Motivation Monday: Just Keep Swimming!

It’s Monday. Yes, I hear the moans and groans. But it is the start to a new week of goals and achievements! Time to get back on track with our fitness and willpower, more importantly. There are often times where the couch beckons you much louder than the squat rack or the treadmill in the gym. This happens to me as well. Resist the evil couch! Pick yourself up, no matter how unmotivated you are and just go. That’s the theme for this week: just keep going, just keep swimming. Because you will always be happy you went. One never regrets a workout unless there is an injury involved.

If you have a headache or feeling tired, go workout! I find that when these symptoms occur, a bout of exercise is the best thing to cure it! Keep the mantra in your head… just keep swimming. Here are some inspirations that I have been using lately:

The Lions vs Eagles game: it was literally blizzarding and they fought through, played through. They had to wade through half a foot of snow but they kept playing. Their skin was probably burning from the cold and they could barely see, but they went on.

It’s about to get nerdy up in here, but the quest in the Hobbit! Dwarves and Hobbits have damn short legs and they were able to get through all that terrain, climb all those mountains with bands of orcs behind them. Think about going to the gym as a quest. You must make it no matter what stands in your way–laziness or sleepiness! Fight on!!

Lastly, look to those around you for strength and motivation. I have a client who is in her later 20s, has a 6-year-old daughter, is a full-time nurse, going to school for her Master’s, oh and training for a half-marathon. She is in the gym every chance she can get. She gives me inspiration to get my butt up when I’m simply feeling lazy because that girl has her priorities straight and she is damn fit.

Never give up, never surrender! Fight past any laziness, sleepiness, or grumpiness and make your way into your workout, whatever it is. Fight hard and stay hungry and fit!

Nov212013

Total Body Resistance Band Exercises

There are tons of ways to workout your muscles…cable machines, using your own body weight, dumbbells, and so forth. And they’re all great–it’s important to switch it up! However, today I want to approach the technique of resistance bands. I use resistance bands every day with clients. And I use them with all levels, from a near-eighties woman to a tough and strong girl in her 20s. There are so many ways to use resistance bands to your benefit. And they come in different levels! Usually the easiest are yellow, then green, to red, then blue, and finally black. Typically. Some do vary, though. There are so many ways to use them for all muscle groups. I’m gonna show you a few ways you can use that band at home, today! And I obviously couldn’t keep a straight face in the pictures…sigh.

1. Curls. Stand on your band, roughly shoulders-width apart. Grab the two handles, make sure the resistance is enough. Now pull the handles up in a curl movement, just as if you were doing it with dumbbells. This exercise is extraordinarily effective for working the biceps. You will be surprised! It’s important not to spring back to starting position after you finish the concentric (curling upwards) motion of the rep. Have control the whole way through.

Curl up!

2. Side step. This is one to focus on the hips. Step on the band, just like before, but this time start with your feet together. Now step to the side, as big of a step as you can. You will feel it in the outside of your hips. Your leg is going to want to snap back, but don’t let it! Slowly let it come back to the other leg. Now, step the other way, again taking a big step and really challenging your legs.

3. Rotator cuff strengthener. Rotator cuff injuries are one of the most common you will find in all people. It’s so easy to injure because it’s overused, and typically weak. Very easy to tear. SO how do we strengthen it?! It’s easy. Tie one side of your resistance band around a pole, a chair leg, something that will stick. Now grab the other handle and step far enough away to give yourself proper resistance. Now, keep your arm close to your body and turn it like a door hinge towards your chest. Slowly go to and fro, feeling it in your shoulder. Switch sides.

4. Rear delt flyes. Here’s another one for the shoulders, but this time for the rear delts. Grab a band, the actual band, and not the handles. Hold your arms straight out. The farther you put your hands on the band, the easier, and the closer you put your hands together, the harder the resistance becomes. Holding the band, you want to pull it so that your arms end up completely away from the starting point. Then slowly let your hands come back together. You really want to squeeze the shoulder blades together. Repeat.

