Meagan Eastman

I am super excited to announce that I have been recruited to write for a brand new up and coming site all about baseball! The working title is Baseball Diaries: The Story of a Baseball Addict, and it should be launching within a few weeks. 

The site will feature game recaps, article’s on MLB happenings, and player features on both MLB and minor league players. 

I can’t wait to start work on this project and will post details and links as they become available! :-)

Earlier today, rosters were announced for Major League Baseball’s 2012 All Star Game. This year’s American League roster was stacked with 7 deserving Texas Ranger’s (the most in franchise history).

The Ranger’s organization has overcome a dramatic transformation over the past five years. New ownership and new president, Nolan Ryan, have led the team to two American League Championships since 2010. While they have yet to win a World Series, the Ranger’s have developed from a struggling team carried by a couple of All Stars, to a team of players who could all be potential All Stars. 

The Texas Ranger’s in on the American League All Star roster are as follows:

Starters:

Mike Napoli - C

Adrian Beltre - 3B

Josh Hamilton - OF

Pitchers:

Matt Harrison - LFP

Joe Nathan - RHP

Reserves:

Elvis Andrus - SS

Ian Kinsler - 2B

The most notable All Star pick in my opinion, is catcher Mike Napoli.

Napoli had an average major league career before joining the Rangers, batting .251 over 5 years with the Angels. Since joining the Rangers in 2011, Napoli has improved his career batting average to .289, and hit .333 during last years postseason leading Texas fans to chant NA-PO-LI! during his at bats. Napoli’s role as a defensive catcher improved in Texas as well, with a fielding percentage of .996 as a Ranger.

Joining the Rangers organization was certainly a step in the right direction for Napoli’s career. While he always played the game as a physical catcher, his offense  was never up to par for a player of his size. Now a days, Napoli has greatly improved his offensive production, as well as his catching duties. In addition to acting as catcher, Napoli also aids his team in the role of first base and designated hitter. 

In addition to Napoli and his teammates already on the roster, pitcher Yu Darvish has a chance to join his teammates via fan vote. MLB’s “Final Vote” allows fans to vote for the final player to join each All Star team. (Link here for all who want to vote! http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/events/all_star/y2012/fv/ballot.jsp )

Yu will be competing against fellow pitchers Jonathan Braxton (KC), Ernesto Frieri (LAA), Josh Hammel (BAL), and Jake Peavy (CWS) for the final spot on the American League roster. 

Tune in to the MLB All Star Game Tuesday, July 10 at 8pm on FOX and the Homerun Derby Monday, July 9 on ESPN!

Article taken from MLBlogs and Bleacher Report. Credit to myself, Meagan Eastman. All statistics credited to baseball-reference.com

Well, you know how I wrote “workout Wednesday” yesterday? That’s gonna stay. But I think I’m going to do a lot more general posts about fitness and nutrition as well, and leave the more lengthy posts for Wednesdays. Because…well, I have a lot to talk about when it comes to all of these changes in my life. And it can’t just be contained in one post a week! (nor can it be contained until I get myself to a functioning computer…I’m typing via the Tumble plus app on my lovely iPhone).

Who knows, this may become mainly fitness rants. We’ll just wait and see!

That being said, today was quite the day for living healthy. And I’m feeling AMAZING! Can you say…three-a-day?!

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1st Workout: 9am. 2 mile quick walk; SPRINTS!  Calories burned:313

Last night a friend emailed me a link for a ten minute high fat burning workout. Umm, yes please!! (I’ll link the video here once I get to my computer, maybe not until tomorrow though!) The idea of this workout is to SPRINT as hard as you can for 45-60 seconds then break for 2-3 minutes, and repeat 3 or 4 times. The point is to get your heart rate UP. Your metabolism gets a kick start. Your body starts burning fat during your workout and continues until the next day. (Hence why I wanted to try this out first thing in the morning. Also, you do NOT want to do this back to back days!)

I started out with a brisk 2 mile walk around the neighborhood at averaging a 3.8 mph pace. Now, watching the video and thinking about how short the sprints are, it all seems so easy. Welp, not so much when your actually doing it! My first sprint I only made it 30 seconds but got up to 40 seconds on my second and third, and up to a full minute on my final sprint. I’ve never been a good sprinter, so my speed wasn’t great by any standard. But boy, did I feel the burn! And in such a great way. My neighborhood is actually designed pretty great for this sort of workout. I was able to easily use uphills for sprints and downhills for “resting”. The “rests” included a few seconds of standing, but then working my way back up to a pretty brisk walk in order to prepare for my next sprint. 

Since I’m not used to this sort of workout, it was a bit awkward at first. But I do want to try and incorporate this into my weekly routine on average 2 or 3 times a week, working my way up to 4 or 5 60 second sprints. 

2nd Workout: 12pm. Legs and Abs.

After a lengthy stretch to recover from my sprints (and a much needed iced coffee!) I spent approximately 35 minutes on my abs and legs, mainly focusing on my abs. Most of the exercises I use come from my dance warm-ups, internet research, and p90x. Because I had already done one cardio workout with another coming later, I didn’t want to push my legs too hard. I did about 10 minutes plyometrics, and the other 25 isolated weightless exercises.

