Accountability | Keeping up with Kate

Week 3 – Accountability

Posted on April 29, 2013 by keepingupwithkate91

Week 3 is in the books. It was a much tougher week than I expected even though I achieved a score (that I calculated) of 87%.

My week 3 goals were to limit my daily coffee to 2 K cups per day and add 2-3 green smoothies (for the week). In addition, to continue my week 2 goal (salad at every meal) and week 1 goal (80 ozs of water per day). I achieved 100% of the week 3 goals and I missed 1 salad (I think it was Tuesday – that was my blur day) and 1 day of water (Tuesday as well).

My observations on the past week:

A tough week – everything felt a little harder this week. I don’t know if was incorporating all 3 goals in a cumulative fashion or just that this was ‘hump’ week of the transformation.
A bit of upset stomach on Tuesday into Wednesday.
Low energy pre-Wednesday workout – felt much better after the workout.
Green Smoothies — I’m not a fan! – I’m sure part of it is I’m not eating fruit (under the guidance of a nutritionist) and I did put avocado (1/2 in it – which I love) – it was just too think – even after I re-blended it. I had my last one for lunch on Friday – and I found out I enjoy eating lunch over drinking it. I will leave the smoothies for now for my in a pinch breakfast. Just not for me on a regular basis.

Celebrate my Success: Not limiting my coffee this weekend – I won’t go crazy – but I’ll enjoy my morning cup of Joe even more!

You are Responsible for the Energy…

Posted on April 26, 2013 by keepingupwithkate91

My fitness studio (www.bodyprojectfitness.com) just started Open Studio days. I had the opportunity to go during lunch last week and check it out. This was my first time trying this out. I was a little nervous as I didn’t know how many people would be there. When I got there was one other member working out – she was almost done with the first circuit. By the time the workout was explained to me and I was heading to my second circuit – I was the only working out. I kept my focus and remembered this saying that is posted in the studio – ‘You are responsible for the energy you bring into this space’. I kept my focus. It was like I had my own personal gym! 🙂

One of the many inspirational / motivational pictures I see every workout!

Here’s the workout:

There were 3 circuits with 3 exercises – complete 3 times:

Circuit #1: High Skips (3xs up and back), 10 Renegade push-ups, 10/side alt. leg v-up (abs)

Circuit #2: Grapevines (3xs up and back), 20 oblique squats (these were killers) (and I felt them the next day for sure), 15 bosu crunches

Circuit #3: Slides (3xs up and back), 15 Frog squats, 15 DB toe touches

There was a finisher workout that I didn’t do as I had to get back home for a quick shower and back to work. I felt energized and ready to tackle my afternoon.

I was feeling so great that I went back in the evening for Yoga! We used blocks for the entire practice. This was a first for me. The highlight of the evening for me was doing a standing balancing triangle! I’m always afraid of standing on one leg/any balancing type poses – so this was a big balance accomplishment for me!

Hump Day Workout

Posted on April 24, 2013 by keepingupwithkate91

Not only is today Hump Day – but this is “Hump” week for the 6 week Spring Transformation – week 3! I started feeling kind of crappy yesterday morning – felt better today but still not feeling great when I made it to my evening workout. It was interesting to see everyone tonight sort of in the same boat – not a lot of pep in the room.

So tonight’s workout was perfect for our little ‘pepless’ group! 🙂 Workout at your own pace!

Here was tonight’s workout – 5 rounds or 25 minutes:

15 High Knees
10 Tricep Crusher (each side) (10 lbs)
10 Deadlifts (12 lbs)
10 Back Rows (12 lbs)
10 Mountain Climbers (each side)
10 reverse lunges (each side)
5 helicopters (each side)
10 Squats with a Plie

I completed all 5 rounds with a minute or so to spare. We finished the night up with some abs and stretching. Everyone (including me) left with a lot more energy and glad we all made it tonight!

Have a great evening!

Week 2 Accountability and Week 3 Goals

Posted on April 22, 2013 by keepingupwithkate91

As promised – here is how I did on my Week 2 goals. The goal is to achieve 80 – 100%.