DON’T SMILE

5. Squat press. Make sure you have a fresh band for this one with no holes. Bad things happen when resistance bands snap (as Chris can attest to), so ensure yours has no tears. Now place your feet on the band, shoulder-width apart. Grab the handles. Perform a squat (properly) and as you are coming up from a squat push your hands upwards for a shoulder press. This is a total body workout. Repeat. This squat can also be combined with the curl as seen above.

and press!

6. Chest press. Loop the band around a pole or some sturdy object. Grab both handles and face away from the pole. You want to really get far enough away so that the resistance is tight. Press forward so that you’re working your chest. Slowly come back. Repeat.

7. Hamstring stretch. Had to throw this one in for last. So many people disregard the importance of stretching and quickly skip it (myself included, sometimes). However, it is vital to keep your body flexible and loose! For this one, you want to lay on your back, hook the band around your foot and use the handles to pull your foot upwards towards the sky and to your body for a deep hamstring stretch. Once that feels stretched, move to the other side.

Now that’s only seven of the many exercises you can do with the wonderful resistance bands. Try these out and get creative–you can make up your own. Use resistance bands to stay hungry and fit!

BONUS KITTY PIC

merp

Aug212013

Never Compare to Others in the Gym

Never ever compare yourself to others in the gym. Heck, don’t compare yourself to others in other parts of life, too! I have always had trouble with this. I’m a competitive person and also a critical person. I’m very tough on myself and expect the best. This can be a deadly combination if you let your focus stray outside yourself. It can initiate a viscous self-hate cycle where you never achieve anything you want to and always harp on yourself for doing something wrong or being weak. Don’t do this.

Creep shot of Chris’ back from last night’s workout…spoiler: he’s not doing a back exercise

I typically workout with men…as in Chris and some of our friends. This makes it doubly important not to compare yourself to who you may be working out with. I’m not saying to not draw inspiration or motivation from others–that is most important! It is great to have a partner who works hard and keeps you working hard as well. However, if it comes to a point where you’re comparing your strength, body composition, or speed to that person, it can get rather unhealthy. Even past unhealthy–dangerous. If I tried to compete with Chris on any strength exercise, tried to match his squat, I’d be snapped like a twig from the weight.

Triceps shot from a recent workout

It’s important to understand your strengths and limitations before you barge into a workout. Are you ready for that heavy weight? Are you reaching too high? You need to re-evaluate why you’re working out and what you’re working out to. Write down your goals and write a healthy, safe way to get there. Sure, I want to get back into lifting heavy, but I’m not going to jump into huge weight right away. That’s a ticket to injury. I may be comparing myself to other strong-lifters and wanting to go farther faster, but I am me, and this is where I’m at right now. I’ve taken long steps to realizing this and saying this to myself. Understand who and where you are and understand how you can go forward.

Back shots, before and after

If I compared myself to all the expert climbers in Boulder, I’d feel absolutely down in the dumps, angry and disappointed. However, I’ve only been climbing for months compared to them. Why on Earth would I compare myself to them? If you let yourself get caught up in the emotion of envy and self-hate, you aren’t going anywhere with your fitness goals. I remember a time when several workouts have been ruined by my bad attitude of comparing to others and my mood goes to the sharks.

Leg shot from a workout a little bit ago

Learn from this. Don’t compare to others around you. Compare to yourself. What did you do yesterday? What can you do today? Challenge yourself. Work hard. Train with a purpose and never, ever give up. Stay focused on yourself to stay hungry and fit!

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BONUS KITTY PIC

double head kitty pic

Aug112013

Intro to the Barstarzz

You may have seem them walking through the streets or parks using public structures as equipment for training. You might have been walking through the subway and seen one of their videos at that sketchy shop that sells everything from candy to underwear. Or you probably saw their crazy videos on YouTube and told yourself you would never be able to do what they were doing.

