Week 3 - Days 15 through 21

This week was very surprising..... what was the surprise you ask?

The fact that I am still on this new workout program and have kept it up for 3 weeks straight! I can honestly say that I have never stayed on a workout plan for 3 weeks (3 days would probably be my average.. and heck I usually don't do things I like for 3 weeks straight).

I will admit that have been fairly athletic growing up.. love to play sports, but I have never enjoyed just working out. It is way too boring and my ADD kicks in and I am off to do something else (anything else really).

As I have said before, that is one of the major benefits to this program... it is easy to stay on it, and it makes you feel like a success. I also think that I am almost ready to begin increasing my workouts - adding in more cardio, heavier weights, etc.... which is not on the 8 Minutes plan.

I think the fact that I am doing the 8 Minutes is letting me slowly get "back in shape" and now I am ready to take on more. If I had started out with a more "traditional" workout plan, I am certain that it would have been too painful and I would have quit... I will end up increasing my workout to the more traditional route.. just more gradually.

You know, the whole object at rest, object in motion thing.

One more week left and I will be an "8 Minutes in the Morning" graduate.

Some Health Myths

I came across this very interesting article on MSN:

Healthy Habits That Aren't

It details 8 different health myths, ranging from drinking water to anti-bacterial soap. I must admit there were a few I did not know.

It just goes to show that you should not just blindly believe what the "general wisdom" is on anything. This goes back to my pet peeve about showing some research before making any claims, and I am happy to say that each of these busted "myths" mentions specific research studies.

Let me know how many of these are news to you!

Week 2 - Days 8 through 14

So here is the new format to get me caught up... week by week.

AS you may have noticed in the first 7 days of the program, the exercises rotate each day to a different part of the body. This allows for the muscles to rebuild, repair and recover from the workout. So the routine breaks out like this:

Monday- Chest / Back
Tuesday- Shoulder / Abs
Wednesday- Triceps / Biceps
Thursday- Hamstrings / Quads
Friday- Calves / Gluteus (fancy word for your butt)
Saturday- Inner and Outer Thighs
Sunday- Off day (yeah!)

What is really great about this is the book only gives you 4 weeks of exercises, but since you now know the "routine" or order you can always keep going by adding in your own exercises. You can of course just start the program over and increase the weights as you get stronger, but it might be fun to find some new exercises that work each muscle group.

So on to week 2....

I would have to say that week 2 went pretty darn well. The program became easier and easier as the days went on and I am really feeling like this is becoming a habit. Now this is coming from a lifelong "workout hater" so I don't say that lightly.

I know that many folks will attack the 8 minutes workout and say that you really can't get a good workout in 8 minutes.... However, the fact remains that I was NEVER able to stay on a traditional workout plan for more than a week and now I am through two weeks and excited about it! I would say that is better than a traditional workout.

I ended Week 2 feeling very good.... and oh yeah... by the way.. I have already lost 3 pounds. Results.... that's all I really care about.

I guess "8 Minutes" is easier than daily blogging

So if anyone has noticed (as if anyone is really reading this...) I am a little behind on the posts in this blog. I am on Day 8 in the blog, but am actually on Day 21 or something in the program itself.

So it appears that I have found a workout that is "easier" then sitting on your butt and typing! Now THERE is a great advertising slogan:

"Our workout is easier than sitting on your butt and typing"

I will even let the author, Jorge, use this if he wants for the next edition of the book (small royalty fee of course).

I have also noticed that since the workouts are so simple and quick I really would not have much to write about every single day. Therefore, I am going to try and catch back up by lumping some of the days together in single posts. This should get me back on track with the writing and hopefully caught up this week.

Day 6 and Day 7- Ooops...Missed a day

So this is where the rubber meets the road.... we ended up missing a day. I woke up late for work (I blame it on the alarm, but I am quite certain it was human error) and had to just rush out the door asap.

No work out... no 8 minutes. This is the spot that most workout plans end up going wrong and never recovering. You miss one day and it is SO much easier to skip the next day.. and the next. Then the next thing you know you are on the couch with that spoon and a tub of lard.

I mean if your workout consists of 30 min to 1 hour and driving to the gym, etc.... its damn hard to keep that up in the beginning. I am sure once you do this for months it becomes habit, but we all know that most folks never get to that point as they end up missing a day in the beginning and go downhill from there.

This is another way the 8 Minutes in the Morning is so great. We missed one day (8 minutes), so we just double up the next day (16 minutes in the morning).. and BAM we are back on track!

If you miss a 45 minuted workout and try to double up the next day you are talking an hour and a half.... who the heck has time for that?

We were even luckier this time as Day 7 is supposed to be an "off day", so we just did our workout on the off day and were all caught back up to start week 2. Very cool feeling to be back on track and not have to go through all the guilt and beating yourself up for days, etc. (there are plenty of other things I can beat myself up about).

By the way, the day 6 work out was inner and outer thighs (sounds a lot more fun than it really was..lol).

Eating better is easier than you think

As I mentioned earlier, I do read some of Dr. Weil's stuff now and find it to be rather helpful. Take this article for instance:

Stocking the Pantry

He has great suggestions for cooking ingredients that you should always have on hand.. and most are not that outlandish at all. He covers oils, pasta, herbs, etc. and makes recommendations of "more healthful" choices.

