Losing "Vanity Pounds" (Closed Group)

I looked and looked around, but couldn't find a good forum for people who are just trying to lose "vanity pounds". Everybody's trying to lose a lot of weight, or trying to maintain a healthy weight. But I can't seem to find anybody who's looking to get rid of the little "soft spots" here and there and just make their body and life a little healthier and look a little better. ;)

IMPORTANT NOTE: This is a group for people who feel they are in pretty good condition already, and they can go about their lives without extra attention to diet/exercise. This is NOT a group for people who are looking to "lose weight," but instead- as stated in the title- to lose the extra "vanity weight" (the extra flab here and fluff there). This is pretty much a group for people trying to tone up. Henceforth, "Goal Weight" is no longer included in the member stats. This is about gaining muscle/toning, not losing weight.

NEWS:
February 18, 11:22 am (AZ, US time)

jewel_girl is the winner for the clean-eating challenge! She whooped us all with her astounding talents to say no to fast food and say yet to healthier alternatives! Even with a slight splurge at the end, she says she wouldn't have traded that moment with her daughter sharing New York Fries for anything! Congratulations, Jamie!

Current Challenge: Add up all your hours/minutes of cardio activity. You can add up everything you do at the gym (bike- 86 min, elliptical, 138 min, etc, etc, etc) AND you can add up anything extra you do. Anything from going out to the club (as long as your dancing, not just trolling! ;] ), swimming, bike-riding, roller blading, anything. Just try to keep it honest with the fact that it's cardio. If you walk to work every day (like me!), I don't think you can count those 15-20 minutes as cardio since they're not getting your heart rate up that high. If you're doing something where you can still keep a conversation going, but you have to breathe a lot heavier, you're in the activity range we're talking!

Post #2 = Members
Post #4 = Challenge Information

Is anything happening here?  :)    ??

In the mean time.... why don't we all  just post ideas for upcoming challenges, in order of preference...

I'll jump off the deep end & go first 

1.   # of minutes exercising per day... or break up to specific groups, ie.walking/running; weights; other aerobic activity  ????  ???  ??

2.   sodium intake per day

Anybody Else ? ?  ?  

I personally would prefer challenges that aren't grams of protein/sodium etc. as if I eat anything in a packet or not listed on CC I just manually enter the calories - it would be SUCH a faff to copy out the whole label so I don't actually know how much of each thing Im getting.  It would probably be interesting to do for a week and see....but I have exams coming up and it would be quite time consuming.

Minutes of exercise/portions of fruit and veg?

Ay Dios Mio!!! I'm so sorry to have everybody waiting around like that! I really dropped the ball, I'm sorry! Things were crazy last week: I had to give a speech in Public Speaking (The Health Benefits of the Nintendo Wii!!!), and I had a HUGE test in Italian. So sorry I didn't check in with you guys!

Anyways, back to business! Energygirl won! (duh!) Hahaha. I'd say it's pretty safe to say she whooped our butts; you go girl! I drank a grand total of 649 oz myself, hahaha!

Okay. I just added all the new stuff to the first posts. Please check it out. The next challenge will be a sort of "clean eating" starting on Monday and ending next Sunday. Please report in with your info on Monday (preferably before noon). Thank you!

This is gonna be so hard for me. Usually I let myself have one "fast food night" a week. I'll keep it in moderation (Jr Cheeseburger, kid's size fries, no soda), but I always get this little treat. This will definitely be a tough one for me!

Here's a question for all of you? Do you consider grilled chicken sandwiches a part of the "fast food" menu? Most people don't count yoghurt, salads, and other healthy options as "fast food" per se, but I just wanted to know if I could specify for everyone (including myself, tehe!) if grilled chicken would be off limits as well. Post what you think! 

Yes, kinda. All challenges are Monday-Sunday, but then have your results all added up and reported to me (at the latest) bu Monday at noon.

