*Challenge Rules* 

The goal is to do at least 100 squats per day to reach 3000 squats by the end of the month. You can do all 100 squats at one time or you can do sets of 20 or 25 reps throughout the day. Just be sure to challenge yourself and try to be consistent daily with yours squats. To give you a little extra motivation remember this quote, “Small daily improvements are the key to staggering long-term results.”

Bulgarian Dumbbell Split Squat

• Stand straight two to three feet in front of the bench. Feet should be shoulder width apart and toes pointed forward.
• Extend your left leg back, placing the top of your foot on the bench while keeping your right foot firmly planted on the floor.
• Make sure you back is flat and squat down until your right thigh is parallel to the floor.
• Press up through your heel, shifting your hips forward and squeezing your glutes to return to standing.
• Stay one the same leg for desired reps and then switch legs.
• Repeat until desired repetitions.

*ADVANCED: Use dumbbells or a barbell instead of body weight.*

Braced Squat

• Start with your feet shoulder width apart while having your arms outstretched in front of you.
• Squat down so your thighs are parallel to the floor.
• While squatting down make sure you keep your arms straight stretched out in front of you.
• Return to starting position and repeat until desired repetitions.

*You can perform this exercise with just body weight. If you want to make it more challenging you can hold a dumbbell or weight plate in your hand.*

 Prisoner Siff Squat

• Stand with your feet shoulder width apart.
• Rise up on your tip toes and then squat down while keeping your legs parallel.
• Return to your starting position and repeat until desired repetitions.

 IMPORTANT REMINDERS

1. It’s very important that you’re stretching before and after you exercise.

2. FORM! FORM! FORM! Get the form right before going for speed or reps.

3. Always keep the knees in line with the toes! Your knees should NEVER be in front of your toes!

4. When you are doing these different types of squats make sure your using just your body weight.

*If you’re more advanced in your weight training you can use light weight once or twice a week but I wouldn’t recommend using weight very often for the amount of squats you will be doing per day.  I want to make sure you are keeping your body safe from injury.* Remember I love to hear from you throughout this monthly challenge. Tell me what your goal are for the month and how you plan to reach it? If you ever need a little encouragement or a boost along the way don’t hesitate to find me on Twitter @lmc2323,  leave a comment on this post, or send me an email.

 *Challenge Rules* 

The goal is to do at least 100 squats per day to reach 3000 squats by the end of the month. You can do all 100 squats at one time or you can do sets of 20 or 25 reps throughout the day. Just be sure to challenge yourself and try to be consistent daily with yours squats. To give you a little extra motivation remember this quote, “Motivation is what gets you started. Habit is what keeps you going.” -Unknown

Sumo Squats/Plies Squat

•  Begin by separating your feet about 1 and a half to 2 times your hip width.
• Turn your feet so that they face outwards about 45 degrees.
• Inhale and bend your knees while lowering yourself towards the ground.
• Exhale and squeeze your glutes (butt) to return to the starting position.
• Repeat until desired repetitions.

ADVANCED: You can use a dumbbell while doing the exercise. Hold a dumbbell in your hands, so that the weight is centered between your legs. Then exhale and squeeze with your glutes to rise to the starting position.

FORM TIPS: Some people have a tendency for their knees to collapse inwards. So make sure that your knees line up with your feet. Also make sure that you keep your back straight during this lift. Do not let your back round and hunch too far forwards!!

Goblet Squats

• Stand holding a light kettlebell or dumbbell close to your chest.
• Squat down until your hamstrings are on your calves. Keep your chest and head up and your back straight.
• At the bottom position pause and use your elbows to push your knees out.
• Return to the starting position.
• Repeat until desired repetitions

TIPS:

• You can perform this exercise using body weight by squatting down and keeping your elbows between your knees or you can use a dumbbell/kettlebell.

Jump Split Squats

• Stand with feet staggered (almost as if you were starting a race) and your arms at your sides.
• Jump up as explosively as you can reaching for the ceiling with your arms.
• While in the air alternate your front and back leg before landing.
• Repeat until desired repetitions.

IMPORTANT REMINDERS

1. It’s very important that you’re stretching before and after you exercise.

2. FORM! FORM! FORM! Get the form right before going for speed or reps.

3. Always keep the knees in line with the toes! Your knees should NEVER be in front of your toes!

4. When you are doing these different types of squats make sure your using just your body weight.

*If you’re more advanced in your weight training you can use light weight once or twice a week but I wouldn’t recommend using weight very often for the amount of squats you will be doing per day.  I want to make sure you are keeping your body safe from injury.* Remember I love to hear from you throughout this monthly challenge. Tell me what your goal are for the month and how you plan to reach it? If you ever need a little encouragement or a boost along the way don’t hesitate to find me on Twitter @lmc2323,  leave a comment on this post, or send me an email.

