Quick Dumbell Workout

Who is short on time?

Time remains the #1 excuse for not getting exercise done. How hard is it really to own just a few dumbbells and get in a quick workout like this?

The first thing in the morning is the best time to do it. You’ll start your day off feeling great just because all day long you will know you did something important for improving your health.

Here is a quick 5 exercise circuit dumbbell workout for you.

If you are finding these workouts:

1) Too challenging?

2) Too easy?

3) You like some of them but you have an injury that prevents you from doing part of the exercises?

Click here to find out how you can have your own

custom designed workouts!

Quick Dumbbell Workout: Do anywhere from 8-12 repetitions of each exercise without resting, and repeat 3-4 rounds.

DB Stationary lunges, both sides

DB Reverse fly

DB Squat and press

DB push-ups (add renegade rows for more challenge!)

DB Russian twists

Dumbbell Stationary Lunge, do 8-12 reps each side

Dumbbell Reverse fly-- keep your back straight, abs tucked in tight!

dumbbell squat and press

Dumbbell push-ups--(you can add renegade rows between each push-up repetition for more challenge)

If you can't do this with your legs up, put your heels on the floor with your knees bent. You can use a single dumbbell in place of the medicine ball. Touch the dumbbell down on the floor each time.

Killer Leg Workout–No Equipment!

Here is a leg workout that uses no equipment.

This of course is great if you are traveling for work, don’t want to join or go to a gym, or you are just plain short on time.

Did you know I can custom design a 4-week program for you personally that is half the price of a single personal training session?

Of course there is nothing like having a trainer right there with you… but when I did a survey of why people don’t hire a personal trainer everyone I asked said it was because of the COST!

So… I took that feedback as how can I make having access to a personal trainer affordable and still give you personal attention?

Honestly… Money will be your last excuse for not doing this: On-line Personal Training!

Here is my “Killer Leg Workout”.  It is a 5-exercise circuit. If you can, do the circuit two times resting two minutes in between…

Just in case that isn’t killer enough… try this Leg Matrix I learned taking a workshop a while back with strength conditioning coach Juan Carlos Santana… Whew!

24 Body-weight squats
24 alternating (12 each side) body-weight lunge
24 alternating jump lunges (12 each side)
24 jump squats

1. Lateral Lunges

Do 8 reps each side

2. Do 8 reps of "Y" squats

3. Single-Legged Get-ups--no hands! Do 8 reps each side.

4. Bulgarian Split Squats-- Do 8 reps each side.

5. Supine Hip Extension--do 8 reps each side

Quick Workout for You

If you could get the same fat burning results or better from a 20-30 minute cardio program as you could from one that takes an hour, which would you choose?

Twenty minutes of interval training feels much harder than a slow one hour walk on your treadmill while watching TV for sure.

With interval training you will probably breath harder, sweat more, and need to turn off the TV and focus, but worth the results if you are trying to burn fat!

What’s more, is you don’t need cardio machines to do cardio!

If you are short on time, can’t make it to the gym, have no equipment at home but want a quick effective workout…

…Below is a quick body-weight workout that will get your heart pumping and your fat burning! By the way these exercises came right out of my Women’s In-Home Workout e-Book that you see on the right.

Strength training workouts that use supersets which combine non-competing muscle groups back to back with no rest period in between will help sculpt your body and get you more results in less time… better than taking long walks for sure.

If you want me to personally design 4-week custom programs based on your own equipment (or lack of it), your specific physical needs, and schedule, just go to this link:
http://bestbodymakeover.com/virtual/
Choose the monthly or yearly option… and then the custom program!

By the way, don’t forget to register for the teleseminar this Thursday where I will be interviewed about how to achieve your fitness goals by Health and Wellness Coach, Danielle Zanzarov:
http://www.4healthinc.com/HealthWellnessinNoTimeTeleseminarSeries.aspx

Quick Workout you can do with no equipment or gym necessary!
1) 30 seconds of body weight squats immediately followed by 30 seconds of push-ups, rest 60 seconds and repeat 2 times.

2) 30 seconds of alternating forward touchdown lunges immediately followed by 30 seconds of mountain climbers, rest 60 seconds and repeat 2 times.

3) Finish with plank and side plank (20-second plank + 10-second side plank alternating sides, up to 8 rounds)

Health and Wellness in No Time Teleseminar Series

Couples Who Get Strong Together… Live Long Together

Isn’t it time you and your partner really supported each other in your fat loss journey?
Your partner who will be doing every possible step with you to achieve your success?
Your partner who understands you, helps you overcome all the challenges, and share your wins?

