The Wayne Carey Workout (AM)

I like to work out regularly these days. Mainly because I have come to accept that I have the metabolism of a hibernating bear and the appetite of one of those bears standing in the river waiting for fish to jump out when they are going for a little fishy swim. It's a challenging combination, but one that I must live with, hence the need to regularly work out. Plus, all the health and wellbeing benefits of exercise, blah blah blah.
I try to go for a run every second day, and on the days I don't run, I try to walk to and from work. Look, it's no olympiad training regime, but it's more than I usually do.
Yesterday was meant to be one of my running days, so in the early afternoon I started getting ready...I put my hair up, I donned my sports underwear, I put on a t-shirt. But when it came to putting my leggings on, I was stopped short. After washing them on Saturday the little suckers were still wet. Or  damp, rather. Unwearable, basically.
Part of me was thrilled that I had an excuse to give the run a miss. But knowing that there was probably going to be hot chips in my Sunday night, I felt like I really should do some sort of exercise. And I was half dressed for exercise.
Then it hit me. I was half dressed for exercise! I was basically wearing the outfit Wayne Carey wore one of the times he got in to some trouble with the law...pants free with socks and a white t-shirt. The funniest outfit of them all! And perfect for staying home, drawing the blinds and getting high like Wayne Carey OR doing this 7 minute workout that I read about on the internet.
Also, perfect for writing about on Miss Soft Crab, because for a while there, few things amused J more than the story about pants free Wayne Carey.
So I did. I pulled on my runners and I chuckled my way through that 7 minute workout knowing that I would have looked like a massive, massive tool but that J would be amused. And after doing it a few times I got quite puffed and sweaty so I think I might do it again.

Fitness Friday - the Travolta method (PM)

Sure, taking exercise cues from a retold version of a routine in a book is sub-optimal, but I really could have read the book myself last time I was at J's and I saw it sitting right there in a pile of fitness paraphernalia. I didn't, readers. I didn't.

Ok. Lets get this over with.

Update on Jane. 
Um, it has not been going well.
I went for a walk around Princes Park on Wednesday. I did  some sit ups and stuff when I got home. Then I lay down on my yoga mat because my back was hurting a little and listened to This American Life and had a nap.
When I got out of bed yesterday, the yoga mat was still on the floor in the exact spot I left it after my nap. So I did a couple of salutes to the sun. Then I had a shower.
I felt great!


My views on John. 
Look, I'm not impressed with the bullshit he is spouting. We know you're looking fine  Travolta but no meals after 6pm? Ewwww, keep it to yourself.

Having said that, he was looking pretty fine in some of those pictures. But nothing gold can stay.

So knowing that, I suspect I am going to keep walking around Princes Park and doing the occasional salute to the sun.  And I am going to sustain the shit out of that routine.

Fitness Friday - the Travolta method (AM)

I am woman enough to admit that Fitness Friday was not necessarily the best idea that Miss Soft Crab has ever had. But it seemed good at first. Spend a month working out from these hilarious exercise books. As I see it there are two main flaws. First, exercising from a book is effing boring. Second, reading a badly conceived and badly retold exercise plan on a blog must be effing boring. So, Fitness Friday is changing a bit. Today I will update you on my progress with Jane and then, rather than give you John Travolta's routine, I will just give you some of his hot tips. Sounds heaps better, right?

Update on Jane

I gave that up weeks ago. A week or two ago when I was trying to do the workout but then Baby woke up and yada, yada, yada, that was that. Do you know how effing boring working out from a book is? And with no weights. Forget that. If I'm gonna do resistance training it is at a gym with some resistance. BUT, on the positive side since the implementation of Fitness Friday I have been going for runs fairly regularly and sometimes after a run I do push-ups and stomach crunches. I think I kind of have Jane to thank for that. I wonder how K has been going

The Travolta Method
 
John Travolta Staying Fit is all about combining the the 'spontaneity and excitement of dance with the building and toning of weightlifting'! Sounds like my kind of routine. I WANNA DANCE! Also, I love weightlifting cause I love getting strong and getting muscles. But right now I don't do any. It's a lifestyle (laziness) issue. So I guess this would actually be a really great work out for me.

The plan has you work out 6 days a week. Everyday you do the same warm up then you alternate dance exercise days with weightlifting days.

