Happy Tuesday!

So, a long weekend is now behind us all. We had a big cookout in Mashulaville at the camphouse, as usual. Ate too much, as usual. Some fantastic red velvet cake that was delicious made by Kristie. We finally made it back home on Monday in time for me to do a round of P90X then run to the gym to teach my 5:30 Spin class where we did Stage 8 - high hills.

Tuesday: Same old thing at work. Ate the same stuff as usual. Left to teach spin at 4:30 - Stage 9, high hills. Great class, even if I do say so myself. Stayed for Bootcamp, and burned 1433 calories. yay.

Well, I also decided today that I am tired of logging my calorie count every day. So, I will do today, then I am done. For now anyways. Whenever anything else exciting happens, I'll report. Until then, here goes my last calorie count!

CALORIE COUNT:
Cereal - 337
Healthy Choice Cafe Steamers - Grilled Basil Chicken - 270 (not good at all) but supposedly has 20 grams of protein, though I don't see how since there were barely 5 small pieces of chicken. I'm not happy that there are 3 more of these in the freezer at home. Should have stuck with my bbq chicken pizza.

*Pictures can be deceiving!*








Fuji Apple - 116
Pure Protein bar - 200
Chocolate Skim Milk - 200
Pasta -  appox 590
peanut butter - 100

Total Calories Consumed - 1813
Calories burned - 1433
Calories remaining for the day..............380

Spinning - Stage 7: Tournus > Station Des Rousses

Here is the profile for the Stage 7 ride that I did last night in class for anyone who may be interested. I used both the profile and the route to design the ride:

The Route:

And the profile:

We start off with a long flat road with a very gradual increase, followed by 6 increasingly harder hills. I used the route to determine when we would need to get out of the saddle for jumps or runs, used the brief downhills for short recoveries, and used the super steep hills as markers for using a 3rd position climb.

Playlist and Notes:

1. Clash (Junkie XL) – (5:06) warm up and describe class: Max HR = 85%

2. Hello Again (Dave Matthews Band) - (3:56) flat > alt flat and run or slow jumps to increase heart rate to 75%

3. Not Myself (Christina Aguilera) - (3:25) moderate climb for 3 minutes, @ 3:00, 1 passing jump (**a passing jump is when you move to third position to pick up speed (not quite a sprint) for a brief period, then sit back in saddle keeping climbing pace up - I queue "get ready to pass somebody!")

4. Stockholm Syndrome (Muse) - (4:05) flat recovery for 1 min 30 sec >@1:30 moderate hill, @ 2:30 gear down low hill

5. Fight For Your Mind (Ben Harper) - (3:41) flat road recovery if needed, maintain high cadence @ 1:00 add every 30 seconds to standing climb

6. Mr. Brightside (The Killers) - (3:41) gear down to low hill for 30 seconds
@ :30 jumps on flat for 1 min (to mimic going around the turns)

7. 999 (Lords of Flatbush) (< Free download!) - (4:21) seated flat 1 min, run 1 min, saddle 1 min
@3:00 find hill in saddle

8. Mercy (Duffy) - (3:40) jumps on hill through sharp turns to top - sets of 4, 8-count jumps
add a little gear last 30 seconds - Ask if anybody is crying for Mercy yet!

9. American Woman (Lenny Kravitz) - (4:21) flat road 1 min,
@1:00 run 1 min, @ 2:00 back to saddle for a fast flat
@3:30 low hill

10. Invaders Must Die (Prodigy) - (4:55) gear up for last 2 passing jumps, finish with strong climb to the end!

COOL DOWN! Take at least 5 - 10 minutes here if they will stay in the saddle that long....And my people really like it when I take a map of the ride I am doing, so they can visualize what is going on or where we are going. It seems to give them a goal. Sometimes I tell them that there is a pool bar waiting ahead they can all relax in once we get there.