Together as a team, you can share an amazing journey towards a better, stronger and healthier relationship… like never before.

• Do you approach weight loss as individuals or work against each other?
• Do you sabotage each other with poor eating choices?
• Do you have equal exercise time in your day-to-day lives, or do you hold resentment for the time that only one of you gets to go to the gym?

If this is you, discover how when you support one another, your chances of success are far greater. You can enjoy the many physical benefits that working out and eating healthy together can offer.

When you work together as a team toward a common goal, you will find there will be a lot more benefits than weight loss alone:

• Grow emotionally as a couple as you reinforce good feelings in your relationship by sharing your experience.
• Build trust and improve communication.
• Gain a greater respect for each other .
• Have a deeper appreciation for each other’s needs.
• Face challenges and overcome obstacles together better.
• Keep each other accountable.
• Have a greater sexual attraction for each other.

You really CAN get back your sexy body you desire and at the same strengthen your relationship. As a team you can work together on a common goal. This will become an exciting journey for both of you.

• Having a workout partner is often the most critical link to your adherence to exercise. When someone is counting on you to workout, you have to be accountable to the plan.

• Working towards a common goal will give you much to talk about and will establish a new connection with each other.

• You will be less likely to cheat on your nutrition plan when someone else is feeling a little stronger than you are at a weak moment.

• You will increase your energy as you begin even to make small changes towards a healthy lifestyle. This will lead to more productivity in other aspects of your life. With both of you having unstoppable energy, it will be a win-win!

• Becoming more physical with each other will establish deeper intimacy and you will have a better self-esteem because of it. As you become more fit and lean, you will FEEL much more attractive when you begin to tone up and fit into smaller sizes. When you feel that good about yourself you will want to share your feelings with your loved one.

• If you have children at home you will become a great role model not only for each other… but for them. Whatever age your children are, the best gift you could ever give them is instilling the value of a healthy lifestyle.

So how can you go about doing all this?

As a special VALENTINE gift to you, from now until February 15th, my coaching program is two for the price of one!

If you are willing to work together as a team… then I would like to be a part of your SUCCESS TEAM too!

Five Fatal Fitness Mistakes, and What To Do About Them–Part 2

As promised, here is part 2 if the Five Fatal Fitness Mistakes. These last two might surprise you. Personally, I think they are the most important of all. If you missed the first 3, click here: First 3 Fatal Fitness Mistakes

4- Not having an action plan when it comes to your exercise - Without knowing what specific steps you need to take, or simply showing up at the gym mindlessly, your ability to change your body or stay consistent with your exercise will be compromised.

If you are doing the same routine, same weights, cardio, even if it seems like you are working hard… you are probably getting the same results. This is not a plateau, but this may be your feedback that you need to change what you do in order to improve or get to the next level.

Changing it up will also keep you inspired and motivated… and ultimately, change you.

Don’t be sure you know how, that is what a personal trainer or coach will do for you, and save you a lot of time and trouble in the long run. Be willing to pay for it, you are well worth it. Avoid the quick fixes.

5- Having an exercise plan that is not aligned with your values - If your goal is to go to the gym regularly but your time there conflicts with job, family, etc., then a gym membership might not be money well spent.

Your desire to exercise needs to be strong and compelling for you to do it. This does not mean if you have too many responsibilities that you can’t workout. On the contrary, without your health, your other responsibilities will be a moot point. Besides, you know as well as I do that some of the busiest people find time to work out!

If you hate working out at a gym, chances are you will get bored and drop out. Weight training and cardio machines are not the end all and be-all. Yes they are efficient and get the job done, but if it is not aligned with your lifestyle or you simply hate it, you will probably quit in the end.

I just had a conversation with someone today who was getting “advice” from a marathon runner. He was trying to tell her she needed to run in order to lose fat. Of course running might indeed make her lose fat but she told me she hated to run, especially outside.

She asked me if she could get the same benefit from dancing. Well, I asked her… have you ever looked at some of the bodies of professional dancers? She immediately saw possibilities where before she only saw limitations.

So what could you do that fits in your lifestyle, burns a lot of calories and you can still have fun?

Five Fatal Fitness Mistakes and What You Can Do About Them

Here are the first 3 of the five fatal fitness mistakes and what to do about them. Next week I will have the other 2!