As I feel my family is eating very healthy right now, we have decided not to use the food recommendations in "8 minutes". We found them to be rather limiting and we feel that we are doing a good job on this front... using many of the ingredients that Dr. Weil suggests above.

My single biggest tip on eating healthy is to do it in small bite sized chunks (pun definitely intended). Pick an area of your diet or an ingredient you want to get rid of and just start with that.

My family first started with removing trans fats from our diet. We read a few years back on how bad they are for your health and decided to remove them completely from our diet (easier said than done as they are in everything!).

I am currently working on a more detailed post regarding trans fats (or partially hydrogenated vegetable oils as they are listed in the ingredients of foods), so I don't want to get too detailed here.

So, look at your pantry.. look at Dr. Weil's suggestions and pick just one thing to improve upon. Then later down the road pick a 2nd item to add/remove. Before you know it you will be much happier with your diet and I bet will start to feel better and lose weight as well.

Day 5 - Becoming a habit

I was up and moving at about 6:20am this morning and it was really much easier. Could it be that this is becoming a habit?

It may be too early to tell, but it sure seems like this is getting easier to do. Since it is such a short period of time it just does not seem that intimidating... and I really do end up feeling better for the rest of the day. A combination of knowing I actually "exercised", and of course my body is actually responding to the workouts.

Today's exercises was calves and glutes.. not really areas that most "guys" would work on. The glute exercise was some sort of kick-up move - on the ground on all fours you kick you up in the air behind you. I really was having a little trouble getting this down and my wife asked "haven't you ever done this in aerobics?" I responded with "I really saw aerobics as more of a spectator sport growing up". (ba da bum)

I should note here that I am not really a sexist and my wonderful wife understands this about me... so she did not even hit me that hard (I was bruised, but she never broke the skin with her repeated blows).

After learning how to do this new "aerobics" move, we finished up and went about our days.. knowing that we were one 8 minute interval closer to being in shape.

Day 4 - The "Beast"

No, the "beast" is not some sort of crazy new exercise or workout..... its a 12 lb. pug. A buddy of mine was going out of town for 4 days and asked me to watch his dog (the "beast" is his actual name). OK, I thought.. how hard can it be to watch a little dog like a pug.

Little did I know.. Pugs have a very difficult time breathing and therefore snore like a freight train. And even better, the Beast likes to sleep on the bed with you.... Yeah! Sounds like fun.

I only mention this whole issue with the Beast because I ended up getting about 2 hours of sleep the first night with the dog and had a VERY difficult time getting out of bed. Finally rolled out at 7:20 am, which means I would definitely be late for work today.

It would have been an easy day to "skip" the workout... but that is another advantage of the 8 minutes in the morning... its only 8 minutes so how much later would it really make me.

So, I hoped out of bed, did my exercises - hamstrings and squats today - and hit the shower in about 12 minutes. Not bad at all.

I must say I really think this program is great for someone as exercise averse as I am. It really is quite easy and I think I will be able to stay on it for the long term.

Now we just have to see if I get results... stay tuned. I will try and type up my current results on a weekly basis, although I would not expect too much the very first week.

Resource - Dr. Weil

As I mentioned in my first post, I also want to include some health related resources that I use and trust. They will include books, websites, articles, or anything health related that I think is useful.

Today, I want to talk about Dr. Weil. Most folks have heard about Dr. Weil, and I would guess to say that most people also think he is a freak.

I have heard people say that he is SO alternative, granola.... or just plain weird. I will admit that I used to think the same thing. That is until my wife forwarded me a few articles from his newsletter.

As I actually read about his ideas and advice, I realized that he is pretty on the money when it comes to health stuff. Even more important, he bases his ideas on actual research. (and not research done by the pharmaceutical companies... but by actual scientists).

I have to admit that this is a huge pet peeve of mine. I really hate folks that spout off about topics with no basis for their opinion or ideas.. or even worse their sources of totally suspect. Dr. Weil references medical journals and quite a few studies done in Europe.

My suggestion is to check out his site and sign up for his newsletter. Read a few issues and judge for yourself whether he is a freak or is just telling the truth (one that Americans don't want to admit is true) that we are poisoning our bodies.

** Note: I have been really been focusing on "eating more healthy" for a while now so that may be why I don't think his stuff is that "freakish"... you may disagree. If you do, please let me know what you think, I would love to hear it.

Day 3 - Ok, Jorge is a genius

Waking up was a little easier today, only hit snooze once. As I rolled out of bed I realized the "genius" of the 8 Minutes in the Morning program... it all comes down to embarrassment.

What I mean is that who the heck wants to admit that they can't even do 8 minutes of exercise. Like I said before, if you can't do 8 minutes then you might as well grab that bucket of lard and a spoon and settle down in front of the TV (I hear there is a rerun of "Everybody Loves Raymond")

It really is pretty easy to motivate myself in the morning, as I know it is only 8 minutes and I don't want to look like a wimp in front of my wife.

Today's exercises focused on triceps and biceps using the dumbbells. Pretty standard bicep curls and tricep curls so it was pretty easy. My biceps and triceps are in fairly good shape. Finished them off and hit the showers.. just another day towards my fit self.