My other workouts
So, I haven’t done a in-home workout for a while. Lately I have been wanting to get outside, or go to the gym. So This is what I have been doing for the past month. I have been meeting my future father in law at the gym, so we can have some bonding time.
We always start off with lift weights, we usual do chest and triceps, back and biceps, and legs and shoulders. We alway do around 20-30 mintues of cardio afterward to. So that is what I have been doing at the gym. Lately at the gym, I have been doing the Stair Machine or the elliptical. But I have also been wanting to run, but haven’t been able to because I have injured my knee again, the ground and pound is just to much. So I decided that I needed to start riding my mountain bike again. I didn’t go on any trails, but I did make a round trip of 16.2 miles, which is pretty good. I haven’t biked in a long time but it was definitely worth it, although my butt is hurting from the seat.
I hope to continue on update my workout site, so you can continue to read my progress. There are a lot of things I want to do. I would love to take another run at the Insanity workout, plus I would like to possibly do the Turbo Fire Workout one of these days. I have also been wanting to do the P90x workout again. I just have no idea which prder I want to do these workouts in. I know these workouts are great and they do work, but it is hard to do workouts everyday in front of a television.
I have also been trying to eat healthy again, my fiance is really trying to help me with that, because she is incredible at staying in shape and eating correctly.
Insanity Workout Review – Day 37 – Max Plyo
In my Shaun T Insanity workout today, I did the Max Interval Plyometrics workout and I’ve got to be honest…I struggled today. I do have a great excuse though, I blame….the cycle class I did yesterday evening. It was probably one of the toughest workouts I have ever done, even in the first five to ten minute I was dripping in sweat. By the end of the cycle class my shirt was so wet, I probably could have rung out my shirt.
Doing that class really made it difficult for me to do my workout today. I started off the workout with a killer headache, so I started drinking more water, eventually the headache went away. My legs were also tired, I was having a hard time getting my legs up. After I warmed up, my body started to feel better. I will not be doing anymore crazy workouts like that but once a week. I really liked the cycling class, it was a great challenge.
The Shaun T Insanity workout today was pretty tough, regardless of me being already tired. There were some very new workouts that I have not seen before, so it was a great learning experience. The Max Interval Plyometrics workout was about 55 minutes long, and the main workout starts around the 38 minute marker. The workout that challenged me the most was the level 3 drills. It is the last workout in the second interval section. You do 16 push ups and then sprint it out in a plank position, and then you do it again. Since you are already exhausted it makes it really tough to to this exercise 3 times.
There are two Interval sections in this Insanity workout, plus there is a five minute workout after the intervals are over. This is a great workout, and I am excited to see what type of results I am going to get.
I ate pretty well yesterday, but I did have some eggnog. I love eggnog, I am like an eggnog addict.
Power Cardio – Insanity Workout Review
Last night seemed to fly by, I still got around seven hours of sleep but the morning felt like it came so fast. Although the rest day was nice, sometimes it’s hard to get motivated again after you have a break, because the “rest day” is so nice you just want more of them. But I did my Insanity workout this morning and it went really well. I felt like this was the best I did so far in any Insanity workout. The Power Cardio and Resistance workout is a pretty intense workout…I mean, they all are…there is no really easy workout, but they are all tough in their own way. What do you expect though with a fitness program called Shaun T Insanity!
So in today’s Insanity workout, I really wanted to challenge myself to stay in the workouts as much as possible, take less breaks and more reps. I felt like I did better with that this time around on this power cardio and resistance workout. There were times when I want to take breaks but I decided to push through, even if I did take a break it was only for a few seconds. There are a lot of power moves in this workout, a lot of squats and moves where you need to focus on your core. There are also some wonderful push ups in this workout, so far this workout has the most upper body workouts. After all the circuits are done, there is one last exercise called 8 squats and 8 push ups (something like that). This is where you really have to push through, you are so tired from all the circuits, but this exercise really is important, because this is a great exercise. You want to push your body to failure, where it just cannot do anymore.
Today for my breakfast I had a Shakeology smoothie, I did two scoops of shakeology and blended it with water and ice. I actually really like starting my day off like this, because I make a couple cup fulls of this smoothie. It is pretty much all water, but it fills me up so much. For mid lunch today I will probably have a pita bread sandwich. I do not know what else I am going to have after that, but I what I will not have and that is a roast beef tortilla, those things give me so much gas it is ridiculous!!
Get Insanity Deluxe!