1- Not getting stronger and increasing muscle mass. If your goal is to lose fat, increasing your muscle mass will increase your metabolism (burn more calories/fat throughout the day). You’ll be stronger, toned, leaner and get rid of cellulite. Establish a consistent routine, ideally 3 times a week.
A) Lift heavier than you did the last time, even if it is for one repetition, and build on that.
B) Slow down. Unless you are doing power-lifting moves or kettlebell swings (both are great), you should not be using momentum.
C) Change up the workout program, the amount of repetitions, the rest periods between sets, the lifting tempo, or the amount of sets you do. Changing the demand on your muscles keeps them from adapting to the same routine.

2- Spending too much time doing ab exercises in hopes of losing belly fat. Your abs may be strong and developed even if you can’t see definition because a layer of belly fat is covering them up. Seeing that amazing coveted 6-pack, takes amazing work. Most of the fat around your belly is a result of your nutrition. Your exercise to reduce belly fat should include interval cardio training and super-sets using high intensity, full body combinations  like squats, pulling and pushing exercises.

3- Thinking that you have to spend a long time doing cardio -Long slow cardio is not the way to burn fat, in fact, it might help you store fat, slow your metabolism, and burn more muscle, not fat.

Let’s suppose you start out at 20 minutes walking on the treadmill. Next you increase it to 30 minutes and so on… until you are walking an hour or more, but you can’t understand why nothing has changed in all that time. Your body has efficiently learned to adapt to the demand you are placing on it… so now it doesn’t need to burn as many calories in order to walk longer. In fact, it becomes very efficient at storing fat and burning off muscle!

Ever watched someone reading a book or talking on the cell phone while on cardio equipment… sometimes for over an hour? Who will burn more calories? The steady walker or the person who is totally focused, breathing hard, sweating and giving it their all-out, either with more resistance or speed?

Just like increasing the weight load with strength training, when it comes to cardio, you need to increase both intensity (how hard) and duration (how long)… and vary the type of exercise. Check out this earlier post on how to do a fat-blasting cardio workout.

If you need help designing a program for your workouts, I can build a 4-week program for you when you sign up for the custom program or you can get a copy of my “Women’s In Home Workout!” E-book that you to the right of this page. These are extremely affordable alternatives to personal training. With the custom program you’ll have access to me personally, and with the self-serve program, you can get effective workouts daily, that are designed based on the information you enter in.

New Year’s Resolutions

I want to thank everyone for all the kind wishes and positive
words I received over the year. I really love what I do and it is
extremely rewarding to know I have helped facilitate a change
that improved the quality of your life.

It is hard to believe that we are not only closing another year,
but a decade too!

For the first blog post of 2010, I would like to give you some
helpful tips to “master” the art of making New Year’s
Resolutions to create the outcomes you want.

First, consider a few questions:

1- Is your nutrition healthier than it was 10 years ago… or
even one year ago?

2- Have you been doing the same exercise routine year after
year but your body has shown no improvement?

3- Were you better off ten years ago in terms of your lifestyle?

Most people make resolutions. That is only the beginning.
Resolutions are the words you speak. They sound like great
ideas but they don’t really mean anything unless they are
accompanied with a plan of action.

Talk without action is only dreaming about a possibility…
and that’s a good start, because all actions begin with a
thought or a desire. When you make a commitment… and
make the appointment that is written in your schedule and
prioritized, guess what… you get it done, no kidding.

I am re-launching my New Year’s Resolution program from
last year at the same price with more added bonuses…
Because guess what, you will get it done, no kidding and
here’s why… it’s those tips I was going to tell you about…

http://bestbodymakeover.com/newyear/

1. Know what worked. It is important to identify all the
things that have worked well for you in the past. Commit
to them… do them consistently and more often.

2. Pay attention to what you learned. Whether you
reach your desired outcome or not, that knowledge is the
feedback that will help you advance. Then, you can speed
up your results each time around and not repeat the same
mistakes over and over again.

3. Have a plan in advance before you set your goal
rather than make it up as you go along. Without a plan you
will waste time. Setting a goal is just the start, achieving
your goal requires a consistent plan of action for both
training and nutrition.

4. Know what it will cost. Every goal has a cost… and it’s
not just about money. It can cost you time, it could cost
you a relationship, and it can cost you your health if you don’t
do it… Most of the costs lie outside your comfort zone. This
is probably what gets most people into trouble.

People don’t realistically think about the cost of what it will
take to achieve their goals. They are unwilling to pay the
price and quit at the first obstacle.

5. You are worth it, pay the price! That’s right… This may
be tough love but if it’s a goal you want, you need to suck it
up! This is your life and quite frankly you cannot put a price
on your health.

