I'm sad. I had originally planned to do a blog post about all the neat new fitness gear I want for Christmas, but I got some disturbing news and would like to share it.
I sat down at my computer this morning with my mocha cappucino and started my day with my 100% favorite blog -- The Great Fitness Experiment. I only discovered this blog about a year ago. At the time, I was pregnant and Charlotte was pregnant. I loved how she continued to be the fitness badass she has always been, especially when it's so common for moms-to-be to plop there legs up and have another bon bon. I read her entire blog that day like it was coated in crack. I've mentioned it before on KUrunner, but for those of you who didn't take my advice and immediately rush over, you've missed out.
Charlotte is amazing (and she has awesome hair). Of course, she doesn't think so, but what does she know? Maybe it's because she grades the writing portion of the SATs, but her writing style is just wonderful. She's written comic pieces about having too much soy before an exercise class and she's written tearjerkers about her struggles with addiction and abuse. She's brutally honest and no topic is off-limits. (Women, if there's anything you wanted to know about your period and exercise, she'll have the answer.) Plus, she finds the most hilarious pictures.
Anyways, I'm in mourning. I've looked to Charlotte for inspiration this past year and she's never disappointed me. I completely understand her reasoning for stopping her blog, but it still sucks. Thankfully, someone is paying her to write The Great Fitness Experiment book, and I'm sure that I'll be the first in line to buy it. She'll be keeping the webpage up, so if you haven't read GFE yet, I'd recommend going over and starting with post #1 (scroll to the bottom).
And I'll leave you with Charlotte teaching how to do a pull-up (and other naughty things with a training dummy.)
Showing posts with label reviews. Show all posts
Showing posts with label reviews. Show all posts
Monday, June 28, 2010
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
P90X Results and Review
Jason and I started P90X 12 weeks ago and the results are in!
… But before I get to the cold hard numbers, I want to begin by saying that we didn’t follow the program. Not 100% anyways. Hell, probably not even 50%. P90X requires 6 workouts a week and a low-carb nutrition program. I never had any intentions of going low-carb as I’m still breastfeeding. The workouts were fun (and HARD), and I looked forward to most of them, but life happened. I probably shouldn’t have started the program with a newborn who wasn’t sleeping more than a few hours at a time. There were a lot of workouts that I was just too tired to start and I’m sure I wasn’t “bringing it” the way Tony Horton would have wanted. Then, we had two deaths in the family — one being Jason’s dad. Needless to say, with the stress and time involved dealing with everything, pushing play wasn’t at the top of our list. Add to that a couple of trips out of state and Jason’s work schedule drastically shifting…
We definitely didn’t do P90X the way it was intended.
I still saw results, even with my half-hearted attempt and I still recommend everyone try it. In fact, my brother and a couple friends are going to be starting P90X while I’m going through Round 2. Yes, I’m doing it again and hopefully this time, I can do the program right. I got pretty decent results doing about half the workouts so I’m dying to see what happens if I follow it all the way. (Still breastfeeding, so still no low-carb though.) As for my thoughts on the actual workouts:
Chest & Back — Lots of push-ups and pull-ups. A little dull, but the basics work.
Plyometrics — I love plyo. It’s hard. You’ll hurt the next day. But it’s fun and I’m sure it’s the reason why I’m running faster even though I haven’t been running nearly as much as I used to.
Shoulders and Arms — My delts and triceps are my favorite parts to work and it was really similar to my arm workout prior to P90X so I may be a bit biased, but I enjoyed it. My problem was not having enough different weights. My 8s were too light and my 15s were too heavy for most of the exercises.
Yoga – Eh. I still don’t like it (and I really love my other yoga dvds) and it tends to be the first dvd that gets skipped during the week.
Legs and Back — Sneaky lunges! Love the calf workout.
Kenpo — It’s fun, but not much of a calorie burn. You really have to push yourself if you want to get your heart rate up.
Chest, Shoulders, & Triceps — Confession here… I’ve only done this workout once. It was HARD. Like, too hard for me to even do half the reps. So, I went back to the Phase 1 dics. Of course, Jason LOVED this workout.
Back & Biceps — Never did it. Again, Jason preferred it over Phase 1.
I did leave out AbRipperX and Core Synergistics because I like to pretend they don’t exist. You know, I hate it, but I love it sort of thing. Overall, it’s a great system although the Classic program is a bit light on cardio. Tony is funny although after 90 days, his “Tony-isms” start to get a little old. I still want to punch Dreya Weber in the face. Karen pot-stirrers are amazing.
Okay, now on to the results.
Jason’s lost almost 10 lbs and 3% bodyfat.