There are some things you should probably know about how Travolta got so buff for Staying Alive. Even though he 'was in the worst shape of [his] life... twenty pounds overweight' he managed to get this body in just FOUR MONTHS!

And only by working out 6 days a week with a minimum of 5 hours of working out a day and up to 14 hours a day. Also he had a personal trainer and nutritionist (of course) and Sylvester Stallone overseeing his transformation guys. And with only those factors in place we could all get this body too!

Travolta says he loves eating but he has some great tips on dieting! Firstly, with the help of Sly Stallone and his personal trainer he really dedicated himself to the diet, even though he would still sometimes stay awake all night 'just imagining what it would be like to have another meal in my stomach'. Oh sure, that sounds like a reasonable diet. Then, as he started getting buff, he says, 'my appetite for food decreased - but my appetite for sex increased! Fortunately sex is not fattening, so treat yourself to it.' Eeeeeeeeeeeewwww! Keep it to yourself Travolta.

He suggests not eating anything after 6PM and having your last meal between 5 and 6. Eeeeeeeeeeewwwww! Keep it to yourself Travolta. No way I could eat nothing after 6. Unless I was working out for 14 hours a day and was passed out for the next 10.

Remember how many exercises I told you Jane Fonda had. Heaps and heaps. So many heaps. Well John Travolta Staying Fit has almost 200 pages of work out! 200! Your crazy if you think I read them all. Basically there are a bunch of standing stretches and floor stretches in the dance section.



Oh and partner stretches. As he says "Working out with a friend is always better than working alone - especially when your partner is someone of the opposite sex!'

Travolta partnering with himself

Then there is the weightlifting section, which I guess is kind of similar to Jane Fonda's except it involves weights and is way more manly.

Travolta says you should train to failure. And that is a workout I can get behind. Jane and her 'just work out a bit' attitude is bullshit if you ask me. I'm more of a go hard or go home kind a gal. Which translates to me spending most of my time at home cause I can't be bothered going hard. But hey, that's how I chose to live my life.

So, where does that leave me and Fitness Friday?  Probably just going for more runs and maybe doing some more sit-ups and push-ups. But maybe, just maybe, I'll keep reading Travolta and get super inspired to get buffffffff!!!!!

Fitness Friday - Progress update (J or PM)

Oh, shit. Man, I really thought that K being stuck in a bunch of depressing motel rooms would be a great situation for her to do exercises. What the hell else are you going to do when stuck in a motel room on the side of a highway. Probably watch Embarrassing Bodies or something.

Well, I would like to tell you that I had a really successful week of exercise, but I did not. I went for one run and I did Jane’s workout one time. My only excuse is that I do not like exercising in miserable weather. I know, so lame, it’s the truth though. Seriously as soon as the sun comes out I can’t wait to run and pump iron. Also my intensity is for shit. BUT I can say that after my run and my Jane workout I felt pretty darn great. So let’s keep these goals realistic. This week I did one run and one Jane, next week I will do two of each. That sounds realistic right? I guess we’ll find out soon enough.

Fitness Friday - Progress update (K)

Oh, hello there readers.

Remember how last week we were all lets get physical, physical, I want to get physical, lets get in to physical et cetera et cetera?

Remember how I was going to do the special Jane Fonda in a book workout that J outlined for us last week and then report back today? 

Well being away for work all week has kind of broken me and robbed me of the will to hear my own body talk. 

Somewhere between the depressing motels and the endless meetings and being advised that the meals at the bistro at the I-talian club are very reasonably priced, I lost touch with this whole J and K do Jane thing.  

I thought about just pretending that I did it but I don't want to lie to you, my little Crab friends. I don't want to lie to you at all. Plus, admitting failure is the first step towards...not being a failure? I don't even know. Anyway, I'm sure that this afternoon J will be able to tell us about what it's like when you apply yourself and actually follow through on the Fitness Friday challenge. Take it away, Matey.

Fitness Friday - the Jane Fonda way (PM)

Russeth has this record. 

Thanks for the summary, J. I think some aspects of this new project will be a piece of cake. 

For example, don't be bulimic? Don't need to ask me twice, Jane Fonda. I didn't even spew when I went to India and ate that cheese dosa that I thought would be stuffed with paneer but was in fact stuffed with what tasted like cheese that a pigeon had used as a mattress for a few weeks,  then melted and put on my dosa.  Not even when I ate (all of) that did I spew. So don't worry about the whole bulimic thing, I'm totally on it. 

