V02 test

I really should be doing my weights right now but I have to blog about this before I forget everything! I redid my V02 test this morning which is testing to find out how my body utilizes oxygen, fat and calories. It's done by a system called New Leaf which tracks your oxygen and C02 thru a mask that looks like this...

You also wear a heart rate chest strap and all of this information is sent to the computer. I did this test in June of 2009 and the results were definitely NOT what I would have expected. I workout 6 days a week doing what I would call pretty intense cardio at times, such as spinning, turbo kick and running.

Before I get into the results, I will say that I really don't remember this test being as stressful as it was for me this time. I do not drink caffeine during the day but wasn't allowed to drink caffeine the day before and I had a massive headache and was so sleepy yesterday! Then this morning, had to get up pretty early on a dark, rainy morning to be there for my test at 8AM. Thankfully, my wonderful husband got up to get Wes dressed for me. I dropped Wes off at the daycare and ran upstairs, I was a few minutes late because of traffic so my heart was already pumping, ha ha. Shaun put the mask on me and got me all hooked up to the machine. The first few minutes are very easy, walking on a treadmill at a very easy pace, every couple of minutes, Shaun increased the incline, when I reached about 80% of my max, I told him I was becoming quite claustrophobic as it's getting more and more difficult to breathe thru your mouth, with that mask on, your breathing is definitely challenged! I really didn't think I was going to make it but I focused and Shaun kept increasing the incline, after 80%, it felt like forever! I got up to a 15% incline and still walking but at 94% it seemed like I was stuck and it took forever but then I was finished! If I would have had to jog, I think I might have passed out but thankfully I didn't have to. So for anyone that thinks about doing this, just an FYI, it's not a walk in the park! :) Thankfully, it only lasts about 15 minutes!

Onto my test results, as I said, I did this test in June of 2009, at that time, Wes was 9 months old and I had only been working out at home and was still having a difficult time with weight loss which is why I did the test. Now, after having worked of consistently for 2 years, I would have thought my results would have greatly improved and they have NOT, in fact, they have gotten worse.

In 2009, in zone 1, I was burning 7.2 calories per minute and 59% fat per minute which should be 50% fat or above.

Now, I am burning 7.7 calories per minute and 63% fat per minute which is great, I have improved in zone 1 but who works out in zone 1? Right, no one! Well some do but not me!

In 2009 in zone 2, I was burning 8.3 calories per minute and 43% fat, not great since again, should be at 50% fat or above.

Now, I am burning 8.9 calories per minute BUT I am only burning 29% fat, that is NOT GOOD! Again, it should be at 50% or above and this should have increased, not decreased!

In 2009, in zone 3, I was burning 11.3 calories per minute and 20% fat which should be at 30% fat or above.

Now, I am burning 10.8 calories per minute and only 19% fat. Again, that is NOT GOOD at all!

I actually thought that doing the RMR test a few weeks ago was going to give me more insight as to why I'm not losing weight but I actually think that this has given me more insight. My RMR is lower than it used to be so I should be eating less but I'm not effectively burning fat like I should be. They give you a 6 week training plan to help your body improve this so I am definitely going to follow it this time, I didn't do that the last time.

My V02 threshold is at 60% compared to others my age and gender which is good, I suppose but it could be better. Your V02 for those of you that don't know what this is is how much oxygen your body needs to burn fat. V02 stands for the volume of oxygen your body absorbs per minute while at rest and when you move. We measure Peak V02, which is the maximum amount of oxygen you used during this assessment. Your Peak V02 measure your heart and lung fitness and is considered the gold standard for determining your exercise potential.

The last thing the test measures is your recovery heart rate. As you increase your level of fitness, your heart gets stronger and recovers faster from exercise. Your heart, being as a muscle does get stronger with exercise. A stronger heart pumps more blood to your body each beat with less effort, giving you a lower resting heart rate. Well my heart rate dropped 21 beats per minute in the first minute and 32 beats per minute in the 2nd minute which is a great recovery rate. The only bad thing about having a fast recovering heart rate is that I don't get to rest for as long as others when I'm doing intervals, ha ha.

