Tag: home workouts

Band Challenge: Day 6

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Move 1: Lunge with a frontal press

This move is very similar to the lunge with overhead press that you did yesterday. You wrap the band around your back foot, lunge forward with the other foot, drop down low, come back up, and then do a press straight up. The difference is that your arms aren’t out to the side this time bent at a 90 degree angle. Instead, your elbows are pointed down in the start position, and your lift straight up. Do your lunge, and then the press when you get back up out of your lunge. Repeat this sequence on one leg for 30 seconds, and then switch to the other leg for the final 30 seconds. As an extra little challenge if you’re up for it, try doing an extra 10 seconds of just the frontal press from an upright position.

Move 2: Squat with a calf raise

This move is similar to the lunge with a calf raise, only instead of a lunge before the raise, you do a squat. You will stand on top of your band with your feet shoulder width apart, and you will hold your band by the handles or below at your hips. You will squat down, rest your hands on your knees for balance if necessary, and come up into a calf raise. You might wobble a bit on this one because you’re doing a squat and a calf raise at the same time, but you’ll get better over time. You will repeat this sequence for 1 full minute. As an extra little challenge if you’re up for it, try doing an extra 10 seconds of just the calf raises from an upright position.

Move 3: Sumo squat with jab punches

By now you should be familiar with the sumo squat, but essentially you will be squatting with your feet wider apart than your typical squat and your toes pointed outward. Instead of standing on your band for this exercise, you will actually have to wrap it around your torso. Take the band and hold the center of it to your belly, wrap one end around your back and to your front, and then repeat on the other side. Once you have a grip on both of the handles, drop down into your sumo squat, and then you will alternate arms and punch an invisible target in front of you. Try to aim at chest height, and try to hit the same spot each time. If this gets too hard, you can drop the band and continue the punches without it, but only if it is absolutely necessary! Otherwise, continue with the sumo squat and punches for 1 full minute. You don’t need to squat up and down on this one, you just stay in that sumo squat position throughout the full minute. It will burn, but that is a good thing! If you need a little break, you can just come up slightly to rest for a few seconds, and then drop right back down.

Move 4: Lawn mowers

With this move you will get into a lunge position and step on your band with your forward foot. You will need to step closer to the end of the band for this move, and you will only use one end of the band. All you have to do is imagine yourself trying to start a basic lawnmower with the pull cord. You stay in the lunge position for 30 seconds with your other hand resting on your knee for balance. Meanwhile, the hand opposite to your forward foot will be pulling on the band and trying to bring it up to the shoulder. You should feel this in the back of your shoulder, and it will feel almost like you’re trying to bring your shoulder blades together. Once the initial 30 seconds are up, switch to a lunge stance on the other side and pull with the other arm for the final 30 seconds.

Band Challenge: Day 5

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Move 1: Bowler’s lunge with a row

This move is a little bit complicated, but you just have to imagine yourself about to bowl. Get in a lunge position, but instead of your back leg being straight out behind you, your back leg will cross behind you. Most of your weight should be on that forward leg, and you should be able to lift that back foot off the ground. If you can do that, you’re in the right position. You will need to have the band wrapped around your forward foot, and you lunge down, come back up, and then do a row by raising your arms up toward your chest. Repeat this on the same leg for 30 seconds, and then switch to the other leg for the other 30 seconds. As a little bonus if you’re up for it, try doing an extra 10 seconds with just the rows.

Move 2: Bicep curl with a leg raise

This move is going to require some balance, and everyone is going to start at a different place depending on your fitness level. You are going to stand on your band in the center and hold the handles in front of you for the curl. Start by curling your arms up toward your chest, and slowly lift one leg out to the side while crunching your body toward the leg raise a little bit. You don’t have to lift your leg high in the beginning, and if you have to tap your toe on the ground periodically to get your balance that is totally okay! Try not to let your foot come back down to the ground until you’ve lowered your arms back down from the bicep curl, and then repeat the move on the other leg. Alternate legs with the bicep curl for 1 full minute. As a little bonus if you’re up for it, try doing an extra 10 seconds of just the bicep curls from a standing position.

