Dance Dance Revolution!

Wow thanks El for the new design for this blog it looks amazing!!

And despite my total blog slacking, January has been/ was actually a decent working out month!
My only real workout goal so far for 2015 has been to try something new and I already did...in the form of a cardio dance class!!

Total disclaimer, I look not one bit as coordinated/ put together as the ladies in this photo! As Katy can attest to, because bless her heart she tried it too...and we have actually sort of ( albeit drunkenly) agreed to go a second time, and possibly convinced someone else to go with us!!

I have more updates to share but will have to be when I'm more awake :)

Workout Update

I can't remember where I left off on here.. my workout schedule has gone something like this:

Mondays: Douvris

Tuesdays: JM workout video, sometimes a run on the treadmill

Wednesdays: Douvris, sometimes a workout video

Thursdays: Workout video or rest

Fridays: yoga or spin, and soccer

Sats: cross country ski (once), sometimes curling (is this exercise?)  douvris

Sundays: cross country ski

This past weekend I was in Boston. Friday and Saturday Claire and I did fitness blender workouts. It is so cool, its a husband/wife team of trainers and they have so many awesome and free videos. Claire is following an 8 week fat-loss for busy people program so we did the workouts in her plans. She kept telling me how cool the fitness blender site was and for some reason I hadn't wanted to try it, but now I really like it. It turns out my boss also does the same videos- ha!

Sunday we went to Health Works, what a  great gym!!

We did a trampoline class and it was a lot of fun.

Since I've been back:

Monday: Lazy Mclazierr , was tired and felt like I was getting sick, so rested

Tuesday: 5k treadmill run at lunch to get out of my slug mood, and squash at night- soo fun!! hadn't played in years.

Wed- today: this morning Tamara and I did a quiet cardio for apartment workout on fitness blender, which included "quiet burpies". Spoiler alert: they suck almost as much as loud burpies. Tongiht I am going to dourvris.

On the nutrition side, my "diet" has been absolutely atrocious, I need to start planning healthy, filling meals so I eat less junk.

How's everyone else doing? Making it through the winter ok?  

Travelling

I am sitting in the airport waiting for my plane to board to Boston and It is taking all my willpower not to go buy a muffin/donut/croissant/ who knows what at Tim Hortons! There is no reason for me to do it. I ate a half a bagel and half a yogurt on the way to the airport and now the banana i brought with. I am also sipping on a half coffee half french vanilla.. To keep me awake. Lots of halfs today..

There is just something about travling that makes me indulge (food) and splurge (spending). Am i the only one? 

I am sure i will eat lots of delicious unhealthy food, but will try to not start it out with a 500 calorie muffin before I even get on the plane :p 

what is worse..

 ..than doing 50 burpees as fast as possible for time at the beginning of a workout?

that's right..doing another 50 at the end! Aiiieee. I was in shock.

I was so sore from the workout last night that I was up at 3-4 am because I couldn't sleep I was so sore. Mostly my legs from so many thrusters, weighted squats and jump squats.

No pain no gain.

Incase normal pushups are just too boring

You can always try out these:

Back at the gym

So I've been back from my "Holiday" since a week now and I've had my gym bag in the car with me since wednesday and only got to the gym today. -.- In my defence I had so much work to do and I started my Russian classes again by the time everything calmed down the week was over it was saturday and I was starting my Level 2 Pole Dancing course. 

Level 2 aka Level of Pain is what I've heard the most painful level from the 12 levels. We climbed a lot and I have to say I'm super proud of myself that I got up on the pole so high, sadly I couldn't do a lot of the new tricks because I forgot my hot pants at home and only had normal leggings on... The coming up saturday I'll be in London so I'll be missing one class of pole :( boohoo.

Anyway I'm doing Pole Dancing with an ex colleague/friend of mine and she surprised me with an awesome foam roller! You read right a FOAM ROLLER! Boy have I dreamed about having those since I was a little girl (not entirely true but since about a year :P)

This Foam Roller is a Trigger Point therapy Foam Roller, we have these at the gym and I love love love them! Needless to say I used mine the second I got home :)

Today I ended up going to the gym and did pure weight training for 1,5 hrs. This includes jumping rope, floor workouts etc etc. and I did all this with a totally bruised foot. I told El I'm going to write a blogpost her comment was "I predict some feet photos" so now I can't let her down! Here's my bruised foot! No pain no gain am I right!?

Anyway I also went to the Finnish sauna for 15/20 minutes and it was absolutely fantastic ! Love love love going to the sauna after a good workout :)

I also need to tell you about my amazing new Jump Rope well Speed Rope from Kettler I got over the "Holidays" I love it so much and used it every day when I was away to help me keep fit! Hope it helped because I start boxing again tomorrow :p

Here are my beautiful foam roller and speed rope together.

