Kickboxing Chic’s BodyBlog

I had mixed emotions about today’s planned workout. It was primarily a leg workout. I did it last week for the first time. And while it was challenging, I felt so good afterwards. So I was excited to do it again. However, the 3 leg exercises involved were far from my favorites. I admit I procrastinated a bit, but eventually got my ass down to my home gym by 6:00am.

After a 10 minute warm-up on my elliptical, the first exercise up was triangle lunges. I noted that I used 25 lb DBs last week for this one, but that seemed too much this morning. If I used them last week, that means I could do 10 reps/side with them again this week. These lunges have 3 parts to each rep – 1 forward lunge, 1 angle lunge, and 1 side lunge. So 10 reps really = 30 lunges. Needless to say, it takes a while to complete 1 set. Sometimes I lose count (was I on 6 or 7??), and if I do the consequence is defaulting to the lower number. If I want to avoid doing extra reps, then I’d better pay attention! Never works… I still don’t keep track very well.

Moving on to the second exercise in this superset – stability ball push-ups with feet on the ball. The target is 20 push-ups with my feet on the ball. I’m getting in position and see the dried sweat drops from yesterday’s workout… another good but tough one. As I easily do 20 good reps, I’m reminded of why I drag my ass down to the garage every morning by 6:00am. And as I gaze down at my abs and see my sixer showing through clear as day, I’m reminded of why I eat what I eat day after day.

Next up is 1-leg DB deadlifts. I love doing deadlifts with both legs and a BB! But I’m not as excited about this 1-leg DB version. I don’t have a BB, plates, or rack in my home gym, so this is the only challenging option. My balance is good if I can focus and establish a good cadence. Otherwise my balance sucks and the reps are not to my satisfaction. So if I lose my balance, I start that rep over and do it right. I remind myself how good these feel AFTERWARDS.

The second part of this superset is dips w/ my hands on the bench and feet on the stability ball. But of my somewhat OCD ways, I have to do the number of reps I put down in my plan. I put down 20, but could do more. So instead of doing more than 20, I count #18 and #19 twice. In my third set of these, after 5 reps I decided that my feet weren’t out far enough. So I adjusted and started over.

Now I’m onto the last leg exercise and it is the one I dread the most – pistol squats. Last week I was able to do 15/side. This week I was able to do 16-17! Not only was I able to do more, I’m getting better at them from a balance and form perspective. Maybe I’m starting to like these after all!

The pistol squats were followed by stability ball push-ups with my hands on the ball this time. I’m sticking with the 20 rep trend on these too. I don’t count a rep unless my chest touches the ball. I have rules for everything in my life.

Last superset is stability ball roll-outs and elevated side plank reps (side plank position w/ feet elevated on a step and I’m dipping my hips down for 15 reps/side). I can still only manage 15 reps on the SB roll-outs, but I remind myself that I’m rolling out further each time and holding it longer before rolling the ball back towards me. So I’m increasing the difficult of the exercise. As I catch a glimpse of myself in the shiny part of my car’s bumper, I notice how long, straight, lean my body is. Another sign of good form and difficulty level.

I’ve been at it for 64 minutes at this point. I really need to get my son up and ready for school. But what’s 5 more minutes? So I jump on my elliptical and do a final set of elliptical sprints. I don’t bother looking at my stop watch to see when the 45 second sprint portion is up, or at the light indicating I’m at my target level. I know by now about how long 45 seconds is, and I know how hard I need to be working to hit that upper number. So I stare straight ahead and just go for it. When I think it’s been about 45 seconds, then I glance down and notice 48 seconds had gone by. That means only a 12 second recovery before I kick it into gear again.

70 minutes later… mission completed and I remember why it is all worth it!

I think I like creating my weekly training plan and designing each specific workout just as much as I enjoy doing them. After getting the kids to bed last night, I sat on the couch to complete my final task for the day, which was putting together my fitness plan for the week.

Training Plan
Monday: Recovery/Rebuild and Plan/Prep Day (I’ve renamed the second “R” in my day off “Rebuild” instead of “Rest” because that’s truly what’s going on.)

