Don't Wanna, Not Gonna'!

After having a perfect delicious dinner of oven poached fish in garlic and lemon and a rainbow of vegetables, not to mention raspberries for dessert ( the point here is that I'm not suffering AT ALL) I sat down to watch Desperate Housewives and I wrestled with Inner Gollum telling me that Paleo was boring and that the best thing to eat would be a bowl of cereal or a piece of toast and honey or peanut butter crumpets...all glutenous problem foods for me.

However he was masquerading as someone else which made it initially difficult to see it was him - he was masquerading as my body, telling me that I "needed" comfort carbs. When I looked rather dispassionately at my food log, it told me that a) I was nowhere near malnourished (calories fine) b) I was nowhere near carb depleted (despite the myth that Paleo is low carb, my carb intake was 47% of total cals yesterday) and the kicker c) that I had only eaten dinner less than an hour ago.

Using cold hard facts, I was able to determine that my thoughts were simply phantom hunger cravings - in fact the real truth was that I'd been putting off watching a DVD that is part of the Bootcamp experience - I had been finding it hard to get it to work. I managed to set the DVD player up to make it work and I got to watching an interesting program from the History Channel about the "Seven Deadly Sins". The series goes through each "sin" from a historical perspective and this particular program was about gluttony - how it seemed like a "soft" sin but how in reality, it was one of the most dangerous. eg a person in hell - gets to choose to live with one of the sins as punishment, so thinking it would be the least harmful chooses gluttony. Gets drunk and accidentally kills someone..."living hell" . Take home message I got from that one was to keep life simple, treat every now and again with gratitude and that is not just for food - it's for everything.

In the end I chose to honour myself and not go for the very foods that seem to be causing me such odd reactions - and woke up feeling much better for it. I didn't have to say "wrong way d..head" to the scales this morning - just had to get up , do my workout and enjoy the busy day of clients I had.

Workout was "D" - "Do what you can!" - shoulder is playing up and there's some crappy movement going on in there so the strength training was more rehabilitative than hardcore but I'm OK with that. I am still jumping up on that stage although my delts may not be bulging as much as I'd like.

The Workout Confessional

For Shelley - weight today - 58.8kg (thank you, spank you as we discussed!) I'm going to send a blog weigh in to the wilderness for awhile so I would like to sit there and bask in my general hotness for today...kidding...but hey it sounded good and I am feeling pretty good about how the old bod is looking. I'm going for a little more weight nudgery in the downward direction but I could see the ol faithful lines in my legs as I was stepping today so all is nice.

I taught Bodystep this morning and even did some weights (more on this in a sec) - I must say that I am in a world of pain and DOMS today - my legs, my glutes, my calves, my abs are on fire but I loved dishing out every minute of the class yesterday right down to all the little dancy bells and whistles that you have the opportunity to add - I am also teaching on Saturday morning - may try for more choreo again..will see.

I labelled this post the workout confessional because lately I haven't trained my lower body at all - between RPM and STep I have been too scared to do any lower body training - yes, this chick hates leg DOMS! Although I am always banging on about the benefits of resistance training, I have been the cardio queen of late. I'm not sure what is on the cards training wise tomorrow - I have my general goals but usually wing it from day to day - see how the old legs are feeling - maybe it's time for an interval run...or maybe not!

back at it

Back in the saddle again today. I'm still feeling a little weary but that's probably because I did some smokin' intervals on the treadmill after my workout this morning!

Workout today:

Warm up: 20 mins running (5.15min km av HR 130)

Chest/Biceps including BOSU work (I'm teaching Core tomorrow)

Running: HIIT intervals 14.5km/hr 30 seconds, 10 km/hr 30 seconds x 20. Ouch :)

This afternoon, I am going to spend going over my notes and preparing for the Core program which I teach tomorrow. I think I've mentioned it before, but it's deceptively tough.

Thanks to everyone for their well wishes for a speedy recovery - those wishes definitely worked!

BOSU madness!

Today's workout involved a mixture of traditional strength training and BOSU work, as per the course work we have for the "Core" program.

My workout went like this:

Warm up: rower

Prefatigue quad workout: leg extensions, then squats as a superset...ouch!

Prefatigue chest workout: flyes then incline bench press as a superset, double ouch! Teamed with BOSU plank pushups, triple ouch!

Bicep workout: Barbell curls followed up by hammer curls.

Then 5 minutes on the bike - Tabata intervals (puke worthy ouch!)

BOSU hamstring/glute work (feel the burn)

5 minutes Tabata intervals (double puke worthy ouch)

BOSU hamstring/glute work (variations)

10 mins escalating intensity on elliptical

BOSU abdominal work

10 minute steady state elliptical (I was running out of gas by this stage and it was all I could muster)

BOSU back extension work.

Thoracic BOSU stretch (aaaahhhhh!)

It was higgeldy piggeldy, but it was quite a workout!

I had energy to burn I guess as we went out for tapas last night and I indulged in some lemon tart for dessert. I haven't had this for yonks and enjoyed every mouthful.

We are now off to take the girls bowling. Should be fun!

Training the pretty little muscles!

Today I trained what I call the "pretty little muscles" - biceps and triceps - with me doing so many compound moves these days, it's probably not really all that necessary to train them! However I have April in my mind as the next time I compete and I'm throwing in these exercises for that reason. Many of the exercises bodybuilders do aren't dreadfully functional (and this includes some of the training I do when I am prepping) and I am at the moment really enjoying getting back to basics with squats, deadlifts, pull ups and the like. I am planning two more break in workouts and then I'm going to work on both pure strength and hypertrophy for 12-16 weeks.

Cardio wise, I am having the time of my life teaching RPM and Bodystep! I have been monitoring my heart rate with my F11 and I found myself almost fully recovered early into Track 4 and today I went for a run and was running under 5 and a half minute ks at only 70% max. Which makes me think that the old gal still has some speed left in her1 I am sure I have mentioned it before but I would love to beat my best 5k time of 21.25 again. I haven't been anywhere near that for years! Decisions, decisions! I could, of course wake up in a few weeks and run the Gold Coast Half Marathon - will have to see what everyone is up to. It wouldn't be my best running effort, but the social part would make up for that!

I am so proud of myself

I am so proud of myself because I have worked out (and almost prepped!) an entire week of meals and workouts. Anyone who knows me well tends to also know that I fly by the seat of my pants with this sort of thing and it actually makes me feel uncomfortable. I feel really good about organizing the week ahead and I'm hoping that it cuts down on that dreaded anxiety of "what the hell is for dinner?" I was feeling despondent last night that I wasn't organized enough and I made a small list to get through today. I'm pleased to say that I've nearly achieved all of it! I guess the secret is in not writing a huge list and being pleased with small accomplishments.

Workout wise, I'm going to do the "Break In" program of the "New Rules of Lifting". I am hoping that the Room of Requirement will be open as the building is for sale and I'm hoping to be able to use it this week. If not, I am sure that I can substitute my exercises around and find a happy medium. I'm going to rest Bodymax 2 this week and try some other Cathe's again.

No exercise today as Miss G is still a bit under the weather. I'm looking forward to tomorrow though!