May!!! 1-15, 2008
 

Count down to summer time :sunny:

Actually, it's freezing here. I was flying doing cardio this morning just to get warm.

No gym again today- I turned the page on my appointment book and was thrilled to discover a noon dentist appointment :p I may try to lift back and chest after work. I've never actually been to the gym at that time and don't like the idea, so it may be another home workout.

Lydia- read your description of "feeling it" on the last thread. I used to feel that way- and legs still do, but I don't push to failure or exhaustion anymore and I miss that feeling!

LG- How are you doing?

Anybody up for a May challenge of some sort? I know many of us are involved in other threads and it gets to be a bit much, but I really need to do a concerted effort to be summer ready :o

Mel

:wave: I'm in for a May challenge!

Depending on the challenge I'd be up for it - I need something to help keep me focussed.

I felt amazing at the beginning of the week but yesterday I woke up with a crazy lower backache that I just can't seem to shake. Slept terrible last night. I think I am still going to go to yoga today though - hopefully it'll help - nothing else is.

I'm in for a May Challenge. :yes:

Mel: Lifting to failure. That was exactly what I was trying to describe.

I'm in...what's the challenge?

This might be a good thing for me. I intend to keep up the "no excuses" food challege in maintainers, but I need to focus on exercise too.

I don't know if the "no excuses" challenge is going to go on for more than a week (it was totally spur of the moment) but if it does, what would you all think about combining challenges? It seems like there's a lot of overlap between the regulars here and the ones doing the Maintainers challenge. We don't want to become too "challenging" (yuck yuck :lol: )

Personally, I'm getting so much out of our "no excuses" week that I'd love to see it continue in some way or shape. I feel reinvigorated and like I'm back in the groove, which is the best feeling ever. :carrot:

Ideas? :)

Yep!
 

I want a challenge! Count me in. What is it and when do we start?! :carrot:

I'm in.

LG - I remember those achey backaches from the uterus stretching. Later on as the baby put on weight and sloped forward, the cramping moved to my groin muscles - gah!

I seriously need a challenge. I fell into a bagel this morning (free bagel does not mean I need to take one) after I promised myself to limit my bread intake. Rest of the day wasn't bad though.

Actually I just need a good kick in the butt...

Hi,
I'm new. I want to also try the soy/whey drink diet that was in first magazine. I have tried many different diets but I thought this may be a good one. Has anyone tried this?

Hi Rossi:wave: and :welcome:

I haven't seen the soy/whey drink diet you are referring to from First Magazine. I don't spend a lot of time reading magazines so I miss out on these things. I do add whey protein powder to a couple of my meals throughout the day and found that they really do help to keep me satisfied till the next meal. Usually I mix it into my oatmeal at breakfast and in a post workout smoothie. Good luck.

Meg and Mel: Combining the challenges would be wonderful. Really both go hand in hand for me anyway. If I'm working out I can almost be certain that it will also be a good food day too. It's those days when I can't get to the gym that I wig out. :dizzy:

Welcome, rossi :) Never heard of the diet. I would recommend a real food lifestyle rather than a diet drink.

Meg, let's definitely combine challenges. We don't all want to just copy our posts from one forum to another!

I haven't seriously thought about how to organize or what to challenge with- but my personal challenge is the "Little Black Dress Challenge" :lol3: I have a very formal wedding to attend on June 27 and a drop dead gorgeous dress that was just given to me with the assurance of "of COURSE it will fit you!". Well...it goes on and zips. So there is hope. But it looks like it was spray painted on me :yikes: I figure I need to lose an inch everywhere except vertically to look decent. I'm not sure that's really possible for me, but I'm sure going to try. That means 100% clean eating except for the 4 days next week when I attend my daughter's graduation (Lydia :wave:- we picked Lindy's :drool: ) and making every single planned workout. 5 cardio days and 4-5 lifting days. Lawn mowing does NOT count as cardio, just a really fun way to spend some time outdoors :p So for me I need 7 weeks of PERFECTLY ON PLAN. Minus graduation :)

Just to make it fun, I'm going to challenge myself to learn at least one new exercise every week or at least incorporate one that I don't usually do and report back.

nelie- I thought we had a kick in the butt smilie but I can't find it. Will this do? :club:


What's your challenge?

Mel

Oh Mel, that will do....

