I know I haven’t been posting much on this blog lately, but I have a good reason!  We’ve been planning a 2 week European cruise from Barcelona to Venice over the past couple weeks, and now we’re finally leaving!

photo credit: etrusco74

There won’t be much posting on here for a couple of weeks.  Regular posting will continue on our sister site Bible Money Matters.

When I return I’ll be picking it up where I left off, resuming my normal workouts, and getting back into shape!  Stay tuned - I might even share a few photos from our trip!

Something that I think about all the time is what types of foods I should be eating in order to better fuel my workouts, and to aid in recovery once the exercise is done.

In an article titled “Best fuel for your workout” at MSNBC.com the fitness experts give a quick run-down of what types of foods you should look to eat before and after your reps.

Good food choices to fuel your workout include high-carbohydrate, low-fat snacks such as:

• a banana with yogurt;
• a whole-wheat toasted bagel with fruit spread; or
• a quick bowl of instant oatmeal.

After your workout, it’s essential to refuel your body with a carbohydrate-protein blend, such as:

• a peanut butter sandwich;
• a small handful of walnuts or almonds; or
• a fruit smoothie with some protein powder.

So there are some quick and easy suggestions to keep your diet on track, and your body fueled like it needs to be.

photo credit: Darwin Bell

Don’t forget to not overdo it though!

You don’t want to eat too much food before exercising, because if you become sluggish, nauseated or throw up, you’ve lost that workout.

One last thing. Drink water and eat healthy!

Of course, don’t forget to drink water before, during and after your workout to avoid dehydration.

And remember that eating a low-fat, well-balanced diet the rest of the day will help ensure that your motor is running efficiently both during exercise and at rest.

I’ll sometimes talk with people I know about their weight loss plans, and how they expect to lose weight. When I ask them what they’re doing they’ll give me a report of drastically reduced calories, and a workout plan that involves a few situps and walking once or twice a week.  In most cases I don’t think that type of a plan is going to be successful, just for the small amount of exercise they’re doing, and because their diet will cause their metabolism to shut down, and harm their prospects for weight loss.

In an article I was reading today people were having a different issue.  They were exercising for too long, using a exercise that wasn’t as beneficial as they thought.   One reader of the MSNBC site emailed in:

I exercise every weekday morning in my hot tub, doing 2,000 forward bicycles, 2,000 reverse bicycles, 2,000 frog kicks and 2,000 reverse frog kicks. It takes me almost three hours. Am I doing too much exercise? I’m trying to lose weight this way because I have leg problems that keep me from doing any other type of exercise.

doing leg kicks in a hot tub for 3 hours?  Are you kidding me?  Who does that?  I know some people  do have some physical limitations that preclude them from performing some normal exercises, but there has got to be something better out there for this person to do.  I seriously doubt they are getting much actual impact from their bicycle and frog kicks!

photo credit: Tigerzeye

The fitness expert answers the question:

There’s a lingering misperception in fitness that if 20 repetitions of an exercise are good, then 200 — or 2,000 — must be better. But sometimes — such as when doing 4,000 frog kicks and another 4,000 bicycles consumes your entire morning — exercise may just not be worth that much time and effort. In fact, you may be pleasantly surprised to know you can restructure your program so that you actually work out for less time and get more bang for your buck.

The person writing in probably needs to look at some other options for their workout plan.  Some low impact whole body workouts like swimming in a pool, riding a stationary bike, or something along those lines.   Even though they’re exercising quite a bit currently, the exercise that they’re getting really isn’t that helpful - especially since  it takes so long to complete.

Sometimes we all need to take a look at our workout plans, and decide for ourselves if the work we’re putting in is worth it.  Is our plan well thought out?  Will it actually have the result we’re looking for?  If not, it may be time to sit down and come up with a new plan of action with someone who knows what they’re doing like a personal trainer at a local gym, or a friend who is a fitness guru.

Set goals, make a plan of attack, and carry out the plan in such a way as to attain positive results.

Have you ever had a workout plan that didn’t work? What was the reason for the plan’s failure?

Week 3 once again

Today I restarted week 3 of the 100 pushup challenge - again. Lately it seems that every time I try to restart this whole thing we get busy, have nights out and I just can’t find the time to get my workouts in. I think I may start having to get up earlier so that I can exercise in the A.M.

Week 3 day 1 Column 2

Once again I started with 20. No problem. Powered through.

the two sets of 15 weren’t too bad, maybe the rest I’ve had actually helped? The 13 and was harder, but overly hard.

For the last set I made it to 20, and it wasn’t as much of a struggle as it was last time. So Wedensday I move on to day two again.

Looks to be a little harder, but do-able.

How’s your pushup challenge going? Have you given up yet? Still giving it your all? Doing it half-way? Let me know in the comments!

100 pushup challenge for Ipod

If you haven’t downloaded the 100 pushup challenge for your Ipod (or other portable device) yet, you can still do so by subscribing to our RSS feed. The download link will appear in the RSS feed. If you have trouble finding it, please email me through our contact page, and I’ll be happy to help.

If you have already downloaded the file you may want to re-download it as I have corrected some mistakes, and made some updates. Thanks!