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Your list of priorities

How high you put your workouts up your list of priorities will usually be a very good indicator of how good shape you’re in.

Someone who says “I train when I get time”, or “I do my best when I’m not busy” or “I have to be in the mood” or “I’m waiting for my ‘training partner’ to call me” are destined to get zero results and be guilty of being the pub “bore”.

Someone who says “I have to train a few days a week to feel good” or “I have to train a few days a week to be in shape” or “I have to train a few days a week because its so important for my health” or “I have to train a few days a week to create all the energy I need in my life” or “I have to train a few days a week to perform the way I need to in my life” is likely to be in great health and good physical condition full stop.

Attitude is always paramount, you are either going to be putting your head in the sand and hope for the best with your health, or you will always be honest with yourself, care about your health and the way you can help your friends and family out because you will have outstanding health and an abundance of energy to be productive every day.

You don’t have to be perfect either like these airbrushed pictures in media magazines. Carrying a couple of extra pounds is no problem, as long as your lifestyle is health most of the time, then your health across the board should look really good.

I have found if you take the pressure off someone and encourage them to be healthy, you will tend to get amazing results. If you tell people to abstain from everything, then its not realistic at all and they are likely to go the other way and have massive binges from time to time, totally unhealthy behaviour of course.

If you can accept someone can have a couple of drinks, eat a bit of what they fancy from time to time, not always have their best ever workouts, then I think the scene is set for an individual to blossom and show their real talent with all the pressure OFF!

This is when this whole thing becomes a lifestyle choice, your way of life forever in a non-threatening way. This is the best way I’ve found for most people, unless of course they have to be in absolute prime condition for a particular reason (actress landing a role for example or a lady having to lose weight for an operation or that person wanting to be in amazing condition JUST BECAUSE they want to be and it feels fantastic!!).

This is the whole message today and the great thing about is that every single one of you are capable of achieving it!!!

Twitt
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Measure yourself

Depending on what level your fitness is at, the more attention you pay to it says a lot.

The attitude of just doing some exercise and hoping for the best never really works because you will not be really focused on getting fitter or eating well, you will exercise simple “because its supposed to be good for you”!

Getting together a proper plan can and will make all the difference and make your health and fitness far more sustainable.

So as we talk about all the time on here, you need to do a mixture of strength work and your walking/cycling/running/swimming etc. You need to do this every week as well as eat well every week of course.

So ASSUMING you have taken all of this onboard and you are taking part in all of this, its time to raise the bar a bit and take your exercise plan a bit more seriously.

An easy way to do this is to measure your waist regularly, once a month is fine. As we have talked about before, if you are 6 foot tall then you are 60 inches. The equation should be that your waist in inches is half or less than your height in inches. This means that your waist should be a maximum of 35 inches if you  are 6 foot tall. Work on and keep it under 35 if you can, this will lead to you not only looking great but the health benefits will be endless!

The weighing scale is not always the most accurate measurement of progress but keeping a once a month check will be helpful and give you a general guideline on how you’re doing. Women should avoid weighing at their time of the month as this can easily add up to 5 pounds on that is only temporary!

If you have a close friend or family member, try asking them to do a more detailed measurement. Try measuring your neck, shoulders, chest, waist, hips, thighs, calf, upper arm, forearm. You can also buy a cheap blood pressure machine from the chemists these days starting off at just £10. Try and do these measurements once a month to keep regular checks and give you a very good indication on how you are doing.

Your health is your most important thing you can have, without it you can’t really do anything worthwhile in life. These are the options open to you without even having to go to the doctor/nurse all the time. The idea of keeping a close eye on your body has never been more valid!!!

Twitt
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Stop pretending and let’s do this thing!!!!

How many times do you hear in the media that they don’t know anything about exercise, they don’t really know what diet to be on, which exercise equipment to use, how long to exercise for, what the “best” exercise is for their stomach’s etc etc!

I’ve pretty much had a gutful of all that rubbish. Did these people have a good formal education to get on air, or were they just picked up from the street one day? Which one was it? Some are very good of course and im talking about the airheads who occupy some radio and TV stations. There’s so much trashy information out there these days, perhaps thats they they are really getting confused by all these false promises by so called “guru’s” or charlatans as they should be called!! Its time to stop falling for all that rubbish so lets call an end to it right now!!!

Well lets fix this thing once and for all because im not putting up with that rubbish any longer!!!

You have to do your resistance training!! Whats that mean? It means working against resistance and includes press ups, squats, arm dips, weight training etc and you need to be putting in this type of workout THREE times a week, just like coronation street, monday, wednesday and friday!! Pick 6-8 exercises and you need to do around 3 circuits of this. See the workout section of examples. These will tighten up your body no end, make your body VERY efficient at burning fat, exactly what you want to be doing. Running and walking will never re-shape your body, working against resistance DEFINITELY will!!!

You need to GET OUT at least twice a week and YES, EVEN IN THIS WEATHER!!! You WILL feel better afterwards!!! Getting out in the fresh air i meant!!

You need to walk up hills if you can, you need to run shorter distances but with more purpose, you can cycle in daylight hours and enjoy the many cycle paths around here, YOU NEED TO DO THIS!!! This is ALL about making you FEEL BETTER!!!

