Thursday, December 27, 2012

December/January Member of the Month!


Meet Lindsey...




Hey there!


My name is Lindsey and I have been a member of the Savannah Stroller Strong Mom’s since it started in September 2012. 

I married my husband, Stephen, in 2008 and quickly realized that to fit in with his family I had to become more athletic.  He comes from a family of runners and tennis players.  I ran my first half marathon in 2009 and have since run three more as well as adding duathlons to my training.  We welcomed our baby girl, Norah, in July of 2012.  We moved to Savannah from Orlando at the beginning of September with our then 8-week old due to a new employment opportunity for my husband.  I am originally from the Atlanta area, so being closer to family with a new baby made the decision to move a very easy one.  I won’t lie, I was nervous about coming to a new town and trying to meet new people.  I was also trying to figure out how to shed some of the baby weight that I gained and get back into running and getting fit. 

I came across the SSM website while searching for mommy and me type classes in the Savannah area.  I read all about Alexa and what the class was about.  It sounded intriguing and I figured that it wouldn’t hurt to give it a try.  When I started the classes, Norah wasn’t quite big enough for a jogging stroller but we made it work and now coming to class has become part of our daily routine.  The stress of meeting new people has long been gone.  The ladies that show up for SSM classes are a fabulous group of women that are incredibly motivating and make coming to class really enjoyable…even if we are all complaining about how sore we are from a previous day’s workout! 



I have made it a goal to come everyday that I possibly can.  I know that I am getting stronger and I hope to show my daughter that an active lifestyle is a fun and important part of our lives.  We have now done our first family 5K (with hubby pushing jogger) and I look forward to many more.  It was great to share this race with many of the other SSM moms.  Thanks Alexa for pushing us hard every workout and being a great instructor, and for all of the moms that are right there with me as we get our sweat on! 

Monday, December 10, 2012

Get Fit for 2013

It's that time of year again for another Get Fit Challenge! The following are the details about Get Fit for 2013.

Get Fit For 2013 is a 10 week program that will start January 14th and it will end on March 25th for  SSM Columbus. The Savannah start has been changed to January 16th. 

It will include both a fitness assessment (during class time) and body composition assessment (by appointment in the first and last week of the challenge) at the start and end of the program. The fitness assessment will include:

-Shuttle run for time
-Step ups, count steps
-1/2 mile run, for time
-Push ups, count reps
-Plank hold, for time

The body composition assessment will be calculated using a bio-impedence scale which gives a readout of the following:
weight
bmi
fat free mass
body fat
hydration %

You will receive points in five ways:
-Class attendance
-Improvement in fitness assessment
-Improvement in body composition assessment
-MVP of the week (a hard working mom will be chosen every week as the MVP)
-Whether you reached the fitness goal you set for yourself on January 14th

Points will be tallied throughout the program and participants with the most points at the end of the 10 weeks will receive gift card prizes.

You will take a before/after picture at class at the start and end of the program so you can see how much the hard work payed off!

There is a $15 registration fee. Payment can be made on the prices page of SSM website or at class. You have to be a member of SSM in order to participate in the GFF2013. To be a member of SSM, you must purchase a 1 month unlimited membership, 10 class pass, or 5 class pass. 

'Get Fit for 2013' will happen during regular class days and times. The fitness testing will take place on January 14th (16th for Savannah) and March 25th during class time. The body composition testing will occur by appointment during the first and last week of the challenge. More detailed info on the body composition testing is to follow.

Moms will also have the option to pair the Get Fit for 2013 Challenge with a weight loss program that will be put on by the weight loss center where the initial weigh-ins occur. The weight loss programs are an extra cost, but discounted for SSMs. The Columbus weight loss program is called bLean and is a 6 week program for $99. Click this link for more info.  www.bfitcolumbus.com. The Savannah weight loss program can be found at http://www.goodbodydoctor.com/ and it is $49 per month for Stroller Strong Moms! Please let an instructor know if you are interested in more information about the weight loss program. 

You do not have to participate in the 'Get Fit For 2013' as a member of Stroller Strong Moms. It is your choice. Any questions, concerns, comments can be sent to info@strollerstrongmoms.com



Last year's Get Fit Challenge was a GREAT success. Moms lost noticeable amounts of body fat and improved tremendously in their fitness assessments. The results were extremely impressive!! The above photo shows last year's top finishers. Moms lost as much as 15 pounds over the 10 weeks and many dropped body fat percentages by over 5% (which is SUPER impressive). 


Looking forward to this GFF2013!!!

