Why Are My Quads Feeling Tight, Pumped, and Hard?

When I went into the forums today I had a great question posed by one of the girls.

Between sets in Superset 1, my quads felt really tight; I tried to do a lot of stretching--as much as possible between sets.  I continued that throughout each superset.  Also, during/after Superset 2, I felt like puking; it got better in 3 & 4, but still a lot of "I think I'm going to puke"...not sure if this is b/c I was working so hard or because I didn't eat anything right before working out.  Again, the meals have been kind of weird today. Overall, it was a good workout; I had trouble going down the stairs to get to the parking log.

I call this a good workout! This is called bringing intensity to the gym. 90% of my own workouts are exactly like this. Even my less than stellar workout today I was sick to my stomach a good while. That's just your body responding to you working hard. Often my trainer and I joke around that a workout isn't complete until you ralph in the trash can.

The other part of this post that shows me how hard this girl is working is feeling quads that are tight. That's called MUSCLE PUMP. When your muscles get more and more conditioned they learn how to saturate themselves with blood during the workout. It's your body's way of getting oxygen and nutrients quickly to working muscles. The more you workout the quicker your body knows to rush the blood.

I live for a muscle pump. It's an awesome thing and it shows you are getting in better and better shape. It's nothing to be worried about or to avoid. It's bragging rights for many people!

Another point about a muscle pump is that one of the best ways to work a muscle to fatigue and get a good pump is to superset your exercises. We do a lot of that at PNP. My exercise plans and routines for fatloss live and breath super- and trisets to keep you moving, burning fat, and pumping those muscles.

This is such a good question I just had to blog it. Women typically only bring it to the gym when they are going to hop on that elliptical. They move to the weights and for some reason the least bit of feeling uncomfortable, fatigued, or burn and they worry they have done something wrong. Ladies, start watching men workout. That's how we should feel and move. You see them grunting, huffing, puffing, and carrying on over there??? That's what you need to be doing. You will never look like them working out like them but you will certainly get hot and sexy by mimicing their intensity level.

Lift on Ladies!!!