Move 3: Sumo squat with an overhead press

Get into your sumo squat position with your feet planted firmly on top of your band and your toes facing outward. Grab the handles of your band, and hold them up with your arms bent at 90 degrees. You will do a sumo squat, come back up, and then raise your arms up toward the ceiling for your overhead press. Repeat this for 1 full minute. As an extra little bonus if you’re up for it, try doing an extra 10 seconds with just the overhead press from an upright position.

Move 4: Lunge with a calf raise

For this move you will need to wrap your band around your back foot. You lunge forward with your forward leg, drop down low, come back up, and then do a calf raise with your forward leg. You stay in that split stance and repeat that sequence for 30 seconds, and then you switch to the other leg for the final 30 seconds. You can rest your fists and the handles of the band on your forward knee as you do the calf raise for balance if necessary. As an extra little bonus if you’re up for it, try ditching your band and just doing an extra 10 seconds of fast calf raises from a standing position.

Band Challenge: Day 4

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Move 1: Squat with a side bend

Start with your feet shoulder width apart on your band and your hands holding the band at your hips. You will squat down slowly, come back up to a standing position, and then crunch your body as far as you can to the right. Try not to lean sideways when you do this, but instead feel the crunch of your obliques so that only your upper body is bent. You will alternate back and forth with the side bend after every squat for 1 full minute. As a little bonus if you’re up for it, try holding the band in both hands in front of your chest and just doing the side bend crunches side to side for an extra 10 seconds.

Move 2: Lunge with a tricep extension

This move will require you to wrap the band around your back foot once, and then you will lunge forward with your other leg. Hold the handles of the band up high by your chest, and then extend your arms back as far as you can. Your elbows shouldn’t move around, they should stay right by your side. Only your forearm should be moving forward and backward as you extend the arm out. You will stay in the lunge position on one leg for 30 seconds, and then switch to the other leg for 30 seconds. You start by lunging down low, coming back up, and then doing your extension. As a little bonus if you’re up for it, try doing an extra 10 seconds with just the tricep extension. For this move you just stand on the band in the center, hold the band by the handles behind your head, and extend your arms up straight toward the ceiling.

Move 3: Sumo squat with a bicep curl

You should be familiar with the sumo squat by now, but basically you’re in a squat with your feet planted on top of the band a little further apart than your typical squat and your toes facing outward. You are going to squat down, come back up, and then do a bicep curl with one arm. Alternate arms for the first 30 seconds, and then for the final 30 seconds you can do both arms at the same time. Repeat the squat in between every curl. As a little bonus if you’re up for it, try doing half range bicep curls in a standing position for an extra 10 seconds.

Move 4: Deadlift with a row

With this move you will be standing on top of your band with your feet shoulder width apart. You will hold the band at your hips, and then bend your body forward with your back straight as low as you can go. Come back up slowly, and you should feel this in your hamstrings and the backs of your legs. When you get to the top and are back in your standing position, you are going to raise your band up toward your chest in a row. Repeat this for 1 full minute. As a little bonus if you’re up for it, try creating extra resistance with the band by making that small circle and do an extra 10 seconds with just the rows.

Band Challenge: Day 3

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Move 1: Deadlift with a posterior fly

You will start this move by standing on your band with your feet shoulder width apart. You will hold the handles or make the circles and hold the band to your hips. Slowly bend down toward the floor and lower your arms down as low as you can go while maintaining a flat back. Slowly come all the way up, and then you will bend back down ¾ of the way, and do a posterior fly in that bent position. You’ve seen the posterior fly before, but if you need to see it you can google the images. As a little bonus if you’re up for it, try holding the band a little lower and doing 10 extra seconds of just the deadlift.

Move 2: Lateral raises

You will start this move with your feet shoulder width apart on the band below your feet. You can choose whether to hold the handles or to make it harder by creating a circle and holding the band below the handle as well. For the first 30 seconds you will alternate arms by bringing your arm up and out to the side. For the final 30 seconds you will bring both arms up and out to the sides simultaneously. As a little bonus if you’re up for it, try holding the arms straight out to the sides for an extra 10 seconds. You’ve seen this kind of move before, so it should be familiar to you. If not you can search google for images.

