During the summer holiday, I had done many Les Mills workouts such as Body Attack, Body Balance and RPM, and I enjoyed doing them because when doing workout, I would be 100% focused on it and not thinking about anything else, which is a good way to release pressure and stress. Since I had never tried the Body Pump session and I had always enjoyed doing Les Mills, so that I decided to do it as an activity.

I think Body Pump is very different from the other Les Mills workout that I did, since it is more focused on the core body strength. Personally, I’m better at doing cardio compared to weight training exercise, because I don’t have strong muscles, especially for the upper body, and when going to the gym, I often do cardio workouts such as running, fast-walking or elliptical. I found it quite challenging for me to lift heavy weights as I had barely done this before, while I also had to do the workout with these weights at the same time. Therefore, I started from 2.5kg at first, and planned to increase the weights gradually in the next few sessions. Although the weights were not heavy, I still became very sweaty and tired after I finished the workout, and my muscles were in pain during the second day. This shows that I really need to work on the strength of my body and grow more muscles, and I think that if I continue doing Body Pump, I will be able to lift more weights every time.

Additionally, Body Pump involves lots of repetitions, while the other workouts were mainly cardio-based and the movements would change frequently. I first thought it would be very boring to repeat the same movement again and again, such as the squats, and it would be more difficult for me to stay focused and persist on doing it. However, when I was doing the repetitions, I didn’t feel like a long journey. This is probably because that I was doing the workout with lots of other people, which was more inspiring than doing it alone, as I could see how the others were paying huge effort on it and working super hard. This motivated me and made me become more passionate towards the activity, which enabled me to keep doing the movements again and again.

It is also very challenging for me to wake up early at 6 o’ clock to attend the Body Pump session on every Monday. When I had early activities like this before, I used to struggle a lot to wake up on time and forced myself not to fall asleep again. Overcoming this challenge mainly relies on my willpower and passion towards this activity: Since I enjoy doing the workout, I have the motivation to make me wake up early. Meanwhile, I would remind myself of the commitment I made to come to this activity and think of how it would help me to keep fit and benefit my strength when my body was trying to haunt me down with sleepiness. Surprisingly, I find that morning workouts are more effective for me because I tend to be more energetic in the morning, and they would help me to keep a high energy level for the whole day. Through this challenge, I have a better understanding on how my body functions and find out the better routine for me, which I could adapt in the future.

Overall, Body Pump is challenging for me in terms of the weight-training, frequent repetitions and early timing, but I had overcame most of the challenges in the first session and my strength would hopefully become better in every session. I knew that Body Pump would not be easy for me as I don’t have a good body strength, but I still chose to do it, because I wanted to try out new things, but not always staying in my comfort-zone. I think I should really keep this mindset in the future and be a risk-taker, because this will open more opportunities and allow me to explore various areas, which is very useful for me to choose my future careers and majors as well.

Learning Objective 2: CHALLENGING (Undertaking new challenges & developing new skills)

Learning Objective 4: COMMITMENT (Showing perseverance, resilience)