Regarding Jane Fonda's recommendation that I set realistic goals, I guess I feel like I don't want to take that advice. I am inherently lazy and frightened of physical discomfort, Jane Fonda. A realistic goal for me would be to support J as she progresses through the Jane Fonda New Workout and Weight-Loss program. But that's not what Miss Soft Crab's Fitness Friday is about. 
No.

So like J, I am going to go for a run three times a week and stretch three times a week. I will also try not to eat sugar. It's not realistic, but shit Jane Fonda,  if you want to make an omelette, you have to crack a few eggs. Though I don't have a small child that prevents me from working out for an hour a day, I have a small inner child that just wants to lie around and eat twisties so shit you guys, give a lady a break. 

See you next Friday for a progress update! Yeah!

Fitness Friday - the Jane Fonda way

Are you familiar with the expression 'seemed like a good idea at the time'? What it means is that sometimes a person has an idea that seems good but then really, it's not a very good one. I think that maybe that's what this Friday Fitness program may have been. You see the one fatal flaw in this plan is that Jane Fonda, John Travolta and the Super Firm guys wrote entire books about their fitness program and I thought I could just write one little post about each and we'd all get fit? Who do I think I am?!

But I made a promise guys, I told you I'd give you Jane and I'm gonna. But don't expect me to be thorough or entertaining.

So Jane encourages us to take a sensible approach to our fitness regime. Sure, there is a little confusion. Like, she is all, "this isn't about losing weight, it's about feeling better, getting strong and healthy". But then she is all, "If you follow this you'll lose weight, but don't rush it". She does have good tips like, don't be bulimic and set realistic goals. Both important.



But there are some things I like about this book. Well mainly one thing, it's Jane's eat carbs, ditch meat approach to eating. Now that is a diet I approve of. Me, I actually only do care about getting buff so I am not following Jane's diet. Also because this is what she says we can eat in one day:


2 choices of dark green vegetables (1/4 cup broccoli and 1 cup spinach, for example)
1 choice another vegetable (a carrot, or a LARGE MUSHROOM! for example)
1-2 choices of fruit (an apple and an apricot, for example)
2 choices cereal/grain (1 piece of bread and 1/2 cup oats, for example)
1 choice protein (1 egg or maybe 1/2 cup cooked lentils, for example)
2 choices dairy (1 cup low fat milk, 1 cup low fat yoghurt, for example)
1 choice fat (1 tablespoon oil, for example)

Jesus Christ, Jane Fonda are you trying to kill me? One large mushroom! Are you effing kidding me. This seemed like a tiny amount but I tried it for a day. By about 1PM I had exhausted my 1 non-dark green vegetable (1/4 avocado), fruit (a few strawberries and an apple), grain (1 piece of bread, one bowl porridge) allocations. Also, I'd had a couple of spoonfuls of custard that I'd been making for ice-cream. So that was probably half my dairy and all my fat intake. Which meant for the rest of the day I could eat 2 green vegetable serves, 1 protein and one dairy serve. Get real Jane, I'm a human. Incredulous that this was all I could eat for the rest of the day I did a calorie count and saw that I had eaten less than half the calories Jane suggested for the day. A mushroom has 3 calories and I can only have one of them? Of course I went off the diet. BUT, I am going to try and loosely follow it. That is I'm going to try and eat a little less food and a little more carefully and cut down on fats and cut out sugar. I feel like Jane would approve.

Okay, now comes the regime. Obviously I can't type it out word for word. Also there about 40 things she wants you to do broken down into warm-up (TWELVE WARM-UP EXERCISES! Fair suck of the sav, Jane!), upper body, aerobics, aerobics cool down, abs, legs and hips, buttocks, cool down. Sheesh Jane, way to make your New Workout plagiarism-proof from the lazy blogger. Boy did she have foresight.