Thursday, November 15, 2012

SSM November News

November News 

Hey Stroller Strong Moms! What a great month of October. The month concluded with a couple awesome Halloween classes in Columbus and Savannah!!! There were so many awesome mom costumes and cute little baby costumes!!! Below are a couple photos, but to see the awesome pics from the Halloween class in Columbus (thanks Joe Paull and the Ledger Enquirer!!), click here. To see more pics from the Savannah Halloween class, click here.  


Stroller Strong Moms in Columbus completed a circuit workout in the huge field at Britt David Park


Stroller Strong Moms of Savannah completed Halloween-themed stations throughout Forsyth Park 

Columbus Instructors in a Waldo sandwich: Kim, Julie (Betty), Jill (Wilma), and Rebecca
Savannah instructor Alexa as Mango from SNL 





















CONGRATS TO THE GIRLS ONLY 5K PARTICIPANTS!!! 
October's Mom's Night Out in Columbus was Big Dog's Girls Only 5K! The ladies really came together and there were a bunch of first time 5Kers in the group who did awesome!!! Look at all that pink SLAM!! 




CONGRATS HALF MARATHONERS! 
Stroller Strong Moms have been preparing for months with group long runs and interval training for the November half marathons. I don't think there was a weekend that went by in Columbus where moms weren't getting together to do a long run. I loved seeing moms work together toward their goal. Stroller Strong Moms participated in two different Half Marathons over the first two weekends in November, the Savannah Rock'n'Roll Half Marathon and the Soldier's Half Marathon in Fort Benning. Everyone did awesome! What an accomplishment!!!! 


Rock'n'Roll Half Marathoners! (Not picured: Kim Watson and Tanya Webb) 

Soldier's Half Marathoners and SSM Fan Club!!! Not pictured: Carly Mueller (where were u Carly?!) and Katherine Rudder (who ran the full!)


So much great stuff has been going on for Stroller Strong Moms. I am so proud of how SSMs came together at the half marathons and I am so excited for future races we have coming up in both Columbus and Savannah! 

WELCOME NEWCOMERS!!!! 
Lets welcome October Newcomers to Stroller Strong Moms. Savannah newcomers include Kim Watson, Candace Russell and Rachel Lane. Columbus newcomers include Kristin Salmi, Ashley Bunnell, Aida Joslin, April West, Melissa Barrington and Annie Chittick. 




And I leave you with another awesome quote. It can't be more true that you get out of something what you put into it. If you attend class frequently and work your butt off, you will get results. Your fitness level with skyrocket and you will notice positive changes to your body and your energy levels.   We have had the joy of watching the transformation take place in so many moms and it's awesome!!! Keep up the good work ladies and keep SLAMing!!! 

~Alexa 





Wednesday, November 14, 2012

Eating and Fitness Flubs


Reposting this one because it's a good one... 

SSM ladies...this is a MUST READ. The following is an article written by Christa Doran, a very successful boot camp fitness trainer. She discusses the big eating and exercise mistakes that women are making all the time and how to fix them. I feel like a lot of us moms find it very difficult to lose the body fat gained during pregnancy. Christa offers lots of tips and explanations that will help you to lose that fat so that you look and feel like one fit mama!!! 

Fatal Flubs on the Journey to FIT

I love reading all the weight/diet/food/exercise posts on facebook. They are just a blog waiting to be written! The reason I only train women is because I feel so many women just simply have no clue when is comes to HOW to lose body fat and build the body of their dreams. It is no fault of their just don’t know what information to trust.

So why is what I am telling you right? Well, I guess results speak for themselves and I have about 300 women who finally “get it” and would be willing to tell you they did it wrong for so many years. Here are the big ones. The big NOOOOO’s!!! that I see women do all the time.

Gimmicks- Have you seen the new Kim Kardashian Sketchers commercial? Apparently she has ditched her trainer and now gets the body of her dreams by walking around in stupid looking shoes. Sounds amazing right? Wrong. She gets paid millions to tell you that Quicktrim and Shape-Ups work. They don’t. You know what works? REGULAR, HARD work and a clean portioned diet. That is it. The stomach flu is a great way to lose weight too, that doesn’t mean it will produce long-term sustainable results.

