Phat Camp Lesson Four: Intensity

I have a saying, “Leave it all on the gym floor.” All of us at Phit-N-Phat fight to make every workout count. You are there aren’t you? Why not make it the best workout you can?

Phat Camp weekend began on Friday afternoon where we did a full shoulder workout, ab workout and followed it with a four mile walk. The girls who had arrived for Day One felt good but a little tired. Two of them actually began their day with a 6 mile run so they were really feeling it!

Saturday everyone had arrived and we moved into a full day of workouts. It was NOT EASY. We all agreed to ram and jam Saturday because some people had to leave before legs on Sunday.

Bright eyed and bushy tailed the girls and guy headed out to the backyard for a little leg workout. After the first Superset was done people were commenting how their heartrates had never beat so fast! I thought that was awesome for them to admit and a great wake up call that everyone can workout a little harder.

We had the leg workout from heck. After lunging and squatting our way back and forth across my backyard, we moved to a cul-de-sac and did suicide sprints, ali twists, and side shuffles. Every last person made it. Some burned over 500 calories in about 40 minutes. The rest of the day they only had to do a full arms and chest workout plus back. They survived because the next morning they woke up to a 30 min. run with a 40 min. walk.

The lesson for all of us is to really ask yourself after every workout did you do what you were supposed to? High intensity should be HIGH intensity. Too often we leave a hard workout without really pushing our limits.

I find that before you start a workout you need to define the goal (high intensity, endurance, recovery, power strength) and then make sure you hit it. When you are supposed to bust it, make sure you leave nothing in the tank. If you are doing an endurance run, make sure you leave feeling like you could’ve run more.

The best way to see yourself improve physically, either fat loss of strength, is to have a plan, work the plan, and make changes to the plan as needed.

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Workout Journal: Chest and it’s done! My son is sick so I got up at 4:15 this morning to work and workout. My hubby is going to relieve me this evening so that I can get in my other short run for the week.

W/up with 1 min. of jump roping

Push ups over step SS with Push up pops on bench SS with Pop Squats

Flat Bench DB Presses SS with Flat Bench Flies SS with Mountain Climbers

Push Up pumps SS with DB Pullovers SS with Bearcrawls

Food Journal:

Preworkout – Marathon Bar with coffee
Postworkout – Fiber One and Cereal
S – Protein Shake with fruit
L – Green salad with Thai Tuna and apple
S – Eng Muffin with PB prerun
D – Coconut Chicken (Kashi Dinner) with green salad
S – Protein Shake

Phat Camp Lesson Three: Form

During our Phat Camp we had a great technique seminar with my own trainer, Bill, and we discussed form. Using good form during your workouts and focusing on the muscles you are working can take a workout from decent to great.

Here are my tips to making a strength workout great:

1. Clear your head before you begin each set. As my trainer says, snap into a mode that will allow you to lift hard and heavy. Afterall ladies, light weight and loads of reps doesn’t do squat for your fat or your body. Challenge your muscles if you really want to burn through fat.

2. Use a slow and controlled movement. You want to lift and lower or push and pull in a smooth fashion. If you are swinging weight around you don’t have enough. If you are jerking and snapping you might have too much. We’re building a physique; not powerlifting.

3. Keep a contraction on your muscles. If you feel you lose the contraction in your movement (your muscle relaxes), stop a little short. For example, I see girls all the time in the gym sitting on the leg extension machine ripping off a fast 20 reps. Each time the weights clank the bottom. Not only are they not using enough weight but they are also losing the contraction by relaxing the muscle when the weight is clanking. Stop short of the weight stack to keep tension on the quads through the whole set.

4. If you don’t know how to do a movement, google it. There are way too many videos and pictures of the proper way to do about any exercise you desire on the internet these days.

5. Maintain your form the whole time. If you have to sacrifice form, you are lifting too heavy. When your form shifts you typically start working muscles that you aren’t focusing on. You also run the risk of getting hurt.

Ladies, you know me. I love the strength training. All of us need to be doing it. It’s the best way to lose fat. My style burns through calories during and after the workout. If you aren’t doing it, you are losing out on a great body and a great way to get in the best shape of your life.

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Workout Journal: Shoulders a.m.

Smith Machine OH Presses 5 sets SS with Hand to Knee Crunches
Upright Rows 4 sets SS with Leg Lifts with Stability Ball
Cable Single Arm Lateral Raises 3 sets SS with Weighted Oblique Twists
Reverse Pec Dec 2-3 sets SS with Squats with Front Raises

Cardio – p.m. workout will do a short interval run for half marathon training

Food Journal:

B – WW Eng Muffin with PB and milk
S – Protein Shake with fruit
L - Thai Tuna Wrap and Green Beans
S – Peanut Butter and Milk
D – Pasta Marinara and Green Salad (I’ll add chicken to mine for protein)
S – Protein Shake (no fruit)

Phat Camp Lesson Two: Who Said It Was Easy?

