Challenge Workouts

Take off your clothes.

Stand in front of a full-length mirror and look at your body – your chest and arms, midsection, thighs, and lower back where the love handles and muffin top start building up…
Are satisfied with the results that you’ve gotten so far with your current fitness routine?

Wouldn’t you like a leaner, more muscular and have an athletic body?

Let me tell you why you may have failed with your fat loss efforts in the past, and why it’s NOT your fault. There’s a boatload of MISINFORMATION floating around regarding the BEST method of fat loss and most of the information out there is pure garbage.

It’s Time To Break The Myths…

Fat Loss Myth #1: You gotta train in the ‘fat burning’ zone. Truth is, there isn’t one. Like we talked about a moment ago cardio on a treadmill, bike, or elliptical machine is a total waste of time. Study after study has proven that steady state cardio at your “target heart rate zone” is a total waste of time.

Fat Loss Myth #2: Training LONGER means MORE calories are burned. Studies once tried to ‘prove’ that you use more energy from fat when in the ‘fat burning’ zone. Theoretically, it takes up to 15 minutes of steady state cardio to get into the ‘zone’. In this first 15 minutes you burn mostly carbohydrates for energy.

Then you need to stay in the ‘fat burning’ zone doing mind numbingly boring steady state cardio for an additional 25-30 minutes to begin to burn fat as an energy source and get maximum benefit.

Do you really have that kind of time spare?

Fat Loss Myth #3: You can burn calories strictly from fat stores. More recent studies have shown that although you burn LESS calories DIRECTLY from fat when you train at an increased intensity, you BURN MORE CALORIES OVERALL in a SHORTER amount of time. So, you’ll use a COMBINATION of carbohydrate and fat as energy sources, but your overall caloric out put will be greater when you do HIIT, or high intensity intervals.

Fat Loss Myth #4: You MUST ‘do cardio’ after your strength training. By now you know that’s the biggest myth of all. Sure traditional steady state ‘cardio’ burns calories, but it’s the most inefficient way to burn calories; once you stop your cardio session, the calorie burning stops too. The best and most lasting way to get lean is to build muscle tone – metabolically active tissue that burns calories around the clock and to blast your body into Afterburn, which will boost your metabolism and turn up your fat burning furnace for up to 36 hours.

Fat Loss Myth #5: Aerobic training is the ONLY way to get lean. In fact, some studies show that aerobic training has been shown to be counter-productive to your ability to get lean. Appetite is increased with aerobic training, but you won’t get the benefit of ‘Afterburn’ if you’re in the so-called ‘fat burning zone’. Often you’ll eat more, but not burn more calories, there by negating the benefit of your aerobic workout.

Fat Loss Myth #6: The Treadmill and other ‘cardio’ machines are the best for fat loss. Wrong. Even if you’re doing intervals on these cardio machines, they’re boring and it’s difficult to maintain any intensity or enthusiasm on them for any length of time. Usually you’ll drop down into steady state cardio on cardio machines. In addition, you’ll open yourself up to overuse.

Fat Loss Myth #7: Anaerobic training can’t be used for fat loss. The latest research is showing that fat loss is related to hormones. As we age we produce less growth hormone in our bodies. One of the best ways to fight aging and reduce belly fat is to increase GH (growth hormone).

How do we get more of this naturally occurring growth hormone? We can increase GH through anaerobic training.

You know that burning feeling you get in your muscles when you train with intensity? That’s your body switching into the anaerobic energy system and creating a by-product called ‘lactic acid’. What’s great about lactate, or lactic acid is that it’s a precursor to GH.

Believe it or not, this can be done in as little as 5 minutes. In other words, anaerobic training is by far the most time efficient method of training for fat loss in comparison to long slow steady state cardio.

Now, how does this relate to you?

Think back to your last workout. It was good, right?

Weight training, some cardio, or maybe even some interval training… fast pace, lots of sweat, you felt good. But was it your best workout?

My biggest fear….not spiders, not heights, not even death…

It’s this ====================>

Yes, the pancake butt is a frightening thing – and totally avoidable if you get off yours 🙂

My dear mother, God rest her, had the flattest bum around. She was too busy raising us on her own to be concerned with this first world problem that I fear. Clearly I probably have too much time on my hands to seriously have a flat bum phobia.

