys. What you do is, put the incline on 8% and the speed on 1.8 and stand sideways on the tread mill like this:

Sorry it's such a bad picture, but (a) I was on a treadmill and (b) I had to take the picture quickly since gyms typically frown on weirdos with cameras. You get the idea right?

So you sort-of shuffle/hop on one side for a full minute - without touching the treadmill. Then you turn around and do the same on the other side for one minute. If you're doing this correctly, you should feel it in your inner-thighs mostly. Next, you put the incline on 9% and the speed on 1.9. One minute on each side. Then the incline goes to 10% and the speed goes to 2.0. One minute on each side. Then, go to 11% incline and 2.1 speed. One minute each side. By now, you should be huffing and puffing and sweating like a pig. (Do pigs sweat?) Once you're done with that, run for 10 minutes. Then go workout!

Back to my Saturday session. Leandro decides to be cruel and starts me at a 10% incline and gradually works up to 12%. Okay, this is how this is going down. By the time the other girl arrives, I'm covered in sweat and gasping for breath. 

The other girl is in the 8:30AM test group so we've never met. She's my same height, age and weight and has a very similar body-type, which I find a relief because I would have hated to workout with a skinny girl that only had a flat butt. We are introduced then Leandro puts her on the treadmill then moves me to a weight machine for inner and outer thigh reps. He's ruthless! He straps my ankle in, puts the weight on 15 pounds, then has me do FIFTY reps of inner-thigh lifts. Then, 50 reps of outer-thigh lifts with 10 pounds. My legs were throbbing. And I had only just begun. 

Once again, not me, but this is the body I want!

Then I have to jump rope for as long as I can without stopping. I hate this for several reasons: It's cardio, it kind of makes me pee a little (thank you falling uterus!) and I hate watching myself jump in the mirror. Everything that can jiggle, jiggles...a lot. But I've got nothing to lose except that jiggle, so I  go for it. I tripped on the rope somewhere around the 50th rotation, then Leandro started from 1. I almost made it to 100 this time. He tells me that, for now, 100 is my goal number when I do this on my own. Um yeah, here's the thing, I'm not, what you would call, willing, to jump rope in public. Ever.

Every time I finish something, Leandro moves the other gal to my station, then starts me on a new exercise. It was such a hard workout, but the best one so far, because it's tailored for us and since there were only two of us, he could correct our form and call us out on not pushing hard enough. It's hard to phone it in when The Butt Master is literally straddling you while you're on the floor doing inner-thigh pulls while wearing 20 pounds of ankle weights. Somewhere around the millionth squat in the squat portion of our workout, I realize that we've been going at it for more than an hour. Oh my god, when will this end? It's 11:00AM. Doesn't he have a celebrity ass to train today? Apparently not. I worked out for almost two hours, and at the end, every muscle in my legs, butt, back, stomach and arms is throbbing...but I felt incredible! And the icing on the cake is, when it was over we just got to hang out and talk to Leandro. We talked about everything, including our concerns for "life after Leandro" (about which I am in complete and utter denial),  and you bet your ass I wrote down everything. This was a priceless opportunity. Far more valuable than a massage...which I would also like to win.

As we were walking out, I asked him if the goals we talked about at my 6-day assessment - you know, that 135 pound, size 4 body we talked about - were his vision for me...in the long run or the end-result of this 8-week program. He looked at me like a disappointed parent. His reply, "At the end of this program of course." Whatchu talkin' bout Leandro?!