Look people. Losing fat ain’t easy. Let me say this again. Losing fat AIN’T easy. I routinely have people ask me what my secret is, how did I lose over 110lbs., and other various spins on the same questions. When I tell them I did it the old school way they lose all interest. Nobody wants to hear they might have to sweat and not be able to eat Skinny Cows twice a day.

It suprised all of us to find how many people are looking for a magic bullet or they are looking for someone to tell them how simple it is. For 95% of us, losing fat is hard. It takes lots of work, saying no, making sacrifices, and learning a whole new way to live. That stuff is hard and never let anyone fool you.

We all had a roundtable discussion about this and why Phit-N-Phat programs and my service has worked. I have never kidded them about what it takes to lose the fat. You have to:

1. Eat healthy foods forever; not just when you are losing weight. Sure you’ll get a little wiggle room when you reach goal, but we eat just as healthy now as we did when we were losing. Personally, I only eat more of the good stuff and have an occassional splurge.

2. Exercise HARD. Sorry, but if you want to look good you have to work out like you mean it. Sure, beginners don’t go gung-ho and walking is a great way to get STARTED. In the end, though, you are making a committment to moving for the rest of your life. You gotta strength train and you gotta get off the couch. As we all say, leave it all in the gym.

3. Quit using your stress, family, friends, co-workers, the melting ice caps, and that kid from fourth grade who called you fat give you reason to continue in self-destructive behaviors. Get over yourself so you can start living the life you want. You’ll always have stress and struggle so just learn right now that eating a cheeseburger doesn’t pay your bills or make your kids behave.

The workouts I sell and give my girls are hard. They are fat busting, sweating, making you wonder why you bought this type stuff. That’s why my girls look hot and they are wearing clothes they didn’t even think they ever would when they timidly signed up with PNP. Most of them were very overweight or had zero to little lifting experience.

Now…huh…huh…huh…they are tight little machines! Don’t believe me? Look at this group shot of hotties. Collectively, including that hot husband of Lorie’s who is a PNP Girl (sorry Bill ) we have lost over 400 lbs.!!! Not all of that is with me, but I will certainly take credit for the tight bods and they can take credit for getting their butts out of bed every day, working out without someone yelling at them to give them more, and eating healthy when everyone else isn’t. I’m so proud of you and well, you know that.

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Workout Journal: DOR…Tuesdays are my housekeeper days so I’m giving it a try to take off my busy day of the week.

Food Journal:

B – Egg whites with 2% cheese, WW eng muffin, fruit
S – Choco protein shake
L - Grilled chicken salad
S – SBD Bar
D – Beef Tips and rice with green beans and beets
S – Orange Protein Shake

Lesson One of Phat Camp: Fake It Til You Make It

I had my first Phat Camp this weekend at my house. We had an awesome time and learned so much about each other and fitness. This week I want to focus on one topic daily that came up this weekend. Today we’re it’s taking compliments.

From the moment my girls (and one hunky husband…and I mean he looks as good as wife says he does) started arriving, I was SHOCKED at how awesome they looked. To hear them tell it they were a flabby mess and just years away from their goals. Whatever! They were hot and so much fitter than what they described. Pictures don’t even do them justice!!!

I just didn’t understand it. Here is a hot group of women in front of me with their heads hung low and feeling self-conscious. The first day we would pay compliments to each other and the first thing that would fly out of our mouths, me included, was “well I really need to lose these thighs.” Or, “only if my gut looked good.” I didn’t realize how bad I do it myself!!! To think, me, drowning in good ole fat girl thinking.

Finally I stopped everyone mid-workout and said from this point forward I didn’t want to hear one more person say anything negative about themselves. When someone pays you a compliment you look them in the eye and say, “Thank you! I’ve been working very hard.” You know what? They did it and I feel sure that just one day of accepting the truth rather than denying it made them feel better about themselves. I know it made me feel better. I’ve got a big ego as it is and now it’s even better. Woohoo!

I don’t care if you are just beginning or you are at the end of the fat loss journey, start taking compliments and quit dismissing them. It wears on your psyche to deny that you work hard, eat right, and look good. You deserve to hear those things and people really mean it. Even if you don’t believe it just fake it til you make it. You know why? The last thing you want to do is finally reach your fat loss goal and feel miserable about your looks. You gotta start NOW changing how you think. It’s a long process so use your whole journey to learn how to believe in yourself.

