Pump hard……. Pump often

I was looking out the window of my office yesterday doing some people watching as I needed a mental break. And I saw some folks wearing summer clothes their bodies were too plump to wear. And I began to wonder is MY body ready for summer? In the winter people can cover up what they don’t want seen. Between thick sweaters, jackets, coats, and layers of clothes nobody knows your bodyfat is higher than you would like. But come summer time? People either get creative in dress to cover it all or don’t care what’s all hanging loose and out.

Well I’m focused on getting my figure summer ready. Heck, not just summer ready but looking good all FOUR seasons. I’m pumped, hyped, focused and determined. Hitting the gym hard and often.

I want to put on a sundress and know it fits well with it bulging in all the right places and none in the wrong ones. My core is the area that needs the most improvement. Which is why I hit abs with a vengeance and it’s helping. Today I altered my diet to drop about 200 calories out of my day. Not burning fat as quickly as I should and my calories are a bit too high. That should help. I’ve also up my heart rate on cardio. These two changes should produce some changes soon.

So how’s your summer body coming along? Ready to turn heads or is your body causing people to raise an eyebrow? LOL

Alisa

There’s a reason they call it a WORKout!

I’ve been gone and few days and I MISSED BodySpace. I missed hanging out online with my internet friends, reading blogs, checking out progress pictures and seeing how pumped up people are getting over at the Do Work Crew. I logged in yesterday but didn’t have much time to hang out or even write a blog. So I’m glad to have my normal routine getting back on track. And that includes my gym workout.

I spent the weekend with my family visiting my grandfather.  He turned 89 years old last week and is recovering from pneumonia. He is actually in great shape for his age. Using a riding lawnmower he cuts his own grass (he has five acres of land), he goes for walks, and he goes to his social meetings. His mother lived to be 101 so we expect him to be around a while. He even has outlived my grandmother.

Where I stayed had a fitness room and of course once I checked into my room that was the FIRST place I checked out. It was 11:00 at night and I’m peeking my head into the fitness room to see what I would be working with over the weekend.  I knew I wasn’t working out that night but I couldn’t wait to see the equipment! It had an "all in one" set up. Basically all the weights, cables, and seats were all connected. Interesting contraption. Got up on Saturday morning and hit the fitness room. The bench press part of the machine was interesting. I laid on a bench under some wide spaced handle bars which was attached to weight plates and pulleys and I just pushed up. I could move the bench to change where on my chest the movement would hit.  I also did leg extensions and leg presses. The seats where also attached to weight plates and pulleys. Separately, there was a bench that could be raised and lowered for sit ups. They also had a knee raise and dip stand. No dumbbells though. My workouts were rounded off with a treadmill and a bike. I worked out on Saturday and Sunday.

My family is from the coast of South Carolina (yea I’m a Geechee gurl) so we spent Saturday evening and Sunday afternoon in Savannah down on the Riverfront. They had a Jazz festival going and I had a bunch of fun. Sunday we ate at a Louisiana style restuarant called Huey’s down on the Riverfront. And that my friends was the time clean eating went out the window. I’m with my family, we’re eating on the riverfront, great music going on, lots of people walking and sight seeing. I was lulled away from responsible eating!  Especially when my sister and I both decided to share some beignets. For those who do not know this is sweet dough which is fried and covered in powdered sugar. Yes dear ones I had stepped outside the safety of clean eating and entered the vicious world of flour, sugar and fried. I did regain my senses the rest of the day and hit the treadmill with a vengeance last night!

Glad to be back on my normal schedule and at my gym. But the craziness is never too far away. I was just reading a review of a back sculpting workout video and the reviewer said "I used 8 and 5 pound weights and it kicked my butt!". WTH???  I instantly opened up a new browser window and logged into BodyBuilding.com. Ahh glad to be back to my internet home.

Alisa
There is a reason it’s called a WORKout.

I feel it all in my feet. I feel it all over me, and I feels good…..

Humming the song "Feels Good" by Tony! Tonei! Tone! from back in the day.

That’s how I felt when I left the gym. No longer tired or frustrated or blah. Just felt GOOD. Nothing like a good WORKout to get you back on track and make life look all rosy again. Ahhh my gym. My sanctuary. The place where I go to physically and mentally heal has cured me of my gym withdrawal symptoms.

Hit my biceps, my triceps, my abs, my shoulders, and did an hour of cardio turning that last 15 minutes from a power walk to a jog and up my heart rate from my normal 150 to 160. And you know what?

IT FEELS GOOD.

ROFL……now I have to go do laundry, wash hair, pack and clean up for my trip tomorrow. But it’s all good because of why?

I feel GOOD.

Alisa
Proud member of the Do Work Crew!

I’m sleepy. Not tired. SLEEPY.

Monday and Tuesday I was not feeling great at all and had zero energy and I also didn’t sleep very well. Plus I didn’t make it to the gym either night. There are two days a month I never go to the gym and Monday and Tuesday happened to be those two days.    Last night was my dad’s birthday and we went out to dinner and it was 10:30 p.m. before I got home. No gym last night either. So I’m feeling very BLAH. Like physically just BLAH.  No gym in three days. I’m having gym withdrawals.