I can't tell you everything that Jane suggests so here is a selection of things I may do (and let's all remember I have no extra knowledge about health or fitness other than what I picked up living as a human for the last 30something years and skim reading this book. I promise nothing, I know nothing):

Warm-up 

Head presses (moving head for side to side, stretching neck each side for a count of 4. Twice each side.)
Shoulder rolls (you know, lift up shoulders roll them backwards in a circle. Do 8 times.)
Elbow circles (put hands on shoulders then circle them forward up and down. Do it 16 times.)
Waist lifts (stretching arms up and leaning to each side stretching the waist)
Hamstring stretch, toe raises, tendon stretch, knee bends (basically all variations of forward bends)
Push-ups (girl style, as many as you can, yesterday I did 10)
 

Upper body

Bicep curls
Pectoral presses
Tricep extensions
Deltoid presses
Side arm lifts
Do eight of each. Jane suggests no weights, but as I am not a pussy I am going to use small weights. Except for the deltoid weights because in truth I am a little bit of a pussy. Finish with a shoulder stretch

Aerobics

Your goal, according to Jane, is to reach 20-30 mins of aerobic exercises here. Go for a brisk walk or jog, dance around the room run on the spot. You know, get aerobic. Do a stretchy cool-down.

Abs

Sit-ups (from lying with knees bent, do 20)
Crunches (legs up in the air, curl head and shoulder up to knees, do 24)
Crossovers (as above but you direct your elbows towards the opposite knee, do 16)
Hip stretch (lie on back bring knees up to your chest)

Legs and hips and ass

A variety of leg lifts (google them, shit you guys I'm totally bored of the sound of my internal voice)
Pelvic curls (do a bunch)

Cool down

Hip and hamstring stretch
Groin stretch
Side stretch

Shit, Jane Fonda, where do you find the time?! Seriously. Yesterday was my first go. Because I wanted to run but was home alone with Baby I skipped the aerobics portion just did the stretching and resistance stuff and went for a run later. I've decided that I will do the stretching and resistance stuff 3 days a week and go for a run three days a week. Because shit, I have a small child, I can't be doing hour long work outs all the time. Not at home anyway. So really this isn't Jane's workout at all. It's more J does Jane. Whoopsee.

Who's with me?! (PM)

J is talking loco and I like it.
There's few things I like more than a cockamamy plan. And few things I think more regularly than "gee, I really should exercise more".
So lets put the two together and see if we can't add a little muscle tone to these Crabby arms.
Perhaps for the duration of these trials we can write a weekly post about our experiences. And perhaps we should take photos of ourselves putting our arms in the air like John and Jane and Mr and Ms Superfirm.

Also, if I can find a way to integrate a leotard in to this without looking like a total moron, I'm doing it.

Who's with me?! (AM)

Recently I was cleaning my bathroom. Really, properly cleaning it; in the way that meant I moved the scales so I could mop under them. Of course a super clean bathroom is one of life's joys, but deciding to weigh oneself after many, many months just because you are holding some scales is, so often, not. Yeah, those scales told me straight out what my jeans had been whispering to me for some time. Now that I am off the world's easiest and bestest all-you-can-eat breastfeeding diet it's like I've got to start putting in some kind of effort. Lucky for me AND all of you, I think I have just the thing. These three books that made there way in or back into my life at the start of last summer.



Sure, late last year when I rediscovered them I had the best of intentions, but what with all the breastfeeding as if I was going to waste my time with watching what I ate and exercises. I'm not a sucker. So now the time has come. The plan is this. For one month each I am going to follow an exercises gleaned from each of these books. At the start of each month I will tell you about the book and the exercise routine and I will follow it for a month and, although I have not so much as uttered a word about this to K before writing these here words, I fully expect K to follow the routine too. Then we will decide which is the bestest! Who's with me?!

I think we should start with Jane. Now don't freak out, friends, this great new exercises routine isn't starting today. No, let's give it a couple of weeks so we can all get psyched! Now, as Jane Fonda is a woman and a feminist I think her routine will be the most beginner friendly. Plus, look at what a great time she is having!

Perhaps after Jane we will move to Travolta. His book "is designed to provide a six-day-a-week workout program"! Shit. Well, let's hope Jane gives us the goods to move onto that.

Then we will finish with Super Firm. That book has a subheading. 'Tough Workouts'! Eeek! This book contains such sections as 'Working harder', 'Advanced shaping and toning' and 'Plyometrics'! Until I looked on Wikipedia last night I didn't even know what that was. In fact, Wikipedia barely made me any wiser but Super Firm tells me that the section is about training to build power, muscle elasticity and recoil, and includes bounding and jumping routines for powerful legs! I didn't even know I needed better muscle recoil!

I CAN'T WAIT TO GET SUPER BUFF!!!! WHO'S WITH ME?!