The Barstarzz is an international team of individuals that use creative calisthenics in order to stay in shape mastering their own body weight while building a natural looking but ripped aesthetic. I remember watching my first “ghetto workout” years and years ago when YouTube first started. It might have even been before that when I saw Hannibal for King hanging on monkey bars in the New York City playgrounds with his 8-pack and bulging muscles for minutes at a time. But he wasn’t just hanging there… he was doing pull ups, chin ups, muscle ups, dips, push ups, levers and every other body weight exercise under the sun. It was inspiring.

Eventually when I started going to the school in the Bronx, I found myself at the same parks in the bad parts of town, playing basketball, sprinting around the track and hitting up the monkey bars or any other piece of round metal that I could. It was tough being 6′ tall because many of the bars were much shorter in those playgrounds but I had to get creative and learn to contort my body. When I started at about 155-160 pounds it was easy to hold myself up with the strength I developed from sports but at that point I had never lifted weights enough to make an impact.

About three years later of serious training in the pool and the weight room for D1 swimming, I was the same height but packed on 65-70 pounds, topping out at 225 pounds. Even though my body fat percentage never increased (I entered school at about 9% and when I hit 225 I was actually about 6%, but usually in the 8-12% range during the regular season) it became so hard to manipulate and control all that weight on those bars with my long arms. Nevertheless, I always kept body weight exercises in my workouts. (That mostly included a lot of core work, swimming obviously, pull ups, dips, and push ups.) It was hard to focus on a single type of workout as I trained how I wanted but also how I needed to as well.

Now that’s not an issue and I have been watching more videos of the Barstarzz online. The movement has grown to an international level and guys that weren’t known years ago are know representatives of the group. I am subscribed to the group on YouTube and follow some of them on Instagram. As the movement has grown and more people are participating, their workouts and exercises have become more creative and inspiring.

And THAT is the reason why this article is being written! Not because I want to share my background of controlling my own body weight on a small scale, more so because I want to share the Barstarzz and what they do with anyone who is not familiar with them. I want to share it with you all because they are inspiring. They inspire individuals that can’t afford to pay for memberships to gyms and supplements. They inspire people who walk by them on the street. They can inspire everyone. There are Barstarzz followers out there that are sentenced to a life in a wheelchair, but the idea of creative calisthenics allows most of the population the opportunity to exercise, stay in shape, create a great aesthetic, and do all of that in a way that fits their needs and lifestyle. If you check out their YouTube page, you will see some great stories about who they have helped.

The greatest aspect of the Barstarzz is the support within their community. A lot of bodybuilders love to put other people down to make themselves feel better, powerlifters in different weight classes sometimes look down on the smaller and weaker guy, athletes come in all levels from amateur to professionals, but the Barstarzz truly want to see every first timer with a great attitude learn to muscle up and human flag one day. They travel the globe and United States running clinics to help get everyone started. And they actually stress technique in order to prevent injury and properly perform the movements. Crossfit is a great form of exercise but there are so many “bad coaches” (there are for everything, but Crossfit can be very dangerous) out there that the risk of injury is high. From my experience, I find the Barstarzz to be different, but they are just the face of this movement. People have been working out creatively using nothing but their own bodies and some tree branches or bars for hundreds, thousands and tens of thousands of years.

So look up these masters of creative calisthenics, get some ideas and SAFELY stop by a local park with some good bars in order to see where you hang. Make sure to bring a friend for safety reasons and also because it’s always more fun with someone else! Hungry and Fit approves of the Barstarzz and their workouts as a great way to stay… hungry and fit!

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Aug022013

15-Minute Upper Body Home Workout

Ever since the completion of the contest, I haven’t done any hardcore or intense workouts. I’ve done some running, yoga, and light weights. I plan to get back to heavy lifting soon, because I miss it! Anyhow, after work one day, I was feeling sluggish and I knew a fast-paced light-weight circuit would give me that pick-me-up and turn on the sweat. All you need are some dumbbells and an elevated surface such as a chair, bench, couch, or bed. Repeat this circuit 3-6x as time allows. Each set is until failure, meaning that your muscles are too tired to complete another rep.

