I ain't what I used to be ...

Exciting news ... I've increased my body strength by 44% since March 9, 2009!! I'm pretty stoked - I've been stuck in my plateau since March, and sure, I could have thrown in the towel and given up after the first few weeks of plateauing.

And believe me, that thought certainly crossed my mind!

MANY times!

And even better news, I think I'm slowly eeking my way out of this plateau. I've had consistent losses with my daily weigh-ins this past week. HOORAY!!!! (Those amazing biceps don't belong to me ... yet! They are the amazing Sarah Jessica Parker's biceps. One day I will make them mine, I guarantee it!)

Today also begins Day 2 of my clean-eating program, and after a horrible caffiene withdrawal headache most of yesterday afternoon, I woke up this morning clear-headed and ready to workout with TrainerGirl at the gym. It's technically week 3 of my program, but as I missed 3 workouts last week due to the Mongolian Hamster Flu, we're tacking another week onto this program (and I really love it - so yaaay!)

We modified today's workout as my left knee is still sore after my amazingly graceful crash onto the unforgiving hard marble floor in the lobby of my office building last week, so instead of box jumps, we did sprints, and the lat pulldowns were done on a stability ball instead of me kneeling in front of the functional trainer. Today's workout consisted of:

5 min warmup on the ellipitical

We repeat the following 3 times with 15 - 20 reps per exercise, and add heavier weights for the 3rd set and keep going until failure.

A1: Chest press with rotation and crunch on the bench. 15 lbs dumbbells for 1st set, 20 lbs for 2nd and 3rd sets.
A2: Upright row with twist using functional trainer while on stability ball. 15 lbs for 1st and 2nd sets, 18 lbs for 3rd set.
A3: Knee tucks on stability ball (my new favorite!)
A4: 1.5 min sprint (30 seconds at 8.0, 30 seconds at 8.5, 30 seconds at 9.0)

Then we move onto:

B1: Incline chest press on bench. 15 lbs dumbbells for 1st and 2nd set, 20 lbs for 3rd set.
B2: Lat pulldown using functional trainer while on stability ball (don't remember the weights, sorry!)
B3: Tricep press on stability ball. 8 lbs dumbbells
B4: Crunches on bosu trainer.

13 mins intervals on the elliptical:

4 mins @ 145 - 150 bpm
3 mins @ 155 - 160 bpm
2 mins @ 160 - 165 bpm
1 mins @ 165 - 170 bpm
2 mins @ recovery

I start off with my tension at Level 5, and increase with each interval. I usually have no problem meeting the bpm (heartbeats per minute) goal because I'm already at 155 - 160 when I start, and can get to the 180s by the 1 minute interval.

Food today was very good, and 100% on plan:

Food	Units
breakfast: scrambled egg and spinach omelette
am snack: gala apple
lunch: tuna, cucumber and celery salad
dinner: salmon and asparagus
dessert: homemade honeydew sorbet
Total:	N/A

Table provided by Roni's Food Tweet, Eat, Post Generator.

I hope everyone had a great day - I'm so excited to see so many new readers subscribed to my blog feed and have to say hi to all my new friends following me on Twitter!

xo,
Michelle

"Do not throw in the towel; use it to wipe of the sweat from your face." Anonymous