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Wednesday, 29th February

The face of training has been changing for the last few years in my view, and shows still no chance of slowing down either!

People have never wanted to be stuck on machines for hours, i certainly never wanted to, and most people i know never wanted to either.

The dinosaurs of the gym world have folded in the united states over the last few years, and that list is continuing to intensify in the UK, with Fitness First the latest gym chain seeking  to avoid bankruptcy and owe their creditord 18 million pounds in interest payments alone PER YEAR!!!

There has to be more to training than being like cattle queueing up for mindless machines that don’t really stretch the imagination, or get your body moving in the natural ranges of motion they were NOT designed to in the first place.

Why work on a machine when you can get fantastic results from medicine balls, free weights, bodyweight exercises and other movements that will burn a terrific amount of body fat every single time you do them!

Hopefully, you are hitting a high tempo in your workouts too?!!!

Without doubt, getting used to the tempo of not taking much rest in between exercises is the single most important thing you can get used to. Please do not become one of  these who spends more time talking than actually exercising, because YOU WILL NOT GET THE RESULTS YOU WANT.

The reason why the chains are struggling is because they forgot about results when it came to formulating their business plan. Frankly, if often makes me sick when someone could be going to one of these gyms for literally years, and you could never tell whether they have been exercising or not!

I’m all about results and im passionate about people giving every effort in order to get them. I am about hard work and instilling the confidence for individuals to really go out there and achieve big things with their health and fitness.

Make your choice but promise yourself that you will go flat out to reach your potential!!!

Twitt
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Tuesday, 28th February 2012

Potential injuries are always a constant threat to our training goals, and its vital we deal with them in an efficient way.

Shin Splints are one of my least favourite injuries, having suffered with them badly when I was 18.

Shin splints are an injury that affects the front part of your leg and in particular your shin. Also, the surrounding tissue can be often painful to touch.

Common symptoms also include pain in this area in the first few minutes of exercise, then it can go away and return just as you finish your run or walk, followed by pain the next couple of days.

I have one lady who is doing the Moonwalk in London in May, and is struggling with the very same complaint.

I have advised two weeks rest from walking to give that area a chance to heal and calm down.

Shin Splints can be caused by running or aggressive walking on hard surfaces, they can be made far worse by using poor quality trainers (you should chance your trainers every 500 miles or 6 months in general).

Icing this area a couple of times a day for 15 minutes at a time can bring a lot of relief, and help greatly with inflammation. The pain can be quite severe and if left unchecked, can lead believe it or not to stress fractures in the shin area!

Simply “running through it” will not cut much ice with this injury, in fact it can make it ten times worse.

When you do feel like getting back walking and running after a rest, I would advise only very soft surfaces such as grass to do your workouts on. Hard concrete type surfaces will only bring back this injury.

Non weight bearing exercises will only be good, such as swimming and cycling, and inside weight training/resistance training of all kinds. This means you can keep very fit and strong whilst you are recovering.

These are all handy tips to make sure you make the most out of a potentially nasty situation, and certainly don’t make it worse!

Twitt
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Monday, February 26th

To maximise your gains in fitness, i cannot stress enough how vital your eating is, and what eating CLEAN really means.
To me, eating clean means eating food as much as possible in its natural state, and keeping refined sugars to an absolute minimum.
 
All the foods we always talk about will always bear fruit for you if you pardon the pun!
 
Porridge is a natural food that gives you long term energy, and stops you snacking.
 
Any oat based products or porridge with added “apple pie” type flavourings, WILL NOT DO YOU ANY GOOD.
 
Wholemeal bread in moderation is a sign of good clean eating, White bread is the equivalent of a disaster zone, full of refined sugar, bleaching agents and lots of chemicals and rubbish designed to put weight on you, it will be really unhealthy on all sorts of level for your body, and you have to avoid this rubbish if you are to be successful in weight/fat loss.
 