So the workouts that they give me are basically alternating heart rate zones always between zones 1 and 2, zones 2 and 3 or all 3 zones. This morning, I went to strike class as I normally do, we did have a different instructor so class was different and I also had to leave for a few minutes to go change a poopy diaper and come back so I didn't burn as many calories as I might have but also attribute that to Shaun having reset my zones on my heart rate monitor and maybe I just don't burn as many calories as I think I do. I obviously don't burn much fat! My body tends to burn more carbs before it burns fat so I guess that right now, I should really, really be watching my fat and I have been.

Shaun is going to continue to keep checking my body fat every couple of weeks and he is also going to look at my food journals from http://www.myfitnesspal.com/ and I also plan to definitely back off of the workouts a bit and start following this heart rate training plan that they gave me to do.

If anyone has any other questions about this, feel free to let me know!

A few articles that I have not read yet but plan to that are included with my test results are...
A better way to burn fat http://tinyurl.com/2GTQ2D
Maximize your metabolism http://tinyurl.com/2PLRJQ
The AT factor http://tinyurl.com/YT36A7

new 21 day challenge

So today is the beginning of a new challenge, it's going to be really hard for me to track my workouts beginning on a Tuesday but I'm willing to go for it. Julie created a new 21 day spring break challenge. I have to replace 1 meal a day with a protein shake (which I already do, breakfast is a protein shake), I have to do 4 days a week of cardio, 3 days of strength training and 2 days of yoga/pilates.

Since I did weights on Monday, Julie said that I could count that as one of my strength training days so I am including that and today, I did ashtanga yoga for an hour and 15 minutes and I also ran for about 20 minutes.

My goal is going to be cardio on Tuesday, maybe Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday, strength training will be on Monday, Wednesday and Friday and yoga will be on Tuesday, Wednesday and maybe even Saturday too.

I am still also tracking my calories for the week too but am still going to count them from Sunday to Saturday. This past Sunday, I took the day off, Monday I did turbo and weight training and burned 1050 calories. Today, yoga and running and I burned 750 calories

So starting the new challenge, into week 1 have burned 1800 calories this week!

The end of the 6 week challenge

Well yesterday was the end of the 6 week challenge to burn 21,000 calories. In this time, I have lost 5 lbs and 1 inch off my waist.

My ending total for this week was 5,120 calories burned and here's the other 5 weeks...
Week 1 - 4,200
Week 2 - 3,500
Week 3 - 4,150
Week 4 - 6, 055
Week 5 - 4,850

So I burned 27,875 calories in 6 weeks. I plan to keep trying to burn 3,500 calories a week which I don't think should be a problem since I beat that goal every week except for the week that I had the stomach flu.

I think that I did great, however, I feel like I should have lost more weight than this and seem to have plateau'd recently. I have been tracking my fat and carbs and have done a great job of staying under my goal, I just am having a hard time eating more calories.

I am going to start a challenge next week to try to do 180 minutes of weights each week so stay tuned! I may need some motivation on this one! :)

Love Life. Do Good. Live Well.

Happy Friday, everyone! I had planned to have a really busy day today but my plans got changed by the 5" of snow that we got last night and I heard that the roads were terrible this morning. :( Boo We had planned to go to the gym for my favorite class of the week; strike and then we were going to go to lunch with some friends and then were going to go to a bounce place called Monkey Joe's. As it turns out, most of our friends that were going to go with us are sick so we're going to try to reschedule it for next week!

Since I updated last, on Tuesday, I did ashtanga (which is also another favorite class) and I ran a mile. I also have been speaking with a couple of instructors about becoming certified to teach some classes and just not really sure what I want to do, still giving it more thought. I really would love to teach but do I have the personality for it and will I make any money at it? If I'm doing something I love, money isn't a huge concern but it will be for my husband! :)

On Tuesday afternoon, we had a playdate with Quinton, Bradley and Barrett, all the boys had a good time and Wes was pooped after they left!

Wednesday, did my usual spinning and piyo. I guess I really can't say that strike is my favorite b/c I love ashtanga and piyo too! :) I don't think we did much Wednesday afternoon other tthan cleaning and laundry. OH, Wes did have speech therapy on Wednesday and he said a 3 word sentence, yay!!! He said Go Blue Car! yay Wes!

