Today I went for a run, walked Tierce across the sand flats in Courtenay, BC and walked for another hour with a friend while we solved the problems of life, love and the universe.
Walking is something that most people do on a regular basis, but it's not always seen as a serious workout. However, if you walk - walk like you have some ass to kick and can't wait to get to it - you can have a seriously badass workout without actually exhausting yourself and having time to enjoy the scenery.
One hour of brisk walking can burn between 250-300 calories. That doesn't seem like a lot, but you're not just going for burning calories; you're building endurance and working your legs, butt and abs. You can work them even more if you incorporate hills into your workout. Or, strap on a backpack.
Walking is the original all-ages, all-fitness levels exercise. If you want to build your cardio, this is where it starts.
(My arm workouts came from hauling Tierce back when he wanted to make a close personal acquaintance with a Trumpeter Swan. This was not for the swan's sake; those things would have kicked Tierce's ass from here back to Nanaimo.)
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Thursday, February 25, 2010
And the Winner is.....
So, the search for the perfect gym is complete. Okay, maybe not perfect gym but good. My perfect gym would include a hot tub and cute guys with no shirts giving out free massages.. but I digress.
My gym dilemma really came down to the choice between the Nanaimo Aquatic Centre and the Anytime Fitness gym at Southgate Mall. (I'd link the Aquatic Centre but there is no proper website for it that I can find for it)
The benefits to the Aquatic Centre is that it's a bit closer to my house and that for my membership fee I get access to the pool facility as well. However, it does tend to get a ton of teenagers in it after school let's out.
The benefits of the Anytime Fitness gym are that it's 24 hour, so I can go whenever is convenient for me, there is a huge range of brand new machines and free weights there, they have a squat rack and a smith machine, AND that it's not within walking distance to the high school :)
Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against teens working out at the gym, I think it's awesome that they're exercising; I just have issues with groups of them taking over parts of a busy gym and standing around and talking while they leisurely sorta work out.
So, for me, the clear winner is the Anytime Fitness facility. The fact that it's a properly stocked gym makes it far more appealing to me. The Aquatic Centre, when I had my previous membership, was really frustrating due to it's lack of equipment. They also offer a free 7 day trial membership, which is pretty nice.
So, two workouts into it so far and I already just about can't dress myself in the mornings, I can hardly wait until I work out hard!
My gym dilemma really came down to the choice between the Nanaimo Aquatic Centre and the Anytime Fitness gym at Southgate Mall. (I'd link the Aquatic Centre but there is no proper website for it that I can find for it)
The benefits to the Aquatic Centre is that it's a bit closer to my house and that for my membership fee I get access to the pool facility as well. However, it does tend to get a ton of teenagers in it after school let's out.
The benefits of the Anytime Fitness gym are that it's 24 hour, so I can go whenever is convenient for me, there is a huge range of brand new machines and free weights there, they have a squat rack and a smith machine, AND that it's not within walking distance to the high school :)
Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against teens working out at the gym, I think it's awesome that they're exercising; I just have issues with groups of them taking over parts of a busy gym and standing around and talking while they leisurely sorta work out.
So, for me, the clear winner is the Anytime Fitness facility. The fact that it's a properly stocked gym makes it far more appealing to me. The Aquatic Centre, when I had my previous membership, was really frustrating due to it's lack of equipment. They also offer a free 7 day trial membership, which is pretty nice.
So, two workouts into it so far and I already just about can't dress myself in the mornings, I can hardly wait until I work out hard!
Monday, February 8, 2010
In which Nim does her best Jesus impersonation and returns from the dead..
Okay, so I wasn't *dead*.. I had the flu. Let me tell you though, I certainly WISHED that I was dead! Or at least unconscious for a week.
Nothing puts a damper into your best fitness plans like a bout of illness or an injury. I've had months of progress derailed due to a shoulder strain that killed my motivation to work out for weeks afterwards.
However, now that I'm feeling myself again, I'm going to get back to my project of researching local gyms so that I can find one that really suits my needs before I lock myself into a monthly payment. Whereas this wasn't a huge pressing need up until now, with our office's new program of paying for 50% of gym membership costs I want to ensure that I am taking full advantage of that!
There are two gyms near my house that I'm considering getting memberships at, the first one is the Nanaimo Aquatic Centre and the second one is a 24 hour gym. They're both close to the same price, so I just need to compare what I'd be getting for my money.
The Aquatic Centre has a gym and pool facility included in the price. There are a few big drawbacks to this gym though. There are no barbells and there is no Smith machine. So, while I can do squats with dumbbells, this is a little less than ideal. Also, the hours that they're open aren't great and in the afternoon/early evening the facility tends to be infested with sweaty teenagers.
The good thing about the Aquatic Centre is that you can use the pool and hot tub after you've worked out; though they tend to be full of teenagers too. Also, this gym is the closer of the two to my house. It might also be slightly cheaper, though I might be mistaken on this point.
Next time: my review of the 24 hour gym...
Nothing puts a damper into your best fitness plans like a bout of illness or an injury. I've had months of progress derailed due to a shoulder strain that killed my motivation to work out for weeks afterwards.
However, now that I'm feeling myself again, I'm going to get back to my project of researching local gyms so that I can find one that really suits my needs before I lock myself into a monthly payment. Whereas this wasn't a huge pressing need up until now, with our office's new program of paying for 50% of gym membership costs I want to ensure that I am taking full advantage of that!