Calorie Count for Wednesday, 6/30/10:

Breakfast - 337

Leftover hamburger and potatoes - 420

Banana - 100

Handful of Zapp's Voodoo Gumbo chips - 120

Pasta for Dinner - 550

Sierra Nevada - 190

Total Calories Consumed - 1717

Total Calories Burned - 911 (which includes spinning + weight lifting afterward)

Total Calories Remaining for the day...........................806

Spinning Stage 7 + Bootcamp

Finally I am finished with the "plains" stages of the Tour de France! Doing Stage 7 this afternoon: Tournus > Station Des Rousses:

Hills! Whooo! Although I LOVE hills in class, I'm suddenly a little cautious about teaching them today of all days since I have to teach bootcamp afterward.....but the temptation looks like so much fun! My solution is to throw together some tunes for the class, and see how many people show up. If it is low numbers, I'll repeat Stage 6 from yesterday, and do this Stage 7 tomorrow. If I have a big crowd show up, we'll do this Stage today and Stage 8 (even BIGGER hills!!!) on Wednesday!

Ok, back from the gym, and I stuck with repeating my class from Monday since I had a low crowd and wanted to save my legs for bootcamp. Bootcamp went well for my second time teaching all by myself. But it was good practice and I loved doing it! Thank goodness some of my peeps were there to cheer me on. :)

AND I now have a nice hill class for tomorrow. Yay!

CALORIE COUNT
Cereal - 337
leftover pasta from last night - 475
Protein bar - 200
Burger on onion bun with cheese/ketchup and new potatos for dinner - 675
peanut butter - 100

Calories Consumed - 1787
Calories Burned - 1487
Calories Remaining..........................................300

Don't Foget To Hit Reset

Monday morning, for me, is usually a time to hit the "reset" button, and start fresh for a new week.

Its time to make up for the Keifer's gyro, cottage fry, and pitcher of Amber Bock I had on Friday night, the large Domino's pizza Jonas and I split Saturday night, and the hamburgers we cooked on Sunday along with the beers I had after working in the yard.

Its time to get back on my workout schedule since I didn't do anything all weekend (except for work outside in my yard for Saturday and Sunday - which quantified plenty of sweat, but still not the same.)

What happens when that reset button doesn't work? OR - what if I didn't hit that reset button in my mind? What if I just told myself, "well, you've done messed it all up now and gained a few pounds back. No point in starting over again...."

Well, that would make me a quitter - and that is something I am most certainly not.

When Life throws you lemons, make lemon-flavored water! (Because lemonade has too much sugar, and sugar is off limits!)

So headed to the gym at 4:00 for my usual Monday routine: Vinyasa Flow Yoga at 4:00, followed by my Spin class at 5:30. Still doing the Tour de France rides in class, and today we did Stage 6: mostly flat roads with a few very small hills. We will keep a fast pace, trying to keep heart rate around 80%.

Whew! That ended up being a killer ride! 655 calories burned in 45 minutes! Tomorrow, Stage 7 + abs class + bootcamp. Gonna be a long day.

Calorie Count:

Breakfast cereal (+ vitamins) - 340

Lunch - BBQ chick pizza - 340

Banana - 105

Dinner - 540

Half a protein drink with skim milk - 190

Total Calories Consumed - 1515

Calories Burned -  724

Total Calories Remaining -----------791

Bye Bye, Margarita!

Oh man, feeling those weights from yesterday - and it's Turbo Thursday. Those punches and burpies are going to be rough tonight! But so glad I am going to be able to burn off all those calories from the margarita and the chips and the fajitas I had last night.

Did you know how many calories are in one margarita? One 16 ounce margarita has about 300 CALORIES.
That's about 3 beers.

So, yeah, I'm ready to get to the gym and work it off! This is why I don't feel bad about eating crazy stuff every now and then because I know what I will be doing the next day. Plan your workouts ahead of time and stick to it.

I get home and decide to practice my round in Turbo before heading to the gym, so I started my calorie counter then. Then I get to the gym and hop on the treadmill for about 15 minutes to keep me moving. Then Turbo starts, and right after, Bootcamp. As soon as I get in the car, I check the HR monitor - and  whopping 1979. I believe that margarita is loooong gone! whoooo!

Ok, this is one of the reasons why I love Mexican food: we ordered fajitas for 2 (steak, chicken, onions, green peppers, and tomatos stir fried), but first filled up on chips, so brought a big doggie bag home, and I had a fajita salad for dinner tonight. Yum Yum!