You need to eat every 3-4 hours, breakfast, lunch, evening meals and snack twice mid-morning and mid-afternoon healthily on fruit and nuts etc. Plenty of ideas in the diet/food section. This is not being a pig, this is keeping your energy levels constant and this will help you to avoid hunger pangs which can often blow your diet!

You need to give sleep some attention too, try and get your head down early in the week and get a good nights sleep. Dont use wine to send you to sleep, its the worst kind of sleep you can get, its not cool or trendy in the week to get trashed on wine, plus it will ONLY make you put on body fat and make you hold water/get bloated, not very good side effects!!!!

There are some basics there and sorry for the rant, because after all this time, its time to let you know that anyone can do this, and if you’re not achieving what you want in life right now, its time to do it and right now, no excuses, no trendy talk, quit all the “‘i’ll do it tomorrow” rubbish, its never going to work with that attitude.

Its a dull rainy tuesday, but still a great day to change your life around!!!!

Twitt
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60 days left to Christmas!

There are literally 60 days left to christmas to make the transformation you made in 2010 complete. Eight weeks left and although it may not sound a like a long time, its long enough to make deep inroads into your overall wellbeing and feel as strong and as fit as possible before christmas.

With the possibility that 2011 will be bleak for many people in economic terms, its vital you approach the new year as healthy and as energetic as possible. When this physical condition is reached, the chances are that you are going to be much more optimistic too, just as the right time of year when most people could be described as on “a bit of a downer”!!

You are also competing with the onset of a different season right now. Autumn is well and truly here, and we had the first proper frost of the autumn today. My first run of the day also meant my hands were stinging with the cold, so it was my first shock to the system of winter, and i’m glad i’ve got it behind me now!!!

Dont be put off at al either by the colder air this time of year. Expect to feel a bit short of breath especially doing outdoor exercise at the moment, the new sharper and decidely lower temperatures may take a couple of weeks to get used to, but once you have got used to them, there will be no looking back for you!!!

Working outdoors is always desirable. Any exercise is good but you tend to get exposed to lots of germs and colds etc in gyms up and down the land, almost a breeding ground for all types of viruses etc.

The time really is here to keep your outside workouts going in, and this will make the transition of the winter temperatures that much easier to take and get used to.

You will probably save of fortune in electricity too, once you have been outside training, you will know exactly what i mean. The difference this time of year between the outside and inside is at its most noticeable. Going from sometimes sub-zero temperatures first thing in the morning back to the 70 degree temperatures often experienced inside can be dramatic and an eye-opener!!!

With most place quiet from now until christmas, this is a great opportunity to keep your eating consistently good, and focus on the raw foods that serve your body so well. Im talking lots of fruit and veggies which really give your body the foundation it deserves going into our colder, wetter winters.

I’ve always tried to stress that if you concentrate on getting your insides right and healthy, then the outside your body will look after itself. Your body and your appearance are always a reflection on how you live your life, how much good food you put in, if you’re getting enough fluids in, if you’re sleeping enough and if you are putting some good quality training in.

8 weeks left to the big day, lets pick up the pace and make sure we end 2010 on a massive high!!!

Twitt
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Never short of workouts

You really do have several workouts available this weekend.

All these posts are designed to get rid of any excuses you may have left in your cupboard!

So we have gone over inside workouts this week, you can do them in ANY weather, there are no snow storms in your living room or spare room? It is not too cold or wet either in your living room and you can even have music on in the background! This is a workout you can do ANY time, so if you have an excuse, you know its not possible for me to believe you!!!

What about your outside workouts?

Are you going to get out there and do them? Or are you going to put on your dressing gown at 6pm in the evening and drink a bottle of wine a night, a takeway most nights or the biggest bar of chocolate its humanly possibly to eat? Lots of people really do live their lives like this, and need rescuing from themselves and need to be introduced to an active lifestyle, it really will change your life and make you far more optimistic for the future!!!

If its cold inside, get out there and do your workouts outside, you will soon get warm, you will soon get some adrenalin through your vains and pretty soon you will be invigorated to go and do something!!! I bet you when you get back inside, you will switch the heating off and wonder how you felt it cold in the first place!!! Staying indoors all weekend and complaining its “cold” doesnt wash either, it really doesnt, and sometimes you need to shake yourself to get out of this vicious circle of feeling sorry for yourself.

Theres a million things you can do this weekend, and getting out there and being active is guaranteed to make you feel better, give you more self-confidence in your abilities and really set the tone for all weekends coming up to christmas!!!

For starters i would look at it this weekend for walking up and down some very challenging terrain but with great scenery. These place include pembrey country park, burry port beach, burry port harbour, sandy water park, mumbles promenade, mumbles mountain, beaches-langland, caswell, llangennith, rhosilli, swiss valley reservoir, millennium coastal path, any cycle path!, burry port park, and there are about a million other places i could list right now for you to try out but i think the above list is enough to get you started!!!!

I know many of you will know more “secret” places so please try them all out, it makes life far more interested if you try different and fresher venues!!

No time to waste in shops the weekend, get out and there and do something that will get your blood going again!!!

Twitt