The margarine and butter on top should be avoided, this is saturated fat and can never be any good. Saying that, butter is the natural product and helps your body more than margarine, which can be horrid for your body and contains needless calories.
 
White meats are very welcome, fish is fantastic (no batter or any fatty sauce on it), cottage cheese is great, lean cuts of red meat are fine once a week.
 
White pasta is not acceptable when you can eat “clean” and have wholegrain and wholewheat pasta.
 
New potatoes and sweet potatoes are great examples of potatoes with a nice low sugar release, and offer a lot of nutrition.
 
White potatoes wont work as well, more refined sugar.
 
Fruit is fine in moderation, although classed as refined sugar, is a food in its natural state and offers far more than any negatives.
 
Fruit juice should be dilluted, and this will will give you far less refined sugar per glass.
 
All vegetables are classed as eating clean, and offer an abundance of nutrients and is nature’s way of making you healthy and helping your body to function properly.
 
Eating clean means trying to be as natural as possible in your food choices, this will automatically cut down on your refined sugars, and give you dramatic changes in bringing your body fat down!!
Twitt
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Friday, 24th February

With the big game in Twickenham tomorrow, on show will be the biggest collection of professional rugby players ever assembled.

If you compare these players to the 70’s, then you will be comparing chalk and cheese. The physical development of the players now would make mincemeat of the players back then.

I have to qualify this statement by stating that the players back then didn’t have the access to the training knowledge these days, the nutrition strategies that are commonplace these days, the different mindsets these days, the recovery advances that are very visible now.

We also have to realise that the players back in the 70’s were strictly amateurs, working a full time job and showing up for training a couple of times a week.

Weight training was often viewed negatively.

Eating a lot of protein was thought of as mad.

Training methods were very behind the times, and very unlikely to develop champion athletes.

Make shift gyms (if they had them in the first place) were remarkably poor and often unsafe, and nobody really knew what they were doing!!!

So it would be safe today to say that the likes of Gareth Edwards would likely still be fantastic players today, allowing for the fact that they would be right in the midst of all this training and eating knowledge, they would just be bigger, faster and stronger versions of what they were around 40 years ago!

The exciting thing is now that i really believe that any youngster can be developed into a professional athlete or at least semi-pro athlete given the right access to training, eating well, resting well and someone believing in them.

Many people don’t get as far as they could because they do not get enough professional help, i see many potential athletes every day coming through, and all they need is some encouragement, tried and tested advice based on science, and belief in themselves!!

More on this next week!!!

Twitt
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Thursday, 23rd February

We talked about injuries yesterday, but the main aspect that needs considering the most is injury prevention. If you don’t develop and care for all of your supporting muscles, your tendons and ligaments, then something or other will catch up with you in time, and this is if you exercise or not.

Indeed those who do not exercise are likely to have worse circulation, more joints aching, bad backs and more colds, flu etc. Also not exercising is one of the major risk factors when assessing one’s health.

People go on about all the time about alcohol, smoking, various diseases, but inactivity is a real risk to everyone in terms of future health expectations.

We talked about running and walking injuries yesterday, but the one legged squat is an excellent exercise to fit into your health and fitness twice to three times a week.

The sooner you learn the importance of proper balance the better. I try to take it several steps further by using various pieces of cutting edge balance equipment that are purposely created to make you more balanced, help you develop very strong core strength, and in general help you prevent the normal wear and tear injuries that most people are likely to get.

There is a thing called gait analysis, which videos you the way you run, and in particular the way you land on the surface as you run or even walk. This can help you decide which training shoes would be best for you.

The facts are that most people over-pronate, which means you tilt over ever so slightly when you hit the floor. Over time, this will create minor niggles to bigger more worrying injuries.

Again this is exactly why I try to concentrate on you AVOIDING and PREVENTING injuries by strengthening your fundamental strength in your body.

If you research more into it yourself as well as reading here, it will confirm the steps you need to take to fulfil your physical potential and avoid the nuisance of needless injury!!!

Twitt