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Day 57

Day 57

What you are capable of in your overall progress is entirely up to you, and varies on the level of commitment you intend to put in, and what is manageable in your everyday life.

If you want to train 3 times per week, eat well 80% of the time, and generally look for periodical increases in your fitness, I think this is a very successful strategy and long term you should be in good physical condition. I see many people working out this way and they have been happy with the way things have panned out.

People who want the shorter terms gains in physical condition, may want to up that to 4-5 times per week, be very keen on their eating, and look for constant improvements in their eating, and put a high priority on sleep. Once you have this approach, then the results can be staggering as some of you are showing in this 12 weeks.

For each and every effort you put into your physical improvements, you will get it back in the form of lower body fat, healthy blood pressure and a strong heart rate, good strong bones and joints, the ability to fit into the clothes you want, to feel as if you have an abundance of energy, your self-esteem and self-confidence going up dramatically, and the satisfaction of knowing you have overcome many challenges on the way!

Don’t expect every week to be the same either, most weeks I would bet you remain enthusiastic, and happy at the changes you have made to your body. It’s the stressful weeks we worry about the most though don’t we?

Stressful situations always tend to throw doubt on all the good things we are trying to do. If we have had 4 great weeks, then one bad week is not going wipe away 4 weeks of progress. In fact, one bad week can often spur us on to make fresh progress the next week, making us realise that all that progress is really not worth throwing away at any cost!

The 80% rule of still enjoying yourself when you train and eat is always going to be a winner for you. Nobody can have perfect weeks leave alone a prefect 12 weeks, that simply is not possible.

Mental freshness is as important as physical freshness and trying new foods out. You won’t always feel like eating the right things, and if one day a week, you have a couple of your old favourites, then where’s the harm in that?

Your capacity can actually be enhanced when you’re fresh for workouts, fresh for getting your eating back on track as you get that feeling that you’re “up for it” again and that the “bad weekend” you may have just had, may not have been that bad at all, especially compared to the way you USED  to eat.

What eating 80% good food and allowing yourself the occasional treat means is that there is room for fun, and still allows you to perform at your peak. Without any fun, your programme will crash and burn, and keeping yourself happy goes a long, long way when it comes to keeping your programme going for the long term, like the rest of your life!

Whatever your strategy, as long as you keep doing something over the week, then you will always be moving in the right direction!

Twitt
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Day 56 End of week 8!

End of week 8 would you believe! 8 weeks at the start probably didn’t sound that long, but now you know it can be quite a long time to get your eating right, your training going well, and the most important part probably, get your mind right in order to give the effort required.

Had my first sunday morning run for a while today, as the demands of two small children over the last few weeks have taken over. Back to normal now that the first 6 weeks of a new baby are over, and this was the best sunday morning in some time, and the temperature was good enough to run in a t-shirt and shorts, the first time since last summer! The run felt great, and once you get a run in for the first time in a while, you realise how much you missed it!

The temperatures in january and february just gone will have actually done us good, however icy and snowy they may have been! If we can find a way to get our workouts in during the coldest time of the year, and the coldest temperatures in the last 30 odd years, then the current weather will only allow more activities, and it should be a breeze from now on to get more workouts in exactly when you want to.

This challenge started during the most demanding time of year, and working in the toughest times gives us more skills and discipline that we ever thought. Most businesses i know have had the toughest times since the Great Depression, but most of them are coming out of this recession leaner and meaner, and better equipped to handle a change world and economic environment.

The same should happen with you, we have a lot of ups and downs from most of you in the past 8 weeks, and from that you will have developed your very own strategies on how to overcome the challenges that life always throws at you. Once you develop these skills, you won’t miss so many workouts, you won’t use the same old excuses to eat sugary/fatty food, and you won’t write whole week’s off anymore, you will tend to recognise bad habits beginning sooner than you did before, and you rectify your habits before they become destructive.

Sunday is always a great time to get out and about, and a means of making sure you start off your new week with a bang. We talked about hangovers yesterday, and now’s a great time to get rid of it, eat some decent food, drink plenty of water today and get back to feeling your old self. I never see sunday as a “let’s break some records day”, i see it more as a relaxing, and gather your thoughts kind of day, and a morning run is a key element in that process for me.

