Summer fitness: staying on track
From left: top / pants / coverup / shoes
Summer is here! The wonderful thing about summer vacation is my schedule. The kids are out of school, and enrolled in camps, as well as activities. These camps and activities are much easier to handle then the schedule we maintain during the school year. This means I can make it to the gym six days per week! Love that!
My goal over summer break is to not only workout six days per week, but to also lose ten pounds. As I write this, I am already down three pounds, so things are looking good! In order to ensure I stick to my fitness, and nutrition, goals this summer vacation, I have a set workout schedule which I put into my iPhone calendar for the entire break until school starts. I also use an app to count my calories and track what I am eating.
If you are trying to lose one pound per week, this might be a good sample schedule for your own personal fitness routine. This is my summer fitness routine:
Monday: 60 minutes LifeFitness Course. I set the treadmill to 3.7 and 6% incline. The incline moves between 11% and 4% throughout the hour as the course takes me through hills, trails, and flatlands. If your gym has a LifeFitness Treadmill, I highly recommend trying the courses. They are a lot of fun! After I finish my routine, I do 15 minutes of weights, then I do 15 push-ups, followed by 15 minutes of ab work. When I am done, I stretch for ten minutes. This workout burns over 500 calories and is low impact; easy on the joints.
Tuesday: 60 minute Spin class. This is always fun and burns almost 400 calories.
Wednesday: Tennis or swimming. My schedule changes every Wednesday, so depending on when I can get to the gym, I either schedule tennis with my friends, or hop in the pool for a workout. I usually burn just over 400 calories.
Thursday: 45 minute Spin class. This burns roughly 350 calories, The teacher is more intense then the one on Tuesday, so I always burn calories faster.
Friday: BodyCombat. I burn roughly 700 calories in this intense, cardio kickboxing class. Always a blast!
Saturday: BodyPump followed by Adv. Step. This burns almost 1000 calories. Super fun to get both cardio work and strength work in to kick off the weekend.
To summarize, Monday, Friday, and Saturday I do cardio. Tuesday and Thursday I do interval training. Wednesday is a combination of interval and cardio due to the starting and stopping nature of the sports. I get my strength training in on Mondays and Saturdays.
In order to lose one pound per week, I try to keep my daily caloric intake to 1200 calories. I use MyFitnessPal app, which you can find in the app store, to track my caloric intake and my daily fitness routines. The app gives you credit for your workouts, so if you burn 400 calories, you can eat 1200+400=1600 calories that day. It works! This app is the best way, in my opinion, to track my calories, and stay on track to lose one pound per week.
If you are like me, and love to eat something sweet, you will love this idea! There are two ways I get my sweet kicks while I am trying to lose weight. For ice cream, I eat Skinny Cow products because they are always under 200 calories. When I don’t feel like ice cream, I will eat a cup of jello with some whip cream on top. This is always under 200 calories and super sugary! It is a great way to get my sweet fix in, so I don’t feel deprived while calorie counting. You should never deprive yourself.
For hunger between meals, I keep plenty of fruit on hand. I prefer grapes, cherries, and strawberries for between meal snacks.
Are you working on losing weight, or trying to maintain your current weight this summer? What are your fitness goals, and your workout routine? Please share in the comments below!
Thank you for stopping by
XOXO
Cathy
