Tag Archives: resistance bands

Working the Band (4/27-5/3)

May 3, 2014 Kim 36 Comments

This week’s 44s were all about using this little band –

Since I was in Texas for the first part of the week, this was a perfect tool to use! And, all of my pictures were taken either Thursday or Friday morning after I was home – I did the moves on the actual day though!!!

Sunday 4/27 –44 bicep curl with a lunge (hold the other end of the band up over shoulder for extra resistance.

And, of course, I had to do a 2nd set of 44 with my left side.

I also did Turbo Fire Tone 30 which is 30 minutes of full body toning using bands.

Monday 4/28 – 44 tricep kickbacks in plank.

These were challenging – to try and keep my body straight, hold plank with one arm and do 44 kickbacks with resistance!!! And, I had to do a 2nd set!!!

I did TaeBo Fat Blasting Cardio (another portable workout!!) and a nice easy 30 minute run (probably only 3 miles).

Tuesday 4/29 – 44 lateral raise with opposite side leg lift.

ready to raise right arm & lift the left leg

I love moves that work on balance!!! And, I try to stay balanced so I had another set of 44.

The rest of my workout was TaeBo Insane Abs (50 minutes of nonstop core work!) and a super easy 50 minute run (about 5 miles).

Wednesday 4/30 – 44 abdominal presses with the band.

This move will definitely get your core burning!!!

I just did a 75 minute easy run (7.5-8 miles).

Thursday 5/1 – 44 squat with bicep curl (band crossed for extra resistance).

Can you tell that I was all about multi-functional exercises for the week?

Since I was back home on my treadmill I decided to do a harder run – 10 miles in 79:54 + 1.5 miles easy.

Friday 5/2 – 44 overhead press with opposite leg stepping back to a lunge.

Another move that required a 2nd set!!!

This move was hard – gotta keep working my shoulders!!!

It was also a run day – 6 miles in 47:52 + 2.5 easy miles.

Saturday 5/3 – 44 sumo squat with a chest fly (standing).

ready - choke up on the band — ready – choke up on the band

Right arm done – time for the left!

Today was a fun running day – Hunter’s long run! He had 95 minutes on the schedule. We kept our 5 minute run/1 minute walk and ended up with 10 miles in 93:40!!! Even with the walking he is still averaging 9:22 a mile (the same pace he had last week when we did 9 miles!!). He is doing such a great job with his training for the half marathon!

Total Running – 41.5 + 4.5 easy for a total of 46. Not sure that is great since one week from today I plan to run further at one time than I went all week – I think I’m ready though!

Happy Saturday!!

Kim

Core, Fitness, Resistance Bands, Shoulders

Sunday Morning Cartoons

January 19, 2014 Kim 41 Comments

Today’s 44 started off nice and easy but the last 10 or so were rough!!! I used a resistance band –

Double the band under and sit on it in V-sit –

I stayed in this position and did a shoulder press –

Like I said, this started off fine but from about 30 on I struggled!!!

This week has been a bit intense so I thought some of the old-time Sunday cartoons would be a nice change of pace!

Hmmm.....too much computer time?! — Hmmm…..too much computer time?!

HaHa - pretty much true! — HaHa – pretty much true!

Lucy - so helpful!!! — Lucy – so helpful!!!

Cathy - one of my all time favorites!! — Cathy – one of my all time favorites!!

OK – maybe they weren’t that funny but we can all do with a good laugh!!!

Happy Sunday!!!

Kim

Fitness, Triceps

Great Weekend Reads

January 13, 2014 Kim 68 Comments

Today’s 44 required a resistance band. I decided that since I worked my biceps yesterday with the 44 today I would work my triceps. I did tricep pulses with the band.

This was actually really tough – the resistance of the band made the last 15 or so brutal!!!

I did a new workout today – The Biggest Loser Power X-Train. Besides a warm-up and cool down, there are 3 15 minute segments: metabolic circuit, power training and all about reps. The metabolic circuit was 14 moves, 1 minute each and alternated between a power move and a cardio move. Power training was more about whole body training with strength, core and plyo. All about the reps was my favorite section – 4 moves done for 1 minute each 3x. The goal was to increase the number of reps each time through!!

I’ve noticed over the past year that blogging tends to be way down during the weekend. I actually have more time to read on Saturday and Sunday so I thought I would share a few of the great things I read.

1. Bryony @ A Series of Beginnings welcomed her 2nd sweet little boy into her family this past week – she has a super cute picture of him for everyone to enjoy!

2. Julie @ Happiness is a Dish Best Savoured Hot wrote a great post with 4 things that would help make the world a better place. One of the things that she said the world needs more of is compassion – completely agree with her!!!

3. Chris @ The Mom Cafe has a devotional series and invites guest bloggers to share their stories. This week Dana from Kiss My List wrote a great piece about Judaism!

4. Taylor @ Lifting Revolution shared about her attempts to master a hand stand in her yoga class recently. The real point of her post was that sometimes you are going to fall no matter what you are trying to do – what do you do after falling?

5. Carla @ Real Into had an incredible post about just being you. She said that you don’t have to do something new to be unique!!! I’m so excited because she said that she is going to be sharing more of her unique self in the future and I can’t wait!!!

6. Coco @ Running with Perseverance wrote a post that spoke volumes to me. She said that we should say yes and not be afraid to fail!!! I feel like that is exactly what I’m doing by attempting another 50 mile race!