Tuesday: Strength Training – Delts and Legs

Wednesday: Indoor Cycling

Thursday: Metabolic Circuit, 2^nd Edition

Friday: Strength Training – Chest, Triceps, Legs, Core

Saturday: Boot Camp/Day Of (sorta)

Sunday: Metabolic Circuit, 2^nd Edition

Monday ended up being my R/R day because I had so much to do. I decided to get my chores/errands done so I could focus on training and other fitness stuff the rest of the week.  Besides, I hadn’t taken a day off since the previous Tuesday… I was due.

Today’s strength training workout was really good. My delts were fried! And there was a little core bonus involved with the exercises I picked. It took me 80 minutes to complete the workout, but it was worth it because I accomplished a lot.

I usually do Indoor Cycling on Friday. But Wednesday just fit better with my schedule. It is the same instructor so should be a killer class.

I had been doing the same Metabolic Circuit for 2 weeks, so it is time for a new one. I’m excited to give this new one (2^nd Edition) a try on Thursday.

Nutrition Plan
No major events or activities to plan for this week. However, I decided to count my lunch out at this Asian Bistro as one of my four deviations for the week.

My 10% or 4 nutrition “rule” deviations for this week are:

1. Sushi/Bento Box Lunch – I decided to count this because of the white rice involved. Although, the meal was super healthy and the white rice portion was 1 cup or less.

2. Weekend wine consumption – 1-2 glasses on Saturday. With so much good wine out there, it is a weekly must-have in my nutrition plan. I’m a red wine girl, so at least it is heart-healthy.

3. Friday’s Hispanic pastry

4. TBD – I have a couple more eating out things this week that may consume the 4^th. I not, pizza on Saturday. It will be a healthy version on a whole wheat crust or pita, but still does not follow my starch carb rule.

An update on my calories… I think I’ve figured out the right calorie level to support my training and daily activities. But I think I’m going to play around with it a bit and plan my caloric intake in accordance with my activity level for that day or preparing for the next. For example, eating more after a strength training workout and a bit less before indoor cycling. It will just be a little experiment.

Random Nutrition Thoughts
 

Just wanted to share some random thoughts I’ve had the past couple days regarding my nutrition:

1. Bye-bye cottage cheese.  I’ve sadly discovered that cottage cheese is pretty high in sodium. Depending on the fat % and brand, it has 380-480 mg per serving! That’s a lot! I’ve cut back on cottage cheese and have noticed more muscle definition; I wonder if the sodium was bloating me since most everything else I eat is low sodium. Anyway, it was sad to see so much sodium in one of my favorite “fitness” foods. At least Safeway sells a “no salt added” cottage cheese. I’ll be making special trips to Safeway to get some every once in a while.

2. I’ll eat any lean, high protein source, even if the taste is not very appealing. A big pet-peeve I have related to my husband is he takes meat from his friends who hunt but lets it sit in the freezer FOREVER. The recent incident of this is with venison. We’ve had some venison steaks, venison sausage, and ground venison in our freezer for a good year or longer. So I took the venison steaks out so he could grill them and eat them up. I am not a fan of venison so had grilled chicken instead that night. However, I was curious about the fat and protein in venison. When I learned the venison steaks were lean and really high in protein… guess who ended up eating the leftover steak??? I sliced it up and put it on my salad… not bad when mixed in with a veggie-packed salad.

3. Training days = good nutrition days. I seem to be more motivated to follow my nutrition rules on the days I train. Not sure why. I just noticed the past couple days that my will-power and motivation weakens on my days off from training or light training days. Wonder if anyone else experiences the same thing.

Sorry this is so long… just had a lot to ramble on about today. More later in the week to share how my new Metabolic Circuit worked out.

While I’m fully aware of the importance the role nutrition plans in one’s training program, it has really smacked me in the face lately. My extreme levels of fatigue and exhaustion the past couple months are not so much due to lack of restful sleep as they are my nutrition. I’ve come to realize that I’ve literally been living off fumes since I started training again after my daughter was born. While I’m eating very healthy, my caloric intake has not been enough to fuel my current lifestyle. For starters, breastfeeding burns about 500 calories a day. My second baby is a good eater (better than my first), so I can’t assume the same calorie needs as my first baby. Secondly, the way I train results in high metabolic rates both during and after exercise. So my caloric burn from training is probably pretty high when you look at it throughout the day. Lastly, my daily activities are far from sedentary. Since I have been off work (not sitting at a computer for a good part of the day) and spend most of my day keeping up with family needs, my caloric burn from daily activities is higher than normal. My daily caloric intake has been what I consider “normal” for me. But what I’ve come to realize is with my current lifestyle, I have a new “normal”.