The ChaLean Extreme Fitness Routine
Let’s first just go over the basics. ChaLean Extreme is a 90 day workout, but you have the option of going 120 days. There are three main phases, the first phase is the Burn phase. In this phase you will lift weights so you can speed up your metabolism and break down any fat reserves. There are upper body and lower body workouts and most the time your are working them out at the same time. The second phase is called the Push Phase. There are different workouts and still weight lifting, but this time with heavier weights. Where in the burn phase you do a weight where you can get 10-12 reps, in the Push phase you use weights where you can only do 6-8 reps. It gets tougher, but you are still gaining muscle to burn away that fat. The third phase is called the Lean Phase. This is where you will really start to see the results, all that weight lifting and work you did in the first two months, lead you up to this point. You will do new workouts and exercises that will help melt those fat reserves right off your body. After this phase you can be done, but there is also another phase that you can chose to do called the Lean for life phase, it is an extra thirty days for anybody who really wants to push themselves. It is there as an option, so you can make the decision after the 90 days is over.
The great part about the Chalean Extreme workout and even the Px90 workout, is that they both focus on beating the workout plateau. The workout Plateau is when a person stops seeing results from their workout routine, your muscles adapt to your routine and even though you might be working harder, you still do not see results. But Chalean extreme addresses the problem, by continually switching up the routine every 30 days. The Chalean Extreme program also comes with a fitness guide and a nutrition guide, because eating is a huge part of the workout if you are going to see results or not. There are recipes for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and I am pretty sure there are some recipes for snacks. Chalean Extreme comes with a sculpting band and a body fat monitor, and if you get the deluxe version it comes with weighted gloves.
All this to say, the main goal is to build muscle so you can burn fat. Do not worry about bulking up though, because this program is designed for building lean muscle, not huge bulky muscles. The Chalean extreme program has a lot to live up to, because it says you can burn up to 60% of your body fat in three months….I guess they are right no matter what, because it do not promise 60% fat loss, but “up to” 60%. Anyways I am sure that if someone really took it seriously and did it by the book, then they can see great results from it and that is what I am going to try to do. My challenge is to see if this thing actually does work, so I will be sticking to a diet of my own and pushing myself to muscle failure. Let’s see how it goes.
Can You Do The Chalean Extreme Workout?
Here is an article that I wrote on my other blog, I thought that it would be helpful for anyone who was interested in the Chalean Extreme workout.
Before you begin your Chalean Extreme journey, it is important to know if you can even physically do the ChaLean Extreme workout. First you need to do the fitness test, to see if you are even in shape for the workouts. For the Fit test you will need a stopwatch, wall, towel, pen or pencil, comfortable clothes, water, 12 inch ruler and free weights ranging from 5 – 20 lbs. or resistance bands. There are eight parts to the Chalean extreme evaluation, you being with doing about 5 minutes of warm up. The warm up is crucial because it will help you to prevent injury that could happen. The warm up can including light jogging, jumping jacks, etc.
The first exercise you will do after the warm up are push ups. All you need to do, is complete as many push ups as you can do without a break, if you cannot perform a push up on your toes, than you can do the knee option. Just make sure that you keep good form, no butt in the air, flex your abs and butt, and do not lover your head. After you are done, mark how many push ups you did, whether on your toes or on your knees.
The 2nd exercise in the Chalean Extreme fit test is crunches, it is the same goal as push ups, do as many as possible. Lay on the ground with bent knees, with your hands behind your head, lift your shoulders off the ground until you come to a 45 degree angle. Perform as many as possible without having your shoulders hit the ground and make sure you do not pull on your head when you perform a crunch.
Thirdly, squats. Again, do as many as possible. Begin with your feet shoulder width apart and squat down like you are sitting in a chair. Keep your back straight and your knees bent, make sure your knees do not bend past your toes. To keep your balance, you might want to stick out your arms straight from your chest. Make sure your weight is focused on the back of your heels. Lastly so the Squats slowly.
The Fourth workout is the Forearm Plank, for this exercise you will need the stopwatch. To perform this workout , get in a push up position, but instead of being on your hands, lie down on your elbows with your forearms and hands faced forward on the ground. Start the timer and get into plank position, holding yourself up on your toes and your elbows, make sure you tighten your abs and butt. Go as long as possible and record your time.
Fifth, do an Overhead Shoulder Press. For this exercise you will need to do 10-12 reps with dumbbells or resistance bands. You will need to pick a weight so that by the 12th rep you can barely push it up, this is important because the Chalean Extreme program focuses on doing reps until your muscles pretty much fail. For the Overhead Press, stand with your feet shoulder width apart, knees slightly bent, and back straight. Hold the weights or the band handles in your hands so that they are just above shoulder height or resting on your shoulders, then push the weights up straight over you head and slowly back down.
The Sixth workout is a Bicep curl. You will need weights or bands for this exercise. Again you want to pick a weight heavy enough so you almost fail at the 12th rep. This is pretty simple, it is just a standard bicep curl. Stand with your feet shoulder width apart, and slightly bent knees. With your arms down and your elbows by the side of your body, lift up the weights and stop just before you get to your shoulders. Do not rush it! Count to 4 when you are curling up to meet your bicep, and then do a 4 count on the way down.