I want everyone to repeat after me: I promise that for the next week I will say…

“Thank you. I have been working very hard!!!”

And, I know if you do my schedules that you certainly back that statement up. All you Let’s Get It Started, Big Mo’s, and Work It Out people cannot ever say you don’t work hard. Be proud of yourself and allow all the great things you deserve into your life. You owe it to yourself.

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Workout Journal: Legs with trainer.

Free Squats – 6 of the best and heaviest to date. I felt like a goddess today because I left it all at the rack!

Leg Press – regular stance. I lowered the weights because my quads were spent from squats. Yay me.

Hamstring Curls – Lying and did drop sets on the last two sets.

No Cardio on leg day.

Food Journal:

B – Oatmeal with Fage and hard boiled egg
S – Pink Lady Smoothie
L – Turkey Pasta Marinara with cottage cheese and green salad
S – SBD Bar and milk
D – Chicken Salad
S – Protein Shake

Fat Girl Visions

Two of my clients have arrived early for Phat Camp. We are having a great time and talking about all sorts of interesting things. One topic that came up so much last night was Fat Girl Thinking (FGT).

If you read my blog regularly you know what this is. FGT is a place all of us visit regularly in our minds that tells us that we are fat, not worthy, ugly, heavier than we think we are, doesn’t allow us to be happy with our choices, and basically is the chubby, little devil sitting on our shoulder. Our little devil holds a big sugar stick instead of a pitch fork, though.

FGT is one of those things that naturally happens when you are losing weight or have lost your weight. It takes FOREVER to go away. Honestly, there are days I think I have it licked and other days that I feel at square one with it. The key for me is to remind myself that it is “just thinking” and it is not “reality”. When it happens I go to my PNP client site and talk about it. I journal what I’m thinking, why it’s wrong, and essentially talk myself off that ledge.

The other key is accepting the fact that there will always be a fat girl inside me. She lived with me most of my life and there is no way to ever erase her. She definitely gets quieter as time goes on, but I don’t want her to ever go away. For all the times she makes me doubt my new body and my self-confidence, she also makes me drag my lazy butt to the gym on the days I really need to go. Yes, even I have days that I want to forget working out and eating right. More than you know.

That’s one aspect of FGT we forget about. Sometimes she’s right! There are times that we start nibbling, shortening our workouts, or saying the dreaded, “I eat so much better than most people or than I used to…I can have that.”Our little pal starts piping up. This is exactly when we need to listen to her. We could be falling into our old habits and ways of thinking and she’s actually trying to help us…she just does it in an ugly way. I mean, it would be nice if she would say, “You really should workout today; you aren’t that tired so buck up,” versus, “You are such a fatty; I can’t believe you are so lazy that you are going to stay in bed this morning!” That’s just ole fat girl…curt, rude, and in your face.

Everyone needs to identify when she makes sense and when she’s just being a grouch. Most of the time she’s grouchy and messing with your mind. Sometimes, though, she’s tough loving you and you need to listen.

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Workout: Back with trainer. We’ll be doing the usual…Pull-ups, some sort of row, and this week we’ll do biceps.

Food Journal:

B – Oatmeal and Fage
S – Post workout Shake (choco/banana)
L – Ham sand wrap, carrots and hummus
S – Protein Bar and milk
D – Pasta with Turkey Marinara
S – Fage with PP

The PNP Girls Are Coming to Town

It’s that time…the Phit-n-Phat Camp is finally here. Some of my clients are coming in from all over to spend the weekend with me, exercise, learn new techniques, and get to know each other better. It’s going to so much fun and we get a chance to show off all the hard work we’ve been doing together.

What I have learned through Phit-N-Phat is that community means a lot to women while they are losing fat and getting in shape. Women need support, they need education, and they need to feel like they aren’t alone. I think that’s what makes my group of ladies so special. Every person that gets into the “club” is welcomed and made to feel like they have always been with us. We share our ups and downs and, mostly, we teach women that you are never alone in this journey.

I encourage you during your fat loss journey to do a few key things:

1. Have a smart exercise plan so that you aren’t wasting your time with something that isn’t going to give you good results.

2. Follow a good, sensible diet. Yes, I said diet. Call it eating plan or whatever, but know that you got to eat smart to lose fat. Eat stupid and you lose weight (muscle). Just click on clean eating and diet in the categories to the right of the screen to learn what that is.

3. Find a support group to journal with, talk to, and relate to. It can be a Weight Watchers meeting, an online community (my favorite of course), or a group of friends at work. The key is to find some people to go through the journey with you.

