Life.

It’s been a while since I’ve written a blog post, mostly due to the fact that I’ve had terrible writers block and as usual have been too lazy to log into my wordpress account. But I’m back! And this time with some exciting news!

About a month ago while my partner and I were training, about half way through our session I caught him staring at my body with this funny look on his face. HA! When I asked him what he was looking at he told me that I was ready to compete and had the potential to win. His belief in me and my ability to compete has been my motivation to start this journey, and so! It’s my pleasure to announce that I will be competing in my very first bodybuilding competition in June 2013!

I am so excited! To prep for this competition, I’m starting by doing a 12 week diet-down to see how much body fat I can drop and how much lean muscle mass I can maintain at the same time. In doing this, my partner and I will have a clear idea of how many weeks I’ll need in order to properly prepare for June. I started this week and so far I’ve already dropped 1.3kg so everything is looking good!
The class I will be competing in is novice physique at the INBA All Women’s Classic.

If anybody has Instagram, I post a lot of photos of my progress and diet food up there daily. Follow me @ monetafitness

Until next time, train hard!

xx Moneta

That’s all I wanted

The truth about ‘toning’

If I had a dollar for every time I heard somebody say to me that they just wanted to ‘tone their muscles’, I would be rolling in a pool of gold coins. Ha!
The truth of the matter is, ‘toning’ is merely a myth. A word created by the social media in order to sell their useless ab crunching, butt firming, fat burning systems, and the annoying thing? People eat that shit up!

What the media has told us today is that toning your body is to become leaner and more defined by lifting weights in a certain way – that is, with high reps and a lower weight. I mean, sure it could eventually work.. but the truth is, doing less reps with near to maximum weight does the exact same thing but in less time and guarantees better results. Mind blown? Let me continue.

The practice of ‘toning’ your body is to do things like dumbbell shoulder press with 1kg weights for 20+ reps which kicks into your lactate and aerobic energy systems, making the exercise more cardio than strength based. This means that.. yeah! you’re burning calories and as a result, will look leaner for it, but in the long run, it’s going to take you a hell of a lot longer to build up some muscle definition if you’re sticking to fairy weights. And if i’m not mistaken, the purpose of ‘toning’ is to look leaner and more defined, am I right? .. Think about it. 🙂

To be leaner, one has to stick to a clean and balanced diet as well as have a good balance between strength and cardio based exercise. Like I’ve said in previous posts, the best way to burn off those extra calories is to lift weights ’til fail because it causes your muscle fibres to tear, speeding up your metabolic rate and ultimately, continuing to burn off those calories at rest in order to repair your muscles for the next time!
This is not to say that spending 5 days of your week running on a treadmill won’t guarantee results (because you’ll have some killer pins!) but how about the rest of your body?

I’ve had countless conversations with girls telling me about how they want to lose all the weight they need to (by only doing cardio) before they start lifting weights because they don’t want to look bulky like me, which I find particularly amusing! 🙂
I try to encourage as many people to lift weights over cardio as I can. Why? Because if you want to look like all of those girls in the magazines with ‘toned’ bodies, the truth is that they all lift weights (and not the fairy weights I was talking about).

So basically, all I’m saying is screw what the media says you need to buy. Screw those weight loss tablets, meal replacement supplements and ab crunching systems.

Just lift.

xx Moneta.

Cardio can be fun?

Hey guys,
Just wanted to make a quick update blog about what’s been happening in my life! 🙂
So the last couple months have been really intense for me having pretty much lost my job and being forced to defer from my personal training course because of that. However, I’ve just scored an amazing job with adidas and so things are finally starting to come back together again!
As for my training, because I’m so strapped for cash I’ve had to cut back on the amount of times that I go to the gym in order to save whatever money I have left, and so I’ve gone from 5 days of strength training down to 3 days. The upside of this 3-day split is that I have more time (and an excuse) to actually start doing more cardio based exercise.

Which brings me to today’s topic:
Alternative cardio work-outs!

Before I begin, just a quick disclaimer; this is not to say that you can’t choose to use treadmills, bikes, rowers etc. Rather, I am simply stating a couple different options which are more fun and beneficial for any and everybody! *peace***

So, like I said, I’ve decided to increase the amount of cardio that I do every week in order to help shred off that extra layer of fat that has regrettably built over my hard rock abs (or lack there of..) but I absolutely hate nothing more than walking on a treadmill or sitting on a dumb bike watching the same spot on the wall for an hour. And since I am in no financial state to buy a bike, I decided to come up with some fun ways to burn off those extra calories in less than half an hour – beats doing the same repetative movement for 45+ minutes a session *Can I get a soul clap?!