I’ve lost over 13 lbs and almost 3% bodyfat. I’m down 2.5 inches off my waist, 2.5 inches off my hips, and over an inch off of each thigh. I haven’t taken my official final fit test, but as of month 2, I’m jumping higher and squating longer. I’ve more than doubled my push-ups and more than tripled my ab strength. I also doubled my bicep curls. (Keep in mind that all of this is without doing P90X every day.)
… But before I get to the cold hard numbers, I want to begin by saying that we didn’t follow the program. Not 100% anyways. Hell, probably not even 50%. P90X requires 6 workouts a week and a low-carb nutrition program. I never had any intentions of going low-carb as I’m still breastfeeding. The workouts were fun (and HARD), and I looked forward to most of them, but life happened. I probably shouldn’t have started the program with a newborn who wasn’t sleeping more than a few hours at a time. There were a lot of workouts that I was just too tired to start and I’m sure I wasn’t “bringing it” the way Tony Horton would have wanted. Then, we had two deaths in the family — one being Jason’s dad. Needless to say, with the stress and time involved dealing with everything, pushing play wasn’t at the top of our list. Add to that a couple of trips out of state and Jason’s work schedule drastically shifting…
We definitely didn’t do P90X the way it was intended.
I still saw results, even with my half-hearted attempt and I still recommend everyone try it. In fact, my brother and a couple friends are going to be starting P90X while I’m going through Round 2. Yes, I’m doing it again and hopefully this time, I can do the program right. I got pretty decent results doing about half the workouts so I’m dying to see what happens if I follow it all the way. (Still breastfeeding, so still no low-carb though.) As for my thoughts on the actual workouts:
Chest & Back — Lots of push-ups and pull-ups. A little dull, but the basics work.
Plyometrics — I love plyo. It’s hard. You’ll hurt the next day. But it’s fun and I’m sure it’s the reason why I’m running faster even though I haven’t been running nearly as much as I used to.
Shoulders and Arms — My delts and triceps are my favorite parts to work and it was really similar to my arm workout prior to P90X so I may be a bit biased, but I enjoyed it. My problem was not having enough different weights. My 8s were too light and my 15s were too heavy for most of the exercises.
Yoga – Eh. I still don’t like it (and I really love my other yoga dvds) and it tends to be the first dvd that gets skipped during the week.
Legs and Back — Sneaky lunges! Love the calf workout.
Kenpo — It’s fun, but not much of a calorie burn. You really have to push yourself if you want to get your heart rate up.
Chest, Shoulders, & Triceps — Confession here… I’ve only done this workout once. It was HARD. Like, too hard for me to even do half the reps. So, I went back to the Phase 1 dics. Of course, Jason LOVED this workout.
Back & Biceps — Never did it. Again, Jason preferred it over Phase 1.
I did leave out AbRipperX and Core Synergistics because I like to pretend they don’t exist. You know, I hate it, but I love it sort of thing. Overall, it’s a great system although the Classic program is a bit light on cardio. Tony is funny although after 90 days, his “Tony-isms” start to get a little old. I still want to punch Dreya Weber in the face. Karen pot-stirrers are amazing.
Okay, now on to the results.
Jason’s lost almost 10 lbs and 3% bodyfat.
Saturday, May 15, 2010
Why I Hate (and Like) Weight Watchers
As I recently said, I’m back on Weight Watchers.
*sigh*
This isn’t the first time I’ve done WW and I’m really having mixed feelings about it. The first time, I did the online version. No good. Seriously, if you are planning on using the online version, go to Nutrition Data, Livestrong, FitDay or some other online calorie counting tool and save yourself the monthly fee. Plus, you can easily find all of the information about Weight Watchers, such as how many points to eat and the formula for calculating those points, with a quick google search. And whatever you do, avoid the WW forums at all costs… well, unless you like bashing your head into a wall.
So after my craptacular experience online, I decided to give meetings a shot. I even enlisted Jason to go with me. Yeah, I lasted through 3 meetings with 3 different leaders and gave up.
Why I Hate Weight Watchers
1. It’s a diet.
I don’t care what the commercials say about Weight Watchers being a lifestyle change and not a diet. It’s a diet. Any program that restricts calories is a diet. Period. “Stop dieting and start living.” Indeed.
2. Points are a fancy word for calories.
The difference between Weight Watchers and most other programs is that WW counts Points, not calories. They claim it’s easier to count to 20 than 1200, but either way, good luck remember how many Points you’ve eaten unless you track throughout the day. But if you’re tracking throught the day, what’s the difference? Computers have calculators.
3. The formula for Points is arbitrary.
Points take into account fat and fiber. Food high in fat is higher in Points; food high in fiber is lower in Points — prompting you to select high fiber, low fat foods. But there’s really no science behind their formula. It seems like they just picked some random numbers and threw them together.
