EAT AT THIS MAGIC HOUR:
Eat a snack that contains protein between 3pm and 4pm. Go for a protein bar, low fat cheese, some almonds and a apple etc... No matter what, do not miss breakfast or that snack. It's important because it boosts metabolism and balances blood sugar. Lower blood sugar, means lower insulin. And high insulin levels make you store fat around your mid section.
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
Exercise to a healthy relationship
Lifestyle choices have a massive impact on how happy you are in a relationship — and let’s be honest, we all have bad days, but if your bad days are starting to outnumber your good days then it may be time to do something about itHeSs trainers we often speak about eating healthy foods and enjoying regular exercise but it all comes hand in hand with how good we feel about ourselves which in turn affects how happy we are.
Get regular exercise
Simple as that. Buy some comfortable workout clothes, start following some videos, and make an effort to get your body moving more. The more active you get, the better you will look and the better you will feel — and if you want an excuse to get intimate with your partner then this one is ideal!
Eat healthily
I know, I know, it’s an obvious one to point out but a constant thrashing of fatty and salty foods can actually make you depressed. Research shows that obese people are 25% more likely to suffer from depression and eating foods that stave off depression and make you feel good are ideal. We often take out our anger on those closest to us, but some of this can be avoided with a little healthy eating — so next time you feel like whacking your partner over the head with a carrot; eat it instead!
Zzzzzzz’s – Get some sleep!
And no I don’t mean go to bed after a fight to sleep it off — I mean get some sleep! Studies show that sleep deprivation causes couples to argue more than any other factor, as people who struggle to sleep are often worried about problems, which, combined with a lack of sleep, can quickly get blown well out of proportion. We all get moody when we are tired but the better you eat and the more you exercise, the easier you will find it to get a good night’s sleep…
Fact: Your partner is often at the brunt of your bad moods
Fiction: You can’t do anything about your bad moods
It’s all entwined — if you exercise well, eat healthily and live an active lifestyle then you will be all-around far happier and far more confident in your relationship. Try it and see!
Get regular exercise
Simple as that. Buy some comfortable workout clothes, start following some videos, and make an effort to get your body moving more. The more active you get, the better you will look and the better you will feel — and if you want an excuse to get intimate with your partner then this one is ideal!
Eat healthily
I know, I know, it’s an obvious one to point out but a constant thrashing of fatty and salty foods can actually make you depressed. Research shows that obese people are 25% more likely to suffer from depression and eating foods that stave off depression and make you feel good are ideal. We often take out our anger on those closest to us, but some of this can be avoided with a little healthy eating — so next time you feel like whacking your partner over the head with a carrot; eat it instead!
Zzzzzzz’s – Get some sleep!
And no I don’t mean go to bed after a fight to sleep it off — I mean get some sleep! Studies show that sleep deprivation causes couples to argue more than any other factor, as people who struggle to sleep are often worried about problems, which, combined with a lack of sleep, can quickly get blown well out of proportion. We all get moody when we are tired but the better you eat and the more you exercise, the easier you will find it to get a good night’s sleep…
Fact: Your partner is often at the brunt of your bad moods
Fiction: You can’t do anything about your bad moods
It’s all entwined — if you exercise well, eat healthily and live an active lifestyle then you will be all-around far happier and far more confident in your relationship. Try it and see!
Sunday, May 23, 2010
Know your cardio...
I asked you a while back, who is usually in better shape, a sprinter or marathon runner? If you said sprinter, then you are absolutely correct.
Why is that? Why is a sprinter, who sprints for 10 seconds be more ripped than a marathon runner who can run 2 hours per session?
Well, it is actually pretty simple. A sprinter focuses on the fast twitch muscle fiber (type IIa and IIb) and a marathon runner focuses on the slow twitch muscle fiber (Type I).
Two different styles of training, two different results.