Calories:

Breakfast (cereal) 340

Lunch, LC Bacon Alfredo pizza - 340

Pure Protein bar - 200

Medium Banana - 105

Dinner - guessing about 450 + a little peanut butter at 100
grapes - 75

Total Calories Consumed - 1610

Calories Burned: - 1979

Calories Remaining for the day............. (-369)
Normally, I wouldn't like to have that many calories in th enegative, but because I went way over yesterday, and I will probably go way over this weekend, I'm not too worried about it.

An Off Wednesday + DAVE MATTHEWS!

Since today is my Wednesday off, I had this grand idea to go to a weight class at 6AM this morning so I wouldn't feel the need to go to the gym this afternoon. I was pretty sure it would have me crashing around noon, but right now, it is about 2:00 pm and I'm doing all right. :)

AAAAAAAAND....if you know me at all, you know I am a HUGE Dave Matthews fan. Well, I just got me and Jonas tickets to go see him in July! So excited!

Calorie Count:

pre-workout banana - 105

post-workout cereal - 340

LC BBQ chick pizza (yes, again) - 340

2:00 snack (almonds) - 170

Dinner -We went to Cazadores and had fajitas and a margarita - No idea on calorie count. Half a basket of chips, 2 bowls of salsa, and fajita steak, chicken, onions, and peppers. No cheese!

Calories Consumed:

Calories Burned: 384 (no cardio today - but much needed weight lifting)

Remaining Calories.................................??

Tour de France Stage 3: Wanze > Arenberg Porte du Hainaut

"NEWSFLASH!!! Exercise doesn't make you gain weight. Consuming more food than you burn makes you gain weight ....period!!!"
- Chalene Johnson

 I saw that quote by Chalene on Twitter and loved it! Having balance in your life is all about what you take in, and how you burn it off. It's pretty simple, actually.

Keeping in line with the Tour De France theme in Spinning, I am working on a Stage 3 ride for today. It goes from Wanze Arenberg Porte du Hainaut. Here is the profile:

Mostly flats with three small inclines. This will definitely be a fast one with fast music! We will also try to stay at our threshold, or 80% MHR.

Music profile for the day:

1. Ain't That Cold - Bodega Girls (6:10) - warm up

2.I Need To Know - Tom Petty (2:23) - engaging in flat road, picking up cadence

3.Fell Down A Hole - Wolfmother (5:04) - hitting that first hill here, we'll make it about 3 minutes then back to a flat

4. Let It Rock (Cahill Remix) - Kevin Rudolf (3:36) - maintaining flat, move to standing to keep HR up if needed

5. Why Must You Always Dress In Black - Ben Harper and Relentless 7 (4:43) - hitting second series of small hills, climb 1 minute, flat 1 minute, climb 1 minute 30 sec, finish out with a flat

6. Go Faster - Black Crowes (4:03) - flat road but progressing with accelerations every 30 - 45 sec

7. Get On Back -  Tishamingo (4:32) - decrease gear for 1 min, add back and run during "Get on Back"

8. Crazy On You - Heart (4:54) - flat road surges during chorus to get to the front (add resistance while maintaining cadence)

9. Paint It Black - Rolling Stones (3:46) - last small incline, we'll climb for 2 minutes

10. Love the One You're With - Stephen Sills (3:06) - finish strong and fast!

11. Awe - Citizen Cope - 4:11 - Welcome to Arenberge Porte du Hainaut! Cool Down

After class, I stayed and went to Colleen's bootcamp (which I am subbing for next week if any of my people are reading!) It was brutal!

Calorie Count

Breakfast - 340

Leftover Pasta for Lunch - 440

Banana - 105

Protein Bar - 200

After-workout shake - 280
Dinner - 325

Calories Consumed:- 1690

Calories Burned: 1495

Calories Remaining for the Day............195

Spinning: Tour De France Stage 2

"Counting calories may not be popular but neither is balancing your checkbook. Both are necessary!"

- Chalene Johnson

Time to get back to the real world. Although the Food Challenge is over for me, I'm going to continue to try to keep up with my calories at the end of every day. Didn't sleep well last night (even had to drink some coffee this morning), and I'm thinking it is from the lack of training from the weekend. Plus I stayed up reading that book, only giving me 7 hours of sleep instead of the 8 that I prefer.

