Congratulations Hillary!

One of my clients, Hillary Skahan, completed her first Figure competition this past weekend and took home 2nd place! She was so great to work with, worked hard and it all paid off. She looked amazing on stage! Congratulations! I think she is hooked so we'll probably be seeing more of her on the Figure stage soon. Congratulations Hillary!

Getting my "Figure" back...

So, after I went to the Triathlon World Championships and represented Team USA in Vancouver, Canada I knew when I got back I wanted to get back to lifting weights. My body had started to look more and more like an endurance athlete. I had no definition, had lost my abs and no matter how clean I ate my body looked soft.

















I first noticed this when I did my Ironman. The first clue was when I was absolutley not going to wear a sports bra top at my Ironman because I did not like the way my midsection was looking. Here I was in what you would think would be the best shape of my life, ready to become an Ironman yet I wanted my abs covered up. After my Ironman and looking at the pics of me in the race



I knew my body needed a break from all of this endurance and I missed my abs and my defined arms but when I qualified for the World Championships I decided I needed to stick with the endurance a little longer to have the experience of going to the World Championships so I kept running, biking and swimming and looking more and more like an endurance athlete.

Now that World Championships are over and I had an amazing experience I am ready to get my "figure" back. When I say "figure" what I mean is looking like a figure competitor. I don't necessarily want to compete but I do want to look like I could compete.

So, since the World Championships(5 weeks ago)I have done ZERO cardio, aerobics, or anything endurance related. I have instead been doing 5 days a week of strength training and interval style cardio using burpees, jumping jacks, etc. My body quickly dropped a couple pounds and above all looks more defined and I am getting my "figure" back!

I love manipulating my training to make my body look different. It is so amazing!

Anyway, today I decided I wanted to go out for a run. It has been 5 weeks. I would do the short 2.5 mile loop that I was doing leading up to the World Championships. I was doing it once a week and timing myself and each week getting faster until I had a personal best the week before I left for Vancouver. I headed out today and felt pretty good. Amazingly after not running for 5 weeks I was able to match the time I did the loop in 2 weeks before Worlds. So, I didn't set a personal best but I haven't lost too much over the 5 weeks.

And I am getting my abs back! Go "figure"!

Goal setting is for couch potatoes

Just finished a CD by Dr. John Eliot called The Maverick Mindset. Interesting stuff.

His big idea is that goal setting is for couch potatoes but once you are off the couch and accomplishing something you need to think about more getting into the mindset of working on the process and not what the actual goal is. Decide who you want to be, what you want to become and then get into the mindset every single day to become that person. But don't focus on a specific date when you will accomplish a specific goal. You might limit yourself.

In other words, goal setting is great for getting you focused on something like losing 10 pounds or saving $25,000 in the bank. These are very specific goals that you can focus on but once you have got that down and you are doing the things that successful people do should you continue to try to set goals or should you work everyday to be the best you can be at what you do and who you are? And not limit yourself to a specific goal on a specific day? What can you contribute today?

It was a great CD and made sense to me. I think it goes along with my whole "What's next?" blog post that right now I am just continuing the process at becoming the best I can be without a specific goal to focus on. It is a different feeling for me being so goal oriented and always looking for What's next....Instead I am focusing on what do I have to do today to be better tomorrow in every aspect of my life and who knows where it will take me...