Crash course on cardio and weightlifting: The perfect fitness marriage!

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I'm going to jump right into the gym stuff now that you've been introduced to a new way of looking at diets and food. Again, make sure you've had a recent physical and clearance from your doctor before starting any new exercise program. And certainly don't start off too quickly! It took me a long time to work up to the weights I use. Just be patient. Pretty soon you'll be challenging me to a lift-off! ;)

When it comes to cardio and weightlifting, you'll need to determine a "split" that works with your schedule. A split just means how many days of the week you dedicate to working out all the muscle groups of your body. I currently have a 4-day lifting split.

My lifting split is as follows:

1. Chest/Triceps/Abs/Cardio (aka PUSH day)
2. Back/Biceps/Cardio (aka PULL day)
3. Off Day
4. Shoulders/Calves/Abs/Cardio
5. Legs
6. Cardio/Abs
7. Cardio

Of course you can switch them around to fit your schedule. Just make sure to rest a muscle group for at least 2-3 days before working them again. And always lift before cardio. The reason why I have PUSH and PULL next to #1 & 2 is because it helps me remember the muscles being used during those days. Should I happen to forget my workout sheet, I can think about what exercises require me to pull (e.g. cable row) or push (e.g. bench press) and it coordinates with the muscles I'm working! I also always include triceps with my chest days and biceps with my back days because you tend to work out those muscles indirectly at the same time. This means you can do less work but still target the muscles just as efficiently as a workout dedicated solely to that group!

When lifting, do about 5 sets: 1 warmup set with low or no weight, then 4 additional sets starting out light with high repetitions (like 12) and working your way up with heavier weight but lower reps (down to about 6 or 8).

Do not be afraid to lift heavy. You will not look like a bodybuilder! Girls are afraid to lift heavy because they think they will end up looking something like this:

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But the only way you're going to end up looking like that is if you're taking steroids while lifting. Women do not produce enough testosterone themselves to build muscle like that so there is NO need to worry about bulking up. I'm pretty sure you're not planning on taking steriods, right? So go ahead and dismiss that silly gym myth. For example, I can squat about 135 lbs but I don't have thighs like a man! See?


Here's the really cool thing about lifting weights: for every pound of muscle you gain, you'll burn an extra 40 calories a day! And that doesn't include the extra calories you'll burn by going to the gym. That's just calories burned during a normal day. So it's really necessary to hit the weights and not turn into a "cardio bunny" as I like to call them (you know, the girls who pedal along on the elliptical for 2 hours a day and wonder why they aren't making real progress, haha). According to Mr. Lab, the girls with the hottest bodies in the gym are the ones who lift like the guys. Seriously.

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If you're only doing cardio, the best you can hope for is to be "skinny fat". Skinny fat people are slim but have virtually no lean muscle. Most models fit in this category. Here's a little lesson on skinny fat vs. fit models:

"Skinny Fat"


"Fit & Fabulous"

See the difference? These two women could potentially weigh around the same, but the "fit" woman (fitness model Jamie Eason who started out like you or me just wanting to get in shape) isn't "soft" around the edges. It took some time in the gym lifting weights to achieve that body, not just time on cardio equipment. And because lean muscle weighs more than fat, she could weigh more than the skinny fat model! Remember: SCALES LIE. Quit using them!

But speaking of cardio, I'm not against it at all even if it may sound so after all that. In fact, cardio is essential to losing fat! I do at least 30-45 minutes of cardio (on any equipment of choice or jogging/walking briskly) 4-6 times a week and burn at least 200 calories each session (to ensure losing 1-2 lbs. a week). Morning cardio and HIIT (high intensity interval training-google it because it takes too long to write out, lol) revs up the fat loss even more.

Try to eat carbs/protein about 1-2 hours before the gym and then right afterward as well. I suggest buying whey protein and putting a scoop in a water bottle so all you have to do is add water and shake it up to drink after your workout. This will help you rebuild torn muscle from your workouts and you'll recover quicker. The only way you'll be able to add that sexy, lean muscle that burns extra fat and keeps you looking toned and tight is by including enough protein in your diet along with weightlifting. It's almost impossible to eat enough protein in a day without going over calories, so you may want to invest in some protein powders. My fave flavors are fresh cinnamon that I put in my morning oatmeal, vanilla that I use for my smoothies and post-workout shakes, and chocolate that I mix with skim milk and a scoop of Skippy Natural peanut butter for a yummy alternative to sugary snacks!

My original fitness inspiration. I liked Jackie BEFORE Bravo's "Work Out"!

I routinely keep track of my progress at the gym by carrying a notebook with my workouts. I use the previous week's data to push myself. I love finishing a workout with a gain, even if it's one more rep or one more pound I can lift. It keeps me motivated beyond seeing changes in the mirror. I am including some sample workout sheets at the end of this post so you can start keeping track of your gym progress. You may have to tailor them to fit your needs or likes (some people prefer tricep kickback to tricep pulldowns, etc.). I make a one page chart for each day so I can fill in my reps/weights and keep track.