So if I want to keep up the same training regimen and be able to breastfeed my baby until 6 months or so, then I need to increase my caloric intake.  Here’s my plan to do that:

·         I’ll increase it slowly, little by little until I find the right balance to fuel my daily activities and still maintain my lean, fit self. Today I’ll shoot for 1750. When I start feeling less fatigued/exhausted, then I’ll know what’s a good calorie level for me.

·         I’ll stick with my current nutrition plan. I’ll just be eating more of what I’m currently eating, especially protein.

·         Don’t be afraid of food… as long as they are good choices.

While this nothing new for me and I preach it to others, finding the right nutritional needs for me personally all came together for me the past few days. What really sealed the deal for me was this morning’s workout. At 8:00pm last night, I didn’t hit the calorie mark I wanted to for the day. So I had a 6^th meal of primarily protein. A 6^th meal is not something I normally do. As a result, I had a decent night sleep and felt really good during my workout this morning. In fact, I hit some new highs in some of the exercises in my current metabolic circuit! Granted, I popped a marshmallow Peep just before I started, which probably helped a bit. But I think it was the additional calories the night before that set me up well for my workout this morning.

 I’ve come to realize my metabolism is higher than I thought, and no “dah”… look at what I need to fuel on a daily basis! All this is good learning and has taught ME a lot about ME. You can use the latest fad diets or try to follow exactly what someone else is doing. But in the end, they may not work for you. You need address your own lifestyle and do lots of reflecting to recognize what works for you.

Going forward, I’ll be keeping my fuel tank at least half full… no more surviving on fumes.

I did my body fat today and I was shocked at how low it is! While it may not be totally accurate because I had a non-professional do the pinching (although she knows the process after having done a figure competition in the recent past), it is still a good enough estimate for me. The final result came in at 12.24%! Even if I assumed a 2% error and rounded up to 14%, that is considerably lower than I was expecting. I wanted to come home and chow down after that! Actually, it was good motivation to keep up what I am doing. With that, here’s my plan for the week:

Training
Monday: Metabolic Circuit

Tuesday: Rest/Recovery day

Wednesday: Strength Training

Thursday: Metabolic Circuit

Friday: Indoor Cycling

Saturday: Strength Training

Sunday: Boot Camp/Rest & Recovery day

While my metabolic circuit reps are not increasing much, my rest periods are decreasing.

Nutrition
Sticking with my same “rules” from last week that must be adhered to 90% of the time. My 10% deviation from the rules for this week are:

1. Friday/Saturday night wine (2-3 glasses total)

2. Friday’s Hispanic pastry

3. Saturday night pizza (a healthy version but still not in line with my rules)

4. TBD

It hasn’t been quite 2 weeks since I implemented my nutrition “rules” approach with the goal of adhering to them 90% of the time, and all ready the results are coming in. I weighted myself yesterday and today (for a sanity check), and I’m down 3 pounds. My scale shows me at 119.6, but I rounded up to 120. I’ve changed up my training a bit, but nothing drastically different. So I’ve got to believe it is the tweaks to my eating. With my different approach to nutrition, I’ve really cut out the mindless snacking while preparing meals. It was never anything major – still healthy foods for the most part and nothing in significant quantities. But I’ve learned that it can add up and make a different. So now, I’ll just get out a handful of carrots or celery sticks to nosh on while preparing dinner. I think addressing this issue alone resulted in the loss of those 3 pounds and a leaner me. I plan to take a pic this weekend to show it… before Easter dinner though.

On a training note… after yesterday’s strength training workout followed by a metabolic circuit for today’s workout, I’m feeling good, but ready for a couple low key days. My DOMS and muscle fatigue are at good levels today… not too much but definitely there. Tomorrow I’ll hit the indoor cycling class just because it may be my last one for a while. Then Saturday is boot camp and I’m trying to focus more on the instruction and pushing my participants to work hard. I should be ready for a grueling Easter Sunday strength training workout by then.