So another Spinning instructor at the gym had a great idea to mimic rides from Tour de France in our 4:30pm weekday afternoon classes. He printed out a map and a schedule of the type of rides, the start-finish, and the distance/time of each stage. I know I could just use some older rides that fit the description of each stage, but I'm a sucker for making themed rides, so today, I'm going to work on a ride for Stage 2, Bruxelles to Spa, about a 40 minute hilly ride. So we will do fast varying hills, will little breaks. Heart rate range should stay between 75 and 85% for the majority of the ride, which will consist mostly of flat roads (seated and standing), and mostly low to moderate hills, with two or three steep hills that may require a break at 3rd to get over, staying somewhere between 75 - 110 rpm.

This is what we are going for. This stage is actually scheduled for July 5.

Now, the trick for me is to find some music on my ipod that I haven't used lately because I have not gotten any new music in the last couple weeks. My plan is to find about 3 or 4 faster songs to get through the first 1/3 of the ride on a flat road, then we'll slow it down a bit with some power songs for the hills.

STAGE 2 PROFILE - BRUXELLES>SPA:

0:00 - 4:18  Scream My Name - LMFAO (4:18) - begin warm up, explain ride's purpose: 75 - 85% MHR, 70 - 110 rmp, flat roads that turn into small hills at an aggressive pace. Most of the ride should be aerobic until we hit 3 of our steeper hills at minutes 19, 35, and 40

4:19 - 8:00 I Need More Love - Robert Randolph - (3:42) - Second song of flat road, with small increase about half way through, but should still keep riders on a flat road. Begin to increase RPMs all the way through.

8:00 - 11:50 Ex Lover - Friendly Fires - (3:50) - Third song of flat road. Maintain high cadence between 90 - 110 rpm. Alternate between seated and standing flat.

11:51 - 15:19 The Small Print - Muse - (3:29) - This song has 2 elevations at :50 and 1:55, so we are adding a little resistance each time, slowly building up our first hill.

15:20 - 19:37 Seven - Dave Matthews Band - (4:17) - Add resistance to a moderate hill for 2 min. 30 sec until we roll back to our flat road, maintain high cadence once we are back on flat road and check HR. Get ready to hit our first hard hill at the next song...

19:38 - 23:09 Shame And Fortune - Yeah Yeah Yeahs (3:31)- Crank up resistance to a moderate/moderately hard hill for 2 minutes, and move to position 3 to power over. At the 2 minute mark, lower resistance just a little, but keep climbing.

23:10 - 27:37 - Showdown - Black Eyed Peas - (4:27) - short flat for about 30 seconds (break here if needed), then add resistance back for a moderate hill at position 3 for 1 min 30 sec, then move back to saddle without changing the gear. Focus on pedal stroke!

27:37 - 33:39 - Assassin - Headman - (6:02) - back to flat road for 1 minute. Recover if necessary, or keep high cadence and light resistance before next hill. Back to a moderate hill for 2 minutes, staying in the saddle. Roll back into a flat road for 1 minute. At 4 mins into the song, go back to a moderate hill with switchbacks to gain speed through the end of the song.

33:40 - 38:10 - More Human Than Human - White Zombie - (4:29) 1 minute Recovery. Second big hill, moderately hard at 1:00 into the song for 1 min 30 sec, then roll back to a flat road for 30 seconds for a brief recovery. at 3:00 into the song, prepare for short accellerations on a flat road, adding resistance every 20 seconds without losing speed.

38:11 - 41:03 - Bacchus - Galactic - (2:53) - Our last steep hill (mod/hard, at 85% MHR). Climb through song.

41:02 - 44:55 - Armistice - MuteMath - (3:53) - Finish with two minutes engaged in fast flat road, and begin to slowly decrease resistance to cool down.

Calorie Count for the Day:

Cereal for Breakfast + multi- vitamin - 337

LC 3 Meat pizza for lunch -  390

Pure Protein Chewy Chocolate Chip - 200

Dinner:- 650 (pasta with wheat noodles instead of my spaghetti squash)

Calories Consumed - 1577
Calories Burned at the Gym - 945
Remaining calories for the day........................632