Move 3: Lunge with a core rotation

You will need to wrap your band around your forward foot for this move, while making sure that the band is even on each side. This time you will be holding both of the handles in your hands at the same time. Lunge forward, and then reach your arms to the right, then to the left, and then lunge down a little more, and step back. When you reach your arms to each side, you should try to crunch your body in that direction as well to work your core and your oblique’s. Repeat on the first leg for 30 seconds, and then switch to the other leg for 30 seconds. As a little bonus if you’re up for it, try standing on the band with your feet shoulder width apart, and then do just the core rotations for an extra 10 seconds.

Move 4: Back kicks

With this move, you will need to wrap your band around one foot and hold the handles or make the circles and hold the band to your hips. You will need to balance on the foot without the band, and then kick straight out behind you with the leg that the band is wrapped around. Try to look back in the direction that you are kicking as you do it. Do one leg for 30 seconds, and then wrap your band around the other leg and repeat on the other leg for the last 30 seconds.

Band Challenge: Day 1

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Move 1: Band LAT pull

With this move you will hold the band a bit more than shoulder width apart in the middle, and make a circle with the end of the band so that you’re holding both the band and the handle. This will protect you from getting hit with the handle as you go. Raise your arms straight up over your head, with an incline slightly in front of your face to keep you from getting hit with the band. Now you will slowly lower one arm down toward your leg, and raise it back up. Repeat the same thing on the other side, and keep alternating like this for 30 seconds. Next you will go back to your start position, and bring both arms down simultaneously for 30 seconds. If you find that it is too hard to keep your arms straight as you do this, you may just need to widen your grip on the band to give you more room to move. As a little bonus if you’re up for it, try holding the band with your arms straight out to the sides for 10 extra seconds.

Move 2: Squats

With this move you will hold the band by your hips, and step on the center of the band. If you don’t get any resistance by holding the handles, which is probably going to happen, all you need to do is make a small circle like you did on the last move so that you’re gripping the handle and the band below it to increase your resistance on the move. With squats I want you to alternate a bit. Start with 4 regular squats, then do 2 really slow squats, and then do 2 half squats (this is when you only squat down half of your normal range). Repeat that pattern for 1 minute. As a bonus if you’re up for you, try doing the half range squats for 10 extra seconds.

Move 3: Bicep curls

This has a similar stance as the squats, and again you may need to make that circle to give you more resistance. You start with your elbows by your side, and they stay by your side throughout the whole exercise. You should always feel your elbow by your side. Now you start by curling one arm all the way up and dropping it back down slowly, then switch to the other arm, and so on. Alternate arms for 30 seconds, then do both arms simultaneously for 30 seconds. As a little bonus if you’re up for it, try doing half range curls for 10 extra seconds. Just like the squats, this is simply going only half of your normal curl range, so you would stop when you’re arms reach a 90 degree angle and come back up instead of letting the arms go down all the way.

Move 4: X Band walk

Start in a similar stance as the last two moves, with your feet standing in the middle of the band shoulder width apart. Start by holding the handles this time because this is a challenging move, and then do your circle 30 seconds in if you need more resistance or want a bigger challenge. With this move you need to cross the band in front of you so that it makes an X, then hold the handles at your hips. Now you get down into a squat position, watch your shoulders and make sure you’re standing straight and not bending too far forward, and walk over two to the right. Alternate going 2 to the right and to the left for 1 full minute. No bonus with this one because it is a doozy lol.

Killer leg/butt exercise (Band required)

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If you follow my blog, you are probably aware that I am currently doing the 21 Day Fix Extreme home fitness program. Well, sometimes I like to take the toughest moves and use them as a little challenge for my health and fitness group participants. Share the love I always say, or in this case, pain! lol

During my workout yesterday, I came across this move. It had my legs and butt on FIRE.

If you watched that video, and you have access to a band, I triple dog dare you to attempt this move! Go until your legs can’t take it anymore, and then comment on this thread and let me know how long you made it.

Enjoy ;)

July Health & Fitness Challenge!!

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In case you are unfamiliar with me and my coaching, I do a challenge every month in my FREE Health and Fitness group. The first three months went really well in terms of participation, and then this past month the challenge had a lot less participants. Instead of coming up with something myself, I thought that I would put it out to all of you!

What kinds of challenges would you find beneficial? It needs to be something that just about anyone could do. For example, the bootcamps I have done in the past had 4 workouts per week to complete MINIMUM and a simple meal plan to follow. The step challenge that we did simply required each participant to wear a fitbit and report back to me with all of their steps each week. Our biggest loser challenge required participants to access the Beachbody On Demand FREE Trial for the month. These are all things that pretty much anyone could do, without requiring a gym membership or expensive equipment.