And I’m very proud to say that I haven’t had any marshmallow Peeps yet this Easter season! But Easter hasn’t come and gone yet… the Easter Bunny may just leave some. And unfortunately, my son and husband do not like them and my daughter is too little for them.

Yesterday’s decision to take an unplanned rest day was a good call. Taking yesterday as a day to re-group has me feeling much better today, both physically and psychologically. I had a much better night’s sleep last night too. Miraculously, my 11 week old daughter slept through the night. I got her up at 5:00am to feed her because my left boob was about to burst. After that… workout time! I need another week of nights like that to be feeling 80% (a level I can live with). I was planning to get up at 5:00am to train anyway, so my day was off to a better start than I had even planned.

The only minor glitch in today’s plan was with my workout itself. I did a metabolic circuit (my new favorite thing). It was a little too much. It took me 80 minutes to complete, and I was jammin’ through it. Because it took that long, it was probably physically too much as well. It was a great workout overall; I just need to scale it back a bit.

I’ve finalized my planned diet deviations for this week. The first of which happened yesterday. My husband and I went out to lunch (Mexican). I made the best possible choices, but it still didn’t align with my rules. The time was more about our relationship, which is more important than any diet rule. Aside from the 12 hours he was home Thursday night to Friday morning between his two trips, I hadn’t seen him in a week. So well worth breaking the rules.

My “finalized” planned deviations for the week (10%):

1. (Friday) A Hispanic pastry during my Friday trip to the local grocery store. I will only have this if they have my favorite one.

2. (Friday/Saturday) Wine Friday and Saturday nights, 1-2 glasses each night. I’ve learned that if I have any more than 2 glasses, it screws up my sleep. So I will definitely be sticking to the limit here.

3. (Sunday) Easter dinner – Not sure what’s on the menu, but I’m sure it won’t be according to my rules. However, I’m going to stick with the healthier options as much as possible. Dinner is with my family so I know it won’t be too bad. Plus, I’ll be contributing to the menu and my contributions will be healthy options that are within my rules.

4. (Monday) Lunch at Jalisco’s Mexican restaurant with my husband.

One more final exciting note about today… the ad for my favorite ghetto grocery store comes in today’s mail. The grocery store is nothing fancy and in many ways caters to lower income clientele. HOWEVER, their produce is awesome and the prices unbelievable. They don’t carry the biggest selection of lean meats, but flank steak is usually a great deal. This is the same grocery store I get my weekly Hispanic pastry treat. So when the mail man comes today, I will be “sprinting” out there to see what’s on sale this week.

After a week of running solo as a parent and crappy sleep, I’ve reach a point of physical exhaustion. As much as I want to do my strength training workout today (delts… my favorite!), I need to have a day of rest. It frustrates me and pisses me off when I get to this state because I can’t execute my plan as I had planned it. I’m the type that MUST stick to my plan in order to feel successful. If I have unplanned deviations, I get frustrated and mad. But today is one of those days I need to be flexible and be OK with it. I know if I gave it a go, it would be a mediocre workout and I’d be even more frustrated and pissed off. Then I’d be in a bitchy mood all day, which is not good for my relationship with my kids or husband (who just got back after being gone for a week). This has happened many times before. So today I will focus on the other aspects of my fitness plan: rest/recovery, nutrition, and planning out a solid training plan for the week.

Since my 11 week old daughter was up at 5:15am and my 4 year old at 6:30am today, I at least had some time to think about my plan at a high level.

Training
Monday: Rest/Recovery and Planning/Prep Day; light activity (going for a walk or something)

Tuesday: Strength Training and HIIT Cardio

Wednesday: Metabolic Circuit Training

Thursday: Strength Training

Friday: Indoor Cycling Class

Saturday: Boot Camp/Semi-Rest Day

Sunday: Metabolic Circuit

I like to have a rest day planned in the middle somewhere. But since today is a full rest day, hopefully I’ll be better prepared physically to handle Tuesday – Thursday. I won’t go too crazy during indoor cycling and will focus more on the “instructing” part of boot camp instead of the “doing” part. Hopefully I can catch up on some sleep too… it has to!