My goal and driving mission behind PNP is to make sure that any women who wants to feel sexy, be healthy, and look Phat can! Since I have finally found peace with a healthy lifestyle I want more than ever for others to have the same experience.

Now, get started on the three steps if you aren’t already and embrace your new life.

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Workout Journal: Shoulders

DB OH Presses 4 sets SS with Lateral Raises

BB Upright Rows 4 sets SS with Bentover Rear Delts

Weight Plate Raises to front 4 sets SS with Kneeling Ab Crunches on Cables

High Rear Delt Pulls 4 sets SS with Bicycle Crunches

Food Journal:

B – Egg withes with sprinkle of cheese, 2 pcs of WW toast, few pieces of cantaloupe
S – Protein shake with banana post workout
L – Tuna with green beans, more cantaloupe, 2 pcs of WW toast
S – Peanut Butter
S – before run apple slices
D – Chicken breast salad with egg and sugar snap peas
S – Fage with PP

Clean Eating

Clean eating means a lot of things. It’s not just about the foods you eat, but it’s the lifestyle you choose to go along with it. I don’t always eat clean but it is something I strive for. Eating clean, or the attempt to do it, leaves me feeling in control of my life and a confidence that I am setting a good example to my family.

Rather than giving you a long essay on how to eat clean, etc., I decided to link you to some of my favorite articles on the internet about the topic. Don’t be scared of some of the sites. We ALL can learn a lot from bodybuilders. You don’t have to be bulking up like a hulk to benefit from eating right and timely. Especially all you women; you aren’t going to bulk up unless you are pumping drugs, a ton of food, and lifting hours a day. If you can eat in caloric restriction and pump up muscle please give me some of your special DNA.

Strategies to Eating Clean
Eating Clean – What to Eat

“The basics of eating clean are using a few simple rules for most of your meals each day, all day, every day. If you simple follow the rule of consuming a portion of lean protein (cold water fish, white meat poultry, etc.) in combination with complex carbohydrates (yams, whole wheat bread, etc.) at each meal you’ll notice a significant change in how you feel and how you look. In addition, adding fresh fruits and vegetables to each meal will leave you feeling full & healthy! Clean snacks include the apples, fruit & nuts, or chopped veggies with hummus (one of my favorites) the fiber in these snacks satiates hunger pangs; plus fruits and veggies are loaded with beneficial vitamins and nutrients.

Meals or snacks should be eaten at regular two or three hour intervals throughout the day if you are interested in really getting lean. If you are really interested in staying trim, eat more high quality foods regularly throughout the day, this will result in increased overall metabolism, fat loss, and retaining your lean muscle.

Eating clean to stay lean does not mean eating less. In fact, you’ll probably eat more than you were before. But now, you will be eating lots of healthy, superior foods that rev up your metabolism and fill you with lots of energy. Tips for eating clean include: preparing healthy foods in advance, having extra chicken breasts, tuna salad and chopped vegetables packed into a Tupperware containers for quick access.”

The Eat Clean Diet book

These links will walk you through the basics of eating clean. If you are a Weight Watcher member, the Core program is close to eating clean. It’s not perfect but it certainly encourages a very healthy lifestyle. I think Core works much better with active women and every woman who does Weight Watchers should look into it.

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Workout Journal: Run 30 min. I only have time for a run today and my body is sore so I’ll jump back into my strength workouts tomorrow.

Food Journal:

B – 1 cup of watermelon, Egg Wrap
S – Choco Protein Shake
L – SKIPPING – I am having professional photos taken today so I’m not eating lunch until afterward. Can’t afford any bloat . The pics are too expensive and they are for a secret project. I’ll eat ASAP after the shoot.
S – Protein Shake, Banana (after shoot on way home)
D – Risotto and chicken bake with green beans and beets
S – Fage

Showing Up and Getting It Done

Some days you aren’t going to have a great workout. My leg workout was mentally hard and not as strong as usual.

The last few days have been stressful and it all caught up with me this morning during my leg workout. I’m not going into the details, but some highlights are Mommy Guilt in full force this morning taking my sweet boy back to preschool after two weeks of being gone, TOM, a family member is seriously ill, and a group of my girls are coming to my house for Phat Camp 07 this weekend! Anyway, everything all compounded to a crap leg day.

My trainer and I were talking about it. He says I’m too hard on myself. My squats were way off, mentally I was struggling, and my body was giving out before my legs were. It made me mad because normally I can “snap” into my moves. Today I just couldn’t push everything out of my head.