I can highly recommend the Kettler as well as TriggerPoint for the foam roller, both items do not disappoint! 

Enjoy the rest of your sunday! 

Get it get it

So it turns out consistency really does get you results! you might not see them right away, but keep at it and you will. I am noticing that I am getting stronger and fitter and it's making my workouts more rewarding and therefore encourages me to keep coming back for more. It's a cycle and the more you do, the more you can do and want to do.  We are all stronger than we think and can do more than we thought we could.

Yesterday at the dojo we had to try and lift as heavy weights as possible for just 1 set of dead lift- squat clean, squat with weights and push press and I managed with 35 pound dumbbells- so 70 pounds! Woohoo. And it didn't feel that bad. I don't know why but I never would have even attempted that before. My flexibility has improved so I am able to get lower and use my legs more. 

After doing what felt like a gazillion squats,  drills, lunges, jumps on and over the bench, and the weight set mentioned above, we were told we could chose between: 5 minutes of squat clean thrusters, or 5 minutes of burpees jump to a target.. hmm. It was hard to decide which was worse but I couldn't bring myself to voluntarily do burpees,  so I chose the weights. After the 5 minutes we looked like this:

I stole that photo from Jamie's instagram. I am in the back left. 

Afterwards, we we were told one last workout. As there were just a few minutes left, I thought maybe we would do abs or hip complex. No such luck. It turned out that we had to do the workout we didn't chose! WTH.. so I had to do the 5 minutes of burpees after all... sneaky sneaky.  I guess sometimes it's better not to know what's coming. Hey, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger, right? or so they say anyway. 

Make your 2014 workout your 2015 warm- up!

Well thanks Juliet for keeping this blog going and for motivating me to keep moving! Especially since you are often done your workout before I even wake up! It really encourages me to get it done.

I am doing pretty well so far, although we are still in the initial 2 week new years resolution period..

Here's a little peak at what I've been up to on the exercise front in 2015

Thursday January 1- New years day

I went for a run and ended up at my parents. I took the scenic route along the river and it felt like forever. It was nice and quiet though as nobody was awake yet. Ottawa was a ghost town at 9 am.

Oh, I almost forgot, I went to a yin/yang yoga class with Patrick. It was half nap half yoga. I fell asleep at least twice. It was more stretching than anything.

Later that day, I went for a short walk with my parents on the canal and then ate a beavertail. Something about the cold weather makes it hard to resist. I am filing that under counter-exercise and moving on.

Friday January 2- Did a spin class at lunch with Tamara that killed me. Had a soccer game at night

Saturday January 3: I was so tired and had no energy so slept in and skipped curling. Still made it to Douvris somehow. The workout was insane and included over 100 burpies.. yikes.

Sunday January 4: Cross country skiing with Antonella in icy conditions. It required about twice as much effort, but was still really fun.

I am so happy to get out and ski this year as I barely went at all last year and I really enjoy it.

Monday January 5- am: Jillian  'Don't phone it in' Michaels- 30 day shred level 1 with Tamara/ pm: Douvris- more sprints, burpies, lunges, and a whole lot of pushups. Oh yeh and thrusters. and poppovers..

I am avoiding Goodlife like the plague as I am sure it is insanely packed.

Tuesday January 6- am: Jillian ' these abs don't come for free' Michaels 30 day shred level 1 with Tamara.

That is all I have planned for today. So that's it we are all caught up. Hopefully tomorrow I will continue with JM and douvris and maybe take a rest day on Thursday. I also want to fit in some yoga at some point.
                                   

How are the rest of you doing? Any big goals for 2015?

Happy New Year :)

So far so good, I've been on one 10,5km run and that was on the first of january. I was planning on going on another run today until my dad said I'd most likely slip and break my neck because it's so icy outside so I thought it'd be best if I left it out today. 

Instead I went down to our cellar and did an hour long workout :) I started out with doing knee-ups going back and forth 10 times (one round for me was going back and forth once). Then I did 10 minutes of jump rope, the first five minutes were just normal jumping (left foot, right foot) and the other five were a mixture of only left, only right, side jumps, lunge jumps, front and back jumps, on the spot running/jumping and double-unders.

I then did day 11 and 12 of the 30 day AB challenge meaning 65 + 70 crunches, 60 + 65 second planks and 26 + 28 leg raises. I also did 50 jump lunges, holding the jumping rope high above my head, 50 lateral lunges, 50 pushups, 50 toe taps, 50 bridges, 50 Leg lifts (25x2 on each leg), 50 (25x2 on each leg) elbow to knee moves and 1 minute wall sit :)

I might go for a run later on but I doubt it!

Happy Weekend :)