Disclaimer: Pics were taken after the home workout as they are obviously taken in a gym 😛

1. Elevated crunches. Put your legs up on the elevated surface, contract your abs, and crunch. Don’t pull your neck, but use the core to crunch up, creating that contraction and eventual burn of your soon-to-be six-pack. Use weight if you want to challenge yourself further.

2. Concentration curls. Sit down on your bench, chair, couch–whatever it is that you have. Lean your elbow on your leg, bend forward, but keep your shoulders back and curl one at a time. Then switch to other arm.

3. Triceps extension. Grab your dumbbells and stay seated. Lift up your arms and hold your hands behind your head with the weights in them. Lift up vertically until your arms are straight then come down to the bent-arm position behind your head.

4. Shoulder press. Hold dumbbells at shoulder level, so that your body almost looks like a T. Press up and almost touch the weights, then come back to starting position.

Coworker making me laugh…

5. Dips. Use that elevated surface and place your hands on the edge, fingers facing forward. Have your legs out straight and bend the elbows, lowering your body. Then raise up to starting position (do not sit in between).

Again, repeat 3-6x. The more times, the better. This will hit core, biceps, triceps, shoulders, and a little bit of chest. Not a bad upper body workout if you’re short on time. All you need are dumbbells and an elevated surface. Let us know how this goes! Stay strong. Use this workout to stay hungry and fit!

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BONUS KITTY PIC

Teehee, caught sleeping

Jul142013

Chocolate Strawberry Lean Protein Shake

By complete accident, this is the most delicious, simple, and healthy protein shake I have ever made. It’s been about 90+ degrees all week here, and today I chose to wear long-legged under-armor (I’m a trainer so I wear workout gear to work), and unfortunately, the AC in the trainer office was broken. On the ride home, my heat kept rising and I knew I needed something cold, refreshing, and nutritious. After all, I am still prepping for contest. This is also the first time I’ve had protein powder since my protein shake hell week, so I was a little nervous because my at the end of that week, my body started feeling disgusted towards that stuff. But don’t worry, it was allllll good. Please follow this SIMPLE on-a-whim recipe for a healthy delicious protein shake. Here are the macros:

Calories: 193
Fat: 5.7g
Carbs: 11.5g
Protein: 26.5g

DELICIOUS.

Ingredients

1 cup Silk Vanilla Unsweetened Almondmilk
6 frozen medium strawberries [if you don’t have frozen strawberries, you can use regular and throw some ice cubes in]
1 scoop MTS Machine Whey Chocolate Protein

[Yup. That’s it.]

Directions

Measure out a cup of unsweetened almond milk

Place 6 frozen strawberries in the blender

Put one scoop of protein powder in and blend! I let it blend for a while longer than usual, probably about 20-30 seconds.

DELICIOUS.

THAT’S IT. Ridiculously simple. I was actually in awe when I first tasted it. I really didn’t expect it to be that delicious. What’s better than chocolate and strawberries? Exactly. Look at those macros and tell me this isn’t perfect. You will feel so full and so satisified after (I felt like this was a cheat meal because it was so delicious, but it was the opposite). DEFINITELY use this to stay hungry and fit!

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BONUS KITTY PIC

Cuddle demons

Jun272013

My Hell Week is Over

Disclaimer: I would never suggest this “diet” to anyone else. For me, it was just a willpower test I’ve wanted to try. I am highly against crash or fad diets.

Second Disclaimer: This is kind of a long post, but only because it means a lot to me.