Butt (pun intended), since training is a big part of my life, I may as well do what I can to avoid my genetic predisposition.

I want to share some of my favorite butt enhancing moves.

Obviously, the best bum is built under a squat bar.

Squats need to be heavy and deep. I know there’s the age old philosophical debate as to the proper depth of squats. My theory, that’s helped me keep my butt from sliding down my legs is ‘ass to grass’ depth. Of course, impeccable form is imperative. The load must be congruent with form, as soon as form falls apart (even in the slightest way) the load must be lessened.

The beauty of the squat is that there’s so much variety, take a look at a few (oh, the ‘diddly squat’ doesn’t count 😉 ):

• plain old bodyweight squats (don’t discount the value of bodyweight moves!)
• squat jumps
• back squat
• front squat
• overhead squat
• goblet squat

Then there’s the lunge. My preference is a reverse lunge hold. This can be done with bodyweight, a barbell or dumbell. I prefer to do one leg at a time and hold my balance at the top of the move for a few seconds. Of course, you can hold at the bottom and adjust rep speed in a number of ways to hit your hinny. In addition to the reverse lunge, here are a few more varieties:

• forward lunges
• walking lunges
• Bulgarian split squats from the floor/with the foot elevated
• swing lunges
• jumping lunges
• lateral lunges
• goblet lunges
• single RDL to single reverse lunge
• weighted donkey kick back (check out the video for this – make sure NOT to weight your arms and your bum with thank you)

Man, I could go on, but I’ll stop there and tell you about my new favorite: the weighted glute bridge. This one is a bit awkward and it’s best if you have a pad of sorts to put on your hips. I’ve been moving a significant amount of weight with this move. Another thing I love about it is that when my knee is acting up, this is a brilliant move for targeting the glutes and hamstrings without aggravating my knees.

Speaking of a hip hinge move – the KB swing is another favorite. Many newbies are surprised that the KB swing targets the hips and not the upper body. In fact, if you feel your arms or shoulders when doing this move, you know you’re doing it incorrectly. Another tip is to ensure your abs are engaged as the KB rises (as if someone were going to punch you in the belly). This will prevent over extension at the hip and will protect the back. This is another fantastic move to hit your bum if your knees are sore.

Now I must not discount the benefits of deadlifts for the posterior. Regular, stiff legged, barbell, dumb bell – all good moves for your rear.

Get out your leg warmers Jane Fonda, the fire hydrant is an awesome move for working the glute med. I’ve noticed that some of my knee pain has been lessened significantly by strengthening my glute med’s. The key with this move is to ensure that there’s no weight transfer to the opposite arm. It will help engage your obliques and really target the glute med if you raise the opposite arm off the floor – so if you’re balancing on the right leg, elevate the left hand so that you can’t put any weight on it.

Bands are brilliant for engaging the glute med too. One move that I’ll throw in is a skater with a band around the knees. Often my fitness boot camp clients will grab a heavy band and allow their knees to roll inward as they step to the side – this is no buenos! Make sure to keep the knees over the toes; the hip action is outward rotation so don’t let the knees cave inward.

I love to train legs and I often get women in particular asking what they can do to keep their legs and butt’s perky. These are the moves that do the trick. Here’s a video summary with demonstrations of some of the moves:

Here’s a fun leg/bum workout for you that incorporates a few of these moves:

• 30 second KB swing
• 10 reps KB goblet squat
• reverse lunge 10 steps each leg (optional load)
• 10 reps BB glute bridge

Do 5 rounds. Rest as little as possible or as needed.

Finish with:

Tabata 20/10 x 4 sets:

• Squat jump/static hold or pulse (no rest) for as many sets as possible

No rest and finish with 20/10 4 sets:

• Skaters (band optional)

Workout variety is the KEY to success and continuous improvement. The BEST Challenge Workouts program for including variety is the 21 Day Challenge Fit Club. You’ll be emailed a different module every 21 days for 7 rounds. Modules include:

1-Bodyweight
2-Jump Rope
3-MRT – Metabolic Resistance Training
4-Sprints
5-Trouble Spot Training
6- Suspension Training
7- KB Training

Modules include all follow along videos so you can check your form and stay on track.