I am not saying that you shouldn't do long boring cardio but if your goal is to burn fat efficiently, then you must train the right muscle fiber. Most people will tell you that all you have to do is run 30-60 minutes a day and you will be ripped in no time. The sad truth is that long boring cardio (slow twitch muscle fiber) alone does NOT give you an athletic, fit and defined body. In fact, doing too much cardio can actually break down your muscle tissue (convert it to amino acids to usable glucose) to use it as an energy source. That is not the ideal outcome. Muscle is the location where your fat is being burned so it is something that you don't want to sacrifice (plus muscle is what gives your the awesome definition).
Why is that? Why is a sprinter, who sprints for 10 seconds be more ripped than a marathon runner who can run 2 hours per session?
Well, it is actually pretty simple. A sprinter focuses on the fast twitch muscle fiber (type IIa and IIb) and a marathon runner focuses on the slow twitch muscle fiber (Type I).
Two different styles of training, two different results.
I am not saying that you shouldn't do long boring cardio but if your goal is to burn fat efficiently, then you must train the right muscle fiber. Most people will tell you that all you have to do is run 30-60 minutes a day and you will be ripped in no time. The sad truth is that long boring cardio (slow twitch muscle fiber) alone does NOT give you an athletic, fit and defined body. In fact, doing too much cardio can actually break down your muscle tissue (convert it to amino acids to usable glucose) to use it as an energy source. That is not the ideal outcome. Muscle is the location where your fat is being burned so it is something that you don't want to sacrifice (plus muscle is what gives your the awesome definition).
Thursday, May 20, 2010
7 ways to lighten up your snacks
Summer saving calorie tips:
1) KICK IT UP; swap that handful of tortilla chips and guacamole for baked pita chips and salsa. Pita chips have more protein and half the fat.
2) SKIP THE WHIP; skip adding whip cream on top of your iced coffees. Instead sprinkle vanilla or chocolate powder.
3) GREEN UP YOUR SMOOTHIE; even though smoothies are usually good for you, they often pack a ton of calories. try blending zero calorie green tea rather than the low fat skim milk. Cut calories and get a extra little caffeine jolt.
4) PICK UP FRUIT POPS; if you want a cold treat, choose all fruit frozen pops instead of the sugar added variety. The 100% ones (coconut, mango, or pomegranate) will taste better and won't have the overly sweet after taste.
5) SUBSTITUTE YOUR SWEET; peach pie à la mode is synonymous with summer, but fresh peaches with a scoop of fat free frozen yogurt will save you calories big time.
6) TURN UP THE HEAR; dust some cayenne powder on high-cal sides like potato salads, and you'll eat less. The spice boost flavor and actually curbs your appetite.
7) TRY THIS CHEAT; instead of serving pigs in a blanket, wrap thinly sliced prosciutto around bite size pieces of cantaloupe and secure with a toothpick. You will cut carbs, have a leaner cut, and hit all your daily vitamin A and C needs.
1) KICK IT UP; swap that handful of tortilla chips and guacamole for baked pita chips and salsa. Pita chips have more protein and half the fat.
2) SKIP THE WHIP; skip adding whip cream on top of your iced coffees. Instead sprinkle vanilla or chocolate powder.
3) GREEN UP YOUR SMOOTHIE; even though smoothies are usually good for you, they often pack a ton of calories. try blending zero calorie green tea rather than the low fat skim milk. Cut calories and get a extra little caffeine jolt.
4) PICK UP FRUIT POPS; if you want a cold treat, choose all fruit frozen pops instead of the sugar added variety. The 100% ones (coconut, mango, or pomegranate) will taste better and won't have the overly sweet after taste.
5) SUBSTITUTE YOUR SWEET; peach pie à la mode is synonymous with summer, but fresh peaches with a scoop of fat free frozen yogurt will save you calories big time.
6) TURN UP THE HEAR; dust some cayenne powder on high-cal sides like potato salads, and you'll eat less. The spice boost flavor and actually curbs your appetite.
7) TRY THIS CHEAT; instead of serving pigs in a blanket, wrap thinly sliced prosciutto around bite size pieces of cantaloupe and secure with a toothpick. You will cut carbs, have a leaner cut, and hit all your daily vitamin A and C needs.
Saturday, May 15, 2010
Stop Gobbling your grub..