Thursday, I decided to get back into the pool because it has been forever since I swam. I spent a lot of the day procrastinating but we did finally make it to the gym. I took Wes swimming for a little while and he had a blast, when we first got there and I asked him if he wanted to go swimming, he said no but I took him out to the pool and showed him and when we went back to put our swimsuits on, he agreed to it. He ended up having so much fun splashing around, blowing bubbles and practice kicking. I decided that I think I'm going to do this every Thursday. Then I threw on a towel and a hoody and took him to childcare (well I got him dressed first) and then I came back and swam laps. I did quite a bit of freestyle with fins on and just upper body with a buoy between my legs. I am definitely not a great swimmer, at all but I feel like I did pretty well considering it has been since last August since I swam. I swam for about 45 minutes and then went to take a shower, I was definitely exhausted after swimming, it takes so much out of you!

Today, as I said, I'm stuck at home for the time being and I went out and shoveled snow already and burned 250 calories in 30 minutes, it's a heavy wet snow too so it was a great workout. I really just wanted to update the blog and see where I'm at for the week and then I'm going to go do the p90x kenpo. One thing I have been having a really hard time with is getting weights in. I'm really unmotivated to do it now so if anyone has any suggestions for me, let me know!

Here's my workout log for the week:
Sunday - weights for 45 minutes 100 calories burned
Monday - turbo for 60 minutes 750 calories burned
Tuesday - ashtanga and ran a mile for about 75 minutes 700 calories burned
Wednesday - spinning and piyo for about 110 minutes 1000 calories burned
Thursday - swimming for 45 minutes burned 345 calories (according to my fitness pal, I didn't wear my heart rate monitor)
Friday - (so far)... shoveling snow for 30 minutes burned 250 calories

So I have burned 3,945 calories this week.

Week 1 - 4,200 calories burned
Week 2 - 3,500 calories burned
Week 3 - 4,150 calories burned
Week 4 - 6,055 calories burned
Week 5 - 4,850 calories burned
Week 6 - 3,945 calories burned (so far)

"The greatest wealth is health."

I know I haven't updated since last Wednesday. Last Thursday, I had a terrible headache. I don't drink much caffeine (none in the morning at all, maybe a diet coke at night) but I had a terrible headache and was so tired. I wasn't able to workout OR have any caffeine because I was doing a resting metabolic rate test on Friday morning. The test went pretty well, for those of you that don't know about it, you wear a mask and probably look similar to Hannibal Lecter (even the personal trainer said I did, ha ha), you have to breathe in and out thru your mouth which is kind of a challenge (or just requires more thought on breathing!) and you basically just sit and relax for about 20 minutes. SO EASY! I did this test a couple of years ago and my RMR was 1450 calories a day, that's what I needed to eat to survive and not let my body go into starvation mode. I really wanted to redo this test since I found out that I have hypothyroidism because I knew that my RMR had changed since then and it did. My RMR is now about 1250 calories which when I first heard was kind of like being punched in the gut. If I didn't workout, that would be very little calories and going out to eat would be nearly impossible! Thankfully, I get to eat a little more calories since I workout. However, I still will probably need to play around with the calorie intake to lose some weight. I had lost 5 lbs in a month but then I plateau'd and haven't lost anything the last couple of weeks.

I did talk to Shaun, a personal trainer and the one who did the test for me and we talked about my fat, protein and carb consumption so I am watching that now and trying to not go above 40% fat and about 50% carbs and not way over on protein but pretty much what I want. I have been really watching this since I did the test on Friday and today when I was looking in the mirror, I thought my stomach already looked a little smaller. I still haven't lost any weight but I took my measurement of my waist and I have already lost an inch off my waist! WOOHOO!!! I took my measurements a few weeks ago and nothing had really changed so I know that this is a loss that has recently occurred. I didn't check my other measurements but will keep watching this. The belly is definitely an important place for me to lose it since I feel like I carry a lot of weight there!

If anyone I know around here is interested in doing this test, I highly recommend it and can answer any questions you have about it!

I'm not going to go into alot of detail about my workouts. Friday, after my test I did the usual strike and burned 650 calories, would have probably burned more but I had to leave to go get a diaper and change it in the middle of class.

