Mid afternoon workout

I don't go into work till 5pm. Yes...you are wondering why my time is so flexible? I have my own business, so I'm my own boss... At any rate, had a late start this morning, didn't get out of bed till 10 am. Don't you just love it? I love sleeping in...I hate the morning, I don't know why... and I also love staying up till 2/3 in the morning. Don't know what it is, but I feel like I could get so much done in the wee hours of the night, and I'm also very motivated to wake up really early in the morning, but that never happens.
As soon as I got up, I headed to the gym and got on elliptical machine for about 40 minutes, and than hit the treadmill for 10 minutes, before doing laps in the pool for half and hour. I feel exhausted after my morning workout, my arm are sore from swimming. I guess I got a good workout...

I feel like I got a good workout, I totally soaked my clothes from my cardio, and cooled down with a nice swim.

Swimming

I've been thinking about swimming, since it is the summer and all...
I said hell to being in a suit, and I went swimming after work today.
I replaced my regular workout and replace half and hour of swim.
What a workout!!! I'm totally exhausted after the swim, but I don't feel like I had a good workout without sweating. There's something about sweating and feeling like your clothes sticking to your skin and your face getting all flushed.

I used to swim as a kid, and I remember always starving afterward. And of course after tonight's swim, I was starving...

I think it's a good variation in my workout schedule... I might do so once/twice a week on top of my regular workout.
I'm going to the Zion Mountain to go hiking in two weeks, and I want to be cardio ready to do the steepest hike. I'm thinking about increase my cardio to 1 and half everyday. Two mile run for about half hour and than incline walk on the tradmill. Starting tomorrow...

Cravings.....Chocolate/Ice Cream/ Pizza

Why do we having cravings only when we know we shouldn't have those food?
I never really have craving until I limit my intake on one particular food, and these days, one particular group of food: Carbs.

Is it human nature? Or is it only our mind playing games with us?

No matter what it might be, I've come to moderate my intake of chocolate/Ice Cream/ Pizza and go work out with a blast. It gives me some sort of control over it, instead of my cravings controlling me.

Getting rid of the Belly

For me the only way to get rid of the belly fat is by cutting down on carbs and doing lots of cardio. I had a late start at work today and didn't have to go in till 4pm. I hit the gym in the afternoon and did 40 mins of cardio followed by light weight lifting. I continue to do 10 minutes of stepper to boost my cardio. I realized that it's not the crunchs, or any abs workout I do, I have way too much fat on my belly for any of the crunchs to show through...
I need to trim down my body fat % and the only way I found it worked in the past is through low carb diet.

Low Carb thing is harder than I realized...Everything has carbs...especially my favorite Mango Fruit Ice Popsicles. Just a nice thing to cool down with on hot summer day. I guess it's always hard at first, but I'll try for two weeks to follow South Beach Phase I.

Lifestyle and food

I'm single and I work full time. Yes, granted I don't have any other responsibility other than myself and my career, it's hard for me find the time to cook for myself.
When I had a boyfriend, or even living with my brother, I did manage to cook because there was a purpose. I had someone else to enjoy my food but these days it's easier and cheaper to just to pick up dinner/lunch.
Is this mentality because I value myself less than my boyfriend/ or brother/ or guest who I like to cook for? Why is it so much harder to cook for oneself?

I've been pretty good about working out and staying active. Now I want to focus on eating healthy. And one thing I know is that you can not eat healthy if you are eathing out everyday or even every other day. You need to know exactly what you are putting into your mouth. Yes it is easier, but changing your lifestyle doesn't come easy, right...

It's about loving yourself more than boyfriends/ brother/ friends and cooking a goumet meal for youself everyday because you deserve it. It's about taking care and control of what you putting into your body.

I know it's difficult and it's probably difficult for everyone out there who's not single and have kids/ husband/ wife/ etc.... but it's really is down to this one question?

Would you really feed your child all the crap you are putting into your mouth?

And your answer is probably NO.

So, why are you still eating all the crappy food?

Ask Yourself?

1) Ask Yourself Questions
The first thing you should do when starting a fitness program is ask yourself some questions that will help you figure out what your fitness goals are. Here are some questions to get you started:

What do you hope to get out of this fitness program?
Are your expectations realistic?
When do you want to accomplish your goals?
How will you measure your success as you go?
How will you reward yourself when you achieve your goals?

My answers:

I expect to be healthiest as possible when I turn 30 years old. My expectation is realistic. It's two lbs weight loss a week and so far, I've been able to maintain my goal. I will like to accomplish the goal by March 21st, 2007. I will measure my success by my dress size, and weight loss in lbs. I will reward myself by going on a ski vacation with my friends in March to Whistler.

Returned from long weekend travel

This weekend was interesting. I didn't really get do much physical activities other than eating. I did walk Central Park on Sunday for about a hour but I wouldn't really call that physical activity.

A friend of my gave me Tony Little's Gilzette which I had a chance to do it this morning and last night before going to bed. It's fun and it's not really difficult, I wonder if it's actually working.
I guess it's better than just doing nothing and watching television.

Back on eating more health consciously.

Two mile walk habit in the Morning

I started my new habit of waking up early and going for a walk around the pond with my dogs. I felt great, and the I feel like I've accomplished so much already in the morning. I noticed that I lost 2 lbs so far...Yoohoo...

