Today I've started the fruit diet and I can tell you already that I am fed up with banana's. Weighing in at 9st 8lbs. (127lbs). It's hard trying to stick with this and anyone telling you that it's easy is not being totally honest.  Todays workout will be pretty much the same as yesterday's, lot's of cardio mixed with weights.

I will be posting some photo's within the next few days so look out for those. Keep training and don't give up! - Take care - Debs.

Cardio 

Exercise Bike  - 500 calories burned.

Elliptical Trainer - 50 steps.

Weights.

Hammer Curls - 20 reps 3 sets -  Dumb bells each arm 12kg.

Military Press Barbell. 20 reps 3 sets - 10 kg

Burning Fat vs. Burning Calories

To lose weight and get in shape you must have a good diet and exercise regularly to burn fat. The first thing you must understand about exercise is that just because you are burning calories does not mean you are burning fat. Your main focus when you exercise should be losing body fat, and you can't lose body fat just from burning calories. When we exercise, our bodies will start burning calories, but the calories that are burned are the calories from carbohydrates in our system. In order to burn calories from your stored fat, your body requires the presence of oxygen. There is a certain amount of oxygen that your body needs in order to start burning fat and the only way for you to measure the amount needed for your own body is to keep up with your target heart rate during exercise. Please understand that if you continue to only burn calories from carbohydrates, you will lose mostly "water weight" which leads to a decrease in your metabolism. Also, think of the calories that are burned from carbohydrates as your energy calories. If you lose too much energy calories then your muscles will not receive enough energy to increase your metabolism which indirectly burn fat. Therefore you must increase your calorie intake when you are on an exercise program to replace your burned energy calories.

Burning Fat Calories During Exercise

During aerobic exercise, your body goes through several stages before it reaches the point where you are burning fat. You will hear people say that you are only burning sugar (carbohydrates) not fat during the first 10 minutes of exercise. This is true to a certain extent. I say this because you will continue to burn sugar past the 10 minute mark if you are not working out hard enough for your body to want more oxygen; or you are working out too hard and you can't supply your body with enough oxygen for fat burning. When you exercise you must move at a steady pace (not too fast, not too slow) so your body will utilize your stored fat (not carbohydrates or sugar) as its energy source. Also remember that just because you reached the fat burning stage does not mean you will stay there. Staying at the fat burning stage once again depends on if you are moving at a pace that is right for your body. Make sure that you are within your target heart rate range.

Burning Fat Calories At Rest

The only way for you to continue to burn fat calories hours after you have finished working out is through the anaerobic exercise of weight training. Weight training is the key to burning fat at rest. Weight training is an anaerobic activity that will cause you to burn more calories than aerobic exercise. The calories that you are burning during weight training exercises are mostly calories from carbohydrates (meaning you must eat even more calories per day for energy); but the calories you burn at rest are mostly calories from fat. The reason you are burning fat at rest is because weight training increases your metabolism which uses your stored fat as energy.

To make your body the ultimate fat burning machine you must do aerobic (cardio) and anaerobic (weight training) exercises.

Todays Exercise is as follows.

Elliptical Trainer - 100 cals burned

Exercise bike     - 300 cals burned

Hammer curls    - 3 sets - 20 reps. - 10kg

Military Press    - 3 sets - 20 reps  - 20kg

Bench Press      - 3 sets - 5  reps   - 30kg

What Is The Cabbage Soup Diet?

 Today, I have found another diet to try, this is basically a very low calorie diet; the cabbage diet works, temporarily by cutting daily calories to near stavation levels.

Interestingly, no person or organization seems to want to claim responsibility for inventing the cabbage soup diet! So there isn't an "official" propriety version, but various cabbage diet plans based around eating copious quantities of cabbage soup, and very little else.

Claims made for the cabbage soup diet range from the ludicrous, ie. the cabbage soup itself has fat burning properties to the dubious, ie. you can lose 10lbs in a week. The diet is often put forward as a quick way to drop pounds for a special event and most proponents advise that it only be followed for a week

What's Involved

The Cabbage Soup Diet plan is very strict. The idea is to eat as much cabbage soup as you like every day - enough to keep you full up, so you don't cheat! Plus specific additional foods on each day of the seven day diet. No alcohol is allowed and other drinks are limited to water, and unsweetened fruit juice on days when fruit is allowed.

• Day 1 - Cabbage soup plus as much fruit as you like, excluding bananas
• Day 2 - Cabbage soup plus vegetables including 1 jacket potato with a little butter
• Day 3 - Cabbage soup plus fruit and vegetables excluding potatoes and bananas
• Day 4 - Cabbage soup plus up to eight bananas and as much skimmed milk as you like
• Day 5 - Cabbage soup plus up to 20 ounces of beef and up to six tomatoes
• Day 6 - Cabbage soup plus as much beef and vegetables (excluding potatoes) as you like
• Day 7 - Cabbage soup plus brown rice, vegetables (excluding potatoes) and unsweetened fruit juice

Recipes for the cabbage soup vary, but all are based on cabbage, onions, tinned tomatoes, green peppers, celery, carrots, mushrooms and onion soup mix.

Monday I will be trying the fruit diet, just to see if I can lose more weight quickly. 

Seven to ten day fruit diet

Going on a much longer fruit diet with purification herbs can assist in eliminating more deep-rooted toxic problems, such as gallstones, kidney stones, gout, digestive problems, bronchial problems, chronic constipation, etc.

How to go on the fruit diet

§         Choose a selection of fresh and dried fruits you enjoy, so you have plenty of variety.

§         Chew your fruit slowly.