Drink 80 ozs of water per day (which includes preparing the night before – filling up my pitcher – seems so simple, but something that I put off). 100% Goal Achieved
Set calendar for every 2 hours to get up and move around (away from my desk). 90% Goal Semi Achieved (got up and walked around every 2 hours – never put it on my calendar).
Have vegetables (non-starch) at every meal. I actually do a good job at breakfast and I’m getting better at lunch – dinner is sometimes the challenge – I use a personal chef and sometimes the meal has a starch vegetable and I don’t have a salad or add something else. I will add a salad to my evening meal. 90% of Goal Achieved – only night without a salad was Saturday night (although I did have asparagus – and do wasabi peas count?)

Other successes: Tried out the Open Studio and made it to Project Sculpt on Thursday (killer workout). Additionally made two yoga classes this week and was able to do a standing balanced triangle.

Celebrate: Got to see a college friend and her family last night who I haven’t had a chance to see in quite some time. It was a great time!!

Notes/Reflections/Revelations: Preparation makes things so much easier!

Week 3 Goals:

Address my coffee addiction – Limit 2 K cups per day.
Add 2 – 3 green smoothies into my weekly menu – most likely pre-workout – good news is I’ve already made them and they are in shaker bottles in my fridge. I had one today – pre 7:00 pm workout. Not too bad (I did add protein mix – didn’t have it in the batch I made last night). (I’ll post later what I put in the smoothie)
Continue the following:
Drink 80 ozs of water per day
Get up and move around every 2-3 hours during the workday
Eat a salad with dinner

I’ll post my results and observations next week.

Week 2 – Goal

Posted on April 15, 2013 by keepingupwithkate91

I’m building on my week 1 goals and adding another goal for this week. My ultimate goal is to make these become new habits. I don’t have a lot of distractions except this Wednesday, I do have a board meeting in the evening – which means I will miss my HardBody workout (and I missed tonight as I had a touch of food poisoning last night – feeling better now – just a little wiped out). I’m trying to figure out if it will go to the open workout during lunch or make it up on Saturday morning (I’ll keep you posted).

Here are my week 2 goals:

Drink 80 ozs of water per day (which includes preparing the night before – filling up my pitcher – seems so simple, but something that I put off).
Set calendar for every 2 hours to get up and move around (away from my desk).
Have vegetables (non-starch) at every meal. I actually do a good job at breakfast and I’m getting better at lunch – dinner is sometimes the challenge – I use a personal chef and sometimes the meal has a starch vegetable and I don’t have a salad or add something else. I will add a salad to my evening meal.

I’ll let you know how I do next week (and try to post daily on my accountability page).

Week 1 – Accountability

Posted on April 14, 2013 by keepingupwithkate91

Last week started BodyProject Fitness’ (http://bodyprojectfitness.com/) 6 week Spring Transformation. We do these twice a year (Spring and Fall) – a great way to re-focus on fitness and nutrition goals! We were all asked to post our goals for the week so we could have accountability and support.

My goal was to drink 80 ounces of water a day and get up and move around every 2-3 hours (I spend a lot of time on conference calls).

Day 1: Goal Achieved (HardBody Class)
Day 2: Goal Achieved (Yoga)
Day 3: Goal Achieved (HardBody Class)
Day 4: 50% of goal achieved – was in NYC for work and got quite a bit of walking in; however, my water was no where near 80 ozs of water – it is such a challenge to get all that water in when you are in meetings – but I did try (oh and I had an event in the evening that made it a challenge as well). (nice amount of walking)
Day 5: 50% of goal achieved – should’ve had more control as I was at home; however, really busy day on the phone and working on some important projects – just ran out of time in the day. (about 50% of water and 50% of movement during the day)
Day 6: Goal Achieved (Yoga)

So 4 out of 6 days, I hit my goal at 100%! And if I was grading my week based on the scores I’d be at 83% or a B! I knew Day 4 was going to be a challenge. I tried to prepare, but sometimes ‘life’ gets in the way. I’m pretty happy with my results. And the really good thing is I didn’t beat myself up on the days I didn’t hit my goal – I’m understanding the why and learning from it.