Cheat Meals

Okay, I promise some talk on "cheating" the last time. The only time you can eat "cheap carbs" (i.e. sugar or any other carb that isn't a complex carb) is right after a workout. Your body will use them to replenish lost muscle glycogen and will cause an insulin spike so your body rushes the protein to the muscles quickly. Don't abuse this though!

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Now, it's inevitable that there will be slip ups. If you happen to eat something bad or miss a few days of gym (like during a holiday or birthday or some other special occasion *cough*wedding*cough*), don't fret! Just pick right back up where you left off! No biggie!!! Just don't PLAN cheat meals. If they happen, they happen and then you move on. But if you get into the habit of planning when you can eat bad, then you'll start to unravel all the hard work you've been doing.

Okay, now it's your turn to take all this information and put it to use. Let's hit the gym ladies! We've got wedding dresses to fit into!

Miss Lab's Sample Workouts:
Chest/Triceps/Abs
Back/Biceps
Legs
Shoulders/Calves/Abs

Crash course on nutrition! NO DIETS! It's a lifestyle change! :D

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Official Disclaimer: I'm no doctor, nutritionist, or personal trainer. Just a regular bride-to-BEE wanting to look smokin' hot for her wedding day. ;) So what I'm basically trying to say is you should consult your physician before starting any diet or exercise program. I'm just sharing what's worked for me because it would be selfish not to. It is certainly not to be taken too literally, as my goals and fitness level are a lot different from the average person. Anal leakage may occur. Okay, I'm joking about that last part.

Don't worry if you feel overwhelmed after reading this post. It's normal. Getting in shape is like the training portion of a new job. It just takes some time to get used to it and figure out how to do everything right, but after awhile, it's all second nature! And like any job that's worth doing, it's going to be hard and push you to fulfill all of your potential.

First things first, nutrition! In my personal experience, I've found that about 90% of my fitness success comes from my diet. Oh yeah, I should clarify the use of "diet" here. My idea of "diets" is someone's daily eating habits. Not the newest fad the celebrities are following.

Glad to get that out of the way. Back to what I was saying: I try to eat enough calories based on my lifting schedule. I use www.fitday.com to keep track of the macros (aka grams of fat, carbs, and protein). Let me take a moment to clarify something again. Checking your calories is meant to give you an idea of what you're currently eating, what you should be eating, and how much you're eating. It's amazing how much you eat in a day if it's not out all laid out in front of your eyes. Once you start learning what foods have certain proteins, carbs, and fats, you'll get to the point where you won't need to track them anymore. You'll know if you're eating too much without relying so heavily on counting up the total calories. So please please please don't get obsessive with calorie counting!

Miss Lab's Sample Macros:

• Lifting days: 1800 calories: 45g Fat, 160g Carbs, 190g Protein
• Non-lifting days: 1600 cal: 45g F, 110g C, and 190g P

Based on Miss Lab's Current Body Specs:

• Height: 5'5
• Weight: 140 lbs
• Fitness Level: Active & Experienced

I can't reiterate enough about not obsessing over calorie totals. As you will see in my sample meals at the end of this post, I regularly stray from my outlined macros. It's no big deal! As long as you're close, you'll be aiiiight!

Since most of you are not going to be lifting as heavy at first as I do, you won't need to eat as much protein as I do (since you won't need that extra amount to rebuild torn muscle). A good rule of thumb is 1 gram of protein for every pound you weigh. I would suggest (if your body specs are similar to mine) that you start out by eating about 1600-1700 calories a day with around 50 g of fat, 150 g of carbs, and 150 g of protein.

The average woman should be eating about 2000 calories a day to maintain their weight. If you cut 500 calories out a day, you would lose 1 lb a week (3500 calories = 1lb of fat). BUT, you don't want to rely solely on cutting calories to lose weight. If you start starving yourself, your body will begin storing food as fat quicker as a basic survival mechanism. You'll also be setting yourself up for failure by doing that. So, in order to avoid this, we'll use weight-lifting and cardio to account for the other 400-500 (or more) calories you'll need to burn a week in order to safely and effectively lose a 1-2 pounds a week.

Keep your meals about 2-3 hours apart with small portions to keep your metabolism running as high as possible throughout the entire day. You should be eating 5-6 meals per day. This will keep you feeling full all day and you won't be as likely to binge on a very large meal. Your meals should be a proportional balance of all three macros (again, that's carbs, fats, and proteins). I'll give sample foods and meals later.

