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26th january 2011

Debbie makes a great point in yesterday’s comments about the importance of fruit and vegetables in your diet, and the dangers of taking in too much fruit, and the importance of taking in your green vegetables.

She is totally right of course because if you consume TOO much fruit, just like too much of anything, YOU WILL put on weight.

The green vegetables are great right across the range and will give you a huge range of benefits, without the sugars and the calories of course will be very low.

Let’s look at the broader picture too though. How many times have you heard someone say, “grapes put weight on me like nothing else”, bananas pile weight on me and i don’t know why”, “whenever i eat fruit, i pile on weight full stop”.

In my experience, and working with individuals who have told me such stuff, i have found deep down that the fruit is not exactly the problem. The problem tends to be the sugary chocolate and crisps they are tending to eat AS WELL as the fruit!!! This is the case 100% o the time in my book, and blaming fruit for putting weight on is usally a copout, or just another excuse. As i said above, it is entirely possible to put weight on eating too much fruit, but the reality is that not too many people actually get around to eating that much fruit anyway!!!!!

You have to be honest with yourself when analysing your diet, are you ignoring the glass of wine every night that definitely will cause weight gain? What about the full fat milky coffee you consume every day with biscuits, or a piece of cake, have you really factored that in? How about all of those low fat sauces and mayo, are you still eating that rubbish because it can be extremely destructive to your weight/fat loss plan for sure!!!!!

Another thing with fruit and vegetables, you should be eating them for what you don’t know too. We all know they offer plenty of good nutrients, but they also give an enormous boost to our immune systems, so as long as the fruit is eaten in moderation ,of course its going to be good for you, excellent for you in fact and give you a ton of benefits that perhaps we don’t know even exist right now, scientists are constantly finding new benefits of fruit so keep your diet varied and you won’t go far wrong at all!!

Don’t forget that the sugar from fruit will give you energy too, far better than the rubbish sugar you get from energy drinks, plus will be better for your teeth!!!

Benefits all the way in my book so lets get them into your body every day but in moderation!!!!

Twitt
Posted on

25th January, 2011

A tribute today to the late Jack Lalanne, to some the godfather of fitness who died at the great age of 96.

He famously said that that he could never die, it would be bad for his image!!!

Jack started off addicted to sugary foods and was thought of as a lunatic, he even took an axe to his brother, was a nightmare at school and was thought of as someone who had a bleak future in front of him.

In desperation, his mother took him to a lecture by a nutritionist who preached the virtues of eating natural food. Lalanne spent 30 minutes backstage with him afterwards, enthralled on what he had just heard about the power of natural foods.

He then gave up all the sugary and fatty food almost overnight, and almost immediately his behaviour changed overnight. He became a good student very soon and became the school’s champion athlete in just one year. He then became a health and fitness advocate with a high profile.

He then started a health club with a  juice bar before anyone else, but due to the depression, these went bankrupt. He eventually started them up again after the war creating a chain which he eventually sold to Bally’s for a lot of money.

He had a television series running for 35 years in the states on fitness, and created the famous jack lalanne power juicer, which is still famous today.

He was also famous for his physical feats such as swimming from Alcatraz towing an entourage of boats with his teeth! He performed such feats on his 40th, 50th, 60th and 70th birthdays!!

A huge advocate of physical fitness and eating natural foods, he became a member of the president’s council on health and fitness and a motivational speaker.

This is a just brief description of his life in the simplest terms, and if you put a google search for his name, you will learn a lot more very interesting and entertaining stories about the great man.

When he first encouraged people to exercise and eat well, doctor’s said you would get a heart attack if you exercised like that, or you would get all ailments under the sun, you would get high blood pressure and if you were female, you would get bulky and huge muscles!

The opposite of all of this is true of course, science has proven this!

The athletes always knew first before the doctors, so rest in peace jack!!!!

Twitt
Posted on

January 24th 2011

How’s your january going?

Have you started exercise yet? Have you moved a bit more or are you still struggling to get off the sofa?!!!

Have you started another diet and already come off it, because its too stringent, too about “points” or “green and red days”, are you really putting yourself through that rubbish again? Have you fallen for the mass marketing? Don’t forget coca-cola is the most popular drink on the planet, so absolutely nothing surprises me any more.

Every year is just like the year before and that’s how sad it has got, with the same old people trying to make the same kind of money, perhaps only a little bit more making more claims they could never prove.

