Greedy Girls Guide

If you’ve been following my blog you’ve seen mention the Eat This Not That books series by David Zinczenko. These are my favorite quick reference healthy/ diet eating books. Forget about the diet books that tell you what to eat, when, and how much; these books show you simply the best choices to make. The premise is that by making better food choices you loose weight, it’s that simple. Currently there are the 3 books in the series the Original, shows you healthy choices in food chains and restaurants, the Supermarket Survival Guide shows which items you should stick with and which to avoid in the grocery store, and the Kids guide helps you make better choices for our kids. David also writes regular articles for Yahoo Health sharing some of the tips in his famous books, his latest article: 6 Healthiest Foods You Aren’t Eating.

So for the exciting news, I just found out today that on 7/21/09 David Zinczenko will be adding another book to the series: Eat This Not That! The Best (& Worst!) Foods in America!: The No-Diet Weight Loss Solution If you’ve read any the other other books or the Yahoo articles you’ll know that this promises to be a great book. The new book is available now for pre-order (order yours by clicking the link below) and ships around 7/21/09. I’ve already order mine and you know I’ll be back with the full review next week.

Book Description from Amzon
Did you know that choosing one fast-food milk shake over another can save you 2,000 calories? That’s right. The difference is an entire day’s worth of calories. Make a swap once a week and you’ll save nearly 30 pounds in one year. And that’s just the start.

Eat This Not That! The Best (& Worst!) Foods in America! lists thousands of the fastest and easiest ways to cut calories quickly while still eating all the foods you love. All you need is a smart insider’s guide. And now, the right choices are simple. You’ll discover:

• The best and worst drive-thru foods. (Place smart orders at the window to avoid packing on pounds).
• 15 “healthy” foods that aren’t. (Learn about the supposedly “healthy” foods that are secretly packing your body with excess calories, fat, sugar, and sodium–and what you should eat instead to lose weight effortlessly).
• 14 foods your cardiologist wouldn’t eat. (These restaurant meals are so salty that you should throw them over your shoulder for good luck instead. If you care about heart health, blood pressure, and avoiding a stroke, don’t let them pass your lips!)

Arm yourself with the ultimate weapon in winning the war on fat. Learn how you can make simple and smart eating changes today that will reshape your body and your life in as little as 7 days.

Technorati Tags: eat this not that, food choices, healthy eating, no diet diet

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I was looking through some Tweets on Twitter today and came across this link to a great workout tool.

It’s called the Workout Builder and it’s brought to us by Diet.com. It’s an online tool that strings videos for individual exercise together to make your own routine. The routine is fully customizable you can choose what area you want to workout, what equipment you want to use, and even what order and how many reps of the exercises. Forget Build-a-Bear it’s Build-a-Workout Video.

It’s perfect if you’re not sure what exercise to do to target a muscle group, if you want to find exercises to use a certain piece of equipment, if you want to mix up your routines, and/ or if you find you don’t like a particular exercise, and want to take it out of your routine. You can build multiple routines and even save your routines for later use. And best of all it’s FREEE!!!!

I tried a few routines and combination and thought is was a fantastic tool. The videos can be a bit choppy but for everything you are getting a slightly slower connection is not going to hurt. It wouldn’t be a full a review if i didn’t mention the 2 Cons that I did notice

1. 1  It appears this is mostly for strength training I didn’t see any cardio exercises in the line up
2. 2  The equipment choice is just home equipment like dumb bells and balance balls. No gym machines.

But even with these 2 shortcoming it is still a great tool. And maybe they’ll expand to include the other items in the future.

So check-it out and let us know what you think:

Diet.com Workout Builder

Technorati Tags: excercise help, find routine, finess instruction, workout, workout video

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It’s been about 2 weeks since I started the Wii Active vs. Personal Training challenge. I had a lot going on last week so I didn’t do so well at either but I did do enough in week one to start with my review.

The Assessments

The first session of each was an initial assessment.

The trainer took me through a few exercises and machines to determine my fitness level, my form, and other items of interest. I was also able discuss with him my goals and to let him know about my recent knee and hip problems so he can modify my workouts accordingly.