The last exercise is a Sit and Reach, you will need the ruler for this one. This is a flexibility test. Sit on the floor with your legs straight out in front of you. place the ruler vertically in between your legs, with the bottom of the ruler even with the bottom of your feet. Stretch three times with your hands stacked on each other. Record each stretch, if you reach past the ruler and your feet, than you meet the minimum requirements for the ChaLean Extreme workout.
Another Day With ChaLean Extreme
So today was the first day of my fourth week with Chalean Extreme Review. I did well, but I really have not gotten into a good flow like I would like to. So I either need to start taking it more seriously right now, or wait until Ben gets back so we can do this workout together, I have not really decided yet. I still have really enjoyed the workouts and I do believe that I really can get great results out of this workouts, but I have not been focused like I need to be. I also want to deliver good posts for all of you and actually show you my results.
Anyways, today’s workout went really well and I decided to switch back to my Monday through Friday workout routine, because the Tuesday thru Saturday routine did not work out. I feel like I am more focused if I start on Mondays and that I am more likely to do the workouts every day if I start at the beginning of the week. These workouts kind of baffle me a little bit, because I will be exercising and lifting weights and doing fine and then all of a sudden I will be sweating like crazy, it hits me quickly. The reason I feel like it is odd, is because when I lift weights normally at the gym, I never sweat. But I think because the Chalean extreme routine has you workout your legs with squats and lunges at the same time you are doing your upper-body workouts, it makes you sweat more. I really enjoy it, and I know that if I am sweating then I am getting a good workout. Tomorrow for my Chalean Extreme workout, I will be doing the Burn Circuit 2 session.
I also have a Softball game tonight, and we had a tournament last Saturday. At the tournament WE LOST ALL THREE GAMES!!! I really hate losing, I am not used to it, none of us on the team are, but for some reason we have just not completely clicked yet. I bat either 4th or 5th in the line up, and I went 0-2 in the first game. I only got up twice, because of the ten run rule. The second and third game were a lot better for me. I think I went 3-5 the second game and either 3-3 or 4-4 the third game with a 3 run home run. So things are starting to pick up for me in the hitting arena, but I am still a little slow at playing third base. I am feeling more comfortable over there but I am just missing the ball on some of my dives, but that will all come around. We have two games tonight, so hopefully we can win them both and be 3 and 1 for the season. Wish us luck!!
Shoulders with Chalean Extreme
So today is Friday and you know what that means… it means I get to do the Chalean Extreme Burn circuit 3 workout and that also means I get to workout my shoulders, because that is all this workout seems to focus on. I really enjoy this workout, although I got to be honest with you, I do not really enjoy working out my shoulders. The reason is probably because I have had some problems in the past with my shoulders. Last year when I was at softball practice, I dove for a ground ball at tweaked my left shoulder, and it has not been the same since. I do not know exactly what is wrong with it, but it continues to stiffen up and pop. I can still do activities without it hurting, but it always pops. Anyways, that is enough of me crying about my shoulder.
Lets talk about the workout, I wanted to push myself a little more in this workout than I did last week, so I used the 25 pounders as much as possible. It is hard to do lateral raises and deltoids raises with 25 pounds, but I did it slowly and with good form. The great thing about this workout is that there are only nine exercises, plus two “get extreme” sessions. So you should be able to go all out and the workout is only 28 minutes long, so it is one of the shorter ones. In every exercise you either do a squat or a lunge, this workout also incorporates calf raises in the squats and lunges too. So not only are you getting a great shoulder, lat, and deltoids workout, you are also getting a great lower body workout. As I mention before there are two “Get Extreme” workouts, in these workouts you do 3 reps as slow as possible, usually an eight count up and an eight count down. The first “Get Extreme” workout are push ups, you only do three, but it is tough because you do them ultra slowly, the second one is an overhead shoulder press as slow as possible. These are great exercises but very exhausting because you hardly get a break before you jump into them. Overall this is a wonderful workout.
Tomorrow I am going to do the Burn it off and recharge, than I have a softball tournament for the rest of the day, so wish me luck, because after our last weeks performance we kind of need it.
Workout Routines For Toning
I thought I would do a little post on a couple workout routines for toning. So many times many people shy away from workouts with weights because they are afraid of bulking up, well that is not the case anymore. Just because you lift weights and build muscle does not mean you are going to bulk up, it is a myth! There are some great workout routines for toning out there, a couple off the top of my head are the P90x extreme home fitness routine and the Power 90 workout routine. Those two workout routines have been tested and tried and both have been very successful for toning muscles. But there is a new workout that I want to mention, which focuses on building lean muscle mass. It is called the Chalean Extreme workout routine, it’s motto is “Muscle Burns Fat” and if you want to burn that excess fat off then building muscle is the best and quickest way to do it.