Saturday- did spinning and 30 minutes of athletic yoga and burned 1000 calories. It was really nice here on Saturday so I went to the outlet mall with my mom and Wes and Alan and got some new things for him for summer and next winter, along with some jibbitz for his crocs and some Thomas PJ's which he was pretty excited about, we got to do a little more walking because of this trip too.

So for the week, that put me at 4,850 calories burned for the week!

Yesterday, I kinda took the day off, I did some abs and then I did p90x legs on my own without the video which doesn't take long. I burned about 100 calories. I had a nice visit with my friend Kathryn yesterday afternoon and got some cleaning done, Wes took a good long nap and Brad went to the office to do our taxes, uninterrupted!

Today, I went to the gym for turbo, I haven't done that class forever. I'm really not very coordinated but I can handle doing strike on Friday b/c it's not as dancy. I think my problem is that I lose my focus and I forget the moves or my count, plus I have never been one to be able to pat my belly and rub my head at the same time or however that goes, I might have that backwards, ha ha. A lot of the moves in this class require you to do things with your hands and feet at the same time. I don't feel like I looked completely stupid but I definitely was not the most coordinated person in the class. I just focused on keep moving and you'll still burn calories no matter how dumb I look! And, I burned 750 calories!

So here's my recap of my weekly challenge since I'm in the final week (although I plan to keep trying to burn 3500 calories a week for as long as I can keep it up!)...
Week 1-4200 calories burned
Week 2-3500 calories burned (stomach flu)
Week 3-4150 calories burned
Week 4-6055 calories burned (that's kinda crazy, hu?) As of this week, I had lost 5 lbs since the beginning of this challenge
Week 5-4850 calories burned
Week 6- 850 calories burned so far and as of the beginning of this week I have lost an inch off my waist!

Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off your goal. ~Henry Ford

Well, I'm finally getting around to updating this from last week. It has been a busy week and I just haven't had the time to do it before now.

I'll start with last Friday, I did my usual strike class but Julie was in Chicago and Rachel was teaching. I don't know what happened that day but I thought I was going to throw up a couple of times. Great class! HA! I also did p90x weights at home that day and burned 990 calories that day. Wes and I also went to Recreation Unlimited in the afternoon with some friends and had a blast, he loved swinging on the big boy swings, going down the slide and he liked jumping on the trampoline too! That evening, we went over to a friends house for dinner and had pizza. That didn't help with my fat intake which I have to admit, I'm having a hard time keeping it low.

Saturday, I got up and went to spinning in the morning even though I was pretty tired that morning, I also tried to stay for yoga after that but Wes had a meltdown in the daycare because he was up late the night before and was tired so I had to leave about 20 minutes into it. I still managed to burn 915 calories. Mom and Alan came over that evening and Alan brought ribs and we had mac and cheese and baked potatoes, not the healthiest of meals but hey, it's the weekend, right?

Sunday, I did kenpo and burned 650 calories. We had another bad day, went to a friends for dinner and had strombolis that evening however in all of this, I never went over my calories, was probably just high on the of the fat which is not where I want to be!

As soon as the thaw began around here, my allergies started going crazy and I haven't felt fantastic this week but went to spinning on Monday, got there late and there was a different instructor (who I didn't care for), burned 650 calories.

Tuesday, I did my usual ashtanga yoga, I finally got back to running and did a mile and a half and then I came home and did weights at home too. So good calorie burning day this day. 950 calories burned, plus Wes and I went out and did some shopping and got him lots of spring/summer clothes so we are prepared for the warm temps, yay! Come on spring!

Wednesday, it's really nice out here today, the snow is melting and it's 60 degrees, though it's not helping my allergies. I went to spinning this morning and then piyo and burned 950 calories. I came home from the gym and vacuumed out my car and cleaned the grime off the windows and then I went to get my nails done. This evening, I'm going to a local cycling place for a ladies night that I'm kind of excited for, meeting 3 friends there and just looking forward to getting out of the house this evening, especially in this nice weather.