:) 

Cool cool. I need a week without junk. Yesterday was REALLY bad. I just got such a sweet tooth all of a sudden and tried to supress it with an apple, then ended up having a piece of cake anyway then some pineapple then some smarties....on top of my big (but healthy but still BIG) lunch and breakfast!

And my exercise has gone down this last week as my revision has gone up.

So tomorrow when I have a few spare hours for once they're going to be spent in the gym and not on lunch. Big free dinner with wine in the evening and predinner drinks with my tutors. And possibly post dinner drinkies at a club!

I think grilled chicken sandwich is not junk but only really if you do it yourself/have it somewhere fairly reasonable. I wouldn't trust say McDonalds grilled chicken sandwich to not have something junkie added.

Missgendale, imo  I would classify grilled chicken from any fast food menu to be "junk" mostly because of the high sodium it contains (I think McDonald's chicken is about 3/4 of the rdi) and because of  the white bun.   :)

My week.....  not the winner,  but here it is anyway:

Wednesday I had a subway salad, which I don't really classify as junk food, it has plain chicken breast pieces, low in sodium, and the rest is all veggies & low fat, low sodium dressing.  It doesn't matter tooo much if it counts or not anyway...... because I blew it yesterday (sunday) as my daughter & I shared a new york fries.  this is something I only get about twice a year or so, and my daughter & I had a nice afternoon out, and decided to splurge together; so I don't regret it, either!  

Do we have another challenge yet?? 

Woah! Your week? I thought it was monday to sunday starting today and last week we didn't have a challenge cos that one was only posted on the 11th - oh yeah, that was monday but I didn't see it til tuesday or wednesday - that's when i got the notification :s

I was going to check in with my day:

5:30 - special K bar - bit sugary but needed something quick before rowing
8:30 - porridge w. tsp PB
11:30 - 2 small slices wholemeal soda bread w. 2 pieces of bacon (all fat removed) and lettuce
12:30 - fresh smoothie made w. 1/2 mango, a banana, tsp honey, handful mixed dried fruit eg. prunes/apricots
2:00 - apple, tsp PB, cube of cheddar
6:00 - small baked potato, big green salad, 1.5oz crumbled wensleydale w. cranberries, roast carrot and roast parsnip

ducklingerthank, you can go ahead with the old challenge and sit the new one out, or join up with us on this one today. Whatever you want! 

The new challenge is to add up all your hours/minutes of cardio activity a week. You can add up everything you do at the gym (bike- 86 min, elliptical, 138 min, etc, etc, etc) AND you can add up anything extra you do. Anything from going out to the club (as long as your dancing, not just trolling! ;] ), swimming, bike-riding, roller blading, anything. Just try to keep it honest with the fact that it's cardio. If you walk to work every day (like me!), I don't think you can count those 15-20 minutes as cardio since they're not getting your heart rate up that high. If you're doing something where you can still keep a conversation going, but you have to breathe a lot heavier, you're in the activity range we're talking!

Sound  good to everyone? :)

Hmm, I think I kind of give up. Only one person checked in anyway. The board's gone a tad quiet. And with exam stress this is probably my least healthy time ever! I had a packet of crisps (doritos) today and I can't even remember the last time I ate crisps.

As far cardio - same goes. I normally do a lot of cardio but I have to revise atm so less time.

Checking in early because I already know what I'll be doing for the rest of the week anyway.

Monday-Rowing(90mins but stopping and starting so call it 45 mins cardio)+Cycling-40mins
Tuesday- Treadmill, stepper, cross trainer, bike - 60 mins
Thursday - Spinning - 45
Friday - Spinning -45
Saturday - Spinning - 60
Sunday - Spinning - 45

340mins?

Plus 270 mins strength training/calisthenics

well, you've got me beat! (though that isn't hard to do!!) 

I have 60 minutes of cardio for the whole week !

but from my viewpoint, it's better than zero, right?  

afterall, I'm middle aged & sit at a desk all day!