50 Burpees – OH My

Posted on February 20, 2013 by keepingupwithkate91

I’m so happy – I completed 50 Burpees tonight at BodyProject Fitness and Lifestyle (http://www.bodyprojectfitness.com). I haven’t been a huge fan of Burpees – ever – but I do have say I like this new burpee (for me less risk of hurting myself as I can be a klutz sometime). Here is the link – try it out: http://goo.gl/fZB0D (shhh – don’t tell anyone – starting to like them a little)

It was such a great workout tonight. 20 minutes and pushing myself (everyone did) with heavier weights – 12, 15 and 20 lbs for me tonight. I completed 4 rounds – and started my 5th round so I did get the 50 burpees in (did I mention that?)!

Burpee 10 reps
Bicep Curls – 5 reps – 15 lbs
1/2 turkish getup – 5 each – 12 lbs (I did try one round with 15)
OH Press w/ one foot – 5 each – 12 lbs
Plie w/calf raise – 5 – 20 lb kettlebell
Tricep Single Arm Crusher – 5 each arm – 12 lbs (this is the one where you are lying down on your mat)
Fast Run in Place – 10 each leg
Single arm Back Row – 5 reps each – 20 lb kettlebell
Running Lunge -5 each leg

This will be one I’ll take with me when I travel – one you can do in the hotel gym in a short period of time and get a nice good sweat going. Enjoy!!

PS: If you are in Central NJ – check out http://www.bodyprojectfitness.com (changed my life)

Training Session 1 – in the Books!

Posted on August 20, 2012 by keepingupwithkate91

In my last post I shared that I caved to ‘peer pressure’ and I’m doing the Beauty and the Beach 5 mile race on November 3rd in Long Branch. It is a walk / run. I have a lot of my boot camp friends joining me and my college roommate and her daughter in for the fun too. I’m really looking forward to it.

Last Friday over lunch, I bought some new kicks. A nice pair of Asics (reminds my of college – my sneaker of choice back in the day). See – aren’t they pretty? And my friend, Tracy, pointed out that they are PSU colors too (totally pulled that off by accident)!

I didn’t make it to boot camp today so I thought it would be a great time to start my training program. My trainer suggested I start out slow – which is exactly what I did – 2 minutes of walking; 20 seconds jogging. I used the gymboss on my i-Phone (although the alarm was almost impossible to hear over my music) for 10 rounds and I completed 2 sets so 40 (-) minutes of walking and about 6+ minutes of jogging (near the end I added on longer running segments) so maybe it turned into 30 minutes of walking and 10 minutes of jogging (total time: 52 minutes, 5,218 steps, 2.907 miles and avg HR 141 / Max 167). What was the verdict? I didn’t hate it. I really loved the countdown/switching to walking / jogging and liked when I pushed myself to run a little bit more. My knee seemed to hold up pretty good – my arches not so much. They were definitely bothering me. Seemed to get a bit better as I went. I did a short cool down and stretched – taking off my sneakers was killer. I just got done icing my arches and I think the golf ball will be my new best friend for a while (note to self – warm up and stretch the arches more).

So in the end, I’m glad I’m doing this event in November. I think it is something I need to do for me and I’m glad the first training session is in the books! 🙂

My New Favorite – HIIT Workout

Posted on July 6, 2012 by keepingupwithkate91

July is a very busy month with vacation and travel so I won’t be attending my normal bootcamp. Two days this week while on vacation I re-discovered HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) workouts. I’ve known about them for since the first BodyProject Transformation, but I’ll be honest I never really embraced them. I dislike cardio – all kinds – it is just not enjoyable to me – never has been.

The mantra for HIIT is “no long cardio” – and this is not a long cardio at all. The gym I joined while on vacation has a 30 minute time limit for the treadmill and elliptical machines. I select the elliptical and have gotten 23 and 24 minutes of HIIT workouts for the past two days with 7 and 6 minute warm-up/cool-down. This hits the mark for me! I love the sense of accomplishment!