Tomorrow afternoon I’m leaving to go out of town and I’m taking half a day off from work. I’m going straight to my parents house after work to meet up with them therefore I will not even see my own house. Which means tonight after going to the gym to do biceps, triceps, abs and cardio I go home to do laundry, wash my hair, pack and clean up the house.

So I had a bright idea this morning. Why not take all of tomorrow off and give myself some extra time! So I mention to my boss that I wanted to take tomorrow off instead of the half day I had planned. My boss started asking me about why and I did what sleepy people tend to do. Start running off at the mouth trying to explain things. So here I am trying to explain why tonight I don’t have time to pack to get ready to leave out of town and why I wanted to do all of this tomorrow morning (instead of being at work.)

And my reason for why I don’t have time tonight therefore I need to take off ALL tomorrow from work? I haven’t been in the gym all week and I NEED to get to the gym tonight.

Cue the chirping crickets to go with my boss WTF did she just say to me stare.

I hate being sleepy. You don’t think straight. Hell, you just don’t think at all.

Needless to say I’m still working a half day tomorrow.

Tonight will be a long night. *sigh*

Alisa

This past Monday and Tuesday my energy level was at ZERO. Well maybe at level one since I was able to at least get myself up and go to work.  Every month the same thing. These two days are like a revolving bad dream that reoccur every 28 days. And the only thing I can do about it is throw some 500mg Tylenol at those days and just wait it out while my body just limps around.

Then those 48 hours DO pass and my energy level begins to rise and I’m no longer pissed at Eve for taking that fruit from Adam and cursing all of womankind to a couple of days of cramping hell. Ok…maybe you didn’t need to read all of that BUT the good news is today is Wednesday and my energy level is putting the pedal to the medal and revving up that motivation engine.

And I need some motivation to get me through this week that will be a good week but will alter my workout schedule a lot. Today is my dad’s birthday which means dinner tonight. I really want to go home after dinner and do the chores that need to be done. But I’m making my way to the gym and doing cardio since I haven’t seen my gym since Sunday. Thursday I’ll be in the gym on full throttle. Friday is up in the air as I’m going out of town this weekend with family to visit my grandfather (he’s 89 years old and I’m glad to still have him around) and I’m not sure if we are leaving Friday night or Saturday morning. I know that where we are staying has a fitness room but you never know if equipment works when you visit places until you get there. But as long as they have a bench and dumbbells I can still work chest and back. I’ll just jog outside for cardio if their cardio equipment doesn’t work. I’ll make do.

My goal this week is to make as much progress on my training as possible, eat as clean as possible (always a challenge when going out of town) and to enjoy my family.

But when my feet land back into Atlanta on Sunday. Ohhh baby. Me and the gym. It’s on.

Alisa

Do your work!

I am constantly looking for ways to motivate myself. Mainly because I’m so darn easily distracted and I can get off track pretty soon after getting on track. So off to the magazine rack I went looking for serious fitness publications.

Finding serious male fitness publications is as easy as counting. Finding serious female fitness publications is as hard as calculus.  Why is that? When I say serious it doesn’t have to be "She-Hulk Weekly". Just something more inspiring than articles about how to get flat abs using an elastic tension bar made out of pantyhose. Or something else just as bizarre.

So far I’ve found Muscle and Fitness Hers.  The ladies in this publication hit the weight area of their gym and it shows as they have athletic figures. I’ve been reading that for months now.

So I’m searching to see what else may be on the rack. I flip through a few magazines and see the tale tale signs of a non-serious female fitness magazine. 1) pink dumbbells. 2) blue, purple, orange or any other odd color dumbbells. 3) the model demonstrating the exercise has skinny arms 4) lots of exercises done with gadgets. But I did read an interesting blurb that said the average female can bench press 64lbs. That’s a bar with a 10lb weight per side. I’ll buy into that. So I didn’t find much of what I was looking for.

What I did find was a magazine called Clean Eating. I did a double take. Clean Eating? Maybe I’m reading into the title what I want to read not what it really means. Because can this really be a magazine about the type of clean eating I’m thinking about? I’m intrigued. I start reading. Hmmm a recipe for oatmeal and banana pancakes. An article titled "Not So Sweet: High Fructose Corn Syrup and Exercise Guidelines for Fat Loss Explained".  A recipe for Clean Mac’n'Cheese. An article on how to make your own homemade frozen meals. And this is what sold me on the magazine as a serious publication. A picture of a contributing editor flexing her bicep and I can see the darn thing.  Well look a here. A food magazine for fitness people. I happily paid six dollars for it.

Here’s the online link. Clean Eating Magazine

Alisa

I surf BodySpace often looking to be inspired by the stories of those who have transformed their bodies. Every body has a story because everybody has a starting "body". That body they had when they began their bodybuilding journey. For some people it was an obese body. For others it was the skinny body. And for the few it was an already built body. No mater what body they started with everyone’s goal is the same. To make it better.