Tomorrow, it's supposed to be SUPER duper nice out. I HAVE to take the day off from working out because on Friday, I'm doing the resting metabolic rate test. I'm so excited to have this done and find out how much I should really be eating because I haven't had it done since before I had a throid problem. I will update everyone then!

Here's my workout log:

week 1 -4,200 calories burned
week 2 - 3,500 calories burned
week 3 - 4,150 calories burned
week 4 - 6,055 calories burned (I have to admit, that's kinda crazy!)
week 5 - 3,200 calories burned (need to burn at least 300 more this week!)

so unproductive today...

• I have been so unproductive today, ugh. I got up and got dressed to workout and never did. I have worked out every other day this week and have already passed my goal of burning 3500 calories this week and I have not eaten bad today so I don't feel terrible about not working out. I just needed to do p90x legs today so I will just have to do it tomorrow instead.
  
  Yesterday, I had a great day and burned 1200 calories doing a spinning class and then piyo (pilates/yoga). I did have my body fat checked by Shaun at the gym yesterday and even though I am down 5 lbs, I'm not feeling wonderful about my body fat. I'm at 28% which is in the normal range of most people but last August when I had it checked last, I was at 24% but Shaun said that it can vary as much as 3% per person that checks it so it could have been wrong. I weighed more back then but that was also when I was training for the triathlon I did last summer and swimming in the morning so I was working out alot more. I definitely would like to get back to at least 24%, possibly lower if I can!
  
  I wanted to post the p90x workout that I did on Tuesday and last Saturday, this was a different video than I had done before, it was chest, shoulders and triceps and didn't require a pull up bar so I liked that part of it. Though, there are a TON of push ups in this video. I just have to tell you that this is an amazing workout and if you're looking for a workout that you can do at home, this is a great one to do. So here we go... (I will admit than when I did this video, I didn't do as many push ups as were in the video because I did yoga that day and did alot of push ups that day and the day before).
  
  
  I'm sure that most of these exercises can be googled if you're not sure what they are. Also, most of these you do as many as you can with the heaviest weight you can.
  
  
• First is 3 in 1 slow motion push ups - this is wide, middle and chataranga
  in and out shoulder flys (this is going out in front and then out to the side) - 16 with 10 lbs
  
• chair dips - 30ish
  
• plange push ups - I did 25 - you can google dive bomber push ups, basically the same thing.
  
• pike press - I did 25. This is basically a downward dog and you do pushups with your head almost touching the floor.
  
• side tri rise - lay on your side, cross the arm that is laying against the floor across your chest and push up with the other arm.
  
• floor flys- you can use a paper plate under one hand, go out wide then switch hands with a push up in between.
  
• scare crows - hang your arms down like a scare crow and lift just your forearms. I did 10 with 10 lbs.
  
• overhead tri- I did 20 with 10lbs.
  
• 2 speed twitch push ups - 12
  
• y press - 10 lbs/15 reps.
  
• lying tricep extension - 20 with a 10 lb weight
  
• side to side push ups - 8ish?
  
• pour flys - 12 w a 5 lb weight. A lot of these exercises are probably what you imagine them to be but I didn't write down many descriptions and I don't remember exactly. Like I said, you can probably google them.
  
• side leaning tri's (leaning on a chair) - 12 with 10 lbs.
  
• 1 arm push ups - okay, I did 5 on each arm but what you have to do is move your knees out WIDE and my arm barely moved but watching the girl in the video, she barely moves either! :)
  
• weighted circles - 2 sets of 10 with 5 lbs, forward and back
  
• throw the bomb - like a tri extension did 10 with a 10 lb weight and 15 with 5 lbs
  
• clap or plyo push ups - I didn't even do these!
  
• slow mo throw - 8 with a 10 lb weight
  
• front to back tricep extension - 15 with 10 lbs
  
• 1 arm balance push ups - ha, yeah right!
  
• fly-row-press - 15 with a 10 lb weight
• dumbell cross body blows (you lay on the floor and since this is the last exercise, you do as many as you can) I did about 50 with 10 lbs.
  

So, that's all for today other than my training log...

Week 1 - 4,200 calories burned

Week 2 - 3,500 calories burned (sick with the flu)

Week 3 - 4,150 calories burned

Week 4 - 3,950 calories burned (still 2 workout days left this week)