Nutrition
After evaluating my new nutrition “rules” last week, I’ve made some tweaks. My body needs more starch carbs and less vegetables. I’m too bloated and hungry with only 2 starch carbs servings per day. I’ll add another half serving of starch carbs and less veggies and see how that goes this week. So I’ve really only changed rule #3 and clarified rule #2 with the types of protein.

My rules to follow 90% of the time:

Rule #1: Eat every 2.5-3 hours. This equals 3 meals and 2 snacks per day.

Rule #2: All meals need 20-25 grams of protein and fruit or veggies. I will have fruit with my snacks and veggies with my meals. Protein needs to come from lean meats, fish, and low fat dairy.

Rule #3: Starch carbs 2.5 times per day. One of which must be post-workout. Starch carbs are limited to oatmeal, yams, and brown rice.

Rule #4: Drink bodyweight in ounces of water. Right now that’s about 125 ounces/day. This includes a big mug of green or peppermint tea which I have on a daily basis.

Rule #5: Take a multi-vitamin and Omega-3 fish oil.

My planned deviations for the week (10%):

1. A Hispanic pastry during my Friday trip to the local grocery store. I will only have this if they have my favorite one.

2. Wine Friday and Saturday nights, 1-2 glasses each night. I’ve learned that if I have any more than 2 glasses, it screws up my sleep. So I will definitely be sticking to the limit here.

3. Easter dinner – Not sure what’s on the menu, but I’m sure it won’t be according to my rules. However, I’m going to stick with the healthier options as much as possible. Dinner is with my family so I know it won’t be too bad. Plus, I’ll be contributing to the menu and my contributions will be healthy options that are within my rules.

4. TBD – I’m having dinner out with a friend and her kids this week, so that may be my 4^th. Or maybe something if my husband and I go out today.

The one thing I’m going to really try not to do is have Easter candy. So far I’ve been successful with this. Especially since I love those damn marshmallow Peeps! Thankfully I can only tolerate 1-2 at a time.

Ok, I’m done with my Pitty Party about not being physically prepared to workout today. I know rest/recovery is the smarter move today. I learned that last Saturday, when I should have rested, and other times in the past when a rest day made all the different. I’ll check back in tomorrow or Wednesday.

I changed my training plan for this week by swapping Wednesday and Thursday. The Metabolic Circuit I did on Tuesday beat me up pretty good, so I did the right thing and made Wednesday a rest/recovery day. I did about 20-25 minutes of stretching, which felt really good. So today was my second strength training workout of the week. Instead of a HIIT cardio session at the end, I decided to do 4 sets of each superset. I may be over-doing the cardio. My upper body was DEAD after today’s workout… I could barely hold the hair dryer to dry my hair! My arms should really be wiped by the end of the day after carrying around a baby all day. This is why moms have buff arms. Here’s a quick rundown of today’s workout:

After almost two weeks of an “abnormal” schedule, I’m back on track this week. The past two weeks also knocked my nutrition plan out of whack with various family and friend gatherings. Additionally, as I mentioned in my previous post, I’m no longer considering myself on the post-pregnancy come back track. I’m calling my new plan a “do over”. I’m incorporating some slightly different training methods along with a new approach to my diet. The training tweaks are not much different than how I normally train, but I’ve been doing some research and want to test out some stuff. My original nutrition plan was not bad and I stuck to it pretty well, but it wasn’t working with my breastfeeding commitment.  So here’s my “Do Over” plan:

Training
Monday: Strength training and HIIT cardio

Tuesday: Metabolic circuits for time

Wednesday: Strength training and HIIT Cardio

Thursday: Rest/recovery day

Friday: Indoor cycling – 1 hour class

Saturday: Metabolic circuits for time

Sunday: Boot camp (semi- rest/recovery day)

This week isn’t the ideal schedule because the indoor cycle class and boot camp are things I need to work around. I lead the boot camp and I’m going to focus more on instructing and motivating my “cadets” than doing the workout myself. However, one of my guiding principles is leading by example, which means I need to demonstrate the intensity I want them to do. For my strength training days, I do a mix of upper and lower body exercises (including core).

