Tabata

Med Ball Tabata Workout

October 15, 2014 by Nicole 10 Comments

Hey guys! Sorry I haven’t posted in a while. I’m in the process of transferring my website over to private servers because my current shared ones can’t handle the amount of traffic P&I has been getting—most certainly not a bad problem to have! However, what is a bad problem to have is my lack of technical website knowledge. It’s taking longer than it should because I’m learning as I go (story of my blogging career), but I think it should be smooth sailing from here. I’m back to a regular posting schedule and just crossing my fingers nothing explodes over the next couple days.

If you’ve been following me for a while, you’ve probably noticed that my go-to workout getup is a pair of leggings (the funkier the better) with a lose tank top. I do wear other workout tops with built-in bras from time to time, but I just love the comfort and laidback style of tossing on a muscle-cut tank or racerback over a sports bra. So when Michelle from Reverence Apparel reached out to me about rocking one from her line on the blog, I thought it’d be a perfect fit. With all the HIIT and tabata workouts I post, I had to go with this tank:

Med Ball Tabata Workout

Equipment I Used:

6-lb med ball (would have liked to use a 10-lb but this is all I own right now)
Exercise mat
Gymboss Interval Timer

You’ll set your timer for 8 rounds of 20 seconds of work and 10 seconds of rest. As you’ll see, for each exercise, you flip-flop each of the 8 intervals you’re working. For the most part, that just means right side then left side. For the pushups, you’ll alternate between hands and feet (see below). Once you complete your 8 rounds of one exercise, do the same thing for the next (so in total, you’re spending 4 minutes on each exercise).

This is a great workout for beginners and takes only 20 minutes to complete. If you’re more advanced, I would recommend going through the workout twice (so that you spend an entire tabata block on each side, rather than alternating).

Med Ball Crossbody Chops: Start in a split-stance lunge position right foot forward, ball of left foot planted behind you, both knees bent to 90 degrees, holding the medicine ball by your right foot with straight arms. Your left foot is going to pivot as you stand up, bringing the medicine ball across your body (keep arms straight) and reaching it up to the left. Chop it back down diagonally across your body to starting position, pivoting left foot and bending your knees.
Med Ball Push Ups: These are your basic push up, only you’ll alternate between having your hands on the ball (similar to doing a diamond push up on the ground with your hands in close and elbows going out wide as you lower) and balancing your feet on the ball (hands on the ground).
Med Ball Hip Bridge Leg Lift Thrusters: Start in a bridge position: right foot on the med ball, shoulders on the ground with arms by your side for support, and left leg held straight up, toes pointing towards the ceiling. Squeeze your glutes to lift your hips off the ground—your bum should not come to rest on the floor throughout the duration of the exercise. This is your starting position. From here, it’s one hip thruster with one leg lift at the top: lift your hips off the ground as high as you can, squeezing your glutes. Hold at the top and lower your left leg parallel to the floor (keeping it straight) and then lift back up so toes are pointing up. Lower your hips back down so that they’re just hovering above the floor, and then repeat: thrusting upward and then lowing the left leg.
Med Ball Plank Roll Out: Start in a plank position, right hand on a medicine ball, left hand on the ground. Slowly roll your right palm–>wrist–>forearm over the top of the ball. As you reach forward like this, you’ll need to bend your left elbow, lowering the body (but still keeping strong plank form!). Reverse the motion, rolling right forearm–>wrist–>palm and straightening your left elbow back to starting position as you do. Alternate each 20-sec work interval: right, left. If you need to modify, do this from your knees.
One-Leg Med Ball Burpees: This is your basic burpee except you keep one leg lifted the whole time and are holding a medicine ball in your hands. This is the whole sequence: Keeping your left foot hovering off the ground, bend the right knee to bring the medicine ball to the ground in front of you. Hop the right foot back into a plank position, and then hop it back up forward towards the ball. Stand up straight, bringing the ball with you and then hop upward on the right foot, pressing the medicine ball overhead as you do.

WEARING | tank: c/o Reverence Apparel // leggings: c/o lucy // sneakers: Nike

I wanted to leave you with a few other tops from Reverence Apparel I like and to spread the word about their #CycleForSurvivalHealthie challenge that’s taking place through the end of the month. Not only do a portion of proceeds from the Spincess tank below benefit cancer research, but you also get involved via Instagram. If you post a selfie doing some sort of exercise to instagram with the hashtag #CycleForSurvivalHealthie and tag @reverenceapparel and three friends, you can enter to win a prize package from Equinox, Athleta & Reverence Apparel. Details here.