I did it. I did it! I did it! If you’re wondering why I’m seemingly raving mad right now, direct yourself to this post. If you don’t feel like reading the whole thing (even though it’s short), I’ll give you a little summary. I did a crazy thing of subjecting myself to 7 days of 560 caloric hell. The actors from Spartacus did this to get lean and in slave-gladiator-like shape for their show. It was a prescribed four water protein shakes a day. That’s it. For an entire week. And that was while they were at “Gladiator Camp” doing 4 hours of combat work each day. I unfortunately had no such camp to attend, so every other day I completed the hellish Spartacus Circuit (3 times over). And on the other days, I did other cardio and strength exercises.

Working hard during a Spartacus circuit

So last Wednesday I forwent food, subsisting on only 4-5 protein shakes a day (water mixed with protein powder). If any of you know me, I am hungry most of the time. Why do you think we named this blog Hungry and Fit? I didn’t choose to do this to lose weight or lose inches (even though I am doing this contest), I did it for the sole sake of testing my willpower. And I did it. I didn’t touch any food for that entire week though I drooled and craved it constantly. I’m waiting for someone to send me my “Willpower Extraordinaire” plaque, but I guess it takes time to mail.

I am very proud of myself and happy I pushed through. Water, gum, and ice are the three material things that really helped me get through it. Oh, and video games. Thanks, nerdy side of myself, for helping me get lost in that while I wasn’t working out or working. More than those, Chris and friends really supported me. Chris was there for me every step of the way and my friends would text me each morning say, “Alana, still staying strong?!” I appreciated it more than they know. Because I was definitely an infinitely more grumpy person during that week. You can especially ask Chris, but also my workmates like Daisy or Kim too.

How I felt

Again, I would not suggest this to anyone. After only consuming 560 calories a day, working out every day, and continuing an active-paced job, I lost ten pounds (I know my mum is yelling at me right now back home). Ten pounds in a week is NOT GOOD. Listen to me, I’m a trainer. That’s what you call a bad crash diet. Again, I want to reiterate, I did it for the willpower test, because for me, I think at the end of the day, if you don’t have your willpower, you don’t have anything. It was extremely rough the first few days–who am I kidding, it was rough for the entirety, but I started getting used to not consuming food. However, by the end, my body was pretty mad at me, making me a little sick and weak. Again–DON’T do this. I’m just sharing my achievement. It ended up de-motivating me for my contest because I was so miserable without food and feeling weak.

“Before”

“After”

I’m showing you pictures of how my body slightly transformed, not as motivation, but to document how this affected me.

You can imagine how blissfully amazing this day of rebirth into food has been (if you think I’m being dramatic, blame my dad, he’s an actor). I had my meals planned days in advance (because what do you do when you can’t eat? You think about food!). I was in such a better mood than I had been all week and I was just happy because I did it. I accomplished something I had wanted to for a long time now. I’m all for celebration, but I’m still on track for this contest. And although today is a “cheat” day (you’ll get descriptions and pictures after this of my meals today), I’m going right back to strict eating of lean proteins, veggies, fruits, and complex carbohydrates to get to my “extremely fit” goal with Chris at my back as a coach.

This wasn’t even close to my cheat day before the Spartacus Hell Week (in terms of bad food), but it was cheat enough for me because it was real, beautiful FOOD. Let’s look at the menu.

For Breakfast: Dot’s Diner

Small House Breakfast…that’s fake meat

I really tried slowly eating, but you can’t understand my excitement and happiness. I ate most of it, but not the whole biscuit. Stomach felt funky for a few hours, but it just needs to get used to solids again.

For Lunch: Snarf’s

Tuna sandwich…mmmm

Face of bliss

The mouth-watering in this situation happened to be ridiculous. Again, tried to take my time.

For Dinner: Korea House

Korea House in its amazingness…we would eat here every night if we could afford it

Happy last meal

I wasn’t going to (or supposed to) have any thick dairy like milk or ice cream, but we were served it by our favorite Korean chef and we always put respect, honor, and morals before anything else.

All in all, I’m glad I did it. I’m proud of myself. But I will never do it again. I only wish to inspire people to try to reach higher and higher, because you never know what you’re capable of. Wish me luck on the rest of my 5 weeks til the end of the contest! Going to be on an eating plan of tuna, beans, rice, vegetables, grapefruit, banana, fish and oatmeal! Use your willpower to stay hungry and fit!

