OCTOBER CHALLENGE - HOW FUN!!! (CLOSED GROUP)

SeasideOasis

Hello my friends and team mates!! As you all know (and in case you don't), my name is Summer and I will be leading you through your October Challenge:glasses: ! This challenge (with major proper to Gary6030 because he puts all this fabulous stuff together) is made to do IN ADDITION to your normal workout routine. We want to see some AWESOME results for the month of October. I don't know about you, but I have a vacation at the end of this month, followed by two MAJOR eating holidays (or should I say....two MONTHS of eating), so I want to make sure every moment of October COUNTS!

Our team consists of:
gemmaterry
lect
cookiegem
thefreeman28
creiche
mindy14456
dmoses
saydee3
rowmoor
And myself

If you could take come time over the next couple of days to introduce yourself to one another on this forum post, that would be amazing. Adding one another, if you aren't already friends, would also be another team building thing to do.

Here is my introduction:

My name is Summer. I am 25 years old and from Cleveland, Ohio! In January, I took a look in the mirror and realized something was horrible wrong...I gained nearly 40 pounds over the last couple of years. To me, I am/was the size of a house. I've got some health problems, however, I am no longer letting that get in my way to becoming healthy again! I've struggled with seeing improvements in my body, but not a whole lot when it comes to the scale. This month, I want to shock myself with some impressive weight losses!! I have started paying closer attention to my eating, more time at the gym, and do funny things when at work (like my 25 jumping jacks every 15 minutes yesterday...for three hours) to keep elevating my heart rate and keep my metabolism peeking! My motivation is myself. I know how fit I can be, I know how strong I used to be, and I'm still here, but not in the right form. I'd love to be back in my normal clothing by the end of the year!! I hope as your leader/captain/friend that I am able to be there for your to motivate you in your exercise or to kick you into shape (per request) if I see you munching on things like endless Hershey Bars.

Here is how the challenge works...
Every Sunday Night/Monday Morning (once the exercises are posted for me to put on the forums), I will post a new forum entry to let everyone know what the exercises for that week are.

There are two different types of exercises you can complete. The Pygmy series, which is a little easier (but still a GREAT workout...let me tell you), and great for starting off! The bushmen series is definitely a lot harder and forces you to test your own strength and endurance. Below are links to the challenge that is going on right now for September. I think it is a great example of what you will be doing in October!

Pygmy http://mfpchallenges.blogspot.com/2011/09/week-5-pygmy-challenge.html
Bushmen http://mfpchallenges.blogspot.com/2011/09/week-5-bushmen-series.html

I will post the actual exercises (with youtube video links in case you don't know what some are) on the forums come the first of the month. Keep in mind, as long as the exercises are completed by the end of the week (Monday start - Sunday end) we get the points. If you know you cant workout on a Wednesday, then use that as your rest day that week, or double up on another day. Whatever you do, do not hurt yourself!!

We get points for completing the daily exercises, staying in the green for our calories, as well as drinking our 9 glasses of water a day!!

Weigh-ins are on Mondays! If you can get your weigh-ins to me as soon as possible that would be VERY helpful. PM or on that weeks forum post are both great ways to let me know your progress so I can track!

October 1st is a Saturday, so it throws things off just a little bit. If you want to wait till Monday, October 3rd to give me you starting weight, you are more than welcome!!

LASTLY, I think we should have a team name to represent us, so throw out some things you think might be fun!!

:flowerforyou: Remember, we are all winners. There is so such thing and failure, only success! If we keep our eyes on the prize, our health (and awesome bodies) will thank us!!:flowerforyou:

Creiche

Hi everyone!! My name is Colleen and I live in the Boston, MA area, though I originally hail from the Chicago area. My journey started almost a year ago after seeing photos of myself from a friend's wedding and realizing there was a huge chasm between the "real" me that loves to be active inside and the blob I saw in the pictures. I've lost almost 30 lbs since then counting calories, exercising regularly, and doing P90X earlier this year. I'm currently training for a zombie infested 5K adventure race at the end of October (yes, you read that right :happy: ), so hopefully this challenge will help get my bootie in gear!

I'd like to lose 5 lbs or so more, but I'm more focused on getting in better cross training shape and losing some inches. I'm currently running about 3 days a week (trying to get in better running shape for this event) and strength training (mostly P90X workouts at home) 3 days a week. Other extraneous information about myself: I'm a shorty (5'3") with freakishly small feet and hands.