Did you know people who eat greedily and quickly should slow down if they want to keep the pounds off? Researchers had people eat the same meal at varying speeds to determine whether peptides in the gut elicited different postmeal responses. It showed that those who ate quickly had a harder time feeling full and wanted to eat more. That's because earring at a fast rate curtails the release of hormones that induce feelin of satiety and this decrease in hormones often leads to overeatting.
Medical jargen aside, if you eat too fast it takes your body a while to realize "we ate enough" By waiting a few minutes between plates, it gives your stomach time to settle and judge how much more you eat.. So unless your in the army, jail or a professional speed eater.. Take your time and enjoy your meal.
Medical jargen aside, if you eat too fast it takes your body a while to realize "we ate enough" By waiting a few minutes between plates, it gives your stomach time to settle and judge how much more you eat.. So unless your in the army, jail or a professional speed eater.. Take your time and enjoy your meal.
Saturday, May 08, 2010
Lose your keg..
"is that my left bicep? No! It's my abbbbbdominals!!" now if you don't know what I'm talkin about, YouTube Terry Crews old spice commercials. You may know Terry as the big ripped black guy in white chicks, or Damon from Friday after next or recently the dad on everybody hates Chris. One thing in all of those movies is that Terry crews is a big ripped guy. So anyway I was training a client and his commercial came on, prompting me to wonder why so many people have crappy abs. Most big meathead guys don't even know abs exist, just downing tons of bench and curls do they look cool in their Ed hardy shirts. Most women do 50 millions body weight crunches on the machines hoping to build some Jennifer aniston body. So to save you all the time, and me the emails, here are the AB RULES:
1) Train the abs like a muscle
‘The biggest mistake people make with the abs is that they forget it’s just like any other muscle,’ says strength and conditioning coach Nick Grantham. ‘They’ll go in and do 200 reps of an abs exercise every day and then wonder why they get a hernia.’ To build your abs, do ten to 15 reps and increase the intensity by adding more sets. Leave one day in between abs sessions to allow the muscles to recover.
2) Do static holds for core stability
‘Your muscles have slow-twitch and fast-twitch fibres but when you hold a weight in a static position you use both sets of fibres,’ says Lee Archer, director of Pro Fitness. This means you can improve the overall strength of all the muscles used to stabilise the lower back and hips in one exercise, such as the plank, as long as you remember to hold the position for at least five seconds.
3) Add resistance to crunches to build muscle
‘Use resistance you can handle, so start with a dumb-bell or medicine ball across your chest and keep the weight close to your body,’ says Grantham. ‘As you progress, you can extend your arms or raise them above your head to create a longer lever and make the exercise harder. If you get into trouble then you can bring the weight back towards you and all of a sudden it will seem lighter.’
4) Do more than crunch
Grantham trains athletes with an all-round course of exercise. ‘When I put together a core training programme I look at hitting all of the movement patterns. So I start with a flexion exercise such as a crunch, then I do something with extension like a superman. After that I introduce lateral flexion with a side bend, then I have a rotational exercise. Finally I do a static hold like a plank or a bridge.’
5) Use a Swiss ball
‘When you train in an unstable environment you recruit a lot more muscle tissue, putting microscopic tears into it and when it repairs itself this leads to muscle growth,’ says Sean Singleton, expertise coach at David Lloyd Leisure. You can also use a wobble board or Swiss ball to progress a core exercise and make it harder, preparing your muscles for adding resistance later on.
6) Target your lower abs
‘The lower section of the abs is the one that’s most difficult to hit and you will need some specific exercises,’ says Grantham. ‘Most people can reveal a four-pack at the top but it’s getting the six-pack that’s hard. My choice would be a reverse crunch with your legs up on a Swiss ball or just straight up into the air.’
7) Do core stretches
‘Flexibility training is important to recovery because if you stretch the muscle you lengthen its range of motion and open it up so that your blood can re-supply it fully,’ says Singleton. Lie face down on the floor with your hands just underneath your shoulders, then push up with your arms to bring your chest off the floor and push your hips into the floor. For your obliques, stand upright with feet apart and go over to one side. For your back, sit on your lower legs and bend forwards, stretching your arms across the floor.