What I have discovered through reading lots of profiles and comments on people’s progress pictures and from looking at how people carry themselves from their first progress picture to their current is a transformation in self image. For some people the look on their faces and how they posture themselves in their photos is night and day from their first progress picture to the current. Amazing the confidence they project. Even if they still have some obvious weight left to loose they carry themselves stronger. You can take a person who started out at 250lbs and is currently 200lbs and they have a stronger looking self image than someone who just started their fitness journey at 200lbs. They both weight the same but the one who has been working on their fitness long enough to loose 50lbs just looks more confident.

At least that’s how I see it.

I’ve noticed the same thing in myself.  I carry myself with more confidence. My stride is stronger due to my workouts. I can "walk that walk". (Go glutes and hamstrings!!).  And it shows.

Yesterday I was going to the grocery store. It was raining and I was crossing the parking lot about to go into the store when a car that was waiting for me to walk through the pedestrian crossing honked their horn. All I was thinking is that "I’m trying to hurry to get out this rain and they must be very impatient right now".  So as I step onto the sidewalk I look back at the car and instead of seeing an upset driver I see two GROWN men…no youngins…grown men (the passenger and the driver leaning WAY over to get his face out the passenger window) grinning at me like I was steak dinner with a free order of fries AND coke. I thought it must have been the walk. It’s raining, dark outside, and I’m wearing some drawstring gym pants with a tee shirt, with my hair wrapped up in a bandanna. (I just left the gym).  What else could they be grinning about.  All I could do was laugh. Because when you’re 39 years old its nice to be honked at because folks like what they seeing not because you are in their way.

I like my confidence level. I like my change in thinking these days.

Alisa

I saw two things today in the weight area that just made me stop my workout cold for a few moments.

Person #1.

This lady was curling an ez bar and then she just broke out in a dance move…with the bar in hand. She started pushing her shoulders up and down real quick and then started rolling her body around from the waist in a circle. I’ve seen that dance move before and at first I just thought I know she’s not doing what I think she is doing. Then the guy she was with who was standing in front of her did the same thing.  And they where smiling and getting their dance on. But she was doing that while holding the ez bar?????? Yeaaaa they really did that. Obviously she was not focused on her workout or her form.

Person #2

This guy did something I have NEVER seen in the gym.  So he’s benching 135.( A 45 plate per side for those who don’t want to do the math.) Then he just breaks out in sit ups WHILE HOLDING THE BAR TO HIS CHEST. I was like WTH.  I didn’t know if I should be impressed, astonished, or stunned.  What was that? Plated barbell sit ups?  I go to the gym all the time and I’ve never seen that before.

Alisa

I work my abs 5 days a week. I do 8 sets of machine ab crunches to finish off what ever weight training I am doing that day.  I decided earlier this week in addition I would make Thursdays ab day since on Thursdays I was only doing cardio. So today was my first day making an extended ab training. Hence the rare "stats" post on my blog LOL. Just wanted to share my stats for my first day at this.

Instead of doing 8 sets of abs I did 20 sets.

12 sets were machine ab crunches with 8 of those at 145lbs and the last 4 at 110lbs.

4 sets were knee hip raises (which was new for me) and the reps were 12,8,8,8

4 sets were good old fashioned sit ups. The reps were 20,15,12,10.

I feel my abs right now. They are slightly sore. I’ll see what they feel like in the morning. But I definitely feel them more than the other days in the gym.

I want flat beautiful abs.  So I’m going to work them extra hard on Thursdays.

I also did 20 minutes of cardio on the upright stationary bike. I thought the stationary upright bike would not be that hard but can you say hamstrings?  And I do leg curls on leg day. Just proved that its a good thing to do cardio on different equipment during the week. You really do work different muscles and over all after a week you get varied cardio.

Alisa

I’m trying. I’m oh soooo trying but that’s 16….count SIXTEEN 8oz cups of water a day!

I’m tired of peeing. I drink therefore I pee. Sounds slightly Zen.

I love water and that’s the only beverage I drink. I just wasn’t drinking a gallon of it a day. So I thought upping my water intake would be easy since I’m used to drinking nothing but water anyways. So even when I’m not thirsty or hungry I try to drink water. I have to to drink a gallon of this a day. Right?

I keep my water bottle in front of my office keyboard so its always in front of my face. It just sits there. Clear and bottled. Just sits there. And I drink. And I drink.

I’ve even starting marking notches on the bottle for every whole bottle I drink to show how much I drunk. By the end of my work day I’ve made three notches. At 19 oz a bottle that’s seven 8 oz glasses. Nine more 8 ozs to go. The gym and post gym water intake is another three 8oz cups. Six more 8ozs before I go to bed?

Never happens. So I need to drink more water at work.

I keep hearing the magical benefits of a gallon of water a day. I’ll do it! I will be a proud member of the one gallon a day club.

Maybe I should start a BodySpace group.

Alisa