Looking forward to kicking butt at this challenge with you guys and getting to know you all!! Huge thanks to Summer for organizing and leading us!!

thefreemans28

Thanks for getting this going, Summer!! I am excited for October 1st (and 31st!)

About me.... My name is Ashlee. I live in a small town between Dayton and Springfield, Ohio with my husband of 4 1/2 years, our 18 month old son, Aiden, and our 3 year old Shih-Tzu, Lillee Mae. I am an insurance agent for my father-in-law's agency (a.k.a. I sit on my fat butt all day, 9-5!) I joined MFP December 2010 and have lost almost 40 pounds since then. I have about 20 pounds to go til my lowest goal weight (I want to maintain between 130 and 140 - I'm 5'4"). Since joining MFP I have discovered a passion for running that I never knew I had! I have also somehow encouraged my mother and father to join MFP and start their own journies, too, and to me that is the ultimate success! To see my loved ones want what is best for themselves! Anyway, my ultimate motivation to lose these last 20 pounds is because I told my husband we cannot start trying for baby #2 until I hit my goal weight! And we don't want to start trying any later than December. So I just have to keep reminding myself that December is quickly approaching, so I had better get my butt in full gear!!!!

As for team name suggestions... I'm no good at that stuff, so I'll leave it up to the creative genius's I'm sure we have here.

Dauntlessness

Hi, I am Tricha aka Lect. I have been with MFP for around a year but I was not an active on the website until December of last year. I have lost about 58 pounds since joining the website and I plan on losing at least another 42. I work out 5 days a week and sometimes on the weekends. I try to eat healthy but food is definitely my biggest issue...mostly the sweet stuff. hehe.
I have been overweight most of my life and around a year ago I think I got sick of tired or being sick and tired. I was wasting my life not feeling good about myself and being in pain from lac of activity. I want to feel proud of the things I do and feel like I am treating my body, mind and spirit with the respect it deserves. I also want to be able to wear clothes off the rack. Recently I was able to start doing that! I shrunk 6 sizes!!! lol woowhoo
Anyhow, Its nice to meet you all and I look forward to kicking butt! I will be adding you as friends too

GemmieNoWobbles

Hi Ladies
So I'm Gemma, I live in the UK in the south by the sea, I'm 28 and live with my boyfriend of 10 years and our 2 ferrets. I've always been unhappy with the way I look, I've never been particularly overweight, I just feel podgy and I want to be lean and svelt and feel comfortable in my own skin. The years are creeping by and I want to get to a point in my life (still hopefully in my prime) and be happy with myself. So I am doing this for me.
So I have a crazy workout regime, I go to the gym or do something at least 6 times a week, see a personal trainer ever 6 weeks and generally try and burn the flab, but its really tough as you all know and food is my biggest weakness. When I am stressed or bored or sad or anything really i reach for the food.
I've done an August challenge and finishing the September challenge with Summer, its really good to keep you accountable and make new friends.

Just asked my boyfriend for team name suggestions and he just came up with Flab Bast*rds... hmmm... thanks for that Ben!! **made me laugh though** I will keep thinking about the name.

CookieGem

Hello Everyone

I'm Gemma and live in lovely York in the UK. Im 28 and live with my boyfriend Trev (who is as skinny as a s0dding rake and can eat anything!). Im a designer for a American company and keeping my fingers crossed that I will be taking a trip to Washington soon. So my big wake up call was when i booked my holiday at the begining of July and realised I hated how I looked in my bikini so went on a manic health kick. As soon as i went on my holiday the diet and fitness have just completely gone out of the window and I need a new goal which is to lose a stone by christmas day, which would just be amazing! At the moment im suffering with something called Laberyinthitis which means at the moment I am permenantly dizzy but hopefully for no more than 8 weeks

I will think try and think of a team name.s tonight.

Go go team nameless

saydee3

Hi team!

My name is Sadie and I live in Little Rock, AR. I am super excited (and slightly nervous!) about this challenge. My weight has always fluctuated from being skinny to slightly overweight through my entire life. I gained almost twenty pounds really quickly from October to January (partly due to a change in some medicine) and now I'm fighting to get it off.