8) Get your diet right
To build muscle you need to eat between 1.5g and 2g of lean protein per kilo of bodyweight every day. ‘Then you’ll get a six-pack by doing exercises – but you may not see it,’ says Grantham. ‘To see it, a man has to get down to ten per cent body fat, and to lose fat you’ve got to burn more calories than you take in. Increase the amount of exercise you do combined with a sensible diet.’
9) Prioritise your training
If you want to get a six-pack you’ll need to devote separate sessions to train your abs so that you hit them when you’re still full of energy. Never try to do an abs session before a heavy lifting workout because you can exhaust the muscles in your core, which could be dangerous. However, it’s OK to do an abs session before a run if you need to.
10) Slow down your reps
‘Muscle will grow only if it spends time under tension,’ says Grantham. ‘If someone does 30 reps in 30 seconds he’s actually putting the muscles under tension for only 30 seconds. If you get someone else to do three sets of ten reps but each rep lasts ten seconds, they triple the time under tension and get the better strength gains.’ Try to count to three on the way up, hold for a count of two, then count to three again on the way down.
11) Train standing up
If you do all your abs and lower back workouts on an exercise mat, you are switching one side of your body off while you work the other. If you then try to use your core as a single unit during sport or hard cardio effort, it will not have been trained to do this and you risk injuring yourself. So do standing abs exercises that involve rotation using a medicine ball or cable machine, such as the woodchop.
12) Do short cardio intervals
Steady-state training will burn fat but only very slowly over a mammoth session. ‘If you want to get a good body by losing fat and keeping lean muscle mass then do intervals,’ says Grantham. By doing ten minute-long runs flat out with one minute’s rest in between, you work for less time at a higher intensity to burn more calories. You also boost your metabolic rate so that you’ll still be burning calories four hours later when you’re sitting watching TV.
1) Train the abs like a muscle
‘The biggest mistake people make with the abs is that they forget it’s just like any other muscle,’ says strength and conditioning coach Nick Grantham. ‘They’ll go in and do 200 reps of an abs exercise every day and then wonder why they get a hernia.’ To build your abs, do ten to 15 reps and increase the intensity by adding more sets. Leave one day in between abs sessions to allow the muscles to recover.
2) Do static holds for core stability
‘Your muscles have slow-twitch and fast-twitch fibres but when you hold a weight in a static position you use both sets of fibres,’ says Lee Archer, director of Pro Fitness. This means you can improve the overall strength of all the muscles used to stabilise the lower back and hips in one exercise, such as the plank, as long as you remember to hold the position for at least five seconds.
3) Add resistance to crunches to build muscle
‘Use resistance you can handle, so start with a dumb-bell or medicine ball across your chest and keep the weight close to your body,’ says Grantham. ‘As you progress, you can extend your arms or raise them above your head to create a longer lever and make the exercise harder. If you get into trouble then you can bring the weight back towards you and all of a sudden it will seem lighter.’
4) Do more than crunch
Grantham trains athletes with an all-round course of exercise. ‘When I put together a core training programme I look at hitting all of the movement patterns. So I start with a flexion exercise such as a crunch, then I do something with extension like a superman. After that I introduce lateral flexion with a side bend, then I have a rotational exercise. Finally I do a static hold like a plank or a bridge.’
5) Use a Swiss ball
‘When you train in an unstable environment you recruit a lot more muscle tissue, putting microscopic tears into it and when it repairs itself this leads to muscle growth,’ says Sean Singleton, expertise coach at David Lloyd Leisure. You can also use a wobble board or Swiss ball to progress a core exercise and make it harder, preparing your muscles for adding resistance later on.
6) Target your lower abs
‘The lower section of the abs is the one that’s most difficult to hit and you will need some specific exercises,’ says Grantham. ‘Most people can reveal a four-pack at the top but it’s getting the six-pack that’s hard. My choice would be a reverse crunch with your legs up on a Swiss ball or just straight up into the air.’
