Tag Archives: exercise

Operation Shed Spare Tire

This morning, I went to Jess from Fit Chick in the City’s boot camp class. As we did lunges (approximately one million of them), I looked at myself in the mirror and did not like what I saw.

My abs, which were so toned in the fall, were covered by a huge spare tire. Maybe it’s the extra alcohol I’ve had this week and the extra treats I had over the holidays, maybe it’s bloating from PMSing and an upset stomach yesterday, or maybe it was just the pleat of the pants. Either way, I spent a lot of the class strategically adjusting my pants and my shirt so that my belly wasn’t flopping around.

I don’t want to make any big changes, because I know when I’m too strict with myself, the pendulum always swings back the other way, to not being strict with myself at all (like lately), so I’m just going to try to be mindful of keeping my healthy balance. 

I’m going to:

  • watch my alcohol intake. (Dear friends: this does not mean no more happy hours, don’t worry. It just means I’ll drink a little less.)
  • watch my takeout intake. (Dear wallet: you’re welcome, too)
  • up my fruit/veggie intake
  • drink more water
  • get back to blogging all my meals. Seriously. I’ve been back and forth on this for a while, because I was getting bored with it, but I just want to be able to keep watching what I’m eating and, for me, that helps.
  • follow my workout schedule more closely
  • add morning exercises (either some of these, or some that Joel gave me when I was doing Theodora 2.5. I never posted the results of that because my schedule got too busy and Joel and I have two more sessions to go, but it definitely worked…until the holidays got in my way.)

I’m not going to take measurements, but I’m just going to go by look and feel of my abs in my clothes.

Breakfast after the boot camp was:

  • 3/4 cup oatmeal
  • 1/2 cup almond milk
  • 1/2 cup water
  • 1 large spoonful of sunflower butter
  • 1 banana 

Holy DOMS!

(DOMS=Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness)

After Monday’s boot camp and a speedy tempo run yesterday (3.5 miles in 30 min!), my quads are SCREAMING at me. Walking to work this morning felt like I was lugging huge weights on each leg.

This morning, since I have another Junior League meeting tonight and plans at lunch, I hopped on the bike for an easy half hour to hopefully work out some of the residual soreness. It didn’t help too much, but at least I got in some exercise while watching The Today Show. Afterwards, I had a hot few minutes with my stick.

When you have delayed muscle soreness like this, you’re supposed to take care of your muscles the same way you normally do when they’re sore—stretching, yoga, massage, etc.—but you should also be mindful of why they’re so sore (did you start a new routine? Push yourself too hard?) and make sure to get active recovery in. That means, don’t stop working out just because it hurts, but take an easy day.

I took an easy day today, but I’m trying to decide if I should do my speed work tomorrow (I was supposed to do it yesterday but I switched my workouts around because I didn’t have time for the speed work yesterday) or take another easy day, or maybe another cross-training day.

Eat in Month be damned, I was craving a spinach feta wrap from Starbucks this morning…so I got it.