Nutrition
I’m simplifying my approach to nutrition by just creating 5 basic “rules” that I need to follow 90% of the time.  This means I’m allowing 4 planned deviations from the rules in a week. I realize these are nothing new and I already follow them for the most part. The change is focusing more on the “rules” and less on a specific meal plan. These rules should be pretty easy to follow since I’ve scaled back my grocery bill. I only buy the basics - produce, lean meats, low fat dairy, eggs, and whole grain items – no extras. I also minimize buying stuff from the middle of the store. Since I do have a husband and kids, I still buy cereal and a few snack items for them.

The rules are…

Rule #1: Eat every 2.5-3 hours. This equals 3 meals and 2 snacks per day.

Rule #2: All meals need 20-25 grams of protein and fruit or veggies. I will have fruit with my snacks and veggies with my meals.

Rule #3: Starch carbs twice per day. One of which must be post-workout. Starch carbs are limited to oatmeal, yams, and brown rice. I may open this up to Ezekiel bread seeing how things go the next two weeks.

Rule #4: Drink bodyweight in ounces of water. Right now that’s about 125 ounces/day. This includes a big mug of green or peppermint tea which I have on a daily basis.

Rule #5: Take a multi-vitamin and Omega-3 fish oil.

My planned deviations for this week…

1. A Hispanic pastry during my Friday trip to the local grocery store. I will only have this if they have my favorite one.

2. Wine Friday and Saturday nights, 1-2 glasses each night

3. Pita pizza night, usually Saturday

4. TBD – I don’t have one yet. I’m meeting a friend for a play date with our kids on Thursday. Afterwards we are going to take them to Red Robin for dinner. I’m hoping I can get something that fits with my nutrition rules. If not, then that will be my 4^th.

I plan to do some body comp measurements and pictures in two weeks to give me an evaluation period. I’m not shooting for any specific numbers… I just want to set a good baseline for further improvements and test out my plan and rules.

I can’t really say I’m in a post-pregnancy phase of training. I’m really back doing the style of training I enjoy and am known for. For the past couple weeks, I’ve created some very intense workouts that I admit are a bit on the insane side. Especially since my sleep is interupted every night for a diaper change and feeding. At least I’m only up once for 30 minutes and get 6.5-7 hours of sleep total. Not bad for a 9 week old baby. Despite all this goodness, I still need to make sure I’m getting adequate rest and not over-doing it. This is always my biggest challenge and toughest battle with myself. I am fully aware results do not come without proper rest. What makes this particularly challenging right now is the breastfeeding. I need to keep my caloric intake higher than I normally would to have a good milk supply for my daughter, and I’m hungry ALL THE TIME! Granted, most of what I eat is lean proteins, vegetables, fruits, healthy fats, and whole grains. But I’m still eating a lot and feel I need to workout to compensate for it. I know this is wrong, but it is still a mental conflict I have with myself. At least I’m aware of this, and at times am successful in taking time off or keeping my workout that day low key.

I had a good, hard workout today (see below). And here is my plan for the rest of the week for not over-doing it.

Today’s Workout

Warm-up: Elliptical, Prisoner squats, stick-ups, and push-ups - 10 minutes

Set 1: 4x thru

A) DB clean and press

B) Plyo-push-ups (on knees)

Set 2: 4x thru

A) DB tricep press lying on stability ball

B) Tricep push-ups w/ hands on a high bench and feet on stability ball

Set 3: 3x thru

A) Double curtsy squats

B) Outer thigh press w/ resistance band

Cardio Circuit: 3x thru

A) Jump rope, 100 basic jumps, 50 high knee jumps

B) Burpees x20

C) Jumping lunges w/ shoulder press (8 lb DBs) x10/side

D) Weighted jumping jacks (5 lb DB in each hand) x100

Friday

Indoor cycling class - 1 hour

I sweat a lot and get a good calorie burn, but it still is not as intense as my self-created workouts. I still enjoy a long, mindless cardio session once a week even though I’m much more of an interval, circuit style exerciser.

Saturday

Outdoor boot camp - 1 hour

I create and lead the workout, so it counts as a high intensity workout.

Sunday

Rest/recover and plan/prep day.

I enjoy sitting down, flipping through magazines and websites to come up with my workouts just as much as I enjoy doing them. So having a day to focus on creating my game plan for the week, is just as important to me as executing my game plan. Must have one full rest/recovery day per week to do that.