4. Fats are punished.
As I explained, foods containing fat have higher Points than foods without fat — even if it’s healthy fat. Even though WW suggests eating healthy oils, you’re going to have to give up a big junk of your daily allowance for that handful of peanuts. Plus, foods high in fat already are higher in calories, so basically, the fat is counted twice. Of course, the European version of WW only counts saturated fat, not total fat, but us Americans are still in the 90′s “fat is bad” mindset.
5. Not all fiber is equal.
Yes, fiber makes you feel fuller longer and um, helps things along. But only naturally occuring fiber. Adding Metamucil to a food does absolutely nothing than make you need to poop. Go to the grocery store and look at how much food has added fiber. I’m sorry, but fiber doesn’t belong in yogurt. Eating what is essentially a candy bar with 10 grams of added fiber isn’t going to help you lose weight.
And get this… I once went to a WW meeting where the leader suggested taking a fiber supplement with junk food so that the junk food would be lower in Points. Obviously, it’s okay to eat a quart of ice cream as long as you chase it with fiber powder.
6. Weight Watchers products
At the grocery store, you’ll find everything from candy to bread with the Weight Watchers logo on it. Look at the ingredients list. Do you really want to eat that crap? Why would WW encourage you to eat a piece of fruit candy instead of actual fruit? Why do they mass market TV dinners instead of encouraging you to cook yourself? Because it’s a business. And like most businesses, if you’ll buy it, they’ll sell it. Weight Watchers yogurt, Weight Watchers snack cakes, Weight Watchers ice cream. It’s all fake food with fake fiber. I would rather enjoy a REAL piece of cake every now and then instead of eating their processed snack food.
7. Weight Watchers allows too few calories
Okay, this one is just my opinion here, but WW restricts calories a bit too much. A target of 18 – 20 Points a day isn’t unreasonable. Let’s add in another 5 Flex Points a day. That’s about 1250 calories a day (assuming you eat no fat.) Most nutritionists will agree that 1200 calories a day is just too low. Plus, it’s practically impossible to get any decent amount of nutrition when you are ALMOST starving especially if you are eating WW processed crap.
8. WW isn’t for athletes
Again, my opinion here, but Activity Points are flawed. Let’s say I go out for an easy 10 mile run. Weight Watchers gives me 6 Activity Points (about 300 calories) even though I burned over 1000. A pre-run snack, a mid-run gel, and a post-run recovery drink and I’m already over my points allowance that I earned. Granted, most people on WW aren’t doing that sort of activity, but it’s still a flaw in the program.
9. A little too touchy feely
If you haven’t read Such a Pretty Fat, you should. Jen Lancaster describes it perfectly. I’m not really into sitting in a room with 10 other women discussing our feelings about birthday cake.
Why I Like Weight Watchers
Okay, so despite all of my complaints, I’m still giving it another go because I’m having very little luck on my own and it comes highly recommended for breastfeeding women. I’m really worried that I’m not going to be eating enough, but I’ve decided to give it 3 weeks and see how I’m feeling.
1. Eight Healthy Guidelines
Despite marking all sorts of processed crap, WW promotes eating fruits, veggies, healthy oils, dairy, etc.
2. Support system
This is why WW is so popular, I think. You sit in a room with 10 other people with the same goals as you — to lose weight. While the meetings are a little uncomfortable for me, the group atmosphere encourages you to keep coming back.
3. The Core Program
The Core program encourages eating a wide variety of healthy, real food without counting Points.
4. You can eat anything.
This is a plus and a drawback at the same time. You can eat anything you want, as long as you still within your Points target. The bad thing part – you can eat 20 Points of cotton candy, 20 Points of pizza, 20 Points of celery, etc. The good part — if you really want that ice cream, you can eat it as long as you have Points for it. Of course, if you follow the 8 healthy guidelines, you’re much less likely to spend a days Points on a bag of chocolate.
*sigh*
This isn’t the first time I’ve done WW and I’m really having mixed feelings about it. The first time, I did the online version. No good. Seriously, if you are planning on using the online version, go to Nutrition Data, Livestrong, FitDay or some other online calorie counting tool and save yourself the monthly fee. Plus, you can easily find all of the information about Weight Watchers, such as how many points to eat and the formula for calculating those points, with a quick google search. And whatever you do, avoid the WW forums at all costs… well, unless you like bashing your head into a wall.
So after my craptacular experience online, I decided to give meetings a shot. I even enlisted Jason to go with me. Yeah, I lasted through 3 meetings with 3 different leaders and gave up.
