David Chiu

When of the best way to achieve your goals is to find a partner who wants to achieve the same goals so that you can keep each other accountable and motivated. Lucky for me, my beautiful wife has decided to join me in my 30 day fitness challenge. Today I had a day off from work so I got to sleep in and recover from yesterday’s yoga/martial arts fusion class. Heather was feeling extra-motivated and convinced me to go hiking with her in the morning at Runyon Canyon. I told her that we should probably take it easy and recover since we were going to another cardio class tonight, but she really wants to make sure we get results from the program so we hiked uphill for about 5 miles with our corgi Winston.

Tonight we were back in class. There was a heater in the room, which I wasn’t sure if it was purposely put there to make the room hot, or just keep the room warm since temperatures outside have been cooler. Either way, 10min into the routine and I’m sweating like crazy. The instructor is able to trick us into these advanced yoga poses which require both strength and balance, then transitions them into martial arts cardio moves mixed with the yoga poses. We end up doing a ton of “downward dog” poses which we hold for a minute or two then lower into a push-up and then back arch. I could definitely feel it in my shoulders and my arms. As the workout went on, the room became hotter and hotter with that heater on, and I found myself not able to keep up with some of the cardio moves. Near the end of the workout we move from downward dog position into a forearm push-up, then transitioned into a “bridge” pose which is a killer ab workout, but then continued to a “v” pose and started doing crunches while holding a “v” pose. By the end of the workout I was sweating so much it sounded like it was raining on my yoga mat. That was a killer workout.

Food log:

• 1 1/2 cups of organic flax seed/raisin bran
• 1 cup french press coffee
• 55g whey protein
• Poquito Mas bean and chicken burrito (no cheese)
• 5 bean chips with 2 tbsp bean dip, 1 wheat cracker w/ 2 tbsp organic peanut butter
• 1 large steamed wild alaskan salmon filet w/ 2 cups of brown rice and 4 stalks of broccolini
• 55g whey protein

Is it possible to transform your body in 30 days?

From all the articles I’ve read over the years in Mens Health and Muscle and Fitness, I know it’s possible. The real question is if it’s possible for me to transform my body in 30 days. That’s my challenge. I’ve been trying for years to achieve my fitness goals and have gone through personal trainers, circuit training, weight training, hip-hop aerobics, abs classes, low carb diets and thousands of dollars worth of sports nutrition supplements to get closer too, but never achieve my goals. The only two things that really seemed to help was the low carb diet - which took me from a chubby 185lbs 25%bodyfat 37in waist to a non-ripped 165lbs 15%bodyfat 31in waist, and my last personal trainer - a half Korean, half African American chiseled body builder with a heavy Korean accent and gentle demeanor. At the end of my training program with him I put on 10lbs of muscle and was benching 225lbs. Right now I’m 182lbs 20%bodyfat 33in waist. Ultimately my goal is to be 185lbs 10%bodyfat. But for the next 30 days I’m going to concentrate on losing 8lbs of bodyfat and mainting muscle mass. I know this is completely possible losing 2lbs a week by staying on a strict diet, increasing cardio and changing my weight lifiting plan to moderate weight and high reps. After years of reading fitness articles, I know getting lean and ripped is all about a strict diet. So for my diet I will be following the guidelines of the Abs Diet, but will increase my vegetable proportions, decrease my carb intake slightly and increase my protein intake so that I will be eating 2000 calories daily maintaining my current muscle mass by ingesting 182g of protein a day and supplementing with BCAA’s, L-Glutamine, and pre-alkalyne creatine (to increase strength but prevent water retention). To increase my cardio I will be joining a new yoga/martial arts class. I’ve studied martial arts for a few years when I was younger, but never have really done yoga. This fusion of yoga/martial arts promises to stretch and strengthen core muscles plus provide an intense cardio workout. I will be taking this class every other day/4 days a week. In-between those cardio classes I will be lifting weights on tuesday and thursday taking saturday off for rest and recovery. I know that if I can stick to this plan and schedule I can definitely transform my body.

Today was the first day of my personal fitness challenge, and also the first day of my new yoga/martial arts fusion class. I really enjoyed the energy of the class and how the instructor was able to ease us into different yoga positions. The workout was killer I don’t think I’ve ever sweat that much in any cardio class. I really liked how plyometric moves were incorporated into the yoga positions and kept my heart rate going. Sticking with this class will be key in helping me achieving my fitness goals.