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Jun202013

The Best Test of Willpower

If you read my post yesterday, you’ll know that I’m doing a contest to transform myself (from fit to extremely fit) and see how strong and lean I can make my body. I started off with a 10-day cleanse, a cheat day, and now Hell Week begins. Again, here is my bodyspace. This is when I need the most support. When the days look bleak and I’m not looking forward to much at all. When my stomach begins eating itself.

I’m not a fan of fad diets. And this isn’t a fad diet, it’s getting my body to a certain point where I can then maintain it for the next 5 weeks or so with lean proteins, veggies, and complex carbohydrates. But even before I knew about this contest, I wanted to do this challenge. I wanted it primarily for the ultimate willpower test. Now you’re probably screaming, “What ‘diet’ are you talking about!” Check this video out, don’t worry, it’s only 2-3 minutes long and it’s a lot of fun.

My “diet” is based on the actors who trained for Spartacus: Blood and Sand, the Starz series, the original series with the late Andy Whitfield. 4 water-protein shakes a day. That’s it. And that was all the while doing 4 hours of “Gladiator Camp”–which I would love to do, but it’s damn tough. To get lean and mean. I got my protein powder from tigerfitness.com (Machine Whey Powder) which Chris recommended as one of the best protein powders, especially for this task (and similar to what they used). So this is what I’m doing: four or five (alternating each day) protein shakes, which is just protein powder and water. That’s it. For seven days.

The protein I’m using

I just completed Day 1 and it feels like a century. 4 water protein shakes spaced roughly four hours apart. The first five hours and last five hours were the toughest. However, I was able to complete a 1.64 mile trail run with a dog and a 1.5 hour arms workout. Not bad, but again, it was rough and miserable. Any food sounds good. I use water and gum to curb my constant hunger. This is a willpower test and I can do it. I know I can. I want to see how far I can push myself. Like I said, I wanted to do this before I even knew about the contest just to test my willpower.

Trail run

So here I go, eating like Spartacus and also training somewhat like him (doing Spartacus workouts). I’m looking at 4-5 water protein shakes a day for the next 6 days. Every smell and glance of food will tempt me, but I will stay strong. This will keep me hungry and fit!

My only sustenance

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Jun122013

Workout Smart: Speed vs. Contraction and Form

Working as a trainer in a gym, I see all kinds of people working out. Some are experts, some are beginners, and some are just plain doing it wrong. I never like to judge: people workout and train for all kinds of purposes and goals, which means they workout differently. However, there are still ways you can workout the wrong way, despite training differently for various goals. It’s not just annoying to see this, it worries me. Working out the improper way doesn’t just make you look silly, but you could seriously hurt yourself too.

This is where the topic of today comes in: speed versus contraction and proper form. Some guys and girls, usually teenage boys (but sometimes 60+ men which is the most worrisome), will try to do reps of exercises–whether it be curls, rows, pull-downs, you name it–as fast as they can. I’m not sure if it’s because they can’t properly handle the weight so they try to get it done as fast as possible or they are trying to show off their abilities. They are wrong in both reasonings. They might even think that doing it as fast as possible is the right way to do it–WRONG.

Proper form

Don’t get me wrong, I will give an exception where fast training is okay. Plyometrics. Athletes. Competition trainees. These are the few exceptions. Athletes need to use plyometrics (training muscles to exert maximum force in the smallest amount of time possible with the most power possible) to get better at their sport. They improve their speed and power this way. You will see athletes doing plyometric jumps or lifts as well as other agility drills. This is okay! People who are training for certain competitions also need to do power-lifting, in which you will see a lot of jerks and snaps for getting their weight up. This is also okay!