I’m looking forward to the start of week 9 tomorrow, and a big last month from all of you!

Twitt
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Day 51 Use your imagination and let’s mix it up!

Day 51

One of the reasons why some people give up and some people keep with their exercise programmes is down to flexibility and variety. I’m not talking about stretching or anything such thing, I’m talking about being flexible with your workouts, and if you can’t do your scheduled workout, then do a variation of what you were aiming to do in the first instance.

For example, if you were planning to run for 30-40 minutes, and somehow you only had 10-15 minutes, and were still focused on great progress, I would rush over to the nearest most vicious looking hill, and hammer 6 sprints forwards, and 6 sprints backwards, each for a total of 30 yards of so. If you go flat out, you WILL get a great workout in!

Jean asked about interval training, should she do it? I think Jean already knows the answer, of course you should jean and show everyone what you can do! I always say that most people are only limited by their imagination when it comes to training variety.

Jean is talking about interval training, which could be described easily as jogging between one lamppost, then sprint the next post, then jog the next, then sprint the next one and so on. Now THIS is a workout that you will struggle to last more than 5 minutes each time, it is that intense!

Now we are starting to use our minds for our workouts, please don’t end up like some mindless zombie doing boring treadmill runs all the time, PLEASE, PLEASE vary it, not only because it brings great results doing different workouts, but freshens up your mind too!

One word of caution before doing ANY type of sprint work. In my experience, it is always advisable to do some kind of warm up before you sprint flat out, the always present threat of pulling a hamstring or groin never goes away, and the more weight you carry, the bigger danger there is. I’m not being prejudiced there, I’m just saying that I’ve done a million sprint sessions, and although you will get massive benefits from the session, the goal should also be not to get injured, in which case you probably wouldn’t run for a month at least!

The different ways of training are literally endless, and although you must still have a good structure in place, any type of workout is good as long as it’s safe and you’re capable of doing it. The more experienced you are, the more options you should have and as you should realise by now, it’s not simply a case of training for longer the fitter you are, that’s simply not true. It’s about doing “higher quality” training sessions in the time to suit you, and as long as you are improving physically, that’s a great sign surely you are doing all the right things.

Always stick to your fitness standards and we all have our benchmarks on how we are doing. Most people training with me may have a very tough hill as a benchmark, if they can do that consistently, they know they are in great shape. If you can do 40 press ups in one go, and your new limit is just 25, you know you have been slipping and you need to re-examine what you’re doing.

Being in shape physically and mentally can be easier than you think, as long as you know what your good standard in life is, and you try your best to stay there, even through the highs and lows that life often brings.

Twitt
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Successful………..but happy?

How many people do you know that have climbed the ladder of success, but they have found out that when they have got to the top, they have been climbing the wrong wall. I have met a few, and they have been some of the unhappiest people i have ever met.

There was the story about the millionnaire business owner sitting in a restaurant with his protege, who became very successful himself. He had a large home, a parking place close the front door, and a brass nameplate on his office door. As they were back slapping each other on how well they had done, the business owner asked his protege “how he would define successs”? He replied he couldn’t really answer. Then, the business owner told him that being successful for most people was achieving and having the things that were important to them.

The protege then started to list all the things that were important to him and made him happy, he never mentioned his job. The boss then asked “well, you’re happy right?”, “well no” came the reply. And then the boss asked “well, you’re successful right?”, he didn’t have a reply. The protege just sat there thinking.

To cut a long story short, the protege quit his job two months later. The boss begged him to stay, but there was nothing he could do. He reminded his boss of the conversation he had, and thanked him for pushing him into doing something with his life that he actually loved, and was important to him.

He used to be in telecommunications, he now has a roofing company! He always loved working with wood and now he’s hammering shingles on roofs and building porches and guess what? He’s happy.

I have a post way back called Your drving force, look it up and you will be asked to list those things that really get you out of bed in the morning, those things that are really important to you and drive you on to achieve great things. Once you make a list, you will realise that being fit, strong and healthy is a major part of you achieving all of those things, and most importantly, being happy. It’s a good idea to fill it in, as the 12 week challenge starts next monday, and this will help you keep motivated and strong.

Give it a go,

Keri

Twitt