Filed Under: Full Body, Interval Training, Medicine Ball, Tabata, Workouts

“No-Rest” Tabata Workout with Isometric Holds

July 7, 2014 by Nicole 33 Comments

Disclosure: This post was sponsored by Target® C9 through their partnership with POPSUGAR Select. While I was compensated to write a post about Target® C9, all opinions are my own.

Gooooooood morning! I know the Monday after Fourth of July weekend is, well, the worst, but I’ve got an awesome, no-frills bodyweight workout for you today, and there’s nothing like a good sweat to brighten your mood. Actually, I take that back—there’s nothing like a good sweat and a new workout outfit to brighten your mood…

I recently got the opportunity to try out a couple pieces from the Target® C9 activewear collection, and decided on the Run Short with Knit Waistband and Sporty Layered Run Tank. They come in lots of color options, and I went with a fun, printed combo.

Especially now that it’s a million degrees outside with this good ol’ New England humidity, the shorts are perfect. The waistband is wide and comfortable; there’s a little key pocket attached to the inside lining; the material is lightweight; and there’s a built-in brief, which I always like. I still wear underwear with it, but I find that the built-in helps keep the shorts in place and prevents them from riding up as I run (adjusting your shorts every few steps is the worst!).

The tank is great, too! The built-in bra is supportive enough to do high-intensity workouts and run (if you’re using this as a buying guide, keep in mind I have a small-ish chest), and the cut is really flattering. I love the bra-with-flowy-tank-attached look, so this was right up my alley.

The best part, as with all apparel from Target®, is the price! You can get both items for about $40. The only downside to affordability is that I’ll run into Target® for paper towels and leave with like four new outfits, a couple DVDs, a new bath mat…oops. Anyone else have that problem?

Alright now that you’ve got something to wear, let’s do today’s workout…

“No-Rest” Tabata Workout with Isometric Holds

In a traditional tabata workout, you complete 20 seconds of work and then get 10 seconds of rest. Today, we’re swapping out the rest period with an isometric hold. This is a great workout to do when you’re traveling or don’t have any equipment at your disposal—you need very little space and nothing but your bodyweight.

Equipment I Used:

Gymboss Interval Timer
Exercise mat

You’ll stay on each exercise for 4 minutes, using tabata intervals: 8 rounds of 20 seconds of movement and 10 seconds of holding. Once you’ve completed all 8 rounds, you’ll do the same thing for the next exercise. As an example, for the first exercise, you’d do jump squats for 20 seconds then hold a deep squat for 10 and then go right back into jumping, and so on and so on.

Jump Squats / Hold Squat: Feet about shoulder width apart, squat down, sending hips back and booty down (don’t let your knees shoot out farther than your toes). Explosively jump straight up, swinging your arms back for momentum. Land softly back in that deep squat position. For the isometric, hold your squat. If you’re advanced, you can hold a set of dumbbells while you do this. If you’re a newbie or you have knee issues, take out the jump: just squat up and down and then hold it down.
Push Ups / Hold Lowered Push Up: Shoulders aligned over wrists, do push ups either from your toes or knees (I made it through the first two rounds on my feet, then dropped down to my knees). For the isometric, hold the lowered push up, elbows bent, and chest as close to the ground as you can get it.
Bridge Hip Thrusters / Hold Bridge: Lay on your back, knees bent, feet flat on ground. We’re working your booty here. Lift your hips off the ground, squeezing those glutes. Lower back down, but not all the way—you never want to let your butt come to rest on the ground. For the isometric, thrust those hips high up towards the ceiling and hold ‘em there.
Mountain Climbers / Hold Plank: In a plank position, drive one knee forward, then the other, in a sort of horizontal running position. These should be quick! For the isometric, hold a plank position. If your wrists start to bother you, come onto your forearms for an elbow plank.
Leg Lifts / Hold Hover: Lay on your back, hands under your bum for support if needed (you want your lower back to stay glued to the ground as you do this—if you find it lifting up, placing your hands under your butt will help). Lift legs straight up, perpendicular to the ground and then lower them to where they’re hovering about 6” off the floor. For the isometric, hold that lowered, hovering position.

If you try this workout, leave a comment telling me the section that was hardest for you. Pushups definitely won that distinction for me! I tried to do “real” pushups, but after two rounds of those holds had to switch to my knees—and still struggled.

And if the pushups and mountain climbers in this workout aren’t enough to get your shoulders burning, check out this 5-minute video from Target® and POPSUGAR:

Filed Under: Bodyweight, Full Body, Interval Training, Tabata, Workouts

How to Use a Gymboss Interval Timer

May 20, 2014 by Nicole 10 Comments

I got a reader request for a tutorial on how to use a Gymboss Interval Timer and thought now would be a perfect time to post it because Gymboss recently sent me their new miniMAX to try out (I’ve included a guide to both models in this post).