There are two gyms near my house that I'm considering getting memberships at, the first one is the Nanaimo Aquatic Centre and the second one is a 24 hour gym. They're both close to the same price, so I just need to compare what I'd be getting for my money.
The Aquatic Centre has a gym and pool facility included in the price. There are a few big drawbacks to this gym though. There are no barbells and there is no Smith machine. So, while I can do squats with dumbbells, this is a little less than ideal. Also, the hours that they're open aren't great and in the afternoon/early evening the facility tends to be infested with sweaty teenagers.
The good thing about the Aquatic Centre is that you can use the pool and hot tub after you've worked out; though they tend to be full of teenagers too. Also, this gym is the closer of the two to my house. It might also be slightly cheaper, though I might be mistaken on this point.
Next time: my review of the 24 hour gym...
Get ripped (off)!
Yeah, because this guy was so gargantuan in the first picture. Positively corpulent. Um.Actually I find the top picture a lot more attractive than the one below. Extremes don't appeal to me. So what if Buddy loses bodyweight that he didn't need to; what does that prove?
What could his secret be? Could it possibly be a lot of vegetable matter and lean protein and healthy fats taken in moderate amounts? How about the limiting of alcohol and sweets? Regular exercise? Do we really need to click on the ad to learn how to get our bodies where they're supposed to be?
Let's click. Oh, my! Apparently you can subsist on chicken chimichangas because
"Turns out this guy knows one of the personal trainers who works with a bunch of the Hollywood elite, and he told him that basically all of Hollywood is using this new bio-engineered hemo-dialator stuff called Acai Elite Extreme to pack on muscle and this other new supplement called Official Cleanse to burn the fat and clean out their colon (gross I know but that's how they get their skin tight and their waste so thin)."
(Please tell me that "waste" is a typo)
Wait a minute, if you know a guy who knows a guy, why aren't you telling the rest of us mere mortals that guy's name? Surely he's not ashamed of his "stuff" that you claim he is using. Surely he has some empirical evidence that proves that Acai and colon cleansing help you lose weight and "make your abs pop out" (Where? In someone's eye?).
The guy on the right looks like he knows that I entered my information for a *free* sample of AcaiElite Extreme but balked at entering my credit card info. Maybe he knows that I'm writing this post! MAYBE HE KNOWS WHERE I LIVE. That's a disquieting thought.
Evil Bitch that I am, I'm suspicious of anything that promises to be the ultimate solution for your weight loss woes, especially something that requires a credit card. It's almost like I don't trust these people!
The thing is, nothing works except diet and exercise. Oh, yeah, you could get your stomach stapled, but it isn't exactly recommended for losing that last 10 pounds. And I would give Acaicoloncleansersupercreatineprotein supplements a miss. Dog knows what else they put in there... just look at Muscles here. Maybe it's just the colon cleanse that he's going through.
Thursday, February 4, 2010
Bodyweight Ass Kicking
Okay, so I'm trying more flexible options for working out like the Prison Workout. Yesterday, while my boyfriend and a bunch of people in our local SCA group did heavy fighting (that's not a bad workout, but I'm not that into it anymore), I did burpees, pushups, deep chair pushups, tricep dips, squat jumps and lunge jumps.
I did 50 burpees. 50. That makes me sound like a total badass, but really, I did them 10 at a time, with lengthy intervals between, because burpees kick your ass, take names and then come back the next day with your audit.
Burpees with Zuzana
See? Zuzana, of BodyRock.tv is panting with 12 of these fuckers and she pwns me every day just by being alive. You should totally check out her site; awesome fitness workouts, nutrition advice (that I don't follow because I haven't yet given up my gorging habits), and a host of other great tips that will get you lean and mean. Or me, because that's my goal. She's also smoking hot.
So anyway, I did pushups. I'm back trying out for the one hundred pushups routine. I managed to pump out 27 of those fuckers. 27! Now you can worship me as a goddess, but not until you realize that my best number ever was 45. How the mighty have fallen. That puts me at Level 3. The problem I've had with the 100 pushup workout is that I stall at around Level 4. But, we shall try again.
THEN I did chair pushups. This is where you take three chairs and position them in an isosceles triangle, so that each hand rests on a chair and your feet rest on the third. Then start doing pushups. Ten of those will exhaust you nicely (more if you're wearing armour, as some of the lads found).
I did 50 burpees. 50. That makes me sound like a total badass, but really, I did them 10 at a time, with lengthy intervals between, because burpees kick your ass, take names and then come back the next day with your audit.
Burpees with Zuzana
See? Zuzana, of BodyRock.tv is panting with 12 of these fuckers and she pwns me every day just by being alive. You should totally check out her site; awesome fitness workouts, nutrition advice (that I don't follow because I haven't yet given up my gorging habits), and a host of other great tips that will get you lean and mean. Or me, because that's my goal. She's also smoking hot.
So anyway, I did pushups. I'm back trying out for the one hundred pushups routine. I managed to pump out 27 of those fuckers. 27! Now you can worship me as a goddess, but not until you realize that my best number ever was 45. How the mighty have fallen. That puts me at Level 3. The problem I've had with the 100 pushup workout is that I stall at around Level 4. But, we shall try again.
THEN I did chair pushups. This is where you take three chairs and position them in an isosceles triangle, so that each hand rests on a chair and your feet rest on the third. Then start doing pushups. Ten of those will exhaust you nicely (more if you're wearing armour, as some of the lads found).
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