What Will Power? Cream Egg Combat

~Written by Chad

What a great time of year! The winter is almost behind us, we have the full spring and summer to look forward to, the days are getting longer and Cadbury releases a 'new' batch of Cream Eggs. I say new, because there are plenty of stores still trying to get rid of last year's selection. You've bitten into the ones from last season, with the almost solid middle. Brutal! But a fresh one...that's my weakness.

Am I the only person who can't walk past the Cream Egg and Mini Egg display without giving in? I don't know what it is about those perfect little chocolate eggs, but I simply cannot say 'No'. Oh well. If you should ever give in to temptation, and I suggest you do from time to time, know that the earlier in the day you do, the less chance of any of those calories finding their way to your hips, or butt or where ever they like to go. If you give in late in the day, chances are very good that they will stay with you.

In order to help balance out the added calories that always seem to show up around Easter, I have put together a longer and tougher workout for us all. This workout combines bodyweight exercises with stability ball exercises, adding some extra core strengthening into the mix. I call it the Countdown. 550 fun-filled reps completed as quickly as you can. Your goal should be under 25 minutes.

Here's how it works. Complete the following, in order, and don't move on to the next exercise until ALL the necessary reps have been completed. There are 10 exercises.

100 mountain climbers (50 each leg)

90 military plank - stability ball (45 each leg)

80 squat hops

70 hamstring rollins/curls - stability ball (35 of each, alternating 1 at a time)

60 side plank rollovers (30 each side)

50 jackknife/jackknife pikes - stability ball (25 of each, alternating 1 at a time)

40 lunge jumps

30 rollouts - stability ball

20 fullnburpees (with push-up)

10 superman bows - stability ball

Enjoy this workout! Chad

I got 28:20 for my first time.

10 minutes of %#@& $!# workout

We are almost 8 weeks into 2012. If you have been following along then you are likely feeling both stronger and bored of the workouts. Excellent! Time to switch things up a little.

The goal is still to complete the February Quick Fit Challenge, but I want to show you all a new and quick workout. I hope that you can give it a shot by the end of the weekend.

As it often is, our goal is to complete as many repetitions as possible in a specific time. For this workout, we are looking at 10 minutes.

There are 3 exercises that we are going to cycle thru in our attempt at maximum repetitions.

The exercises are...

1. Burpee Blaster (5 reps)
2. Alternating Lunge Jumps (10 reps)
3. Up and Down Spiderman Planks (10 reps)

Please see the video for the exercise demonstration.

This workout is tough. Add it onto one of your 2 minute challenges and you've got quite a workout.

Both Kate and I did this workout the other day. She was able to complete four full cycles plus a fifth cycle of the burpees.  Due to my, slightly above average, competitive nature, I was able to complete four full cycles plus a fifth cycle of the burpees AND the alternate lunge jumps :)

Even if you only get thru once, it will be worth it. Try it and repeat every 3-7 days, you'll be amazed how quickly you improve. Always be sure to give at least 2 days to recover before repeating. 

The key to success is pushing yourself. Try hard and you can only get stronger! 

Chad

Putting it all together

It's hard to believe, but we are almost 6 weeks into 2012. Doomsday is getting closer and we are going to need to be fit in order to save the world. Kidding. I hope that you are all feeling, at the very least, a little stronger now than you were when this year began. We have been getting our bodies good and ready for some more serious workouts and we are about to have some fun!

We are going to be putting out some 5 - 30 minute workouts over the next few weeks and I hope that you will enjoy them. The idea behind our series of workouts and challenges, is that you can design a workout to fit into any available time slot. If you only have 2 minutes, and we all have 2 minutes, take advantage of it!! If you have 20 minutes or even more, link a few workouts, challenges and quick fits together and create a workout that fills the time. Or do one of our longer workouts (coming soon). Any choice is awesome.

The workout below is a little mix-up of many of the things we've been working on so far. If you haven't been with us, now is as good a time to get going as any!

Part lunge/push-up burnout, part mini-pyramid, and filled with the exercises from the Quick Fit Challenges this little workout will take about 12-15 minutes and will give your whole body a nice once-over. The only variation that is new, is that we are taking the push-up out of the thrust-up. Just do the legs. This makes it a squat thrust instead of a thrust-up.

jog on the spot for 2 minutes (lift your feet 8" off the floor)

30 seconds of plank-jacks

lunge/push-up burnout - rounds 1, 2, 3, 4

45 seconds of squat thrusts

lunge/push-up burnout - rounds 5, 6, 7

60 seconds of mountain climbers

lunge/push-up burnout - rounds 8, 9

45 seconds of squat thrusts

lunge/push-up burnout - round 10

30 seconds of plank-jacks

The link below is to a video that is the 3 minute exercise demonstration and workout description.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aE36UAHF6ak&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL

I will also be posting the video for the workout soon and will also post my results so that you can try to beat me.  You can do this workout all by itself or add it into any other workout that you do. It is guaranteed to make you more fit, make you sweat, and make you utter a few curse words.  Enjoy!

February Quick Fit Challenge - Daily updates on our facebook page.

Okay, we've been friends long enough. It's time to raise the bar! January, and all of it's negative energy, is gone. February is here and it's a clean slate. The beauty of it all, is that all we need to do is a little more than we did in January and we will be moving in the right direction. Of course, doing a lot more is also an option, but let's be realistic. In order to facilitate things, we have designed a month-long challenge for February. Complete a 2 minute quick fit challenge every day for 1 month. That's less than 1 hour dedicated to your fitness for the whole month. You will get back much more than that in strength gains...guaranteed! There are 8 different challenges so you will get to have a third and sometimes fourth chance to improve at the challenge. I have attached a copy of the month's challenges and I suggest printing it out and tracking your numbers as you go. To get more out of the month, a few times each week, the challenge should be a component of a bigger workout. Give it a shot, you will NOT be disappointed! We are starting with jumping jacks. As you will see (once I get home from taking Ayden to her 'sea turtle' swimming lesson and can load the video), I got 140. Remember when doing these...be bouncy!

Here's the proof...

 day one : 140reps