Check in #7

Once again it is check in day, and today I weighed in at 183lbs!! I know I should be feeling really great about my self, but I just feel okay. No heart flutters or mental fireworks at my achievement, just an Okay feeling. I don't thinks it's a bad thing, I think it just means I have become complacent. This week I really want to push myself! Today I ran 3 miles on the Eliptical Machine in 28 minutes, which means I burned some 250 calories. By Friday, I hope to increase the distance to 3.5miles. In addition to my Eliptical workout I also have been doing my ab routine immeaditely thereafter.

I have developed a sort of pyramid crunch work out using my Stability ball. I have one of those big red medicine balls, with that I do the following: I sit up right on the ball and begin to move each hip up and down (kinda like a wiggle) for about 15 seconds, then I rotate my hips in on direction for about ten seconds, then I change directions for another ten seconds, then I roll down on the ball very quickly so that the ball is at the small of my back and I begin to do crunches (always keeping my abs tight.) I do about 30 crunches then stop and repeat the wiggle/rotate process, then I do 25 crunches, and so on and so forth until I get down to a 5 crunch set. In the end you will have completed 105 crunches!!!!Its pretty fun, and it works! You can definitely feel it. The key thing to remember though is to keep your abs tight. Do your best not to let you ab muscles push out when completeing a crunch but rather try and make sure they press down towards your belly button. I do this routine on my cardio only days. On the other days I do half of what I usually run, and then I circuit train in the weight machine room at the gym. I pick a different set of muscle groups each time I circuit train. Usualy I'll do all the ab machines and all the leg machines, and then the next time I do circuits I'll work my back, shoulders, and arms.

I have to admit after my work outs in the gym I just feel so great about myself! It's like I'm high on life! But I will also admit, it still takes a lot of mental cajoling to get me in there. However, I found that last week when I actually had no choice but to skip the gym, I felt positively terrible! It's what promted me to go further than the 2 miles I had been running in the past, and go for 3. I felt I had to make up for lost time. I discovered that I did have in me to go that extra mile! It was an awesome revelation! Hence whay I've decided to kick it up a notch in the gym.