Leg Circuit

I’ve wound up with an inexplicable deltoid strain/sprain to my left shoulder, so I’m giving it a break for a few days, lest I end up with something that’s going to haunt me all season. In search of something to do this week that wouldn’t involve my shoulder, I dove into Vern Gambetta’s leg circuit, which I’d read about on Dusty’s blog.

I figured that 11+ weeks of weight training qualified me as having a “good base” for beginning this program, which meant starting with three circuits at full repetitions.

Warmup: Five minutes on the treadmill at 7’30” pace.

Dynamic warmup (from Coach Dos’s Cardio Strength Training): Knee skips x 2, leg swings x 2, carioca stepovers x 2, Atlas lunges x 2, lateral 180-degree squats x 2, Spiderman lunges x 2, three-quarter speed accelerations x 2 (all movements were done for the length of the room).

Bodyweight squat x 20
45sec. rest
Alternating lunge x 10 each leg
45sec. rest
Alternating stepup x 10 each leg
45sec. rest
Jump squat x 10
3min. rest

Time for three circuits: 21’45”

Cooldown: Three minutes of stretching.

Despite my concerns, the Atlas lunges and Spiderman lunges did not bother my shoulder. As for the actual circuit, it wasn’t easy, but I also felt fairly prepared for the workload. That being said, I was much slower on the bodyweight squats than I expected to be (I guesstimate each of those sets took me ~ 40secs.), and on both the bodyweight squats and jump squats had difficulty breaking parallel. I was pleased with the workout, however, the future of this progression is up in the air depending on how things shake out with my shoulder and wrapping up my power training.