The gym that I train at has an awesome cross fit section which is where I got the ideas from, but if your gym doesn’t have one, you can set up this kind of circuit anywhere! Basically, what cross fit is, is high repetitions of strength training exercises with little to no weight (body weight). What makes this kind of training fun is you can combine whatever exercises you want together to keep it fun and interesting.

For example, yesterday I created 2 different circuits which I repeated 5 times each. As long as you keep the weight selection low, the reps high, and the exercises are even (legs, chest and back) you will get an amazing workout without fatiguing your muscles to the point of DOMS.

My first circuit included:
– BW close grip pull ups til fail.
– 10 burpees
– 10 Dead lifts
– 10 kettle bell lunges

My second circuit included:
– 10 BW dips with feet on bench.
– 10 clean and press.
– 10 BW push ups
– 10 dead lifts

When you perform each circuit, make sure there is little to no rest in between changing exercises, this way you’ll really get your heart rate up! What I love about this style of exercise is that you get to rest for up to 2 minutes before doing it all over again. By doing interval training, you can get your metabolic rate racing which speeds up the fat burning process drastically. This is definitely a style of exercise that I swear by and will continue to do so up until I compete.

I’ll keep you posted!
Much love, Moneta xx

Happy training!

My secret to fat loss

Body fat has been a personal battle for me since starting my training and clean diet.
I’ve so far dropped about 5% of my initial body fat and today I wanted to share my secret to shedding off that extra layer of fat that hangs off your tummy and thighs. (Can I get a soul clap?)

My big secret? WEIGHT TRAINING.
Ladies, honestly, I cannot stress to you enough – the importance of weight training!
Not to say that spending an hour of your time doing cardio all day everyday isn’t going to pay off, but for those of you who want to ‘tone up’ you NEED to do weights. ‘Toning’ is the medias way of saying ‘muscle definition’ and cardio just isn’t going to cut it. Even if it’s just two days a week of full body strength training, the benefits you’ll get from that sort of exercise will be AMAZING!

I always get asked about my training regime, and to be honest, unless I feel the need to go to the gym twice in the day, I steer clear of the cardio room. Cardiovascular training is good for maintaining and increasing your endurance levels, but unless you know how to kick into your fat-burning zone, there is so much leeway for wasting time, and i don’t know about you, but there is nothing I hate more than wasting time!

What’s even more important and essential to fat loss is your recovery time. What’s amazing about weight training is that, training at a high-intensity will increase the amount of human growth hormone which helps to build muscle, bones and organs. With the production of HGH comes an increase in your metabolism which aids in the burning of calories and fat while you’re resting!

And please don’t think that if you weight train you will end up looking anything like those she-males you see in photos.. Women don’t produce enough testosterone to build that kind of muscle unless it is taken as a supplement. Feel free to read my post on women and supplementation. https://dailyhealthblog.wordpress.com/2012/01/07/protein-is-not-just-for-men/

This blog is a little scattered because I’m currently getting ready for an interview. My mind is elsewhere. Nonetheless, I hope this gives you enough information to get into the gym and pump those weights!

Until next time, safe training! xx
Moneta

Progress!

no abs, but lost body fat!

One month into my diet.

So, no abs photo this week.. I don’t think I’ve made any progress with my abs so there’s no point!
In the last 2 weeks, I’ve managed to get two injuries.. I pulled my groin muscle, and also have a strained right wrist which has really limited my physical activity drastically.. how devastating.. So in saying that, I feel like I’ve made no progress, almost like I’ve gone 2 steps back with my body..
My diet hasn’t been too good either.. being financially unstable, it’s been really difficult for me to stick to my diet because I can’t afford to buy everything I need to cook my weekly meals.. I’ll just have to prioritize and for the time being, just stick to doing cardio and very very light weight exercises so I don’t lose any of my muscle mass.

See you next week! xx

Progress!!

Week three! Posted one day late due to bloating from my cheat meal haha. I lost 900 grams in a week, almost a whole kilo. Progress!! Woo!

Week 2

Decided to keep tabs on my progress by posting weekly photos of my abs which are my main focus with this new diet. Its currently week two and my stomach is looking flatter and Mt waist is noticeably smaller. 🙂

Getting there

I’ve been eating cleaner and exercising a hell of a lot more than I did when I first started.. My ABS are coming through!!!