I’m talking about the people who aren’t training for competitions, but just working out to achieve certain goals. The average gym-goer. Form is my #1 priority with my clients and they know it! They learn so well that they are able to point out others’ bad form in the gym while we are training. And because I love good form so much, I hate bad form even more. Attention weight lifters: you do not look cooler, sexier, or fitter when you yank that bar down so fast you pull a muscle.

Us in the weight room

Weight-lifting is all about control. Control is power. It’s not even all about not injuring yourself (although working out in jerky, fast motions without proper muscle control is a quick road to injury), it’s about maximizing gains and muscle strength. We could get very detailed about how fast repetitions should be based on what you’re looking for (muscle endurance, hypertrophy, strength, power, etc.), but that’s for another post.

Let’s just go to the basics. You will “feel” the reps more when you slow down. You will feel your muscle working, breaking down, and getting stronger. If you don’t believe me, try it out for yourself. Try a set of bicycles (lay on your back, knees up, elbow to opposite knee, repeat). Do 30 seconds of it fast, and then try 30 seconds slow. I’ll bet your abs will feel it a lot more when you go slower. I always have my clients slow down, for example, doing rear delt flyes, even on machines like leg extension, you will get such a better workout if you just slow down.

Just think about it. When you slow down, and thus get the full repetition, you are allowing your muscle to go all the way through the motions, feeling it at each range of motion. Also, another quick note: don’t skimp out on the “negative” motion of a muscle action (aka the release, the elongation, the extensionof a biceps curl, not the actual curl). Many are tempted to quickly let go of the muscle tension and let it “fall down” to the starting place rather than controlling it. Again, we control it, we gain strength, we show power. If we cut it short, then we don’t get to strengthen the muscle at the most important part: the elongation of the muscle where it feels it the most.

Gunz from lifting with CONTROL (haha jokes)

Next time you hit the weights or the machines, remember about good form and slowing down. Don’t hunch, keep your shoulders back, and your heart strong. Use these tips to stay hungry and fit! Cheers!

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BONUS KITTY PIC

Sajah hiding

May072013

Strong is the New Skinny

I hope you’ve been seeing this around. Within the recent decade, gyms, fitness centers, and health clubs have been booming. And along the last couple of years, females have been admired for getting buff. Especially this and last year, as I’ve noticed, there are tons of phrases coming out like “Strong is the new skinny” and I am 100% on board with that. For too long, women have been shuffled into a space where they are expected to look a certain way.

Hello, earth to people–everyone’s body behaves, evolves, and trains differently. That’s it. Check out this post to learn more about fitness definitions like “mesomorph” that describe different body types. Now, I’m not saying, go and eat 5 cheeseburgers because it’s okay to be fat. No, it’s not okay to be overweight for your body type–not because of how you look, but because of the health inside of you and the problems it can create. No, I’m saying, that it’s okay to have more than 15% body fat, that skinny is out, and strong is in.

Abby Wambach, the “gladiator” of the US Women’s National Soccer Team

Once you begin strength training and really building yourself with endurance, strength, and agility, you find power. Think of our Olympians–they’re sexy because they’re strong. And guess what–it is HEALTHIER to be strong. Often times, it can be unhealthy to be skinny. It’s a whole new level of empowerment. I ask you to stop shying away from your broad shoulders like I once did and embrace them. They give you great power for swimming, back workouts, and overall strength. They help you become a better athlete.

Me during a pull workout a few months ago

Some people call me skinny and I stop them. I don’t have a lot of body fat, but I do have a good amount of muscle. I am strong, not skinny. I almost take insult to being called skinny now when I would’ve loved that compliment five years. Times have changed and perspectives are almost coming around to where they should be. I am lucky enough to have someone like Chris who admires me for my strength, which all should do of their partners instead of desiring unrealistic and unhealthy figures. I apologize for the rant, but I’m sick of people starving themselves to get a certain look. Feed your body and put it through work. Love yourself, love your body, and love the power that strength can give you.

Treat your body with respect and kindness. STRONG IS THE NEW SKINNY