I have always been interested in fitness and keeping myself in shape because I was a part of both my high school and college cheerleading teams. I did not work out at all in high school because I thought cheer practice was enough. I went to Northeastern University for Physical Therapy and that was the first time I stepped into an actual gym.
When I first started working out, I did not really know what I was doing. As a freshman in college, I would go to the gym and only do cardio for my entire workout. My second semester is when I decided I was going to start lifting some weights. I wanted to get more “toned” to prevent myself from gaining the freshman fifteen. I started doing high rep exercises with very little weight. This helped me to lose weight, but I did not develop any muscle or get the “toned look” I was going for. I would slowly increase resistance every few weeks, but was never consistent about it. I was always scared that by lifting too heavy it would make me look like a guy. I only started lifting with intention after I started learning about the body and what it can do.
Even with the knowledge I had attained through my physical therapy classes, I was still too scared to lift heavy. I was even more intimidated to go into “man room” in Marino (the gym at Northeastern) to actually lift heavy. I am so thankful to the guys on my cheer team that forced me and some of the other girls to go into the dreaded man room to actually start lifting heavy. They saw our potential before we did. It was then that I finally realized that I had been lifting without an actual plan for years. Once I started progressing and relying on my team to push me harder than I could push myself, I finally started to see results. However, there was still so much more to learn. We would write out a different exercise plan filled with whatever exercises we felt like doing every time we would lift, but it was never anything consistent.
My workouts started to change after I graduated with my Doctorate in Physical Therapy. I had a more consistent plan in place. I had fitness goals of being able to do unassisted pull ups, bench 135 lbs for one rep, and squat 225 lbs for one rep. It took me quite a while to achieve these goals, but once I hit them, it motivated me to progress and do better. I had never really done a workout program before, but I had looked into them. Some of my gym friends forced me to do a workout plan with them that was very different from anything I had done before. It was the same exercises for upper and lower body each day from one week to the next, which I thought was so boring. After I finished the 12 week program, I had never seen my body be so defined, especially my upper body. I was officially hooked! I learned that completing the same exercises on a weekly basis is what I needed to go to get the results I wanted. I was no longer bored because I started to focus on progression with these exercises on a weekly basis. I progressed resistance, reps, sets, and built a stronger mind muscle connection. With a combination of consistency, discipline, and progressive overload, the results I wanted became reachable. It helped me to build both confidence in myself and strength in my body. I let go of the idea that lifting heavy was going to make me big and bulky.
My new goal was to grow my lower body. I have always had a nice booty, but I wanted to see if I could get it to grow. With that as my new goal, I did a few glute guides, which helped me grow in both size and significantly in strength. I went from doing legs 1-2x/week, to consistently doing legs 2x/week, and progressing to doing legs 3x/week (which is what I do now). I started to see significant glute growth with a combination of doing legs 3x/week, being in a caloric surplus (2700+ calories/day), and focusing on progressive overload.
I was doing one of the guides when I hurt my back. I took a few days off, but couldn’t really get back into the program I was doing because everything hurt. I decided to listen to my physical therapy brain and practice what I preach. I made my own 8 week program to continue to build my lower body. I held off on completing exercises that gave me pain for a few weeks, but then slowly started incorporating them in again at less weight. Overall, my glutes & thighs grew two inches each. Once I saw my results, I knew I would be able to make programs that would help all of you.
Now we are here and I want to share my growth with all of you. Get ready to experience your own growth. The booty burns and pumps will be real. Enjoy the key information and the exercise plan coming your way.
- Veronica Lopes