My current challenge is really get under 200, fit in some pants I fit in a couple months ago (argh). It will include NO bread, no peanut butter (oh do I have to?), and getting back into my exercise routine. Exercise has been rough because I got sick and I still have remnants (breathing is still rough) but I need to stop using that as an excuse and start up again. Of course I know there are free bagels again tomorrow so I have to be strong... Why am I addicted to bagels?

Nelie,

Use the spider tactic!

You are a gazillion times bigger than a bagel...and even while it is not actually wearing glasses...you can win!


Rabbit

Happy Friday everyone!!

Hey - I found a great new diet...it's called the flu diet! ;) Really though, wow did I have a nasty bug that knocked me out for a few days. I'm just starting to feel back to normal. Needless to say the workouts have been zero but then again the food intake was zero for a couple of days. :o I could not put one thing into my mouth other than some juice. So the scale plummeted but is, of course, coming back up.

Anyhow, I promise to get back to a good exercise week next week and I'm always up for a challenge!

I hope everyone has some fun weekend plans and better weather than we're having here right now. :(

Nice to be back....:D

:kickbutt: Here you go, Nelie. :)

I did 3 hours of lawn mowing today...I think that should count, Mel! ;)

I'll have to think about my challenge when I have more than 2 brain cells to rub together. Is this going to be here, or over at the Maintenance forum?

Great leg workout this morning and I have 6 Perfectly on plan food days in the bag. Yay me ;)

Here's my new exercise which I think might be the MOST compound one I've ever done. Not for injured knees or shoulders, tho!

Back Squat-press to front squat clean and press

Start with a bar across you shoulders and do a normal squat (warning: I was doing this with an empty 45 pound bar and was tired after 10 reps). As you come up, press the bar up into a military press. Now bring the bar down to front squat position, and as you descend slowly (or before descent). lower the bar to where your arms arm hanging completely down in front of you. Do a complete, deep squat and touch the bar to the floor. As you come up, do a clean, pulling the bar up to front squat position then press at the top of the squat. Lower the bar behind your head onto your shoulders and that is one rep. Getting the whole sequence smooth and remembering where you should be in the sequence takes some practice. My workout partner stood behind me shouting out directions :dizzy:




Mel

Nice one, Mel...ouch! I won't be doing that today, since my knee is not right, but will save that one for later!

Originally Posted by Mel:
My workout partner stood behind me shouting out directions :dizzy:Mel

Yeah, I bet she did! Wow. That would take some focus before the movement seemed to be automatic. Great sequence though. :cool: By the way, everything at Lindy's is caloric free. I checked. ;) Enjoy dinner. If you need to get into a gym so that your conscience is free after that meal let me know. :D

Boy, looks sure are deceiving and it is all a matter of perspective. I came home this morning after my workout while DH was preparing the kids for their cub scout camping trip today. (pouring down rain all day and t-storms tonight) Anyway, I chose not to shower and change at the gym so that I could be home in time to say goodbye to the boys before they left. DH doesn't see me very often after a workout without a shower. I was covered head to toe in wet clothes. Not a dry spot on my shirt and my hair was pulled back in a headband and soaked through. He looks and asks, "Good workout?" expecting for my answer to be a yes. But it was a humph kind of workout. I don't know that happened but after my cardio session, 55 minutes on the ATM I just didn't feel like lifting today. Now for some people 55 minutes of any kind of cardio would be a good workout. But it is a matter of perspective. I so wanted to enjoy lifting today. I had three days off so I really shouldn't have been too tired to dig right in, but I just didn't have it in me today. :dunno: Maybe the dreary rain has something to do with it. Or the list of crazy obligations coming up this week are weighing on my thoughts I don't know. What I really wanted to do was dig into a a carton of ice cream and then take a nap. I did half of that. Guess which half. :devil: Nope, don't keep ice cream in the house but I did collapse on DS2's bed and napped for 45 minutes. ~sigh~ Tomorrow is another day.

Hope you all are having a great weekend.

Lydia, PM coming your way....

Mel, will you come to Pittsburgh and shout directions at me? I don't think I could do this on my own! :D

Meg, you are exactly two hours from Columbus. That's not too far to drive for a workout is it? I'll even buy you a cup of Starbucks ;)

Ahem, that's two hours the way that YOU drive. A bit longer for those of us using Warp One. :lol:

But for Starbucks and a workout .... :chin:

Seems to me that when we drove it together, YOU were driving and I was snoozing in a Nyquil induced haze. :p

I'll buy you two cups.