Get off your bum and avoid the dreaded pancake butt look. Pancakes are okay to eat on occasion, they are NOT okay as an appendage 🙂

The 21 Day Challenge Fit Club will get your butt in gear.

We called it the  ‘Canuck Vs Oz Throwdown’ when my biz partner from Australian visited Canada.

It sounds adversarial, but really, the weather seemed to be the worst enemy for my publishing partner and good friend, Lisa Bullock.

It was a long time coming, but Lisa finally made her way to Canada from Australia and Calgary’s weather did it’s best to chew her up and spit her out. It was absolutely horrible.

She combated it with a smile and was actually thrilled to see snow. She questioned the beautiful ‘blossoms’ on the trees, but I had to burst her bubble telling her that the blossoms were actually icicles 😉

Here was our finisher for a fantastic back workout:

• 10 pull ups (assisted or inverted rows)
• 10 push ups

• 9 pull ups (assisted or inverted rows)
• 9 push ups

This was a ‘ripper’ as Lisa would say.

Need to work on your pull ups? I sometimes forget to tell you about one of my first Challenge Workout programs called Pull Up Challenge where you can discover how to do your first pull up or add ten more to your personal best.

Here are a few tips to help you maximize your pull up if you’re a TOTAL beginner:

Tip #1 – To lead up to an assisted pull up, just grab a bar and hang. You’ll be surprised at the stretch that you’ll get through the back and even the abdominals. Ensure that you can easily touch the ground without too much effort. Do this hang for up to 30 seconds and it will stretch and lengthen those muscles of the back, and it will also improve your grip strength.

Tip#2 – As you hang, think about inwardly rotating your scapula, or squeezing your shoulder blades together. You should start to feel a slight elevation of your body, even if you can’t move your entire body up to the bar.

This is called scapular retraction. Follow this with arching the back, looking upwards and slightly bending the arms, see if you can lift the body slightly. Your body cannot be too vertical. Imagine bringing your breast bone up to the bar. This isn’t possible if you’re hanging completely perpendicular.

Tip #3 – The most effective way to improve the pull up is to perform ‘negative’ reps. This means that you can assist yourself on the concentric portion of the movement, or the ‘pull up’ part, but then during the eccentric or lowering portion of the movement, you will take your full body weight and lower to a count of four seconds. If you can’t lift ANY of your own body weight, make this a FULLY assisted pull up by stepping up to the bar from a chair and then take your full body weight on the descent.

Just for fun, here are a few of my favorite pull up workouts:

Workout #1

Warm up – Full body warm up including jump rope, modified push ups, wall stick ups, scapular retractions from the bar (about 3-5 min)

Do 5 total rounds:

• 1 minute of jump rope
• 8-10 pull ups (assisted if necessary)
• 8-10 heavy DB, BB or cable rows (last rep should be hard!)
• 10 cable or DB pull overs
• plank recovery (30 seconds)
• Rest as needed

Workout #2 – This one uses traditional gym equipment.

Warm up – Full body warm up including jump rope, modified push ups, wall stick ups, scapular retractions from the bar (about 3-5 min)

• 1a – 8 Pull up negatives (6 second decent, feel free to use an assist on the way up to the bar)
• 1b – 10 Lat pull downs

Repeat for 3 total sets

• 2a – 8-10 cable rows
• 2b – 10 burpees

Repeat for 3 total sets

• 3a – 10 Single arm DB rows per side
• 3b – 10 hanging leg raise variation

Repeat for 3 total sets

Workout #3 – This one is tough!

Warm up – Full body warm up including jump rope, modified push ups, wall stick ups, scapular retractions from the bar (about 3-5 min)

• 1a – 10 burpee pull ups (do an assisted pull up like a jump pull up, if that’s not possible, so this in a tri-set with the burpees first, assisted pull ups second)
• 1b – 10 per leg spider crawls

Repeat for two total sets

• 2a – 8-10 heavy BB deadlifts
• 2b – 8-10 hanging leg raises

Repeat for three total sets

• 3a – 10 Single arm DB rows per side
• 3b – jump rope 1 min

Repeat for 3 total sets

Get more tips and workouts guaranteed to improve your pull up HERE.