Here is the work-out I did today (I did the 10 rounds x 2):

Work Hard – 15 seconds; Rest: 45 seconds
Work Hard – 15 seconds; Rest: 45 seconds
Work Hard – 30 seconds; Rest: 60 seconds
Work Hard – 30 seconds; Rest: 60 seconds
Work Hard – 15 seconds; Rest: 30 seconds
Work Hard – 15 seconds; Rest: 30 seconds
Work Hard – 30 seconds; Rest: 60 seconds
Work Hard – 30 seconds; Rest: 60 seconds
Work Hard – 15 seconds; Rest: 45 seconds
Work Hard – 15 seconds; Rest: 45 seconds

For more information about HIIT workouts check out this link: http://tiny.cc/5zv0gw

Here was the rest of my workout this morning:

5 Times x 5 Rounds

Overhead Press – 8 lbs
Bicep Curls – 10 lbs
Tricep Kickbacks – 8 lbs
Chest Flye – 8 lbs
Back Row – 10 lbs

And lastly 4 30 second low planks and finally a nice stretch. I’m ready to start the day. Have a fantastic Friday!!

PS: This will be my go to workout when I’m traveling for work next week! 🙂

Happy Day – June 11th!

Posted on June 12, 2012 by keepingupwithkate91

I started this blog almost a year ago to document changes when on the Clean program for 21 days – to see if I could find my X factor. Although I learned a lot during the process – it just didn’t work for me. The blog has morphed into both my personal journey and self-discovery as well as random fun and observations in general.

I’m hopefully that I’ve found my X factor – almost a year after I started this journey. During the Spring Transformation at Bootcamp there was seminar with a Nutrionist that I went to see (and was encouraged by my trainer to attend). I listened, took notes and even made changes starting the next day – moving from small meals throughout the day to 3 meals per day. I promised myself I would make an appointment to go see the Nutrionist. It probably took me a month to finally make the call and he is in high demand so it took a few weeks to get an appointment. My first appointment was May 7th. I weighed in at my heaviest ever (maybe someday I’ll share). He gave me simple things to focus on: Hydration, 3 meals a day (and make them things I enjoyed – ‘no dirt and grass’ – things to chew), have at each meal – protein, carbs (30 mg) and veggies and no fruit (he was treating me as a diabetic) and if I was hungry between meals go for protein first. He also wanted me to find an exercise I enjoyed. That was easy – I had bootcamp.

The first two weeks I did pretty well – well balanced for all three meals, getting at least 2 bootcamps in a week. I even got a workout in while traveling (historically I take my workout clothes and sneakers and never use them – the workout is the lugging of the suitcase in the airport 🙂 ). Then I had a challenge – weekend leadership conference – I did pretty well with my food selections and still enjoyed some libations with friends in Happy Valley. I was hit with a stomach bug that derailed me for a few days and took me awhile to get back on track. I started noticing major fatigue in the afternoon that I just couldn’t explain – that was really starting to worry me.

Fastforward to yesterday – my appointment and review of the past month. We talked about how I was feeling – especially the fatigue. We discussed what I had changed in my diet – I had added bread back to my diet as I love a sandwich for lunch – think that is what is driving my fatigue. For the next month, I’m going to experiment – either selecting lower carb bread or bread type items for lunch or swap my lunch / dinner options – dinner for lunch and lunch for dinner. We’ll see how it goes. The end of the appointment is the weigh-in – I’m pleased to announce that I dropped 6 lbs!! We were both very pleased with the results. I will never see that ugly unnamed number from above. I’m still on a HIGH from it. I’ve tried many things in the past (JC, WW, SB, Clean, NS, etc – it may have worked for the short-term – but always felt I was missing something). I can honestly say I didn’t feel that this passed month. I went out to dinner, I shared dessert, had cocktails, enjoyed a BBQ over Memorial Day, had a hot dog and beer at a Phillies game. I enjoyed life and I’m enjoying this lifestyle change that seems to be working for me.

I go back for my next follow-up mid-July – stay tuned for updates.

Have a fabulous day!!