The idea that I came up with for July is a YouTube Challenge. I am always pulling cool workout videos off of YouTube and sharing them in the group as a weekly challenge anyways, so I thought it might be fun to make it a theme for the month! If you vote on this challenge, I would put together a schedule of Beachbody based workouts found on YouTube to be completed throughout the month. Each week I would post the schedule for the upcoming week.

So far, the only other suggestion is to repeat the step challenge! If you have any other ideas, you need to go and request to join our group. Once approved for membership, you will be able to vote for your favorite idea, or submit a new idea for consideration!

Please let me know ASAP if you are interested in participating in this challenge.

May Step Challenge!

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So for the past few months I’ve done a Bikini Bootcamp, and for May I would like to do something a little different. Starting May 4th, one week from today, I am thinking of running a step competition. The warmer weather is starting to come around, so it will be easier for everyone to go on walks!

You’ll need to purchase a step counter to wear for the month to participate in this challenge. Every day, I will post a status in my FREE Health and Fitness group asking about your steps for the day. It will be your responsibility to make sure that you take a photo of your step counter at the end of the day and submit it on the thread to be counted toward your total.

I am going to leave this up to the participants, but someone in my April Bootcamp made a suggestion that I am considering for this challenge. Normally all of my challenges are free, and again, this is totally up to you guys – but depending on the amount of signups we have, we could do a small participation fee. Please know that I would NOT be keeping this money! The money would be tucked away, and then at the end of the month, the person with the highest total number of steps for the month would win a fitness program. This would provide a bit of extra incentive for everyone to do well. Like I said before, this all depends on the amount of signups that we get and the fee that we agree upon. Once we have the list of participants set and I’ve collected all of the money, I would then be able to come up with a list of all of the fitness programs that would be covered by the fee total. Ideally I would like to have enough of you participating that we’d only have to have a small fee like 5 or 10 dollars, and still come up with enough money to pay for any fitness program available – maybe even a challenge pack!

I highly recommend that you find a partner to do this with you. It can be a friend, family member, significant other, whatever the case may be. You could even partner up with someone else in the group! It just helps to have someone else to hold you accountable. If you find someone to do it with and they aren’t in the group, have them send me a message and I can get them added into the group to participate! If you currently aren’t a member of my group and would like to participate, click here to request to join.

Let me know what you guys think! I am fine with doing it either way, I just thought the prize might help motivate you all to do well. For those of you that have signed up, I encourage you to get your step counters as soon as possible so that you aren’t caught last minute without one. I also encourage you to start thinking about who may enjoy doing this with you, and to reach out to them and try to find a partner.

If you haven’t signed up yet – what are you waiting for?! This is going to be a lot of fun, and you may have a chance to win an awesome prize. Get in on the action while you can!

Do your relationships hamper your progress?

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Don’t let other people tear you down. There are going to be people out there that are going to try to discourage you from making positive life changes and/or tell you that you can’t do it. This may even come from someone close to you, like a friend or family member. This hurts, but you can’t let them beat you down to their level.

If you’ve watched Extreme Weight Loss with Chris Powell over the years like I have, you’ll have learned that sometimes the people closest to us will try to prevent us from being successful on our journey simply because they aren’t ready to make those changes themselves. Sometimes they do it without even realizing it, and though they would never intentionally do something to hurt you, their subconscious wins the battle and they say or do things that can set you back.

Making the shift from junk food to healthy food and from inactivity to activity on a regular basis is not easy. It takes hard work and dedication. This process is made much more difficult if you don’t have a support system to lean on. For example, if you live with a spouse or significant other that doesn’t want to make healthier choices, or if your friends constantly invite you out to places where you’ll be tempted to eat poorly.

What I would recommend that you do moving forward is to start analyzing the people in your life. Think about the people that mean the most to you, and the people you spend the most time with. Once you’ve figured that out, you should then have an open and honest conversation with each of those people. Say, “listen, I have decided to start eating better and working out because it is very important to me that I get healthy and/or lose weight. As my family member/friend, I was really hoping that you would support me on this journey.”