*Challenge Rules* 

The goal is to do at least 100 squats per day to reach 3000 squats by the end of the month. You can do all 100 squats at one time or you can do sets of 20 or 25 reps throughout the day. Just be sure to challenge yourself and try to be consistent daily with yours squats. To give you a little extra motivation remember this quote, “Nothing worth having was ever achieved without effort”.

Prisoner Squats

• Stand with your feet hip width apart and place your fingers on the back of your head, pulling your elbows and shoulders back and sticking your chest out.
• Lower your body as far as you can by pushing your hips back and bending your knees, keeping your back straight and your abs tight.
• Hold the squat position then slowly push yourself back to the starting position
• Repeat until desired repetitions.

ADVANCED: Pick up your tempo and do these rapid fire to really get a burn

Overhead Squats

•  Stand with your feet slightly wider than shoulder-width apart, toes slightly turned out.
• Grab a rolled-up towel with an overhand grip, hands shoulder-width apart, and raise it overhead so your shoulders are roughly in-line with your heels.
• Squat down as far as possible without letting your knees jut out past your toes.
• Return to standing.
• Repeat until desired repetitions.

*You can perform this exercise by just lifting your hands if you do want or do not have any dumbbells, medicine ball or a light barbell to use.*

Single Leg Squats

• Stand with left foot on floor and right foot elevated.
• Squat down so that your leg makes as close to a 90 degree angle as possible and making sure that your elevated foot never touches the ground.
• Pressing through left heel, lean body slightly forward and stand up, squeezing glutes to return to the starting position.
• Repeat as desired on that leg
• Switch legs and repeat.

ALTERNATIVE: If you are not strong enough to do this without assistance then use a wall or hold the back of a chair to assist you.

IMPORTANT REMINDERS

1. It’s very important that you’re stretching before and after you exercise.

2. FORM! FORM! FORM! Get the form right before going for speed or reps.

3. Always keep the knees in line with the toes! Your knees should NEVER be in front of your toes!

4. When you are doing these different types of squats make sure your using just your body weight.

*If you’re more advanced in your weight training you can use light weight once or twice a week but I wouldn’t recommend using weight very often for the amount of squats you will be doing per day.  I want to make sure you are keeping your body safe from injury.*

Let’s start May off right by getting our glutes and legs right. Remember I love to hear from you throughout this monthly challenge. Tell me what your goal are for the month and how you plan to reach it?

If you ever need a little encouragement or a boost along the way don’t hesitate to find me on Twitter @lmc2323,  leave a comment on this post, or send me an email.

Squats are one of the most popular exercises used to work on our glutes and legs. I have to admit it is one of my favorite leg exercises that I love to do. So I am thrilled about this challenge. I never heard a woman say she did not want a nice backside with a pair of tone legs. Today I am going to introduce three variations of a squat. So let’s all get our squats on while building muscles in our quads, hamstrings, and glutes. We want people to hate to see us leave but love to watch us walk away!!

*Challenge Rules* 

The goal is to do at least 100 squats per day to reach 3000 squats by the end of the month. You can do all 100 squats at one time or you can do sets of 20 or 25 reps throughout the day. Just be sure to challenge yourself and try to be consistent daily with yours squats.

Regular Squats

• Start by standing with your feet shoulder-width apart. Sit your hips back until your knees are bent at 90 degrees.
• Squat down slowly by placing all your weight in your heels. Be sure your keep your core tight and chest up while you squat down.
• Next return to your starting position by push up with your heels while contracting your glutes.
• Repeat until desired repetitions.

Jump Squats

• Start by standing with your feet shoulder-width apart. Sit your hips back until your knees are bent at 90 degrees.
• Keep your chest up and your back straight.
• Explode straight up until your feet leave the floor.
• Land in the squat position.
• Repeat until desired repetitions.

 Chair Squats

*You can do these type of squats in front of a chair, box, bench or any thing else you can sit on.*

•  Place a chair (or whatever you are using) just behind you and stand in front of it withyour feet about hip or shoulder width apart.
• Contract your abs and keep them tight as you bend your knees and slowly squat down towards the chair.
•  Keep your knees behind your toes as you squat down towards the chair
• Squeeze your glutes (butt) and hamstrings (back of your legs) to lift up out of the chair and begin extending the legs.
• Fully extend the legs until you’re back to standing position.
• Repeat until desired repetitions.