Recently I have had the opportunity to try this Chalean Extreme workout. I am only at the beginning of the third week, so I am pretty new at it, but I have already noticed a difference in my body fat. Chalean Extreme is a 90 day workout program that can be extended to 120 days if you want to. In the 90 day session there are three different phases, the Burn, Push and Lean Phase. Each phase is 30 days long and comes with a complimentary food guide that outlines each phase. The reason Chalean Extreme is a great workout routine for toning is because it takes full advantage of dumbbell training. Dumbbells are some of the best weights you can use for muscle building, dumbbells not only use weight resistance but it also use stability resistance. Using dumbbells force all your little muscles to stabilize the weight as you lift it, that is the advantage dumbbells have over bars.
Another thing that makes Chalean Extreme a great workout routine for toning, is that it has you do full body workouts. You are never working out one body part at a time, if you are doing a bicep curl then you will also be doing a squat at the same time. If you are doing a tricep extension, then you will be doing a lunge at the same time. You will always be focusing on two major body sections at a time, whether it is upper and lower body or lower body and mid-section and so on. There are some great cardiovascular routines too.
It is important to know, that even though the Chalean Extreme routine has some great exercises, if you do not have heavy enough weights than you will be cheating yourself from achieving great results. So go out and get a nice set of dumbbells or resistance bands. Dumbbells do not take up much space, but are kind of expensive. So if you are looking for a cheaper alternative, than take a look at getting some resistance bands, they virtually take up no space and are very cost affective. Another great thing about resistance bands is that they create resistance through the band and not gravity like dumbbells. So if you are looking for a workout routine for toning, I highly suggest trying the Chalean extreme program.
Chalean Extreme Day 13
Today, I had to wake up earlier than normal to go to work. I helped tear up a deck because the wood is all rotten, so I was not able to stick to my normal schedule of doing the Chalean Extreme workout in the morning. I did however meet up with a friend at LA Fitness and did a back and bicep workout routine with him, which worked out great because that was the workout I was supposed to do with the Chalean Extreme workout. We always workout pretty hard at the gym, and we use all the same principles that Chalene Johnson believes in. We use dumbbells for the most part and we do not try to rush our exercises, slow is key.
We usually start off with pull ups but because I injured my bicep last time, we decided to warm up with a lighter bicep curl first. Then we went to the pull up bar, and with our hands facing forward we did as many pull ups as possible, 3 times. After that your biceps and upper back are pretty tired, so it makes it pretty tough to finish the rest of the exercises. We continued to switch off, focusing on biceps and then back and so on, we also did routines that involved working out both areas at the same time. After the back and biceps workout, we usually end it with some abdominal workouts. Doing some crunches and oblique exercises, afterward my abs are always sore, but a good sore not a painful one. I probably will not get to my workout tomorrow, but I will be doing the Burn circuit 3 workout on friday. So far this has been a great workout routine for toning.
3rd Week with ChaLean Extreme
So today marks the beginning of the third week for my Chalean Extreme workout, the first couple weeks took awhile because of my television being broken, but I am back up and running in full force. I started off this week with the Chalean extreme burn circuit 1 workout, I really enjoyed this workout, it is challenging and motivating. For the most part this workout focuses on your upper back and your chest, and of course it also works out the lower body at the same time, having you do squats and lunges with weights. But what I love most about this workout is that there are a couple exercises that workout your abdominal. In one workout, with heavy weights you squat down and back up and then crunch to the sides, you do that slowly 12 times, even with 25 pound weights you can feel the burn really well. In another workout called the Bench press and lower leg exercise, you lie on your back, placing the band around your ankles. Raise your legs straight up in the air and extend your weights above your chest. Then as you lower your weights to your chest you simultaneously lower your legs as far as you can go without touching the ground and back up as you lift the weights back up from your chest. You do this 12 times. This was a pretty difficult workout, especially if you do not have the strongest abs. I recommend that if you cannot to the 10 to 12 reps than maybe you should do the modified version with your knees bent. There are a couple more abdominal routines in this workout that are just awesome, just make sure to use the right weight or you might not get all you can achieve.
For my diet today, I had a whole wheat English muffin in the morning, with all natural peanut putter and lower sugar jelly. It was super good!! After the workout I had a banana and a protein drink to help my muscles recover from this morning and last night. Speaking of last night, my buddies and I had our first softball games. We did absolutely terrible the first game, I do not even want to talk about it. But the second game we were down by three in the last inning and we came back and won it!! So that was sweet! Personally though, they were probably some of the worst games I have ever played. I went 0-3 in the first game, and then 2-4 in the second game. My fielding was off too, I moved over to third base this year, so it is going to take me a little time to get used to that position.