The Wii Active assessment is very basic it asks you a few questions regarding weight, height, and intensity level and you on your way. The Wii Active assessment is very basic compared to even that of the Wii Fit game which takes you through a battery of test. So much for improvement, I think such a brief assessment is major short coming of the Wii Active. Another short coming of the Wii Actives initial set up is it doesn’t ask you what your goals are. This is a very simple question that would make a big difference in how much and often you do certain exercises, and they just neglected to ask.

The First Works Outs

The works out with the Wii Active and the Trainer are structured very similar; both started with a warm up and then moved through a series of exercise.

The warm up for the Wii Active is running in place for 2 mins and with the trainer it was the Cardio of my choice for 10 mins.  Although I think the longer warm up is preferable, here is an area where I thought the Wii Active made a great attempt. The game monitors how fast you are going and how much effort you are putting in, it pushes you to go faster when you have dropped below acceptable levels and it gives you different running styles such as high knee kicks to continue to add interest to your run.

After warm up the Trainer and Wii both begin a series of exercises the trainer using weights and gym equipment and the Wii using the band and Wiimotes. Prior to each new exercise the trainer shows the equipment adjusts the weight and counts as you complete the set. Occasionally he commented on my form, breathing and how fast I was moving through the reps. The Wii shows you a brief video before each exercise and then counts and monitors as you complete the sets. I found the videos were sometimes long and disrupted my workflow but for the beginner it is important to watch them so you ensure you are doing the exercise correctly. Also, the game keeps track of what videos you’ve already seen and the next time you do the exercise it skips over the video and goes straight into the workout.

So far I think the Wii Active is a good start to compete with a Personal Trainer. For this initial review I did not discuss each exercise but join me for future installments in the series where I will discuss things like how many calories you’re burning, specific exercises, and more.

Already tried Wii Active feel free to chime in with your pros and cons or Join the Challenge get you Wii Active now:

Check out the rest of the  Wii Active vs. Personal Trainer series:

Intro to the Series

Technorati Tags: cost, exercise, Fitness, gym, personal trainer, wii active, wii fit, wii games, wii remote, wii workout

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Today is my first day with my personal trainer at the gym. In honor of I figured I would talk about getting a personal trainer and that little extra nudge to get fit here with my Greedy Girl fans. Ironically I found this great youtube clip from diet.com about the Wii Active. As a result I decided to turn my Personal Trainer discussion into what will be a series on Wii Active vs. Personal Trainer.

Wii Active is a new game from EA Sports for the Nintendo Wii system that is supposed to be like a trainer in a box. Using the Wii controller, Wii Fit board, and the bands provided with the game Wii active is supposed to guide you through a work out just like a personal trainer would have.

I’ve purchased Wii Active and signed up for a personal trainer. 2 days a week I’m going to workout with the trainer and 2 days a week I’m going to workout with Wii Active. I’ll give weekly updates on my progress and let you know if I feel the Wii Active really measures up to the to having your own personal trainer.

If you own a Wii Active feel free chime in with your comments about your experience.

Check out the rest of the  Wii Active vs. Personal Trainer series:

Part 1- The Initial Assessment and Work Outs

Here’s the Wii Active Review from Diet.com she gives a great overview of the game and you can see first hand how its played and whats included.

And some other Wii Active reviews

• http://www.dietsinreview.com/diets/ea-sports-active/
• Naptime is the New Happy Hour: Wii Active
  
• Savvy Gaming: Wi Active Full Review

Technorati Tags: diet.com, exercise, Fitness, free chime, personal trainer, wii active, wii fit, ww

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Last weeks question was a big hit and I think we got a lot of information. There is so much we can learn from each other, I figured I would try posing a weekly question and see how it works out.

This weeks question is What commercial diet programs have you tried? For example Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig, Nutrisystem, etc.  So post your comment tell us what you tried? Pros and Cons? How did it work out for you? If your still on it? and If not why?

Technorati Tags: diets, jenny craig, nutrisystem, program, weight watchers, ww

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