Week 1 of the Pierre Spies Virgin Active Challenge training.

First week in my attempt to beat Pierre Spies’ time in his Virgin Active challenge is complete, and it went pretty well. Here is a brief glimpse of my initial attempts to try and transform myself from sports fan to sports man.

The first week was all about testing the waters so to speak with my trainer Dom. He and I decided we would kick off with 6am sessions, great, well it is until the alarm goes off at 5:30!

The key to this training (as you can see in my intro to the challenge) is all about developing explosive power, core strength and stamina to function for the 5 or so minutes at high intensity. Right now I’m more high maintenance than high intensity, something the first session confirmed. For the second session I felt a whole lot more capable, so much so that I got stuck into some pretty decent reps on a TRX circuit that Dom guided me through.

See the reason I am rather confident about winning at this challenge is because of having Dom with me from start to finish. Training can be a little daunting and you can get a bit lost within all the weights, machines and funny things lying around, but when someone is showing you how it’s done as well as motivating you – you simply just need to breath in and out and make sure you are punctual really.

The punctual part I actually found toughest as I’m not a morning person, but once I get to the Sandton Virgin Active I’m in a good space.

Little stiff today as I have discovered what glutes are after squats and lunges, but next week I shall return much fitter and stronger. I shall also have a more detailed report for you going into some of the exercises a little more. Until then, have a healthy happy weekend!