THE EATING
I have to be honest, this week got off to a rocky start. My intention was to hit the grocery over the weekend so I could prep food Sunday afternoon and evening. But somehow the grocery story trip happened Sunday night, having us walk in the door with everything around 8:45 pm. So much for prepping!
Despite the lack of prep work, I worked with what I had and prepared a lunch for Monday. I put it in the fridge in my cooler. That morning, I ended up being called into a work lunch so I brought the snacks with me and left the lunch in the fridge for Tuesday. I made the best choice for me for lunch and stuck to my plan for the day. I also worked out!
Tuesday I had Jury Duty. I brought lunch and ate it but didn’t get to snack at all. I really needed an afternoon snack. By the time I got in my car at 5:15 I was starving. Actually, I felt hungry the rest of the night despite what I ate. I still stayed in control and tried to drink tons of water and eat good fat and protein. It’s amazing what blood sugar crashes can do to your body.
I didn’t prep for Wednesday. I just didn’t want to be in the kitchen anymore after laboring over those damned zucchini burrito bowls! So I did end up hitting ChickFilA. It’s real life people! It happens! I got the Super Food Side (which I LOVE) and the grilled chicken sandwich (which I ate with ketchup and no bun). I have this trick to eating them this way which requires no fork. Not my first CFA choices but I didn’t feel guilty after and felt totally satisfied. Plus my macros were perfectly in line.
The rest of the week was in line…OK but not great. I ate better than I have been and didn’t eat as many starches as usual. So that’s definitely a positive!
You can see below what I ate for the week. Definitely not perfect but it’s a start I guess? Just being honest. I’m human.
THE WORKOUTS
Again, not off to a great start. I hate that I’m such an all-or-nothing person. I set my goal to be 3-4 times a week and I did work out 3 times this week. So technically I reached my goal. But for some reason, I have it in my head that I need to work out 4-5 times a week for it to count. That’s just silly isn’t it? I mean I probably should ease into it anyway.
These are the workouts I chose for this week and below are my thoughts on each workouts and whether or not I’ll be keeping or tossing them.
THE FIRM: TOTAL MUSCLE SHAPING: KEEP
This runs about 45 minutes and is from their Body Sculpting 3 set. This is a solid cardio+strength workout. The strength segments really keep the heart rate up as well. This has a tough classic Firm feel but is nicely updated. I love Stephanie Huckabee as an instructor. She gives good, clear, concise instruction and is friendly but not overly chatty. They start the ab work on the box with it set on an angle which I find a bit uncomfortable. I simply did it on the floor and still felt it. I like that it clocks in under an hour yet gave me a great workout that I enjoyed doing.
TURBO JAM LIVE: BOOTY SCULPT + ABS: KEEP
This runs 30 minutes and is a strength workout that moves fast enough for me to break a sweat but not too fast that I sacrifice form. It’s challenging yet not so over the top that I want to die at the end. I’m a big fan of Chalene and her style and enjoyed this workout. I’m not sure why I haven’t worked this into any of my rotations before! I also love the 30 minute length for when 40-60 minutes is too long yet 20 minute “quick” workouts seem just a bit too short. This packs a lot into just 30 minutes. I appreciate that and the fun factor of this workout.
THE FIRM: TOTAL BODY SHAPING MIX: KEEP
This runs 70 minutes. I did forget how long the stretch segments following the warm-ups were in the old Firm workouts. Since there’s a thorough warm-up already, I kind of find them a bit unnecessary and fast forward through them most of the time. This is a TOUGH and THOROUGH workout that incorporates strength+cardio. I did sweat throughout the whole thing. It’s a compilation of several vintage Firm videos so if you haven’t done any of those and bought this, you might be a bit put off by it being dated. But those of us who are familiar with those old Firms can easily pick any of these workouts up and feel quite at home with the leotards and library sets, knowing that we get a solid, quality workout along with all that awesome stuff! There are a couple of plyo sections that can be made low-impact if necessary. There were several lower body sections that felt tough as well. This broke down into roughly 45 minutes of standing work and 15 minutes of floorwork (not including warm-up and cool-down). This will be good to have on hand for when I want a good, challenging workout that I KNOW will do something good for my body.
SUMMARY
I had pretty good luck with the workouts I chose this week. I’m keeping all three because I can easily see doing them in the future.
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