Breaking Down “The Bikini Challenge” – Part 1

I’ve heard the same question from quite a few women I know, “What do you think about ‘The Bikini Challenge’”. When I first heard this, I was like “What’s that?” Apparently, the skin product Nivea has developed “The Bikini Challenge”, a four week diet and exercise plan to lose weight for swimsuit season. It has been featured on TV shows like the Tyra Banks show. Even though I tend to steer people away from diets at all costs, I realized that this is something that can get people excited about living a healthier lifestyle, so I decided to research it and break it down. Here we go!

Nutrition, Fitness, Cellulite and Style

The bikini challenge has four parts to it; nutrition, fitness, cellulite and style. While I could have focused on the first two and been done with it, I tried to understand the four combined as a complete system. And I’m glad I did. While in my mind, nutrition and fitness are obviously the most important, the cellulite and style sections are really goals that are just as important to most. So let’s take a look at each section individually.

Nutrition

First and foremost, I’d like to applaud Brooke Alpert, who provides tid-bits of information to help explain why you will be following certain ideas throughout the program, for laying out upfront one of the most important parts of eating right… 5-7 meals a day, less portions per meal. However, I would make one change. Alpert identifies meal 2 and 4 as “snacks”, which is not the best way to look at it in my opinion because snacking evokes thoughts of binging.

Alpert also stresses some pitfalls to newcomers in health and fitness such as the “yo yo” phenomenon, which occurs when people lose a few pounds and then put it right back on, lack of motivation, and

structure in your meal plan.

From the first week of the bikini challenge, the nutrition section provides “ADD” and “ELIMINATE” sections of your diet. They focus on incorporating foods with fiber, fruits, vegetables while staying away from foods with a high GI level like sodas, white rice and donuts. The eating tips tab definitely stresses the difference between good carbs and bad carbs, which is a great thing to be aware of at all times!

Also, the bikini challenge knows the benefits of taking measurements and assessing where you’re at when you start the program! This is very important in order to gauge your success and keeping you motivated on the road to a healthy, fit body.

In Part 2 of Breaking Down “The Bikini Challenge”, I’ll analyze the Fitness, Cellulite and Style sections along with a final overview of what I think about the program. So stay tuned!

photo by flickr user mgleiss