Lisa's Sublime 09 Kickstart Plan

Happy New Year everybody! hope you all had a great break and ready to tackle the challenges of 2009 whatever they maybe.

Now the party's over! But who's still got remnance of all that lingering christmas spirit? No, I don't mean all the warm fuzzies of being with family and sharing the joys of being together over the festive period. I mean the 'jingling', not of the christmas bells, but of the extra padding you've gained on your hips from the excess food and drink that you've indulged in over the past month!

Hands up all those who've got the jingles. Yes even you who don't dare to step on the scales in case you can't handle the frightening number that might stare back at you. You probably don't even have to step on the scales to know a couple of kgs have crept on. You can tell by the way your clothes are feeling tighter and you've had to loosen your belt. But don't worry, I sympathise with you as I'm also in that situation. The ghost of christmas past (or should that be carbs) has caught up with me...yikes.

So I'll put my hand up and join the jigglers too! Since finishing my comp 2 months ago, I've really been pushing the limits of what and how much I can eat so that I have plenty of calories to put on muscle. I have been training pretty hard and heavy so I didn't just eat with no training - now that would be sinful!

I've deliberately been a little 'bad'. Not bad like eating fat laden foods, eating for the sake of eating kind of bad. But just eating more carbs at each meal, eating extra fruit - even some at night....oooh naughty naughty, more meat and fattier parts of chicken like chicken drumsticks and thighs..oohh another naughty naughty. During the christmas week I also had more chocolates and ice cream than I should.

left: Santa gave me 3kg for christmas! how much did he give you?

No wonder I'm now 58kg! from 52kg on 14 Nov 08. But there is some good news from my weight gain as it wasn't all fat. I have put some size on my upper body and increase my overall mass. Ideally I'd like my normal weight to be 55kg which will be manageable and at least at that weight I'll be able to see some definition. But at the moment there's a nice coating of carbs, salt, water and ofcourse fat putting a layer over my newly grown millimetres of muscle right now.

Bodybuilding is all about phases. You have mass building, conditioning and pre contest - within all those phases there are many variables you can change to keep your body adapting.

In mass building you have to accept that there will be some weight gain as you endeavour to put on muscle mass. Some people try to be in pre contest mode all the time but this doesn't do your body any good as you can't make changes to your body with adequate rest and calories. So you end up looking the same show after show, and perhaps year after year.

There is a fine line between eating for muscle size and eating for the hell of eating though! Sure you need to eat enough to get the calories but it doesn't always mean its going into muscle building. Too many calories, whether from good food or bad, it will just go to enlarge your fat cells.

A regular bodyfat test is a better indication of how you're doing rather than stepping on the scales and get frightened by your weight increase. It could be muscle and not fat gain.

Eventhough now I'm 58kg, gulp, I have put on 700g muscle since my last bodyfat measure 2 months ago. My bodyfat is at 16% so would like to get that down while increasing muscle mass.

So its time to nip this thing in the bud (or should that be butt!) before the jinggling gets too big. My initial goal is just to lose 3kg so that I can get to a more aesthetic 55kg. I figured, if it took me 2 months to put on the extra 3kg, its going to take 2 months to get it off. But hopefully I can get it off faster than that. I'm going to Australia for holiday in Feb so that'll be a good goal for me to trim down for.

I'm not going to go hard out into pre contest mode but I'll be seriously cleaning up my diet. Not that I'm an unhealthy eater, but just to get rid of things that have crept into my diet. And ofcourse to increase my cardio.

These are some simple steps I'm going to use to kickstart my Sublime 09 plan, why don't you incorporate them into your fitness regime and start to feel better too.
	* Know your numbers. Firstly you have to know what you're dealing with. Sure you know you've put on weight but how much? Having an initial weigh in and bodyfat test will give you a starting point and mentally knowing just how much you weigh will frighten you to get into shape! * Cut down the carbs! looking back in the past 2 months I've been eating more carbs than my body can handle. Darn I wish I had one of those metabolisms that would just be able to eat anything and weight wouldn't go on. But alas, I have my own unique metabolism and learned that I can't be too flippant with my carb eating. I had been having carbs at night, not a huge lot, just 1/2 cup rice so will be dropping that. I had also been having a couple pieces chocolate a couple times a week at night which is forming a habit so that will go too. I have been enjoying fruit, I'll still have it after training, but this will be the only time I have it... boo hoo.
* Out with the alcohol and sugar. I don't really have a soft spot for alcohol but if you do, its best to go sober and now! Alcohol contains heaps of sugar and interferes with your fat metabolism so if you're serious about fat burning then don't drink. The other biggie is sugar, this can come in many forms and you probably have plenty in your cupboard. Start throwing out your biscuits, chocolate, ice cream, protein bars. * Eat leaner cuts of meat. I had been off the rails a little bit going for the tastier chicken thighs and drumsticks but its back to eating more white fish and chicken breast for a while. * Drink water! I noticed I haven't been drinking as much water as I should. So that'll be another resolution I'll add to the list. I'll be lucky to have 2 litres a day at the moment so will try to bump that up to at least 2.5L each day. * Limit eating out. Over the past couple of weeks I've eaten out alot. My mum was up before christmas and I think we ate out at least every other day. We didn't eat unhealthily but still, you can't control how food is cooked and you end up eating more calories than you should. When eating out I usually go for Thai, Japanese or chinese. As these meals usually come with rice, I'm just tempted to have too much! In the next month, I'll still probably have a treat meal once a week as I don't want to totally feel I'm being restricted. A gal needs some pleasures in life eh?!

Cardio!
Throughout the holidays I've kept up my cardio doing at least 45min a day. So to enhance my shaping up routine, I'll do 30min in the morning before breakfast which I haven't been doing. So on your plan, you should incorporate at least 30min cardio at a time other than your weight training to enhance your fat loss.

And the most important component of the Kickstart regime? Motivation and mental attitude ofcourse! now that I know my numbers, that's a big motivating factor to get my butt into gear.

As you can see starting a new training plan doesn't have to be complicated. If you try to do too much ie too much cardio and diet too hard, you're less likely to follow a new plan through. Do the achieveable and you'll likely stick with it and see the results.

Hopefully I can show you my results in a few weeks. If you need to get some direction and a plan to get you on the right track, email me This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it and we can look Sublime together!

Lisa, 5 Jan 09
Go Figure

Lisa's Sublime 09 Kickstart Plan

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