Mel

Ok - so we're picking our own challenges? Do I have that right?

Here's mine: To get a handle on an appropriate weight training workout for this trimester.

I went yesterday - had a great workout but feel terrible today, sore everywhere, bloated, ick. I think I pushed a little too hard. Problem I'm having is there is very little information out there for those who want to continue at all seriously with their workouts through pregnancy & my doctor is obviously a dunce on the subject. Everything seems to be geared to those who either didn't workout or rarely worked out. Sigh!

Lydia - I don't think I could ever do my cardio first! I'd have to do a complete costume change to continue I sweat so much!!! Good for you for taking a nap - sometimes they're the best things for you!

Challenges are good. :)

:wave: I joined a new, bigger gym, very close to my house, and I'm getting a couple personal trainer hours. :hyper: I'm really excited about that. There is so much I want to try out at this new place that just that should keep me busy for a couple months. :rofl: So my new challenge for now is to try out anything I think I may like and find out what I enjoy the most.

Today would be a wonderful day to go to the gym, but I went to a bodypump class on Thursday, and I'm STILL so sore that I can't walk properly because it hurts! :o I thought today (third day) would be better, but it's not. I'm hoping I'll be able to move like a normal person tomorrow, but my hopes are not too high. Ouch!
(Someone please tell me it will go away? :^:)

I may be :dizzy: but I want to go to another of these classes as soon as my muscles allow. I want to be able to get through them without shaking after I don't know how many squats and without walking out as if I was racewalking because my legs wouldn't move like they should. :rofl:

Day 8 of perfectly on plan! I tried on my dress this morning and it's still too tight, but less so :D I will be wearing it this summer!

LG- That's a perfect goal...along with a healthy, safe pregnancy:)

Mel

Lalala - the muscle pain will get better as your body adjusts. One of the most valuable things I learned from one of my trainers is that movement helps. I had done his bootcamp class & was just dying - could barely move - so I called to say I was not coming to the next class to recover (it was a small class) & he told me to come & that if after the warm-up I was still sore I could leave. Well, you know, I finished that class & wasn't nearly as sore the next day.

Thanks Mel! I think I should be able to find a good balance that will help me maintain my current strength level & prepare my body for the demands of childbirth. I must admit I'm already itching for it to be done so I can get back at it good & hard in the gym!LOL

Greetings everyone. Haven't been around much, but I'm still around, if you know what I mean.

Mel: Couldn't you build a high hurdle in there, just to complete the circuit? Because then it would be exactly like a weighted-bar-jumprope-squat-clean-press. Only different.

Be strong,
K

PS. What's this about a challenge? I'm less than three weeks away from the big 4-0 and not where I want to be BF-wise, so I could use a good kick in the butt!

Hi Kaw:wave: I was thinking about you the other day. I'm glad to see your post. The challenge is a spinoff from a thread started in the Living Maintenance forum. Since we would rather pull our eyelashes out than confess to eating anything that deviates from our program it's been pretty effective. Mel has suggested doing a challenge within this forum as well and it looks like the two may be combined. Has a date been set to begin this anyone? Anyway, I still need to clarify my goal for this portion of the challenge.

So your 40th is in a few weeks. Congratulations. You must be a Gemini. Me too. ;) I'll reach this same milestone the first week of June. This year my b-day falls on a Saturday. DH better have something great planned. :club:

Ah, Mel has been too frantically doing her own challenge and getting ready to go away for five days to come up with anything concrete :?:

I'd really like to see everyone come up with their own goals, then strive to meet them. I was working on a chart that we could paste into posts, but it just doesn't work.

Hi kaw! I was thinking about you last weekend also. We'll have to have a 3FC birthday party for you and Lydia!

Mel

Ah, they're just young chicks! :lol: But an age ending in a zero is always something to celebrate....

I've been out of the gym for a week now. A nasty respiratory infection combined with severe hay fever had me wheezing and trying to cough up a lung. I thought about going anyway, but I have a real fear of being unable to breathe, since I had pretty severe asthma as a child. Now that I'm only dealing with hay fever, I'm really anxious to get back to the gym.

