Question Answered

"Your lips will turn blue, you may pass out, but you will not die!" - Jillian Michaels from the Biggest Loser......

In some sense she's right. Getting 6 pack abs, even just losing some weight requires that you CONFUSE your body in both exercise and diet. You need to push yourself! How did I know I had a good workout? If I felt any one or combination of the following A) I sweat through my shirt B) I felt light headed (Not passing out light headed, but a little woozy) C) I felt like I was going to puke.

I'm sorry, but if you go to they gym and are able to read a book/mag or able to hold a long conversation with a friend, you're not working hard enough. Your signs of a good workout may be different (and I'm not encouraging you to go pass out or puke), but your body should be telling you that its not used to the workout.

I posted my pictures and the link to the voting to the contest on Facebook in hopes my friends would vote for me. I got a lot of congrats and some questions. My good friend Steve sent me a this message which basically covers every ones questions:

"Hey looks like that program worked great. I need that! give me the skinny what are you actually doing? I saw the essay, all processed foods gone, but what else? what was the fitness aspect? It says train at home..." - Steve

Well first the obvious part, the program I used: Turbulence Training

I'd suggest signing up for Craig's emails and looking at his products. If you like what you see and hear and want to make a huge change to your body, then go for it.

I can honestly say that 80-90% of my results were from proper eating, while the other 30-40% were from the workouts.

I completely changed my eating habits. Please notice I am not using the word diet. Diets come to an end and people gain the weight back afterwards. What you really need is a lifestyle change! I think I managed to make that change. As I said in my essay, I switched to natural, unprocessed foods and tried to eat 5-6 times a day. When I didn't have time to prepare meals I'd have some fruit, almonds and a protein shake. Did I cheat or slip up? Hell Yes!! And don't worry if you do, if you get your eating habits right 90% of the time you will be fine.

I will go into more details on exactly how I ate in future posts, but I think that should answer the basic question for now.

The other half of the equation was the exercise. Craig does an awesome job at offering different workouts. When I first started I bought the TT basic edition which provides some great workouts. I also joined the TTMembers forum which gives me access to Craig's new monthly workouts.

All of the TT workouts can be done in 45 minutes (1 hour max) and are only scheduled for 3 days a week. This was very appealing to me since I am a pretty busy person and don't want to be in the gym 2 hours a day.

Craig uses 'supersets' to get your weight training and cardio in at the same time. Its very intense, but the results are amazing! Most workouts consist of 3-4 supersets containing 2 exercises in each superset.

The other great thing about TT is that there is no long cardio on the treadmill!! I hate long distance running and love this!! The longest you will be on a treadmill or bike is for 20 minutes! You get your cardio in by doing HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) after your weight workouts. As I stated above, you need to confuse your body and HIIT will accomplish that!

And for the final part of the question, working out at home. Yes TT lets you work out at home. The main workouts do not require a lot of equipment (dumbbells, stability ball, bench, pull-up bar) so they could be done at home with some substitutions of exercises. Craig has also put together workouts that specifically use body-weight exercises that people have used exclusively and seen great results. Again check out the differences in Craig's products to see which ones offer body weight workouts.

I will go into more detail in future posts and you can follow along in the next Transformation Contest as I blog my way through that too.

Any questions, just leave me a comment.