If you cannot honestly say you have improved your nutrition
or exercise habits over the past year or decade; then you can
make the next weeks, months, even decade ahead be different
that the last 10 by making a decision and a commitment to
change no matter what price.

Find out more about New Year’s resolutions and how you can
keep yours by clicking on this link:

http://bestbodymakeover.com/newyear/

You will discover everything you need to succeed: nutrition,
cardio training, strength training, and your motivation to do it
all. You will stay focused on the resolutions you make.

I will be customizing this program for you with personal
one-on-one attention. Nobody else gives you this kind of
support.

There is one catch… because it is important that I give you top
quality attention, it is very time intensive for me, I have to limit
this to 12 people.

As an added incentive to make 2010 a significant year of change
for you, grab this offer before January 6th, and save big time
for a limited time.

http://bestbodymakeover.com/newyear/

All the best in 2010!
Lauren

How to Create a New Habit

Do you have a health habit that you would like to create but for some reason you are having trouble creating it?

For example, you set the alarm early so you have time to exercise. However when the alarm goes off, you are overcome with sleep, and the comfort and warmth of staying in bed overrides the need to get up and exercise.

Worse, you feel defeated and guilty for not getting up, but you hit the snooze button to go back to sleep anyway, and you don’t create the new habit.

I’m sure everyone has experienced not being able to get out of bed early to exercise, yet some people are able to maintain the habit of getting up early to exercise consistently… and have been doing it for years.

Let’s suppose all the excuses, the holidays, no time, no gym membership, no training partner, too old, bad knee, etc., are not really what’s stopping you… and by the way these really are just excuses.

In order to change a behavior, you need to replace the belief or feeling about the current behavior with one that is stronger and more desirable.

What drives you to change? Your brain works in a way that it will choose the feeling or behavior that drives you the most.

Let’s take the same example of wanting get up early to exercise. If you really believed your life would be better if you changed this behavior, and you believed that the consequences of not changing would produce undesirable consequences, you would be driven to change. Changing would not only feel good, it would feel better.

So how could you replace the habit to stay in bed under the warm covers?

Maybe the new habit would feel better because of the results that getting up and exercising elicits… having more energy throughout the day, less body fat, looking and fitting into clothes better, and you would no longer feel guilty and defeated from sleeping in and not taking responsibility to get in shape.

Any time you want to change a behavior, the intervention is to replace or move towards a new behavior by associating the new behavior with good feelings…feelings that will override the feelings you had for the behavior you need or want to replace.

How can you create a new habit that would feel good and benefit your health?

Happy Thanksgiving

For many of you this week is the start of holiday festivities and fun. In the US we will be celebrating Thanksgiving on Thursday which is always challenging for anyone struggling with their weight, or simply short on time for exercise routines.

This need not be a situation of all or nothing, meaning either you stuff yourself silly or deprive yourself of pumpkin pie, stuffing or even the smallest spoonful of gravy. It is one day, you do not have to over-indulge all week long or straight through until New Year.

If you start today, by staying compliant with your healthy meal plan, you can indulge a little on Thanksgiving! Focus this week on maintaining the weight you are right now and eat your Thanksgiving meal responsibly. You can have everything! What you don’t need to do is have everything for 3 people!

Tomorrow, you can get right back on track. Remember, it is a time to enjoy your family and friends and be grateful for all you have. With that in mind, here are a few tips:

1) Focus on how many times and how long you will be able to exercise this week, then schedule it. What gets scheduled, gets done.
2) Eat small amounts of food every 2-3 hours throughout the day to give you better control of your appetite so you do not arrive at the Thanksgiving table starving. Not eating or eating very little that day will make you more inclined to over-indulge.
3) To the best that you can, start your day with exercise and focus on the intensity and duration both. Obviously creating a calorie deficit will help the equation of calories in calories out… which also supports #1.
4) Avoid drinking your calories, they add up quickly and stimulate your appetite. Water is always the best choice. Save the calories in your calorie bank account for the delicious food.
5) Make smart choices with what is available. Go ahead and try it all if you can’t resist… just watch your portion size.
6) Eat slow, and relax. Enjoy your company. Stop frequently and take a deep breath. Give your brain time to get the signal that your stomach is full… it takes a while.
7) Get up and move from the table or help clear as soon as it is appropriate.

I would like to take a minute to tell you how thankful I am to all of you who have participated in my programs, to all of you who have taken the time to leave comments on my blog, and to all of you who subscribe to my newsletters. To all of you celebrating Thanksgiving, I wish you all a very happy holiday.

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