As a heads up, all the Gymboss links in this post are affiliate links (if you go to Gymboss from P&I and buy a timer, I get a small commission), but I’m by no means trying to be a salesman here. There are free smartphone apps that work great for interval timing as well, I just personally love the Gymboss—and it comes in especially handy when I’m teaching group fitness classes (students don’t want to see you walking around the studio with your iPhone). For those of you with a Gymboss or wanting to buy one, here’s a basic set-up guide:

How to Use a Gymboss Interval Timer

There are three modes: clock, stopwatch and interval timer. To change modes, hold both the up and down arrows at the same time. I’m going to focus on the interval timer mode.

Press any button to turn it on.
Press SET. The work interval will start blinking (top number on the right). Use the up and down arrows to adjust the number to your desired length of time.
Press SET again. The rest interval will start blinking (bottom number on the right). Use the up and down arrows to adjust the number to your desired length of rest. If you don’t want a rest period (for example, just want the timer to beep every minute), bring this number down to zero.
Press SET again. The number of rounds will start blinking (number in bottom left corner). Use the up and down arrows to adjust to the desired number of rounds.
Press SET again. The type of alarm beep will start blinking. BH = beep high BL = beep low V= vibrate. Use up and down arrows to change the type until the one(s) you want is blinking. I usually just keep mine on BH.
Press SET again. The alarm duration will start blinking. You can choose 1, 2, 5 or 9 seconds in length, using the up and down arrows to scroll through the options until the one you want is blinking. I keep mine on 1.
Push SET one final time to exit setup mode. You’re now ready to begin your workout.
Press START to begin.

If you need to pause it during the workout, hit the START button three times quickly in a row. To stop and reset the timer, hold the START button down for three seconds.

How to Use the Gymboss miniMax

The buttons and general instructions I went over above apply here as well; the miniMax just has some extra features. Instead of just one INTERVAL mode, you have four options:

1 interval
2 intervals
3+ intervals (up to 25)
Multi (2-25 intervals with the option to repeat certain interval or groups of intervals)

Hit SET and then MENU (use the arrows until the pointer is at MENU then hit SET) to chose your desired mode. For the 1, 2 and 3+ interval options, you’ll follow the same steps as with the regular Gymboss timer (Hit SET and then SETUP to begin). For the 3+, once you’ve entered the desired number of intervals, put 00:00 for the next one and it will stop prompting you to add more.

Setting Up Multi Interval Mode

Let’s go through an example on the Multi Interval mode because this is probably the most complicated.

Let’s say you wanted your running workout to look like 3 rounds of this:

A 5-minute jog
Tabata intervals of sprinting and walking (8 rounds of 20 seconds of sprinting and 10 seconds of walking)
A 5-minute jog

When entering this into the Gymboss miniMax, we think of it as 4 intervals: 5 mins, 20 secs, 10 sec, 5 mins. Just like I outlined anove with the regular Gymboss, you use the SET button as an “enter” and the arrow buttons to adjust the time. Keeping that in mind, you enter the following:

5:00 x1 – a 5-minute interval
0:20 x8 – 8 rounds of 20 seconds of work
0:10 xP – 10-second rest intervals alternating with the previous interval (push the down arrow from 0 to get the P option when entering in number of rounds)
5:00 x1 – a 5-minute interval

The timer will prompt you to enter in another interval, just leave it at 00:00 and press SET so that it knows you’re done. It will then ask you how many rounds of the above routine you want to complete. For this particular example, you’d use the arrows to bring the number to 3 and then hit SET. You’ll then be prompted to select alarm type and duration of alarm, as outlined at the beginning of the post. When you’re finished, your screen will look like this:

When you’re ready to start your workout, hit START. This is what your Gymboss will look like in progress:

Other Gymboss miniMax Features

You also have the option to save a workout configuration for future use so that you don’t have to go through the process of setting up each interval again. Once you’ve entered all your intervals:

Hit SET to bring up the menu.
Use the arrows to scroll to SAVE. Once your pointer arrow is next to it, hit SET.
Chose preset 1 (P1) or preset 2 (P2). Hit SET.

To open a saved workout, hit SET to bring up the menu and scroll to RECALL. It’s important to note that you have to be the in the same mode as the workout you’re trying to open. For example, you can’t bring up a saved 3+ interval workout if you’re in Multi mode.

I hope that was helpful! This post is super long, but hopefully it doesn’t make using this timer seem more complicated than it actually is (it’s easy–I swear!). If you have any other questions about Gymboss timers, let me know in the comments section.

Before I sign off, I wanted to let you all know that Women’s Health Magazine and Exhale Spa are teaming up for Fusion Fest today and offering free core classes at Exhale locations across the country. If you have one in your area, sign up for a free class! Details HERE.