Tennis is one of my absolute favourite sports to watch. I look forward to Wimbledon every year and even applied for tickets for what would have been the tournament in June. I like watching tennis so much that I sat and watched all six hours of the 2008 Roger Federer vs. Rafael Nadal Wimbledon final again, last month. I love tennis, but I can’t play it to save my life.
I used to work at a tennis centre where staff could play on the courts for half price. Every now and then I would give it ago, only to barely be able to hit the ball over the net. I am terrible. Whilst I have no great desire to play tennis, I’d still like to think I could if I trained more, that’s why today I decided to work out with tennis superstar, Venus Williams.
Venus Williams has won 7 Grand Slam tournaments, and 5 Olympic medals (4 of them gold) since 2000, and whilst still playing tennis, she turns her hand to coaching her Instagram followers with different workouts from time to time. Yes, I sadly didn’t have a one-on-one training session with Venus, I followed one of her #Coachvenus Instagram workouts.
I was drawn to the workout as she said it was going to target the arms and we didn’t need weights. Although I do have weights they are currently buried at the bottom of a heavy pile of stuff, that ironically, I can’t lift. I work my legs out often through regular walking, running, and yoga, but rarely focus on my arms, so this would be a good starting point for me to become an international tennis star.
After a little chit chat with her guest, model Ashley Graham, the workout begun and I begun to feel the burn after only a few simple moves. I had no idea I could work out my arms so much without weights! We focused on each part of the arm and chest, and then the workout switched briefly to the legs. Unfortunately, the workout wasn’t very smooth as there were quite a few technical problems, and camera re-arranging, so this was a bit off-putting. I also didn’t enjoy the leg portion of the workout as a lot of them were similar to the warm-up stretches I do before running, but it always feels good to get moving.
Although I wouldn’t repeat the workout with Venus, I’m definitely going to practice the arm exercises again: writing this a day later, I can feel that familiar post-exercise ache, but in my arms! I’m still not going to be playing tennis anytime soon, but if I keep these exercises up I might at least be able to get it over the net next time.
New Day, New Thing 