Feb. 12, 2012: Switchin' it Up Sunday!

Today I decided to switch up my routine a bit.  Instead of going to the gym, I took a 45 minute hike and tried out my new camera.  I kept a fast pace except when I stopped to take photos.  It was a cloudy day, but just before heading home, the sun peeked through.

  One of the great things about living in the Central Valley portion of California is seeing a variety of vegetation year round.  Citrus fruit are abundant!

There are many variety of oranges but two of the main ones are Navel and Valencia; Navel oranges (great for eating) are ripe in the winter, and Valencia oranges (which are used primarily for juice) are ripe in the spring/summer. 

 As pretty as my walk was today, it is still February.  The snow in the Sierra Nevada's has not yet melted so our river bed is dry.  There are no leaves on the trees.  I'm looking forward to spring.

Switching up the exercise routine from time to time is wise for those who get bored easily.  It keeps things interesting.  Often if you focus on doing activities you enjoy, such as photography, hiking, playing a competitive sport, walking the dog, etc., your attention can be diverted from the fact that you are actually getting in exercise.  It becomes fun and less of a chore or something you have to do.

In the past, I've heard that it is important to change up an exercise routine in order to prevent the body from hitting a plateau.  According to Medicine.Net's "Ask the Experts", there is no evidence to support this claim.  In fact, according to the author, Richard Weil, MEd, CDE,Exercise Physiologist, Certified Diabetes Educator, and Director of the New York Obesity Research Center Weight Loss Program at St. Luke's Roosevelt Hospital Center in New York City, biologically it does not make sense.  "...your body maintains fitness as long as the stimuli remains consistent. If you consistently run three miles every day at the same pace, then oxygen delivery and all the other physiological mechanisms responsible for fitness necessary to run three miles will remain constant. It is true that in the first few weeks or months of a training program there is a learning curve where the body becomes biomechanically more efficient (for example, the more you practice ice skating the better you get), and when you move efficiently, you burn fewer calories than when you move inefficiently, but eventually you reach a consistent level of biomechanical efficiency and then energy expenditure and heart rate remain the same for the same level of exertion."  So when should you change your exercise routine?  Listen to your body.  Weil concludes "change when your strength or performance decreases, when your physique stops changing in the way that you'd like it to or when you're bored" (Q&A by Richard Weil, MEd, CDE).

On another note, tomorrow is weigh in day for me.  I cannot believe that two weeks have flown by already since starting this challenge!  I promised not to hyper focus on the scale, so I put my home scale away for the past two weeks.  I was used to stepping on the scale every day, so this has been a change for me.  I will weigh in at the gym before my evening workout.  I do hope I see improvement in the number.  Regardless, I feel better abiding by many of the clean eating principals and sticking with my 3 goals as much as possible.

I hope your Sunday was relaxing!  Enjoy the rest of the evening.   
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