I got married last fall and we're almost to our one year anniversary! We are a food family (cooking professionally) and love to eat! There's pretty much nothing I won't eat except for pickles, olives and avocados, and a lot of the things I love to eat are not good for me! I can redesign pretty much any recipe into something healthy, and I've had a lot of fun testing out new recipes to learn to eat healthier.

I will think about a name, I really don't have any ideas right now but I'll ponder it!!

Woohooo team!

dmoses

Hi All,

Thanks for letting me join you guys on this challenge. I hope I don't disappoint!!

My name is Debbie, and I live in Durham, NC. Hubs and I have been married for 11 years, and we have a 12-year old Jack Russell and an 11-year old Yorkie. I was always an overweight child, one of the largest in my small classes. Needless to say, self-esteem was in the negative, and kids were awfully mean to me! I lost a lot of weight after I moved out on my own, about 50 lbs, and kept it off for a while. I got lax, and slowly put back on about 30 lbs. I hated taking pictures because I didn't feel as fat as I looked in those pictures. So, I was always behind the camera. In June 2009, I stopped eating sweets in preparation for my annual physical (yea, I know. I cheat!!), and then the weight started dropping slowly. I added some exercise to my daily routine, and the weight just fell off. In September 2010, I reach my ultimate goal, and I've been struggling to maintain since then. I had some issues with binge eating a few months ago, but hopefully, by eating more throughout the day, I think I have those episodes under control now (I HOPE!).

I'm looking forward to this challenge!! Let's do this thing!!

mindy14456

Hello my awesome teammates!! My name is Mindy, I live in Rochester NY. I have been on my journey since April, I signed up in January but didn't start until April. I have been active but overweight my whole life. Luckily I am in great health, so my weightloss goal is to be fit and happy with what I see in the mirror. I have 50 lbs to go before I can get my reward of skydiving. Seriously can't wait for that! I have been doing Turbo Fire, Chalean Extreme, and just added in running. I am not loving it but hope it grows on me. Especially since I just signed up to run my first 5K on Thanksgiving morning!

So happy to be doing this challenge with you, and our team will definitely be on top!!

Stephabee38

Hey I know that this is a closed group... but do you mind if I join?

SeasideOasis

Thank you everyone that has participated thus far I love seeing my girls rock out!

So, Gary posted this line the other day ".I think it's about that time to throw Fatty Overboard in October", so I think our Team Name should be something funny...Gemma, maybe Ben wasn't so far off :laugh:

saydee3

Look out ladies!!! Some of the exercises we'll be doing have been posted on the Challenge blog. We're going to get our butts kicked!!

GemmieNoWobbles

Are we all going to be brave and post before and after pics?

Creiche

Are we all going to be brave and post before and after pics?

I think I will! Not sure that I'll lose much on the scale this month, but I'm hoping to see progress in photos and from measurements!

GemmieNoWobbles

OK done my pics... Monday is the start of me being a good girl!! x

saydee3

So Gemma and I talked this morning, and since the challenge isn't up yet, we're going to go through a circuit of the nine exercises listed as new for October, doing each exercise for 60 seconds, resting 10 seconds between moves, then repeat the whole thing from the top at least once, maybe twice.

I did it once this morning and I'm going to do it again tonight. I just woke up late and am hustling around the house trying to get ready.

Here are the exercises. http://mfpchallenges.blogspot.com/2011/09/overboard-in-october-exercises.html

Summer, are we supposed to log these a certain way to get credit?

Creiche

Just FYI for everyone, I'm leaving on vacation Thursday and won't be back until Tuesday night. I'll likely still be popping in, but I wanted to make sure everyone knows I'm not abandoning the team and plan on doing next week's challenges as soon as I return...hopefully they'll help burn off all the bad food I'll likely be eating!

I was hoping the challenges for this week would have been posted by now so I could do some of them before leaving, but it's not looking good. I'll do my best to squeeze them in though! Good luck to everyone and have a wonderful weekend!!

GemmieNoWobbles

Just FYI for everyone, I'm leaving on vacation Thursday and won't be back until Tuesday night. I'll likely still be popping in, but I wanted to make sure everyone knows I'm not abandoning the team and plan on doing next week's challenges as soon as I return...hopefully they'll help burn off all the bad food I'll likely be eating!

I was hoping the challenges for this week would have been posted by now so I could do some of them before leaving, but it's not looking good. I'll do my best to squeeze them in though! Good luck to everyone and have a wonderful weekend!!

Have a great time!!