§         Don’t mix fresh and dried fruits at the same meal.

§         Eat 4 to 5 small meals a day.

§         Fruit digests a lot more quickly than many other foods so be prepared to carry some fruit with you in case you feel hungry – most people do.

§         Always eat watermelon alone; do not mix with other fruits.

      Many, but not all, slimmers find a fruit diet helps them to lose weight.  It can be used as a dietary regime in itself or as a one to three day aid to a slimming programme.  Typical weight loss on a three day Fruit Diet can be between 2 to 6 lbs (1 to 3 kilos)

Contra Indications

If you are taking or have been taking drugs for a diagnosed health condition for a number of years, or are a frequent drinker of alcohol, it is possible that your liver is storing a great deal of toxins.  What we recommend is overhauling the quality of your diet completely and introducing fruit meals as part of your regime, such as a fruit breakfast or fruit lunch.  After a few weeks of this dietary improvement, you should see some overall improvement in your health, and then you can try a one day Fruit and Raw Vegetable Diet.  If you feel good after this, then keep on with your new normal dietary regime and do a Fruit and Raw Vegetable Diet once a week to help boost your system.

Wish me luck and I will let you know how I get on.....

Take care and have a great day! - Debs.

KEEP GOING DON'T GIVE UP!

So far to date I have lost 10lbs - Keep training and don't give up!

Elliptical Trainer - 100 cals burned

Exercise bike     - 100 cals burned

Hammer curls    - 3 sets - 20 reps. - 10kg

Military Press    - 3 sets - 20 reps  - 20kg

Bench Press      - 3 sets - 5  reps   - 30kg

Meal Today

Breakfast

Oatmeal - 1 small bowel / Orange Juice

Dinner

Salmon/Broccoli/Pasta/ Protein shake.

Tea

Chicken soup with two slices wholemeal bread./ Water.

 consider the normal body fluctuations that occur everyday. The human body is always in a constant state of flux; therefore, no one’s body weight remains constant. A persons lean body mass can fluctuate up or down by one to five pounds on any given day. These fluctuations have nothing to do with body fat, but have more to do with other variables. Water retention, hydration levels and the time of day can contribute to variations in body water. In addition, the weight of your clothes, the amount of food in your stomach and certain medications can all affect the reading on the scale so please don't worry to much about it.  Take care and have a great day. - Debs.

Bodybuilding Advanced

- TRIPLE DROP-SETS are single, prolonged sets where the weight is reduced when you reach failure allowing you to complete further reps. Start heavy with a weight that allows 6-8 reps, reduce the weight when you are unable to perform any further reps, go to failure again and reduce the weight for a final time. You are aiming to complete 6-8 reps on each of the drops. Remember to take each drop to complete failure; the weight should be reduced no more than two times in a single set.

- STRAIGHT SETS are traditional sets of 8-10 reps. Again, straight sets should be taken to failure.

The programme is split as follows:
Monday - Chest
Tuesday - Quads/Hams/Calves
Wednesday - Rest
Thursday - Shoulders/Triceps
Friday - Back/Traps
Saturday - Rest
Sunday - Rest

Monday (Chest)
Set 1. Incline Dumbbell Flyes. Pre-exhaust.
Set 2. Incline Dumbbell Flyes. Triple Drop-set.
Set 3. Bench Press. Straight Set
Set 4. Bench Press. Triple Drop Set.

Tuesday (Legs)
Set 1. Leg Extension. Pre-exhaust.
Set 2. Leg Extension. Triple Drop-set.
Set 3. Back Squat. Straight Set.*
Set 4. Hamstring Curl. Pre-exhaust.
Set 5. Hamstring Curl. Triple Drop-set.
Set 6. Stiff Legged Deadlift. Straight Set
Set 7. Calf Raise. Triple Drop-set
*Can be replaced by Hack Squat or Leg Press; if this is the case I recommend you use the triple drop-set technique.

Thursday (Shoulders/Triceps)
Set 1. Side Laterals. Pre-exhaust.
Set 2. Side Laterals. Triple Drop-set
Set 3. Seated Dumbbell Press. Straight Set*
Set 4. Seated Dumbbell Press. Triple Drop-set*
Set 5. Machine Dips. Triple Drop-set**
* Can be replaced by any form of shoulder press.
** Can be replaced by any triceps exercise incorporating the triple drop-set technique.

Friday (Back/Biceps)
Set 1. Dumbbell Pullovers. Pre-exhaust*
Set 2. Dumbbell pullovers. Triple Drop-set*
Set 3. Wide-grip Pulldowns. Straight Set
Set 4. Wide-grip Pulldowns. Triple Drop-set
Set 5. Deadlift. Straight Set
Set 6. Hammer Curls. Triple Drop-set
*Can be replaced with machine pullovers or straight-arm pushdowns.

Exercise Bike - 250 cals burned

Billy Blanks Abs workout.

Lateral thigh trainer - 40 steps.

Menu

Breakfast 

Oatmeal (with no Suger) Orange juice.

Dinner

Tuna/salad.Water

Protein drink

Tea

Chicken with brown rice/ water.

Today I started back after a brief rest from training.

Exercise Bike - 300cals Burned 

Billy Blanks Boot Camp Fitness DVD. 200cals Burned. You can purchase Billy's DVD at - http://www.asseenontv.com/prod-pages/billys_bootcamp.html

30kg Bench Press. 1 set 5 reps.

Food Today

Breakfast

Oats, Orange juice,

Dinner

Chicken with rice, water,

Tea

Tuna Salad/ water.

Keep training and stick with the diet. I will be weighing in again on Sunday. Take care - Debs.