The real test will be when I visit my parents this weekend. I love my parents, but they are such a contradiction. They tell me that I need to lose weight but they love feeding me. I know they want the best for me and that's why they want me to lose weight, but I also know that one of the sign to express their love for me is to feed me.

I will be cheering my brother with his triatholon this weekend and hopefully that'll give me more motivation to keep up with my training for my 5K run. Last time I was cheering him during short tri, there were so many good looking buff men....Such a eye candy!

I really didn't feel like running this morning, so I just walked it with my dogs.

Just Barely made it...

Got tied up at work and just made it the gym for half an hour of running. The thought of running for hours is tempting but when I actually start to run I start to feel the pain under the ribs and feel short of breath by the first mile. But I did my first mile without stopping at 5 mph speed. I feel pretty good about my accomplishment, now only if I could do that for first 3.2 miles. This is start of my training. I am training for my first 5K race in two weeks. I will increase my run tomorrow to 1.25 miles of run without stopping and increase it to every other day by .25 miles. That's not too dramatic of increase, right?

I need a new habit. How about running the first thing in the morning with my dogs. My dogs are getting chubby and it'll do them good. I do have an awesome track near my house. I will do it!

JUST DO IT...

Good Start

Having a pretty good start. Last night I came home and warmed some leftover mango fish. Pretty filling. This morning, I actually had some breakfast, stawberries. Uhmmm...So good.
They do say that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. I find it so difficult eating something first thing in the morning. I usually don't get hungry until noon, does this indicate that my body has slow metabolism, or just bad habit?

I am trying to change that... I love having morning coffee front of my computer in the morning with relaxing music in the background and really think about all the things I have to do for the day. Stragize about the day and plan for an attack. I don't think I enjoy cooking first thing in the morning, too much stress. Maybe to compromise, I should just mix a protein powder and green/veg powder in the morning but have something. Yeah...But always forget because I'm too busy trying to get the dog into the house and getting ready first thing in the morning. I know it's all excuse. STOP making excuese...I WILL DO IT.

I have couple of patients in the afternoon but hopefully I will find a hour to head to the gym and go for run.

Remainder, need to pick up swimming gear from parents house as well as stepper to do some Exercise DVDs at home. If parents have 5lbs weight, pick that as well...
I'm such a smoocher off my parents but they don't use it. I'm actually doing them a favor by helping them get rid of the clutter.

Just Returned from the Gym

I usually try to head to the gym when I have two hours in the middle of my work days. But sometimes that doesn't happen. I need to be consistent about heading to the gym everyday and also add maybe half hour of running/ yoga at home.

I completed 50 minutes of Cybex elliptical which burn ~600 calories and also half hour of weightlifting. I feel great...I always feel great after working out, don't know why it's so difficult to do everyday when I know it's so great for me and also I get to catch up w/ my television time.

Recently I got rid of cable TV so that it'll motivate me to go watch TV only when I'm working out, but that seems to be not working because I always manage to avoid the gym.

I also find that my social activity seems to impose on my new lifestyle, so I need to workout a balance between my social going out drinking and my healthy lifestyle. Of Course I can't stop social drinking and going out with friends, but I do need to keep in to minimum like once a week.

I also seem to have difficult time cooking for myself since I am single and it's always more difficult to cook for one. I don't mind picking up something to eat, but that becomes difficult with my diet.

For now, my Diet will consist of Morning Greens (which consist of 8-10 Fruits/ Veg) Drink
Lunch: Cookie Diet throughout the day )Left over from my cookie Diet days)
Dinner: Grilled Chicken w/ Salad
Snake: Fat Free Pudding
Water: 8 serving a day

Keeping it up!

How much do you weigh

You Should Weigh 160

If you weigh less than this, you either have a fast metabolism or are about to gain weight. If you weigh more than this, you may be losing a few pounds soon!

How Much Do You Weigh?

Life in the skinnygirl for ever has started.

This Blog was started to help myself lose 50lbs before end of this year. I will be turning 30 next year and it is my resolution to lose my post college lbs.

I've been good about exercise on and off but never been able to be consistent. It's never really difficult to be active so I don't think that will be difficult. The most difficult will be eating as often as I should. With work and running around, I sometime forget to eat and that's always not good because your body goes into starvation mode.

To keep me motivated, I have decided to run a 5K run in 2 weeks with friends and continue to do so every two weeks and in a month move up to 10K run. One of the things I hate is running, but I do enjoy running in races.

I will be starting my lifestyle change in my diet by cutting back on Carbs. Eating more salads and meat, etc. Pretty much following the South Beach Diet, I've done that before and had success with it...If only if I could include chocolate in there too.....

Started weight is 185lb and I would like to be 135lb with body fat less than 10%. (Exactly same proportion of my college days.) Goal is to lose about 2-3 lbs a week. Calorie intake will be ~1200 a day, depending on how much exercise I have completed.
My exercise program will consist of Running, weightlifting, yoga, Pilates, video DVDs, rollarblading, swimming, biking, etc.
I will keep updated in terms of progress and I will use this blog as exercise/nutrition diary.

Hope all of your Blogger out there could support me and watch me while I transform my body.