Ease the Shredding Burn

Day 3 of Level 2: I’m still sweating like a pig and feel like I’m dying. Things seem to be working. My two tips for the day follow Kristen’s point that the one-minute stretch is not enough. Actually, the one-minute (30 second?) warm up isn’t really enough either. So here’s what I recommend:

Warmup: If possible, start shredding after you’ve been up and about with daily activities. So, this could be after going up and down the stairs to do laundry, after hauling loads of groceries into the house, after the walk to the corner store for a newspaper, etc. Today, I shredded after walking the 1+ mile loop to and from the post office (which included scaling snow banks…). After the brisk walk my heart rate was up and my legs felt loosened and ready to go.

Cool down/stretch: I’m not great at just stretching for stretching’s sake, so Kristen’s recommendation of stretching while watching TV is a good one. Also, since I spend so much time working at my laptop, sometimes I stretch while I work. So after shredding today, of course the first thing I did (before even showering) was log on. I use the time while I’m just reading email, Twitter feeds, and online articles (i.e., not needing both hands to type) to do stretch lunges, etc.