Hitting the weights

Well, after almost a full year of laying off the weights to dedicate my time and energy to getting my black belt, I did my first all-out workout on Wednesday evening. I did two workouts prior to this, but they were light -- a kind of gradual getting used to lifting again. Wednesday, I decided to go for it, and friends, I AM SORE. It didn't help that the very next day I went to Karate class and did a bunch of grueling pushups ("press ups" for my English friends!) and squat variations. It's a good sore though. My plan is to lift heavy (for me anyway), lower reps (6-8), for one working set only (after a warm-up), with profoundly compound exercises, and rest about one full week. Yep, I'm going for strength. Here's the current routine I came up with:

Deadlifts

Dumbbell Bench Press (well, a variation of it where I hold both dumbbells up, and then alternate lowering one down and pushing it up... kind of simulating a punch).

Dumbbell Bent-over Rows

Military Press

Dumbbell Curls (an isolated movement, rather than compound)

Dumbbell Lateral Raises

Standing Calve Raises

And some weighted cruches.

I plan on doing that for a few weeks, and then switch things up a bit.