Unfortunately, I'll be back out of the gym for another week starting Friday. I'm going on vacation with my partner and won't have access to a gym. Since I won't have any weights, I'm planning on focusing on more core exercises. Squats, lunges, planks . . . Lots of romantic walks around the lake. Any other suggestions on how to keep up with my exercise would be appreciated.

I am absolutely up for a challenge.

So I'm still not feeilng up to par and I haven't been at the gym for over a week! Today I'm hoping for some yoga. That shouldn't be too strenuous and if it goes okay, maybe a power class tomorrow. I need to get a run in but I don't think I'm up to that just yet.

autumn - good luck with your vacation exercising! It's not something that I'm normally good at. ;) Lots of walking is all I can ever squeeze in.

Lydia/Kaw - oooh, big years for you this year! I celebrated that milestone last year :( and I'm still trying to adjust.

Mel - congrats on your "on-plan" streak. Keep it up. I wish I could do the same.

Have a great day everyone.

:D

Autumn, your vacation exercise plan looks great to me as is. Simple, easy, can be done anytime or anywhere. You'll be able to get it in without it detracting from enjoying your time away. Have fun! That's the most important thing!

Originally Posted by WaterRat:
Ah, they're just young chicks! :lol: But an age ending in a zero is always something to celebrate....

Awww. Thanks Pat! :hug:

Originally Posted by elisa822:
Lydia/Kaw - oooh, big years for you this year! I celebrated that milestone last year :( and I'm still trying to adjust.:D

great.:s: Your not exactly helping me boost my enthusiasim for this birthday :lol3: Actually, I've been bemoaning this one since my 35th birthday. How bad is that! Every year I punch in the number on my cardio machine thinking a year closer to 40 ~sigh~ but at least it's not this year. Really, I'm thinking about this almost every day. As it draws closer though I'm punching in 39 and thinking yeah, well, I'm still here and doing better than I was at 35 so there! :devil: The reality is that I would only want to be 25 again if I could be the person I am today with better knees. :D

Today was my first day back to the gym since last Saturday. If you recall my previous post it was pretty pathetic. Now I know why I hit the wall. I was getting a small cold. I woke up Sunday morning feeling a touch of it but it wasn't too bad. I rested most of the last two days, took tons of zinc and vitamin C. I'm feeling so much better today and was able to finish a fbwo after my 55 cardio session. :yay: My glutes are a little achey and all is right with the world. :goodvibes:

Elisa: I hope you can make it to your yoga class. It is such a drag to be down with a cold/flu or anything in addition to missing your daily dose of endorphines. Hang in there and get better.

AutumnHarvest: Enjoy your trip. Bodyweight exercises are a great way to kick your own bad self. Last summer I continued my workouts during our family vacations and it was one of the highlights of our vacation. I dragged DH out of bed each morning before sunrise and we ran on the beach and around the golf courses. Loved it! For my b-day DH had given me adjustable weights which I did take on the trip. I'm sure I was breaking all kinds of guest codes on the balcony of that condo but :dunno: no one was up early enough to witness or complain. :devil: Have a great time.

My enthusiasm for 40 isn't terribly high, either. I think it's because I work in higher education, and in higher ed the students never get any older. Being around 20-year olds all the time just drives home the fact that I'm the same age as some of their *mothers*.

So, I make up for it by trying to be in way better shape than their mothers! :)

I still haven't come up with a challenge for my challenge, but I think it should be to (a) go to the gym every day this week, and (b) do cardio at least two of those days. This may not be much of a challenge by Mel's standards, but keep in mind that I'm *allergic* to cardio. :)

The chicken we're having for dinner is starting to smell tasty, so it's time for me to sign off. (Mmmm, dinner...)

Be strong,
Kim

Hey, where is everybody this morning? Sleeping in? C'mon it's after 6! Time to be up and at 'em.

OK, I'll stop channeling my mother.

I had a reasonably successful leg day yesterday, and I'm feeling it this morning. I can't say I'm making a whole lot of progress on my lifts anymore, but I'm still happy adding a rep or two each session. When I start to get bored with this, I'll have to shake things up a bit and try some new exercises. Maybe not any of the exercises Mel dreams up, though; I'm too coordination-challenged!

Off for coffee. Be strong,
Kim