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When you first start out, you'll drop pounds quick due to water weight followed by a slight weight gain (during weightlifting you'll be replacing fat with lean muscle which will weigh more), then plateau (this is the REALLY hard part), then start leaning out (where you see the REAL results that LAST). Start learning to judge your success based on the way your clothes fit and using tape measures to keep track of inches lost rather than hopping on a scale. Scales LIE. The sooner you learn that, the less you'll beat yourself up later for thinking you're failing! Seriously! :)

Clean Eating = The Secret to Success

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No fitness goal can be reached without "cleaning" up your diet. Most of us are used to overly processed foods. Our reliance on these types of food is an addiction. Think addiction is too strong of a word to describe our eating habits? Consider this:

A person that eats clean generally practices the following:

• Eliminates refined sugar
• Cooks healthy meals
• Packs healthy meals
• Makes healthy choices when dining out
• Drinks a lot of water
• Eats 5-6 small meals per day
• Eliminates alcoholic beverages (or significantly limits it)
• Always eats breakfast

Do you follow that regularly? Is it hard for you to give up your daily Mickey D run? When you've tried "diets" in the past, did you eventually give up on them? Still think it's not an addiction? Didn't think so. ;)

An easy way to remember if a food is clean is: “if man made it, don’t eat it.”

Eating clean will give you the optimum chance of getting to your goals as quickly as possible. They rev up your metabolism, help you cut fat, and build lean muscle. Basically, the less processed a food is, the "cleaner" it is. Don't get caught up with "low fat, reduced fat, healthy" blah blah blobbity blah crap on packages like Lean Cuisine, Healthy Choice or Cheeze Its, etc. Do some research and check the nutrition info. That's what it's there for!

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Red arrows: Macros
Blue arrows: Other details you should be aware of!

Anything with more than 6g of sugar per serving size or that has saturated fat or has a billion ingredients you can't pronounce is probably a bad idea. Remember: a clean diet is about 90% of what's needed to be successful. As they say, "Abs are made in the kitchen." That's no joke and is 100% accurate.

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Now with all that said, just like with the counting calories warning, don't go too overboard with clean eating when you're just starting out. It takes a long time for your body to get rid of its addiction to processed food. If you jump in the deep end before learning to swim, you just might drown. ;) Even at the height of my training I never ate 100% clean. Besides, it can be hard on a busy schedule to cut out ALL processed foods. So just start with a few simple changes and work your way to a cleaner diet. For example: didn't have time to make a bagged lunch to take to work? Well stop by Chick-Fil-A and grab a grilled chicken sandwhich made on whole wheat buns instead of a McDonald's Big Mac. The grilled chicken only 270 calories of mostly protein and good carbs whereas the Big Mac has 270 calories from fat ALONE (and 560 calories total). See? It's about compromising when you're first learning!

Have this:

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Not this:

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I hope this gives you a good idea of where to start and a better understanding of how to be successful with nutrition. There's no short-term dieting your way to your goals. You have to change your lifestyle to have real and lasting results.

Here are some suggested sites and readings:

Miss Lab's Sample Meals
Miss Lab's Clean Eating Grocery List

The Eat-Clean Cookbook

Oxygen Magazine
Bodybuilding.com

Still need some more motivation? Here's one of my favorite examples of what being fit can do for you. I can only hope I'm half as talented and in shape as this woman at her age!



Next up: Crash course on cardio and weightlifting: the perfect fitness marriage! Plus, "cheat meals"!

Taking My Own Advice.

I'm ashamed of myself. As I near the 100-day mark I've become more and more aware of one thing in this wedding planning process that I've completely neglected: my health.

I came to this (not-so-abrupt) realization yesterday when I had to call in sick to my internship. I had somehow forgotten to drink water/liquids the entire day before and was severely dehydrated. Desert-dehydrated. Nearly hospitalized-dehydrated. Dehydrated to the point where I felt like I had spent the previous night partying in Vegas harder than those Hangover guys. You get the picture.

This is so not like me. I routinely carry a reusable water bottle around with me EVERY where I go (I have a huge glass of water at my desk as I'm typing this). While recovering, I also realized that I've hit another point in my life that I've never been before: weighing the heaviest I ever have. I seem to have just disregarded my health and fitness completely while planning for my wedding. The worst part? Exactly a year ago I was in the best shape of my life and making money as a part-time model because of it.

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No, I didn't have any self-image problems. In fact, it was the absolute opposite. I was healthy because I had changed my lifestyle, not started on some crazy fat-loss pills, crash diet, or detox. I worked out 4-6 times a week, ate 4-6 small (but satisfying) meals a day, didn't stress over calories and got plenty of water and rest. And although I've always been a slimmer (but "soft" around the edges) girl and active in athletics, I was learning to truly take control of my health and fitness. Pretty soon, my "model" body began morphing into more of a "fitness" body.

Photos taken by friends.


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This photo was even featured on a calender sold by bodybuilding.com!

