Pic of the Day... (and workout frustration)

I have been neglecting my workout posts. In truth, I have been neglecting Bodyrock workouts in favour of hours of walking (or hiking). Gotta finish up some grading...then Bodyrock can start anew. I am happy to say that I ate really well in DC. I ate fruit, ate organic on occasion and did my best to stay away from heavily processed foods. On a different vacation I might have chowed down on fast food every night... Thank you, clean eating!

On the downside, working out frustrates me. I know it should be about how I feel, but I am pretty caught up with how I look. I am less concerned with how much I weigh (muscle weighing more than fat and all that) though I have to admit that sitting around waiting for the last six pounds to do something - anything - is annoying.

So...with all that said, I thought I'd post pics of cute chubby things, comfortable in their own skin(s), with more important things (i.e. climate change, habitat loss, species disruption etc.) to worry about.  (A day at the zoo is a workout, too!)

These pics are from my zoo, not Washington. :)

Matschie's Tree Kangaroo

Fitness: Day 4 (Bodyrock.tv 15 Minute Challenge Routine)

As I've mentioned elsewhere, earlier, yesterday (whatever)...I am not typically one to stick to anything. It doesn't matter what it is, I will get bored of it.  The harder it is, the more likely I am not to go through with it.  Working out is on the top of my list of things to be easily bored by so making it to "Day 4" (arguably it's a little better than that) is a small feat. But let's face it, I shouldn't be patting myself on the back.

Anyway, Tuesdays to Thursdays are typically the most difficult days for me to workout since I'm deeply embedded in school or teaching or some combo of the two during the middle of the week. The upside to this is that it leaves my weekends free for great workouts and planning food for the week. The downside is that my weekly exhaustion catches up with me and I usually pass out from 5pm Thursday until sometime on Saturday evening.  Even as I write this I want to pass out.

In an effort to stay motivated I opted to try the 15 Minute Challenge Routine, one of the "shorter" routines at Bodyrock that my friend Green Eyed Girl tried yesterday. This was the first time I'd tried this routine and I was a little slow with it. I had to throw a blanket under my tailbone because, like every crunch I've ever tried, the Core Exercises hurt a bit. Oh well.

The routine consists of the following:

Core Exercises (Reverse Crunch) 10 reps

Low Jumping Jacks (back and forth) 10 reps

You are to do as many of these reps as you can in a period of 15 minutes.  On my first attempt I made it through 23 reps (or 12 of the core exercises and 11 of the low jumping jacks). Low jumping jacks are killers!

When I was done I decided to work my arms so I completed the following:

3x10 reps Single Knee Pushups (each side)  for 60 reps

4x10 reps Modified pushups for 40 reps* 

With the modified pushups I assumed a "table" pose in yoga, but turned my hands inward so my fingertips pointed toward each other. 

Food today was kind of questionable. I had coffee for breakfast (I have found I have no desire for breakfast which is bad, bad bad!), yogurt for a snack,  and lunch (and dinner, yesterday's leftovers) consisted of veggies, potatoes and Tosca Reno's Clean Eating Chicken Nuggets (which we did as baked chicken breasts).

All this so I can be ready for prom!  :P

(It is SO awesome that one of the "related" posts for this entry is "Should've stayed in bed"..) haha