7) Do core stretches
‘Flexibility training is important to recovery because if you stretch the muscle you lengthen its range of motion and open it up so that your blood can re-supply it fully,’ says Singleton. Lie face down on the floor with your hands just underneath your shoulders, then push up with your arms to bring your chest off the floor and push your hips into the floor. For your obliques, stand upright with feet apart and go over to one side. For your back, sit on your lower legs and bend forwards, stretching your arms across the floor.
8) Get your diet right
To build muscle you need to eat between 1.5g and 2g of lean protein per kilo of bodyweight every day. ‘Then you’ll get a six-pack by doing exercises – but you may not see it,’ says Grantham. ‘To see it, a man has to get down to ten per cent body fat, and to lose fat you’ve got to burn more calories than you take in. Increase the amount of exercise you do combined with a sensible diet.’
9) Prioritise your training
If you want to get a six-pack you’ll need to devote separate sessions to train your abs so that you hit them when you’re still full of energy. Never try to do an abs session before a heavy lifting workout because you can exhaust the muscles in your core, which could be dangerous. However, it’s OK to do an abs session before a run if you need to.
10) Slow down your reps
‘Muscle will grow only if it spends time under tension,’ says Grantham. ‘If someone does 30 reps in 30 seconds he’s actually putting the muscles under tension for only 30 seconds. If you get someone else to do three sets of ten reps but each rep lasts ten seconds, they triple the time under tension and get the better strength gains.’ Try to count to three on the way up, hold for a count of two, then count to three again on the way down.
11) Train standing up
If you do all your abs and lower back workouts on an exercise mat, you are switching one side of your body off while you work the other. If you then try to use your core as a single unit during sport or hard cardio effort, it will not have been trained to do this and you risk injuring yourself. So do standing abs exercises that involve rotation using a medicine ball or cable machine, such as the woodchop.
12) Do short cardio intervals
Steady-state training will burn fat but only very slowly over a mammoth session. ‘If you want to get a good body by losing fat and keeping lean muscle mass then do intervals,’ says Grantham. By doing ten minute-long runs flat out with one minute’s rest in between, you work for less time at a higher intensity to burn more calories. You also boost your metabolic rate so that you’ll still be burning calories four hours later when you’re sitting watching TV.
Friday, May 07, 2010
Survive a Diet
3 Smart Ways to Survive a Diet
I don’t know that it’s entirely possible to stay sane while dieting, but here’s a few tricks that may work.
1. First and foremost: when you’re hurting focus on your goals. Remember why you undertook this crazy challenge in the first place and what it means to you. This is my most effective means of staying disciplined while on the diet.
2. Cheat meals! These should be planned and normally no more than once per week early in the diet and then used only when needed to stave off catabolism in the final weeks. These not only prevent the body from breaking down too much, but also help the mind. The mental break can be very valuable and reduce stress levels. The most important part of these is to totally indulge what ever cravings you have. That is the entire point of the meal. However, it must be one single meal. This means all of the food should be eaten within approximately a 45 minute window. It also must be the last meal of the day, and if it can be the post training meal, that’s even better. So, if you want a whole large pizza and ice cream – go for it!
3. If you have a sweet tooth, sugar-free Jell-O can be a savior. It tastes great and provides no calories so it can be a guilt-free pleasure when needed.
I don’t know that it’s entirely possible to stay sane while dieting, but here’s a few tricks that may work.
1. First and foremost: when you’re hurting focus on your goals. Remember why you undertook this crazy challenge in the first place and what it means to you. This is my most effective means of staying disciplined while on the diet.
2. Cheat meals! These should be planned and normally no more than once per week early in the diet and then used only when needed to stave off catabolism in the final weeks. These not only prevent the body from breaking down too much, but also help the mind. The mental break can be very valuable and reduce stress levels. The most important part of these is to totally indulge what ever cravings you have. That is the entire point of the meal. However, it must be one single meal. This means all of the food should be eaten within approximately a 45 minute window. It also must be the last meal of the day, and if it can be the post training meal, that’s even better. So, if you want a whole large pizza and ice cream – go for it!
3. If you have a sweet tooth, sugar-free Jell-O can be a savior. It tastes great and provides no calories so it can be a guilt-free pleasure when needed.
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