If they are the type of person that says or does things that bring you down and work against your health and fitness goals, you can add something like “You are very important to me, and I don’t want to damage our relationship. However, I feel like you sometimes say and/or do things that make it more difficult for me to stick with my positive life choices. I would love for you to join me on this journey, but if you aren’t ready, I at least need that discouraging behaviour to stop. Otherwise I might have to take some time away from you for a while until these new life choices have had the chance to become habits”

This isn’t always an easy conversation to have, but it is important if you want to be successful. If you’re open and honest with them about what you want and how you are feeling, they will likely be open and honest with you in return. It may be just the push they need to agree to these changes themselves, and it could really strengthen your relationship. However, if they refuse to join you and they continue the negative behaviour, you really should consider taking some time away from that person to work on yourself. You need to surround yourself with positive people that support you and your health and fitness goals, otherwise your chances of being successful tend to dwindle.

As for household relationships, like children and/or spouses, think about who does the grocery shopping. Is it you? If so, just gradually start reducing the amount of junk food you have in the house! Your family might not like it at first, but if you replace the junk foods that they enjoy with some healthier options, they will get used to it over time.

You need to be a positive role model for your friends and family. SHOW them that it is possible to make these life choices and what kind of results can come from making those choices. Invite them to join you on your workouts. Talk to them about how you are feeling now that you have started this awesome journey, and make them want to join in.

If you have children, this is more important than ever, because children will model after you when it comes to food choice in most cases. If you constantly eat junk food and allow them to eat junk food, they are going to learn that junk food is good. If you don’t eat junk food regularly and you don’t keep junk food in the house or allow your kids to eat it regularly, they will learn that junk food is not good for you and that they can only have it as a treat once in a while. The problem is that many people are eating junk food ALL DAY every day. For example kids get sent to school with chips, cookies, fruit roll ups, lunchables, gummies, etc. Instead, send your kids to school with healthier snacks like fruit and veggies.

If you teach your children healthy habits early in their lives, they are less likely to become overweight or obese going into adulthood. I wish that I had been forced to learn healthy habits when I was a child, because I could have avoided all of the years that I spent depressed and in self-imposed isolation because of my weight.

Send me an email to hfmxj@stu.ca with the subject line “I’m ready to transform” if you would like to make me your free Beachbody Coach. I look forward to speaking with you, and I can’t wait to watch your mind and body transform over the course of your health and fitness journey.

Discontinuation Blow-out!

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Hey everyone! I just wanted to bring these two awesome programs to your attention. I am very sad to say that these two programs will no longer be produced by Beachbody. Unfortunately, this includes Beachbody On Demand. These programs will only be available as long as product already made are in stock, but once we sell out, both of these programs are gone for good. Take advantage of the discontinuation pricing and get these while you can!

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LES Mills Combat is honestly an amazing program. This is one of my go-to workouts if I am upset or angry about something. Maybe it is all the kicking and punching, but for some reason, I always feel so much better by the time I finish one of these workouts! One of the things that I love most about this program is that it is 100% gender-neutral. I find that some programs do tend to be more targeted toward one gender than the other, but this program has a perfect balance that I feel would be a great fit for both men and women. Click Here if you would like to watch a video preview.

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The results don’t lie! This program is awesome, and it really does get results. Combat is not for everyone though! There is a lot of jumping around, balancing, and core work in that fitness program. If you have any injuries or joint issues that keep you from doing that kind of high impact activity, LES Mills Pump could be more your style.

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This program includes the barbell and weights that you need to complete the program. Honestly when I first watched the preview for this program, I thought that there was no possible way that I could ever do that! After being involved with Beachbody for over 6 months, I decided to give it a try based on high rep/low weight fat burning method. I found that it is actually very doable, and the instructors show you how to modify every move so that you can gradually work up to doing it the way it was intended to be done. My mom struggles with knee and back pain, so she absolutely loved this program. It allowed her to get a great full body workout in without doing damage to her injuries from high impact activity. Click Here to watch a preview of this program.

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Ready to take advantage of the awesome sale pricing and start working on your health and fitness journey? Click Here to create your free Team Beachbody account, and send me an email to hfmxj@stu.ca with the subject line “LES Mills” for information on how to access the sale in either US or Canada.

I look forward to coaching you along this journey, and watching you transform!