Sometimes, I use weights in the gym for my arms legs and abs. Others I prefer going weightless and working on my own. It’s super easy to whip out a few leg raises or planks while watching TV, or doing what I did today - laying out in the sun! :-) **A possible ‘Workout Wednesday’ for next week, weightless exercises! Some of my favorite exercises and maybe even creating a schedule for them all?! Again, we’ll see!**

3rd Workout: 5:30pm. 2 mile jog, 2 mile walk. Calories burned: 424

I took it pretty easy this evening, running on the flat surface of the Minuteman Bike path. I walked the first 2 miles, then turned around and jogged back at just about an 11 minute pace. I do want to get my ‘jog’ time down, but right now struggle telling body the difference between wanting to full on run and wanting to just jog. Because I’m still new at this, its a little hard because the two are rather close in time. But again, I’m getting there! (Another post on that too, perhaps!?). Other than that, it was a rather uneventful walk/jog to finish out my day.

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NOW, yeah. I did do three, separate workouts in one day. And at first thought, that may be overdoing it. But in reality, I simply spaced out over the whole day what easily could have been one LONG workout. I didn’t ever feel like I was pushing my body farther than it could handle, and didn’t feel any out-of-the-ordinary pain. Right now, its close to 11pm. And I feel better than most days.

A journey to lose so much weight doesn’t come just from eating right and going to the gym a couple of hours a week. You need to bust your ass working out too. Which is what I am doing. (Or at least, attempting to). 

This isn’t something I do every day, or even close to it. Typically I do one or sometimes two workouts each day, and I plan to keep it at that. But sometimes, I’ll throw this kind of spaced out long workout into my routine. It keeps things interesting, me working hard, and getting that much closer to the results I want (and need).

Xx

I won’t lie, I was kind of cranky last night when I set my alarm for the morning. A summer of night classes has also meant lots of sleeping in, something I rarely if ever get to do even on the weekends during the school year. But let me tell you, now that I am up and at ‘em, I think I may have to set an alarm every morning.

Nothing sets you up for a good day like a good hard morning workout. 

My friend, Mallory (who is also quite fitness obsessed and on the journey to a new body with me) and I, decided to hit up our favorite State Park, Harold Parker in Andover, MA. We had planned to run, but decided in the morning we should give our bodies a bit of a break and just power walk this time. We put in 4.5 miles in just over an hour, keeping a quick enough pace to work a sweat while also catching up. That walk was just the jump start I needed. 

My workouts this summer have been okay. Burning a ton of fat and gaining muscle. But my urge to workout hasn’t been what I wanted it to be. After every workout I feel glad I did it and better about myself, but I want to be EXCITED to workout, like I was just months back.

My morning walk was just the kick start I needed. It gave me the urge to change up my routine more often. 60 minutes on the treadmill or elliptical is great for me because of all the calories burned. But staying inside a gym get boring. Even running around the same few blocks of my neighborhood can get boring. I need something different to keep my body - and my mind - fresh and interested in what I am doing. 

Walking and running in new places. Or just taking different routes in the same places. Going with different people, and at different times of day. And not doing the same boring weight training exercises each and every time. 

Suddenly, I find myself WICKED EXCITED about working out again. I even signed up for BodyBuilding.com! I’ve always been a bit skiddish to make an account on there, and stuck to MyFitnessPal, which seemed a little less scary. But now, I am motivated as ever. I have a pretty good grasp on my cardio right now, but the weight training tips and ideas on BodyBuilding.com seem like they will be really helpful, and I really need them right now. I also like that the site lets you set goals for each week, for not only your weight loss (or gain, if you are looking to strictly gain muscle) but for body fat percentage and measurements of your waist, legs, neck, etc. You can also add in any supplements you may take, and set up your own nutrition program. My favorite part of the site is that every thing is in your control. You can check out tips for setting goals each week, and see what makes a goal realistic, but you are in control of what numbers you would like to see and when. What I found frustrating about sites like MyFitnessPal was that the site set goals for me, and I felt like I had to reach them. No matter how unrealistic they may be for myself that particular week. Here, I can change my goals week by week. For example, this week I set a pretty bold goal for myself to lose 6lbs. I have the time and ability to return to two-a-days most days this week, and have no plans to eat out or any parties I need to attend. I think it’s do-able. Next week, between the Fourth of July and my mom having surgery, I may not be able to get to the gym as much as I would like, or eat as healthy as other weeks, so I may set a small weight loss goal for that week. 

I am the person who needs is doing all of the work. I am the person who needs to commit to eating healthy and sticking with whatever plan I set for myself. I should also be the one telling myself what my progress should be. 

I’m thinking I will start writing about my weight loss more, like I used to on my old blog. Writing it down gave me that much more desire to follow through. And putting it out there for the world to see gives me the feeling of support. When I reach my goals, and when I fall a little bit short. And that extra bit of motivation when I may not be feeling it. For now I think I will do at least one post a week dedicated to working out, “Workout Wednesday”. Lame enough?! Maybe a few in between if I’m feeling extra enthusiastic!

That’s it for now, gotta hit up my final work out of the day :-)

xX