7. Biz @ My Bizzy Kitchen is so amazing!! She just spent the last week working her full time job plus a new part time job, dealing with horrid weather (scraping snow off of part of her heating unit most mornings), plus trying to spend plenty of time with her husband who spent the first week of 2014 in the hospital (and while he was there she organized a DVD drive for the kids wing of that hospital!). After a particularly rough day she wrote a post listing all of the ways that she is blessed!!! What a great reminder that life really is good. (Plus, Biz shares some really tasty recipes almost every day!!)

I don’t think a day goes by that I don’t Pin at least 5 recipes from some of the amazing bloggers I love!!! This weekend was no exception!

8. Lori @ Finding Radiance shared a recipe for creamed chicken and corn soup in the crock pot!! I love things that can be done in the crock pot!! And, as a bonus, she included a recipe for making your own cream of ____ soup – so awesome!!!

9. Davida @ The Healthy Maven always has some of the most amazing recipes. Most of them are way above my ability level (lots are for tasty baked things!!) but I’m pretty sure I can handle this one: White bean kale & artichoke dip with quinoa flatbread (remember I’m going to try quinoa this year!!) I can’t wait to try this!!!

10. Jill @ Fitness, Health & Happiness is so consistent with weekly meal planning and sharing new recipes. This breakfast salad (or lunch, dinner or even snack) looks super tasty and full of good things. There is an omelet and a sunny side up egg in this salad!!! And feta – one of my favorites!!!

I don’t know yet if I will make this a standard Monday feature (I haven’t ever done a set daily thing) but I love to share – there are so many great posts out there!!!

Do you read blogs on the weekend?

Happy Monday!!!

Kim

Butt, Fitness, Thighs

An End and a Beginning

December 31, 2013 Kim 58 Comments

Today’s 44 was another fun one with my resistance band. I stood on the band and crossed the handles to make the resistance greater. Then I stepped out with my right foot, out with my left and back in with each.

In the video you can see that I switched lead legs while doing this move – I’m not sure my hips could handle 44 each side. (now I sort-of feel like I should go do another set!!)

I pulled out one of my favorite workouts today – Les Mills Combat – Ultimate Cardio Fighter. 60 minutes of sweating while kicking, punching and jumping = awesome!!!

Looking Back at 2013:

I have seen similar posts to this and decided that it would be a fun to end 2013 with a recap of the year.

January:

I finished up a long-term sub job at an elementary school library – super fun!
Packing away Christmas was a bit of a disaster –

Another shopping trip and a little assembly later, the problem was all solved!!!

February:

I decided to do a little personal challenge during the month of February. In addition to my daily 43 and my regular workouts, I did 1 minute wall-sits to correspond to the day of the month – so by the 28th, I did 28, 1-minute wall-sits!

March:

We had a special Hobbit themed meal to go along with the DVD viewing of the movie. This was mostly Jordan’s thing but I enjoyed planning the meal with his help and then fixing the meal with the help of both boys!

April:

The biggie from this month was more of a huge mistake and learning experience on my part. I had vein surgery on April 24th and feel like I’m still paying the price for that decision!!

May:

Chris and I celebrated our 17th anniversary!

June:

The boys and I went to Texas and enjoyed what would end up being our last summer visit with my Poppa!

July:

We took a great family trip to Florida!!! The driving (22 hours each way) wasn’t really my favorite part but lots of great memories were made!!

August:

The boys started another school year – Jordan went to high school and Hunter to middle school.

Jordan kept busy with marching band!

I made a quick trip to TX to pay tribute to my wonderful Poppa.

And, our lives completely changed when we became business owners!!!

September:

More high school football games and plenty of middle school cross country meets.

Hunter walking through the end of the chute

I celebrated another birthday with another birthday run – and started doing daily 44s.

October:

HaHa – I couldn’t think of anything from October and then I remembered – the epic fail!!! I attempted my first ultra – not pretty!

November:

Hunter started his wrestling career.

Sam, Stacy, Isabel and Hays came up from Texas to spend Thanksgiving with us!!December:

We hosted our first (probably annual) Christmas Day open house at the Governor’s Row House.

We have enjoyed a much needed family reset time while we celebrated Christmas and prepare to start a new year!

Tonight we will have our yearly New Year’s Eve party (we started doing this after Jordan was born so that we could have a family oriented way to celebrate the start of the new year) and tomorrow we will wake up ready for a great new year!!!

Do you have big plans to celebrate the start of 2014?

Happy Tuesday – the final day of 2013!!

Kim

Cardio, Core, Fitness, Shoulders

Resistance Bands or Weights?

November 18, 2013 Kim 87 Comments

Today for my 44 I did a slight variation on the standard burpee – sumo burpees. The main difference is your feet are in sumo position (out wide) at the beginning of the move and when you jump back up.

I was sucking air big-time at the end of this 44!!!

I pulled out an oldie today – TaeBo – Total Body Fat Blaster. This workout uses the TaeBo bands – It is about an hour of very fast-paced moving – lots of cardio plus some serious resistance training with the bands. My shoulders were screaming about half-way through this workout!!!

While I was struggling with some of the moves this morning I started thinking about the differences between working out with bands and weights.

Bands: lightweight, portable, great for travel, constant tension

Weights: heavy, not portable, gravity will take over if you aren’t careful

Don’t get me wrong – I love lifting weights!!! But in workouts like the TaeBo one that I did today where it is non-stop and fast paced, the bands are a great way to really push your muscles to the point of fatigue (especially your shoulders!!!).

I have no plans to get rid of any of our weights but if you are just starting to build a home-gym and want a way to do some resistance training bands are a great investment. Plus, they don’t take up any space!!!

So – what are your thoughts – bands or weights? Both? Neither?

Happy Monday!!

Kim

Day With KT