What I came to realize is that all workouts are not created equal. There are going to be days you just have to get it done the best you can. Today I didn’t have the strength I normally do, but my body felt the workout nonetheless. That’s about all you can ask for. I vowed to judge today’s success by this standard: I showed up when I didn’t want to, I pressed as hard as I could, and I didn’t make excuses. I even made a note in my journal “mentally checking out” on one of my sets so that I knew why the week looked funny.

That’s how you know you are making progress. It’s not always seeing bigger weights, less numbers on the scale, or cals ticking off the heart rate monitor. Some days the wins are showing up and getting it done.

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Legs:

Free Squats with traner six sets
Leg Presses (I did great on this for some reason) four sets
Hamstring Curls with negatives two sets

Cardio: I’m walking for a few minutes tonight and then heading to the store with son. My hubby has his first session with my trainer tonight as his birthday gift. Go Chris! I’ll pick Logan up at the gym from Chris, otherwise, it would be no cardio and rest for my legs.

Food Journal:

B – Fiber One and skim milk
S – EAS Shake post workout
L – Slaw and chicken breast
S – peanut butter
D – Tuna Green Salad and apple slices
S – Fage

Working Hard For What?

I was writing in my member site journal last night that I sometimes feel like I work very hard for little progress. It made me think about this whole journey and why it can be so frustrating to so many.

In the beginning you are so giddy with excitement and you are losing well. Each week is a nice payoff for all of your hard work. Even if the scale doesn’t reward you, measurements or your clothes give you that little push you need to feel confident that you are making great strides.

The closer you get to your goal the harder it gets to stay focused. The changes you experience are so small that it takes a microscope to see the changes. You just have to trust blindly that eating right and exercising really is the way to a healthy, fit body.

For me it’s even harder. My Phit Girl goals fly in the face of my Fat Girl Thinking days. No longer do I await a drop in the scale or see numbers decrease. Now it’s all about increasing numbers in inches across my shoulders, sculpting one area while maintaining another, and going heavier and heavier with the weights.

I can honestly say that the journey never ends…the goals just change. I can’t eat what I want, I can’t stop exercising, and I can’t afford a pity party everytime I do eat something off my plan. If I want to have a fit life, I have to lead a fit life. There really is no magic day looming where I finally go “off the diet.”

So, regardless of what stage you are in your work is a lifelong journey. It’s not a quick fix. You won’t be in fat loss mode forever, but you will never go back to ding-dongs for breakfast either.

What do we work hard for? We do it for ourselves, we do it for our kids, and we do it because even the little wins each week add up to the life we all dream about.

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Back Day:

5 sets Wide Grip Pullups (Assisted)
4 sets Close Grip Pulldowns
4 sets Single DB Row with a Twist

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Food Journal:

B – SBD Bar, Fruit
S – Postworkout Protein Shake
L – Boca Burger and beans
S – Tuna Salad
D – Risotto, beets, green beans, chicken
S – Fage

No Scale for Thirteen Days

Being addicted to the scale is something many of us suffer from. It’s the one thing I have never truly conquered in my own fat loss journey. I found that when I lost all my weight that it was disappointing every morning to hop on the scale and not see a loss. You get so used to the payback and forget about all the other good things you are doing.

I had a period where the scale had lost its power. Then, without warning I saw myself falling into old patterns of beating myself up if the scale fluctuated…regardless if I knew that it was due to factors outside of my eating.

This month I vowed to ditch the scale for a whole month and solely go by how I look in the mirror, feel, and fit in my clothes. Let me tell you, it’s been a lot easier this month to eat right and feel good about how I look. Seeing the number on the scale first thing in the morning was ruling how I ate and felt all day. Some days I would not “look” bigger but be up in weight. The rest of the day I was cranky and ill for no reason!

Some people operate better when they weigh everyday. I think it’s great because you can correct yourself really fast if you are gaining. But, there are some of us who just don’t have that healthy relationship with the numbers. I try to, but in the end I allow that number to have way too much control over me.

For now I am going cold turkey. It’s all about how my jeans button, the reflection in the mirror, and my eating and workout journal. Onward and forward through the lifelong journal.

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Workout Journal: Shoulders. Last night Chris and I ended up just running so we could get to the grocery store for healthy food. This morning I did shoulders and I am *gasp* cleaning house. My housekeeper has not shown up for two weeks so now I’m stuck doing it until we find someone else.

Food Journal:

B – Fiber One with Skim
Workout
L – Grilled Chicken Salad with parm cheese, lite caesar dressing, and a lite Eng Muffin
S - Protein Shake
D – Grilled Chicken with Risotto and Green Beans
S – Fage