Hopefully, most of you have concentrated on the quality of your food, and ate in proper portion sizes. Have you filled your shopping trolley with good nutritious food? If you have been affected by government cuts and the cost of living, and who hasn’t, you should really be looking at making every penny count, so the money you used to spend on rubbish should really be spent on food thats actually going to be good for you? Hopefully, that didnt come across in a too patronising way?!!!

Same for your workouts, have you finally got away from measuring your workouts purely on time rather than performance. My workouts are valued in terms of am i doing better week in, week out? If i am, then my body should be showing some good results, especially over a period like 6 weeks.

If you do the same old thing, you will get the same old result and thats what we are trying to get away from. There is absolutely no reason why we all cannot improve as we get older and i have proved this time after time, and its a great feeling seeing everyone i train getting fitter and stronger every month and every year.

Whoever we are, we know we can get better as long as we adopt a valid plan, and this means you need to get away from faddy diets and plastic workout equipment. There are a thousand ways to get fit and healthy, and that includes getting off the sofa 6 times a week so lets make it happen big time starting right now!!!!

Twitt
Posted on

21st january 2011

Another week when the cold and ice has definitely played its part. Its been tough to get out there and run most of the time, unless you were running on some grass where there has been no frost, or on the beach of course. Even with the beach, there was frost on the areas where the sun hadn’t hit the sand!! In parts, it was like running on concrete so you had to be careful wherever you were running/walking!! I love it outside though so its my job to seek out all the best places!!!

Another issue in this weather is the cold weather when running, especially when you are putting, or trying to put in good performances! Its not uncommon to experience a shortness in breath when temperatures are so low, so i wouldn’t worry too much about putting your absolute best workout in during weather like this, unless you’re inside of course which will be no problem of course!!

A big positive sign this week has been the lighter mornings and lighter nights, its only 21st january and things are looking up already!!! The shortest day was already a month ago so you should be experiencing more and more opportunities to get some quality workouts in. When there’s more light out there, you are more encouraged to do more and your enthusiasm to do well should be returning quickly.

Another exciting way to look at things is that spring is only around 10 weeks away, the sort of time you need to look absolutely fantastic!! You really CAN make the necessary changes in your life by spring IF you decide to do it right now. This is the exact time of year when everyone seems on a diet anyway, so you may as well try and start eating healthily and starting an exercise programme.

Its all very well these presenters in the media saying taking a brisk walk, which is great, but you also need MEANINGFUL exercise with a PURPOSE!!! This is what really brings results and theres plenty of workouts in the training/exercise section. It all starts with you deciding to change and you giving it everything you have. If you can get this mindset, then you’re already halfway there so lets give it your best!!!!!

Twitt
Posted on

20th January 2011

Mixing up your training is the hardest thing to come to terms with, besides actually doing the training in the first place. Most of us prefer to do one form of training and be comfortable with something we are fairly good at.

I know many people over the years to be obsessed with running and that’s it, that’s all they would do and a steady run would be all the variety they would want to experience.

They had never tried sprint training, hill running, running on beaches, or any form of resistance/weight training, it simply didn’t suit them in their opinion of course.

The facts are that they were/are depriving themselves of an all round programme that could be designed to work far better than the one they are on right now.

Weight training/resistance training is used in every single sport in the world now as science proves its value, and has so many benefits it would be impossible to list them here.

Then there’s the trainers who would never leave the gym, the “gym” was everything to them and no other training existed. A run or cycle in the great outdoors was alien to them, after all it couldn’t really be better than a “gym workout” could it?!!!

These types of individuals are also missing out, training should be a very enjoyable journey for you, taking in different experiences in as the weeks, months and years hopefully go by. If you don’t offer variety into your training, that horrible word “plateau” will soon come into your life.

Deep down, you know you want to be experiencing the kind of results that impress yourself as well as everyone else. You want your health covered too, no point in looking great and internally, you are sick and need attention.

Fortunately, looking good inside usually leads to looking good on the outside. If you’re fired up to make a difference in your life, then you need to open your mind up to all different types o training, and different kinds of food too.

I you’re a one trick pony, you will tend to get one dimensional results. Any programme has limited results for a certain period of time, so open your mind to change and try something new this weekend and that will usually mean getting outdoors, you never know, you may get to like it, never look back and love being outdoors!!!

Twitt