Eating diet food- Lean Cuisines, 100 calorie snack packs, Light and Fit,  and sugar free jello are all diet missteps that are making you fatter. Nutritionally empty, but filled with crap and artificial ingredients, these foods are a waste of your calories and your money.
Instead, eat small portions every 3-5 hours of real,whole, foods. And don’t get me started on the sugar! That Gatorade you are guzzling during your Zumba class? Loaded with sugar.
What is real food? Food that rots. Food that has one ingredient. Food that was grown, or harvested by farmers, not made in a lab with scientists. Whole eggs, whole grains, vegetables, whole fruit (not dried or juiced), lean meat, plain greek yogurt, almonds, beans, grains like couscous, Bulgar wheat, quinoa, and whole grain pasta are foods that fill you, fuel you, and make your body look, feel and perform better.
Good food has calories too so you need to watch your portions!

Going on a diet at all- If you want to change, then you  have to change. And a diet it a short term fix for a long term problem. Change the way you eat and change how much you eat, and your body will change. It will take time, but if you stick with it, 3 months from now you could be leaner, lighter, and feel amazing!

Using the calorie counter on the elliptical as a guide of how “good” your workout was- This is one of those that I just laugh out loud on. “Man do I feel great! Burned 500 calories walking on the treadmill!” Calories burned depends on how much you weigh, how much muscle you have, and how hard you are working. And the treadmill can only tell you one of those things. So you might THINK you burned 500 calories, but you probably burned about 20-40% less than that.
I actually hate when my clients asked me how many they burned. Who cares? Are you a sweaty beast? Can you barely lift your arms? Are you struggling to get up off the ground? Good! Then you earned the right to leave.

Using the elliptical at all- If you want to change your body, you have to challenge it.  And unless you are warming up on the elliptical (and even then I don’t like it) before you throw around some heavy metal, than you are making a HUGE mistake.
One of the reasons men lose weight quicker than women is because they have more muscle, and muscle is your furnace. It is what burns the calories. So a 140 pound woman with 15% body fat is burning a LOT more calories throughout her day than a 140 pound woman with 30% body fat. Build muscle, burn more.
The only way to build muscle is through strength and resistance training. So pick up some weights and get lifting. And those weights better weigh more than your handbag. In fact, if they are pink, and you can do 20 reps, they are too light. Take that Tracey Anderson.
It has to be HARD. You should be struggling. You should be breathing heavy. It should be very challenging. If not, trade up for something heavier.

Expecting overnight results-One week of hitting the gym hard and eating salads for lunch and you lost a pound. So you skip the gym and eat ice cream. Big mistake.
It takes a 3500 calorie deficit to lose one pound of body fat. And fat is what matters. Who cares about water weight. Yea, you are lighter after a night of boozing, but that doesn’t mean your jeans fit any better. Keep doing the right things, week after week, month after month, and if in a few months you are STILL not seeing changes, re-evaluate.

Quitting quickly- This goes hand in hand with seeing overnight results. Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither will a chiseled, lean, strong physique.

Weighing yourself every day- Hormones, water retention, time of the month, a big meal, all play a part in our weight. Once a week weigh yourself- NO MORE. If you have fat to lose, and the scale is not budging, you are doing something wrong. Stop making excuses, and change something.
Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”
-Albert Einstein

Focusing on a “goal weight”- Muscle weights more than fat. So if you are working out with weights for the first time you might actually gain weight. So what? Your body will look better, feel better, take up less space, and perform better. I would rather be a 130 pound size 4/6 with a shredded middle and cut arms than a 130 pounds flabby size 8/10 with no muscle. Wouldn’t you?

NOT lifting weights- Get off the elliptical, cut back on Zumba (gag) and start picking up things that make your muscles burn, your arms shake, and your sweat flow.
But be sure and work with a qualified trainer to teach you proper form or you could hurt yourself. What is qualified? NOT an accountant turned Crossfit trainer, or a substitute teacher turned globo gym training god after one weekend course.

Training with the wrong people- I recently had a very thin client show up to bootcamp with 2 pound weights telling me she wanted to lose ten pounds. I had to fight back my laughter as I told her we don’t use 2 pound weights here (her large handbag weighed more than her weights). I also fought back a disturbed look thinking she needs to GAIN ten pounds of muscle, not lose ten pounds of fat. She told me she works with a trainer at a globo gym that I cannot stand. After watching her struggle during class it was clear to me her trainer was, just as I expected, terrible, and obviously feeding her weight loss neurosis. My guess is this client had never lifted a weight over 5 pounds. Shame on that trainer.
You get what you pay for. Work with a qualified, experienced, reputable trainer who will NOT stick you on any machine.
So in summary. Work hard, really hard, really regularly. Eat real food, in small amounts, real often. Don’t eat crap, steer clear of sugar. Get off the treadmill and lift heavy things. Push and pull your body-weight. Stop stressing about each and every pound and try to ENJOY the journey to your best body. It will take time, dedication, discipline, and sweat. But if you really want it, it can be yours.

