Living Healthy: 20 Months
For a long time I'd been doing 30 minutes walking briskly on the treadmill and various upper body weight lifting circuits. I'm down 17 lbs since I started this whole thing but considering I've been doing it for 20 months, 10 more (for my interim goal) seems like a long way to go. I'd plateaued, as they say, so with the helicopter tour and skydiving deadlines fast approaching, I've decided to step up my game.
Rather than build muscle by lifting I've decided to decrease that and favor a significant cardio workout. For the last few weeks, I've moved to 45 minutes on the stair climber twice a week and push ups every day. I'm finally working out hard enough that I can't form complete sentences and the push ups will keep my upper body from losing strength. This week, I'm trying to start a 3x/week routine, in hopes I can really burn off the pounds. My Wii Fit shipped today and while a bit gimmicky, I hope it will encourage me to be active in my off days as well as motivate me all around by tracking my progress.
The best news is that I went shopping for new clothes a few days ago because the pants I bought a year ago are too big. I'm down another pant size, had to make a new hole on my belt and even dropped a shirt size. It's hard to believe at one time I was wearing XXXL and now I have shirts in my closet that are XL. Stayed tuned for updates... those 10 lbs must go!
Rather than build muscle by lifting I've decided to decrease that and favor a significant cardio workout. For the last few weeks, I've moved to 45 minutes on the stair climber twice a week and push ups every day. I'm finally working out hard enough that I can't form complete sentences and the push ups will keep my upper body from losing strength. This week, I'm trying to start a 3x/week routine, in hopes I can really burn off the pounds. My Wii Fit shipped today and while a bit gimmicky, I hope it will encourage me to be active in my off days as well as motivate me all around by tracking my progress.
The best news is that I went shopping for new clothes a few days ago because the pants I bought a year ago are too big. I'm down another pant size, had to make a new hole on my belt and even dropped a shirt size. It's hard to believe at one time I was wearing XXXL and now I have shirts in my closet that are XL. Stayed tuned for updates... those 10 lbs must go!
3 Comments:
You should even try to get over an hour once a week. I can't find any links, but Ive heard numerous times before that after 60 minutes of activity your body starts running differently and you burn a lot more fat.
Edit: In trying to find links to back up the above, I found many that said more sessions of higher intensity burn more fat because your metabolism is still running hard during each rest. So instead of doing a 30 minute session, do 3x10 with a little break in between. Makes sense to me.
Now to get you to do a 5k...
I used to ride 20, 30 and even 45 milers in high school so maybe I can sign up for a "not entirely physically fit" event. :-)
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