Why I Hate Weight Watchers
1. It’s a diet.
I don’t care what the commercials say about Weight Watchers being a lifestyle change and not a diet. It’s a diet. Any program that restricts calories is a diet. Period. “Stop dieting and start living.” Indeed.
2. Points are a fancy word for calories.
The difference between Weight Watchers and most other programs is that WW counts Points, not calories. They claim it’s easier to count to 20 than 1200, but either way, good luck remember how many Points you’ve eaten unless you track throughout the day. But if you’re tracking throught the day, what’s the difference? Computers have calculators.
3. The formula for Points is arbitrary.
Points take into account fat and fiber. Food high in fat is higher in Points; food high in fiber is lower in Points — prompting you to select high fiber, low fat foods. But there’s really no science behind their formula. It seems like they just picked some random numbers and threw them together.
4. Fats are punished.
As I explained, foods containing fat have higher Points than foods without fat — even if it’s healthy fat. Even though WW suggests eating healthy oils, you’re going to have to give up a big junk of your daily allowance for that handful of peanuts. Plus, foods high in fat already are higher in calories, so basically, the fat is counted twice. Of course, the European version of WW only counts saturated fat, not total fat, but us Americans are still in the 90′s “fat is bad” mindset.
5. Not all fiber is equal.
Yes, fiber makes you feel fuller longer and um, helps things along. But only naturally occuring fiber. Adding Metamucil to a food does absolutely nothing than make you need to poop. Go to the grocery store and look at how much food has added fiber. I’m sorry, but fiber doesn’t belong in yogurt. Eating what is essentially a candy bar with 10 grams of added fiber isn’t going to help you lose weight.
And get this… I once went to a WW meeting where the leader suggested taking a fiber supplement with junk food so that the junk food would be lower in Points. Obviously, it’s okay to eat a quart of ice cream as long as you chase it with fiber powder.
6. Weight Watchers products
At the grocery store, you’ll find everything from candy to bread with the Weight Watchers logo on it. Look at the ingredients list. Do you really want to eat that crap? Why would WW encourage you to eat a piece of fruit candy instead of actual fruit? Why do they mass market TV dinners instead of encouraging you to cook yourself? Because it’s a business. And like most businesses, if you’ll buy it, they’ll sell it. Weight Watchers yogurt, Weight Watchers snack cakes, Weight Watchers ice cream. It’s all fake food with fake fiber. I would rather enjoy a REAL piece of cake every now and then instead of eating their processed snack food.
7. Weight Watchers allows too few calories
Okay, this one is just my opinion here, but WW restricts calories a bit too much. A target of 18 – 20 Points a day isn’t unreasonable. Let’s add in another 5 Flex Points a day. That’s about 1250 calories a day (assuming you eat no fat.) Most nutritionists will agree that 1200 calories a day is just too low. Plus, it’s practically impossible to get any decent amount of nutrition when you are ALMOST starving especially if you are eating WW processed crap.
8. WW isn’t for athletes
Again, my opinion here, but Activity Points are flawed. Let’s say I go out for an easy 10 mile run. Weight Watchers gives me 6 Activity Points (about 300 calories) even though I burned over 1000. A pre-run snack, a mid-run gel, and a post-run recovery drink and I’m already over my points allowance that I earned. Granted, most people on WW aren’t doing that sort of activity, but it’s still a flaw in the program.
9. A little too touchy feely
If you haven’t read Such a Pretty Fat, you should. Jen Lancaster describes it perfectly. I’m not really into sitting in a room with 10 other women discussing our feelings about birthday cake.
Why I Like Weight Watchers
Okay, so despite all of my complaints, I’m still giving it another go because I’m having very little luck on my own and it comes highly recommended for breastfeeding women. I’m really worried that I’m not going to be eating enough, but I’ve decided to give it 3 weeks and see how I’m feeling.
1. Eight Healthy Guidelines
Despite marking all sorts of processed crap, WW promotes eating fruits, veggies, healthy oils, dairy, etc.
2. Support system
This is why WW is so popular, I think. You sit in a room with 10 other people with the same goals as you — to lose weight. While the meetings are a little uncomfortable for me, the group atmosphere encourages you to keep coming back.
3. The Core Program
The Core program encourages eating a wide variety of healthy, real food without counting Points.
4. You can eat anything.
This is a plus and a drawback at the same time. You can eat anything you want, as long as you still within your Points target. The bad thing part – you can eat 20 Points of cotton candy, 20 Points of pizza, 20 Points of celery, etc. The good part — if you really want that ice cream, you can eat it as long as you have Points for it. Of course, if you follow the 8 healthy guidelines, you’re much less likely to spend a days Points on a bag of chocolate.
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