What a great article by Christa Doran. Be sure to take away the following important rules to diet and exercise:
1. Eat real food: fruits, veggies, nuts, whole grains, lean meat, etc. 
2. Eat small portions about 5 times a day...tip...eat on smaller plates and eat just until satisfied
3. Push yourself HARD and 'Sweat like a Mother' during every exercise session
4. Don't focus on weight loss but rather on how you feel and how your clothes fit

Hope that helps ladies!!! Stay tuned for healthy eating food list....

Wednesday, November 7, 2012

November Member of the Month!


Hey everyone!
Most of you might already know me as I have been a part of Stroller Strong for over a year now- (since day one!) and I must say that it has become such a big part of my life!
What you might not know about me is that I am from Tucson, Arizona and never in a million years did I ever think I would end up here. I met my husband Chris when we were in high school then shortly after he graduated, he joined the Army. I graduated two years later while he was already serving his first combat tour in Iraq. I stayed in Arizona and continued to play soccer (which had been my life since I was 6) at Pima Community College, but when I was offered an athletic scholarship for my second year there, I turned it down and ran away to Ft. Bliss, Texas to marry my soldier!

A year later, he deployed again and we welcomed Evan into the world during his two week R&R. Five months later, daddy returned home and we began preparing for our move to Fort Benning. Since arriving here, we have fostered four dogs and I am just three classes shy of my Bachelor’s degree in Elementary Education.
When I first heard about Stroller Strong Moms, I decided to give it a try, but honestly, I thought it would be pretty lame- just a bunch of moms walking around taking up space at the park- but my was I wrong! Now six months pregnant with our second baby, I got Evan and my jogger and gave it a go. After that first class, I remember thinking it was like one of those conditioning practices we sometimes had without the soccer ball… So I ended up sticking around until about two weeks before our Norah was born and made a vow to myself to come back as hard as ever!


In March of this year, before Norah was three months old, I ran my first ever 5k. It was such a fun, inspiring, and motivating experience running with a big group of my fellow SSMs. After that, I was hooked! I had never ever run just for the sake of running before and now I will running in my first half marathon next weekend!
Thanks Alexa, Kim, Rebecca, Jill, and Julie, and to everyone else alongside me every day SLAMmin’! I’m so proud to call myself a Stroller Strong Mom!


Thursday, October 18, 2012

SSM October News...

October News!

Hey Everybody, 

I am going to start a monthly news blog just to talk about what's going on each month, welcome new members, share important information and just keep in touch! So here goes... 

October is a fun filled month for Stroller Strong Moms. There are some great events coming up, especially the Girl's Night Out 5k tomorrow night (Friday) in Columbus. I am excited that so many SSms are going to participate including moms who have never done a 5k, that's awesome! 

We are also looking forward to the Halloween Theme class on the 31st. Both Columbus and Savannah will be having a costume class with a 'stroll or treat' for the kids afterwards, followed by a potluck! Check out the Facebook invites for more info!

Savannah classes are in full swing and going great! The grand opening was a huge success with 23 moms who came out to give SSM a try! My hope is that SSM Savannah continues to grow and help more and more moms achieve their health and fitness goals. 



I am looking forward to having some Columbus ladies in town for the Savannah Rock'n'Roll Marathon, the Bridge Run and hopefully the Color Run too! It will be great to have Savannah and Columbus SSMs come together for some races!

I'd like to welcome some September newcomers to Columbus SSM including Christy Hubbard, Cathryn Pease, Bonnie Stahl (welcome back!), Boyana Bjork, Donna Gilberti, Tara Gomen, Katie Provencher, Paola Carreno, Meghan Speris, Rachel Thomas, Sarah McLean, Shannon Porter, Tuesday Pritchett, Gabby Gutridge (welcome back!), Jessica Hooser, Ashley Bialochowski, and Katie Herczeg!! Wow, that's a lot of new ladies, welcome! Shows what an awesome job our amazing instructors are doing!! Keep up the great work everyone! 

Something to look out for: Next month I will start a monthly feature called 'Member of the Month' where a deserving member will be chosen to share her amazing story with us. Each month a different member will be featured on the blog!

Lastly, I have some news... we will be expecting our 3rd little one on April 29th!!!! We are really excited and couldn't wait to share our news with our SSM family!!!!

And I leave you with this awesome quote that made me think of all you amazing Stroller Strong Moms and your efforts to continue to take on new challenges and improve yourselves day after day... 


Keep SLAMing ladies! 

~Alexa