Photos courtesy of NRV Photography

My back a year ago would have looked sexy in my low cut wedding dress now! (Don't worry, only Mr. Lab was in the house with me all nakedz!)

Can't believe I'm sharing this one with the hive, but here's part of my progression into a FIT body from the "I'll just cover the extra flab with my clothes" body.



Yeah, that last one was taken exactly a year ago. So what happened? Well, school started (I had been training during the summer) and with it I suddenly had a ton of excuses for skipping out on the gym and stuffing my face. I never quite learned how to manage my fitness with my hectic schedule (classes, extracurriculars, studying, friends, football season, the holidays, etc.). And when I got engaged, I thought the magic wedding fitness fairy would pay me a visit and get me back on track. Well, I'm still waiting on that fairy. In the meantime I've put on about 20 pounds. Here's me now:

Photo taken last week. Wii Fit kicked my out-of-shape ass.

Yesterday's set back has really knocked some sense into me. I'm not trying to get down to a certain pant size or number on the scale. I'm trying to get healthy and fit, to feel energized all day, and to like the way I look. I want to do all this for my everyday life, not just for the wedding (although I'd be lying if I said that the wedding wasn't a big factor in getting back on track).

I know some of you are reading this thinking "Why is she complaining? I wish I looked like that now!" All I have to say to that is we all have different short and long term goals and know where our bodies should be. I know that I shouldn't be this out of shape. It took a lot of fast food and laziness to get this way. (Ever heard of skinny fat?) And it's a bit frustrating to hear people say I look good when I'm so out of shape that playing a hula-hoop game on the Wii gets me sweating and panting in less than a minute. I mean, not that long ago I could run 3 miles in less than 30 minutes and squat 135 lbs!

I have a little over 3 months until the wedding. You might think that's not enough time to get where I want to be, but those progression photos were taken over just a 2 month period. I won't be "ripped" like an Oxygen magazine cover model, but I'll be in shape. (Btw, in my opinion, Oxygen is the best women's health and fitness magazine out there. Trash your Shape & Self magazines and get a subscription to the "O" stat!)

I'm going to occasionally post about the things I have done in the past (and am doing now) that have worked for me. I'm no fitness or nutrition expert, but I do know enough through experience about what works and what doesn't. I don't expect everyone to agree with me when I write about my renewed fitness journey and that's okay. A lot of health and fitness is trial and error, so what works for me might not be the best route for you. But I guarantee you'll learn some things along the way that will help you get to your own fitness goal-finish line.

Now I just have to start taking my own advice, starting now. :)

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The Inevitable Post About Wedding Fitness

What's wedding planning without talk of getting into shape for the big day? :D

As most of you know, I'm really into health and fitness. But since the start of the 2008-2009 school year, I've somehow managed to fall off that bandwagon. I tried to take on too many extracurriculars and ended up putting my health on the back burner. I paid for it too in the form of 10 extra pounds and 3 straight months of bronchitis that I still haven't completely shaken. Now that I have an incredibly motivating factor to get me back to my old ways, I'd decided to give it another go.

My fitness goals are probably a lot higher in standard than most girls my age/size. I don't strive to be "skinny". I strive to have a lean, muscular body that looks good in any outfit. I love walking up UGA's north campus steps without hyperventilating. I love being the girl in the gym that clearly lifts the heaviest weights. Now I want to be the girl who looks so good in her (FREE) wedding dress that everyone wonders just how I did it and comes to me for advice.

So how will I do it? With a LOT of hard work and determination. It will takes months, not weeks, to get to my goals. I would say that getting my dream body will be about 90% sheer mental willpower. I've done it before but this time I'm pushing myself harder. I'm going to eat clean (thanks to my new cookbook!), lift heavy, and dutifully perform my cardio requirements every week (I HATE CARDIO, lol) for the other 10% needed for success.

I used to keep a blog with my fitness journey, but this time around I'm keeping it to myself. I'll post updates now and again for accountability. My matron of honor is in this with me, so I have a support buddy (and I'm some of my other girls will be there for me). Not to mention the king of fitness, my very own fiance, will definitely keep me in check.

For those of you who may think I look fine now, just wait until November! I can only hide in my winter clothes for so long before this Georgia heat exposes where I've been keeping all my "hibernation fat". ;)

And just for anyone who is curious, here's my lifting split and daily nutrition macros:

1. Chest/Triceps/Abs/Cardio
2. Back/Biceps/Cardio
3. Shoulders/Calves/Abs/Cardio
4. Off Day
5. Legs
6. Cardio/Abs
7. Cardio

Lifting days:
1800 calories:
45g Fat, 160g Carbs, 190g Protein

Non-lifting days:
1600 calories:
45g F, 110g C, and 190g P

Boring post, I know. But it's a necessary evil, haha. Let me know if you ever have any questions about jumpstarting your own lifestyle change!