Fab Fit Squad

Not it…. I am roughly 5 weeks out from a NE Classic. Here is where the dollar values double. Eat clean, lift heavy, do your cardio or GO HOME. Everything counts! My cardio has gone from 45 min to 60 minutes 6x/week. I have a confession. I HATE CARDIO. Yes, I hate it. I know that their are many pros and cons to cardio, but its the best way I know to lean out of a show. I can strength train all day long, but ask me to do cardio longer than 30 minutes the excuse monster comes up with some real doozies.  Being on a piece of a equipment for 60 minutes makes me kooky. But it has to be done.  Here’s my plan. I play a ton of mind games.

• The first game I play is splitting it up.
  • 30 minutes in the AM and 30 minutes at night.
• I machine hop, if I’m at the gym at all off peak time
  • 20 min of running intervals
  • 20 min step mill (love this machine)
  • 20 min elliptical
• I watch TV, give me a MTV marathon or VH1 decade count down and I’m hooked (see why I stink)
• I will metabolic circuits where I swing a kettlebell for 1 minute and then jump rope for 1 min and rest for 1 minute (more…)

I am currently doing Insanity and its awesome! I just did the FitTest and was SWEATING profusely in my living room. I previewed the next workout to see if I would find it as challenging and WOW, I can’t wait to do it again tomorrow.
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As I train for the Miami half marathon a good friend of mine and an amazing marathon coach, John Furey has told me the secret to running an injury free marathon is cross training and intervals.

I know interval training has been around for awhile and people have been doing them, but are you really getting out of your comfort zone! Really pushing yourself to that 9-10, when you push yourself to the limit. So.. why do we do it.  Interval training helps:

• boost performance, by making the heart become more efficient at pumping blood
• helping increasing our tolerance for lactic acid burn
• we can increase our intensity in a short amount of time without risk of burning out or injury
• most importantly we BURN MORE FAT!!!!  You read correctly… We burn more fat!!!

So I have know this for years, but have I really pushed myself to the 9-10 zone!!! Honestly speaking I think I have been hanging out in the 7-8 zone. So I have been cheating myself of all of the benefits. Okay let me be honest the benefit I really want is FAT BURNING. Okay I’m training for a half marathon, I’d like to be able to be able to cross the finish line on my own 2 feet and not be dragging ass! So.. interval training will be my friend 2x/week until January 31st.
Now my interval will be a combination of cardio machines and metabolic circuits using only my bodyweight and light weights.  If you have bodyweight circuit that you would like to share tell me about it, just write below in the comments

I have had sciatica pain since for the past several years. I couldn’t drive more than 30 minutes without pain shooting down my right leg and running an activity that I thoroughly enjoy was PAINFUL. So I started stretching and STOPPED running. This year was my 15th anniversary and we decided to run the Falmouth Road Race, there is that word RUN.  So … if I was going to run 7.2 miles I would need to get rid of my sciatic pain for good.
So I sought out a posture specialist, Aaron Brooks of Perfect Postures to help treat my sciatica. Why did I go to a posture specialist, my hips have been tight my hold life and so I felt that my sciatica was caused by a muscle imbalance that through sciatica exercises I could fix it fingers crossed for good. So. I went to go to my first visit. I basically a paid a man to check out my ass. Yes, I walked back and forth for about 10 min so he can study the bio-mechanics of my glutes ass. He conclusion, my right ass doesn’t fire. So he gave me some exercises do every night to help wake up my ass.

It’s been 1 month and I will tell certain muscles have come awake that have been dormant. I was doing deadlifts the other day and felt my inner thighs turn on for the first time in YEARS. I’ve been running regularly and my sciatica has acted up by not nearly as severe as it has in the past.

The morale is if you have stopped living an active life because of pain, STOP and figure out what is causing your pain. Everyone has a right to live actively.

Today is our last big run before the race. We will be running 6.2 miles. The humidity is suppose to break or it will be a long, hot sweaty run. If you are in Boston and want to tag along meet us on the river. BTW have I told you that the race doesn’t allow headphones so we have been training without our ipods. I thought it would be hard, but not so much. You really get into a nice rhythm listening to your footsteps and your breathing its kind of meditative.

<a href=”http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/united-states/ma/mid-cambridge/868124900372960214″ mce_href=”http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/united-states/ma/mid-cambridge/868124900372960214″>Kim and Philip 6.2 miler</a><br/><a href=”http://www.mapmyrun.com/find-run/united-states/ma/mid-cambridge” mce_href=”http://www.mapmyrun.com/find-run/united-states/ma/mid-cambridge”>Find more Runs in Mid-cambridge, Massachusetts</a>

So, I’m 4 weeks out from my show.  What does that mean? Crunch time!! So I’m up to 60 minutes of cardio.  How many of you are cardio queens, you know who you are.. you can stay on a piece of cardio for more than 60 minutes and not have it feel like sheer torture.  How many of you don’t even do cardio or maybe for 20 -30 minutes, but you are reading People magazine or a book and not breaking a sweat.

For me I hope from machine to machine to break it up.  I know how important cardio is, but I HATE it!!!

With that said, I’m not doing intervals…

Please start slow, trust me it will come and its just as effective.

This can be done on any piece of cardio equipment or on an outdoor track.
Start with a 5 min warm-up

Week 1:  sprint for 30 sec then rest for 90 sec do 5-6 sets
Week 2:  decrease the rest period by 30 sec do 6-7 sets
Week 3:  now sprint 30 sec and rest for 30 sec do 7-8 sets
Week 4:  stay the same but increase the number of sets to 8-9 sets

Do this 2-3 times/week and let me know how feel.  For those of you who feel the same way about cardio as I do, you will find this definitely keeps you moving!

The only thing you need is some good tunes on your pod!  Personally I’m trapped in the 80’s!