Day 8

Me desperately trying to do an unassisted pull-up 3 years ago.

So, today is the first day of the second week, and I eagerly got up this morning to weigh myself and take pictures. The scale moved some, but the pictures aren't much to write home about (not that I expected them to be, I mean C'MON! IT'S BEEN A WEEK!), but I still wanted to snap a few to document the process. I did see some more definition in my back, which is cool. When Giacomo gets home tonight, I will take a few of him too.

So to recap week 1:

*To start, I should mention that we are doing all of the strength training routines in the gym, not in from of the tv. We pay $80 a month to use the gym, and we own neither dumbbells nor bands. Plus, if you know the exercises and the order, and can get your hustle on without Tony yelling at you, I think you could probably do even better at the gym, but hey-that's just us.*

Day 1: Chest and Back. Ab Ripper. nearly all push-ups and pull-ups, neither of which I am especially good at, but it was challenging, if not frustrating. Giacomo did pretty well (comparatively) here. Then we moved onto the ab ripper, and just totally laughed at ourselves because of how many times we had to stop to actually hit the 25 reps for each set. Some exercises (like oblique V-ups), I'm pretty sure we were doing wrong. And this nightmarish toe-touch-roll-down-leg-lift-v-up combo, was SO hard for me, that I couldn't do them at all. And I have a damn strong core! But we did it, enjoyed our delicious recover shake, and went home.

Day 2: Plyometrics. What a freaking nightmare this workout is...in a good way? We did this workout separately for lack of space in our living room, which meant I got to watch Giacomo hop around the living room and laugh at him :-) But seriously, this workout was exceptionally difficult, and I had to pause it about a zillion times. Did I mention I have virtual no cardio vascular capacity? My form was perfect though. As opposed to Giacomo, who made it through without pausing it even once, but I thought his form was sloppy. Eh, we'll get there.

Day 3: Shoulder, Arms. Ab Ripper. This workout wasn't nearly as hard as all of the others for me, which is probably why so many people call this one the "favorite" workout. I felt really swole when I was done, but I didn't feel breathless or anything like that which was nice. There is one exercise where you do 4 bicep curls with one arm, while the other just holds the weight static at 90 degrees, then switch for 4 reps, until 16. That was an awesome move. The Ab Ripper, while still being extremely difficult, was less difficult than even 2 days prior! SCORE!

Day 4: Yoga. As my friend Sara over at lean mean vegan machine told me, this wouldn't be the greatest yoga workout ever....and it wasn't. It was like power yoga, without any of the calm or centered mindfulness. It was a tough physical workout, but with Tony yapping through the whole thing, it was really hard to get "into". Also, while doing crow (which they call crane on the dvd?), I actually somersaulted into the tv stand. It was priceless.

Day 5: Legs, Back. Ab Ripper. As I was transcribing all of the exercises we would have to do the night before, I was in pure horror! ONE-LEGGED-WALL-SQUATS?!?!? ARE YOU KIDDING ME!?!?! Ugh. This workout was a toughie! And both Giacomo and myself used very little weight. Giacomo was much more sore the following day, most likely because he never does lunges, and I usually do. As for all of the pull-ups we did, I found that I could drop my weight on the gravitron (dropping weight on a gravitron, makes it more difficult. when you get to 0, you can do an unassisted pull-up!) from the 4 days prior. Unfortunately during Ab Ripper, my hip (i have a tricky/clicky hip) wouldn't allow me to do any sort of in-and-out leg motion, but I did everything else, and Giacomo did great!

Day 6: Kenpo. I watched the Kenpo Dvd, and decided I really wasn't in the mood to shadow box in my living room, although I am sure that I will do it eventually. So Giacomo and I went to the gym and got on the treadmills. He jogged at various inclines and I did sprint intervals for an hour. Now, I am not a runner, although I have always wanted to be. and I was sprinting at 8mph (!!) for one minute, and my heart was recovering in about 75 seconds. Normally I don't recover so quickly. Mind over matter? It's possible, but either way I like it.

Day 7: Rest or Stretch. I stretched like crazy. Felt amazing. Giacomo, being the madman that he is....went snowboarding!

FOOD STUFF

So Giacomo and I didn't go nuts or kill each other or anything like that, although we both definitely got a case of the hangries here and there. I can feel myself starting to get hungrier, and that means I have to mix it up a little. Part of the problem with diets like this, is that they are SO routine, that you get bored with eating, and then you just plain aren't eating enough. Taking the time to have different dinners each night, and mixing up your snacks is important to keep yourself as fueled as you can on a diet as limited as this.

Did we cheat? We didn't cheat. Some times we would save one of our "snacks" for after dinner and have a couple of those little squares of dark chocolate. That's as cheat-y as we got. And we are also lucky enough to live in a town that has a marvelous vegan salad bar with the tastiest tofu around. So we went out to eat once, and that was nice and let us still feel normal.

As always, feel free to shoot us any questions you have!!