ADVANCED: Squat down until you’re just hovering over the chair, but not sitting all the way down.

*If you’re more advanced in your weight training you can use light weight once or twice a week but I wouldn’t recommend using weight very often for the amount of squats you will be doing per day.  I want to make sure you are keeping your body safe from injury.*

Let’s start May off right by getting our glutes and legs right. Remember I love to hear from you throughout this monthly challenge. Tell me what your goal are for the month and how you plan to reach it?

If you ever need a little encouragement or a boost along the way don’t hesitate to find me on Twitter @lmc2323,  leave a comment on this post, or send me an email.

I decided once I got back from my spring break I was going to improve my workouts and eating habits.  I wanted to kick my workouts up a notch and work on increasing my strength.  As for my diet I wanted to go back to eating clean and making sure I was eating 5-6 meals a day.  It has been three weeks since I started my new program and revised diet. I must say it has been demanding but also a refreshing experience. I feel like this change was much needed.

I believe it is very important for us to always reevualate your short and long term fitness goals. Having goals set helps keep us focused on what we are working to achieve. Our short term goals should help us reach our long term goal. As we continue to improve it is necessary for us to continue making new improvements. For example one thing that helps me is to write out my workouts in advance and to record how much weight I do. That way I can monitor my progress on how much stronger I am getting. I also started preparing my food in advance at the beginning of the week. This helps me have my meals ready that way I have no excuse to miss a meal.  The last change I made was to log my food that way I can track precisely what I eating.

I will be the first to tell you that it is important to make fitness a lifestyle change and not something you do for a temporary fix. No matter what fitness level you are at you have to continue staying committed to improving or maintaining your health.

Challenge Rules:

The goal is to get at least 1000 push ups in by the end of the month. That is about 33 push ups a day. If your more advanced I would aim for 1500 or more push ups by the end of the month. You can either perform your daily repetitions all at once or perform them in sets of 3. Just remember to challenge yourself!!

Close Stance Push Ups

• Start in the basic push-up position but place your hands on the ground about 2 inches apart with your arms at your sides.

• Lower your chest as low as you can to the floor and then return to starting position keeping your elbows against your sides.

• Raise up continuing to keep your elbows in tight.

• Repeat until your desired repetitions.

Burpees Push Ups

• Start in push-up position

• Lower yourself to the ground and perform a full push-up

• Return to starting position and then immediately stand or jump up and extend your arms overhead

• Return back to push-up position.

• Repeat until desired repetitions.

*You can modify all of these exercises and perform them on your knees if needed.*

Go ahead and add these new push ups in your routine. Keep me posted on how many push ups you finish with for the month either on the LMC Fitness fan page or on here.

Challenge Rules:

The goal is to get at least 1000 push ups in by the end of the month. That is about 33 push ups a day. If your more advanced I would aim for 1500 or more push ups by the end of the month. You can either perform your daily repetitions all at once or perform them in sets of 3. Just remember to challenge yourself!!

Medicine Ball Push Ups

• Start in traditional push-up position, with the arms placed a little wider than the shoulders and your toes on the floor to form a straight plank with your body.
• Place the medicine ball under one palm to create an uneven surface.
• Perform a push up normally, but focus tension on the chest as you straighten the elbows to return to the beginning of the exercise.
• Repeat

Tips: You can make this exercise more advanced by rolling the ball back and forth alternating sides between each repetition.

 Diamond Push Up With Medicine Ball

• Get into traditional push-up position but place your hands directly under your chest with your index fingers and thumbs spread and touching making a diamond.
• Keep your back flat throughout the movement.
• Lower your body until your chest nearly touches your hands.
• Push your body back up to the starting position.
• Repeat

 Decline Push Ups

• Place your feet on a bench or a raised platform and get into the push-up position with your hands slightly wider than your shoulders
• With your feet on the bench and your arms holding your body up, begin the exercise by lowering yourself down to the ground while keeping your entire body in a straight line. Make sure you’re keeping your core tight the whole time.
• Lower your chest as close to the ground as you can, pause, then push yourself back up to starting position.
• Repeat

 *You can modify all of these exercises and perform them on your knees if needed.*

These are some new and exciting push up exercises you can add to your workout. Next week is our final week of our challenge so I will introduce the last few new push up exercises. Keep me posted on how many push ups you get it on either the LMC Fitness fan page or on here.

Eggs Florentine Wrap

Ingredients For 1 Serving:

• 1 egg
• 2 egg whites or 1/2 egg substitute
• 3 tsps. of trans fat-free margarine
• 1/4 of medium diced onion (I don’t like onion so I didn’t use them but will still include them in the instructions.)
• 1 cup of fresh baby spinach chopped
• Ground black pepper
• 1 slice of reduced-fat provolone cheese
• 1 plain light sandwich wrap

Instructions:

• Start by beating the egg and egg whites together then set them aside.
• If you plan to use onion in this dish then heat a large skillet over medium heat.
• Then add the margarine and onion to the skillet and cook it. Once it is done remove the onion from the pan.
• Add the remainder of the margarine in the skillet and lower the heat to medium-low.
• Add the egg mixture and spinach then scramble them until it is cooked.
• Then mix the onion in with the eggs. You can also add in the pepper at this time.
• Next grab your sandwich wrap and place a piece of cheese in the center.
• Add the egg mixture last before your roll and cut the wrap.

*If you want to add a side item you can have fruit, turkey bacon, and yogurt to name a few.  You can pair it up with a glass of water, type of juice, smoothie, or protein shake (depending on your fitness journey and if you need to get in some extra protein in.)*

If your looking for a new recipe to spicy your normal breakfast routine up then you should definitely try this delicious dish.  Once you try it out let me know what you think.  Also if you have any healthy recipes feel free to leave me a comment on her or on the LMC Fitness fan page on Facebook.  Check out the fitness magazine Muscle & Fitness which is for men and then Health & Fitness Hers for the women.  The websites are www.muscleandfitness.com and www.muscleandfitnesshers.com.

Hey Everyone!! We are now entering our 2nd week of our push up challenge.  Is anyone else’s arms starting to burn?? I know mine are!! But I must say I am able to do more push ups now over time then I was able to do in the past.  So I can not wait to see mine as well as you all results by the end of the month.  Today I am going to introduce three new variations of push ups you can add for the challenge.

Challenge rules:

The goal is to get at least 1000 push ups in by the end of the month. That is about 33 push ups a day. If your more advanced I would aim for 1500 or more push ups by the end of the month. You can either perform your daily repetitions all at once or perform them in sets of 3. Just remember to challenge yourself!!

Incline Push Ups

(All Fitness Levels)

• Place your hands on the bench, slightly wider than shoulder-width apart. Place your toes together on the ground behind your body.
• Extend your arms and lift your hips up in the air. Tighten your core and form a straight line from your shoulders to your heels. Your body should be at a 45 degree angle to the ground.
• Look down at the ground right in front of the bench and slowly lower your body down by bending your elbows. Stop when your chest is the width of your fist away from the bench and push back to the starting point.
• Do not let your arms completely extend when you push up. This keeps your chest muscles engaged and can prevent undue stress on your elbow joints. Keep your back perfectly straight throughout the entire exercise.
• Repeat until your desired repetitions.

*You can perform this exercise on a bench, chair, bed, or anywhere you have an incline if your doing this exercise in your house.  If you are performing this exercise in a gym you can use a bench.*

 Wide Stance Push Ups

(All Fitness Levels)

• Start on the ground on your hands and knees
• Put your arms in front of you and space your hands so that they extend beyond the width of your shoulders.
• Press your hands into the ground flat with your fingertips pointing straight out away from you.
• Stick your legs out behind you with your toes on the floor. Your weight should be evenly distributed between your toes and hands. Keep your legs perfectly straight and spaced evenly apart.
• Stretch your neck out and hold it in place. Do not move it up and down or allow it to droop while engaging in the push-ups. Keep your eyes focused down or straight ahead of you.
• Keep your body straight and don’t allow any part of your shoulders, hips or belly to droop toward the floor. Pretend your body is a straight line and keep it that way. Begin the push-up by bending your elbows and taking a deep breath.
• Control your body as you lower it toward the ground, feeling the tension in your arms and abdominal muscles. Breathe out, then push your body back up, bringing your arms back to a straight position, but don’t lock your elbows.
• Repeat until your desired repetitions.

*You can modify this exercise and perform it on your knees if needed*

 Diamond Push Ups 

(Advance)

• Get into traditional push-up position but place your hands directly under your chest with your index fingers and thumbs spread and touching making a diamond.
• Keep your back flat throughout the movement.
• Lower your body until your chest nearly touches your hands.
• Push your body back up to the starting position.
• Repeat until your desired repetitions.

*You can modify this exercise and perform it on your knees if needed.*

I hope you now have some new and exciting push up exercises to help start your push up challenge of right. We are all going to have some nice toned arms once we’re done. Next week I will introduce a few new push up exercises. Keep me posted on how many push ups you get it on either the LMC Fitness fan page or on here.