Posted on

13th April 2011

Making a statement that you are doing your best with your training, you are doing your best with your food is a lot harder than what usually what happens in practice.

The hardest thing i have to achieve with individuals is getting them to believe in themselves, and to develop confidence in themselves, if i can do this, then i know i have won the hardest battle and things should move along very quickly after this.

All the great coaches in sport and in  business pursue this quest all the time, and use different ways to do it.

Some people need a good shouting at, in fact they thrive on it.

Some people would crumble if you shouted at them, and their confidence would be lost forever, this is why every individual is different and needs to be handled with different degrees of care!

Telling someone that they will soon be capable of climbing any hill, any mountain and by climbing i mean running or walking hard! I am no expert in mountaineering and im not pretending to be, but i do know how to get up vicious hills and how to get others up the same challenging hills!!

It is all small steps, and you have to demonstrate to the individual that there is progress each and every week. If you focus on progress then you will already be in the fast lane of development. If you simply show up and go through the motions, your workouts will not only be very boring but unproductive too, and thats exactly the situation you don’t want to be in!!!

The positive nature of hill training can never be underestimated! Everyone who i have ever taken up hills always conquers their insecurities about their true ability and sometimes, a new and much more confident person is born from being able to conquer any hill in the area. You may also find that the same person will never run flat again, the prospect of hill running or walking can be addictive not only in the challenge factor, but the results in terms of fitness are always tremendous!!!

Get up there and give it a go as long as you have developed your fitness to a good standard! There must be a hill which you currently think is impossible, its to to crush your fears and surprise yourself so give yourself 6 weeks to conquer it, edging up further each workout, a little progress every week will lead to massive progress over 6 weeks so plan it and see how well you can do!!

Twitt
Posted on

12th April 2011

Great things happen in your body when you first start exercising. You body responds well to moving around more, and your body likes the feeling of doing things again, and you develop your confidence as you go.

Your body responds very well in particular when you adjust your food intake. Most people who go from eating processed food to more natural, fresh foods will experience increased energy levels, and an inner confidence that they are going to get healthier if you keep your habits up.

Most of the measurements i take on individuals who start an exercise programme look a lot better at the end of their first month. Progress is relatively quick and 4-6 weeks can make a good difference to anyone as long as they show commitment. Two inches off your waist will always look and feel great, and your clothes will feel a lot looser too. I always tell people if they are carrying a lot more weight than they should, that the biggest worry they will have is changing their wardrobe!!!

The trick is to keep these exciting feelings going well into the times when the novelty factor of keeping fit and healthy has gone, and make it part of your daily life and make it become routine.

This is why routines are important so you end up doing healthy things without even thinking about it, which is exactly where you want to be.

Your workout becomes “your” time when you relax, get rid of stress and you find yourself again after a long day, or even before you embark on your challenging day. If you can keep your workouts going in times of stress in your life, you know that you have fully integrated a healthy lifestyle into your life and you should already be relatively fit and healthy, and have some good ability in terms of exercise of all kinds.

A true athlete and i mean that in a broad term, should be able to do outside exercise such as running, cycling, hill walking as well as work inside with resistance workouts, and you should be able to combine them too. You should be versatile and open to new ideas, no need to spend all your time in the gym, there are endless and exciting ways to keep fit and the gym is just one angle you can use. You will learn more about your body in different environments so lets keep it varied and keep doing your best!!!

Twitt
Posted on

April 5th 2011

Its tuesday already and the great news is i feel alive again. After a weekend of being away and eating not so good food, my energy levels have returned, simply by getting back to normal which is an amazing feeling!!!

Hopefully, some or most of you are going through exactly the same feeling and realise that your normal routines can be much more valuable than you ever thought!!! I know my porridge is very valuable to me in terms of energy and internal health, nothing to beat it.

I know my chicken, turkey, lean beef is going to serve me well, keeps me lean and feeling as hard as possible.

My fish is vital to me, to keep my joints in good working order and to keep those essential fatty acids working very well all the way throughout my body, life feels good when there is fish in my life, plus i get to stay lean too, its a win win situation for me!!!

Then theres the other good carbs apart from porridge, which is the wholegrain pasta  and sweet, new and jacket potatoes, all great vegetables that give me energy and keep me lean, provided i don’t slam lots of butter in the potatoes of course!!!

Then theres the rest of the veg, i feel instantly better outside and inside when i get my daily supply of vegetables. Same with fruit, lots of energy going in and lots of nutrients going in the whole time, if you consume fruit the way i do, the better you will feel and hopefully you will know the same great feeling.

What about water? When we are away, we tend to drink much more coffee and tea, plus alcohol!!! Having water back in my life makes my energy levels and awareness go through the roof, this is the time to be full of energy, full of vitality, full of enthusiasm and try to make things happen, despite what the economy is going!!!!!!!

Twitt
Posted on

31st march 2011

The reasons why we exercise, why we don’t give in to temptations in the week, why we drink water instead of pop, why we make time for a healthy lifestyle full stop are many.

When you are very young, its all about looks usually, when you get a bit older and perhaps have more responsibilities such as children, your reasons change pretty fast in terms of order of importance.

If you are a father or mother, you want to be in shape to look after your kids, while still looking good and proving you’re not ready for the knackers yard just yet!!!!!

Then when you become older again, you want to be in seriously good shape to be around to help your kids, and perhaps even your grandchildren, this is when a lifetime of keeping yourself in good shape is really going to be worth it. Like we always say though, its never too late to change your pre-conceived ideas about exercise, nobody is ever too old to get into good enough shape to totally transform their quality of life.

Its not all about six pack’s and rippling muscles either, this is just an extreme version of a healthy lifestyle. Most models you see of all kinds in magazines have been airbrushed to different degrees and digitally enhanced to make their bodies seem like the perfect version, in reality this level of conditioning doesnt exist for long because these low level of body fat are kept only for short periods of time, due to the extreme diets and mental discipline required. To get in this shape is to be admired because it is quite a feat, but it shouldn’t be considered the normal expection from working out and eating well and this is the point i’m trying to get across!!

I am away tomorrow on a family weekend break until monday, so thats enough reasons right there for me to be in shape, as i get older, i appreciate my health more and more and never take it for granted, like perhaps i did when i was 18!! Having enough energy to do everything is no longer a distant dream anymore for most people, it is essential in these busy times we live in and training smart and eating fresh and healthy foods are number one and number two in order to achieve these very important goals!!!

Twitt
Posted on

30th march 2011

It’s the end of the month then and have you made the most of your winter’s training? Has it been a productive one or another missed opportunity?

The great thing about training and eating properly is that it doesnt always have to be a missed opportunity at all, you can always start back whenever you want, or indeed start for the first time no matter what age you are, that’s a fact and i have seen it many, many times.

The biggest thing that stops people exercising is perhaps fear of the unknown.

We all dont really want  do something we have never done before, or we think we won’t be that good at, or somehow we would be embarrassed to exercise in front of people which is totally understandable, or we sometimes think we won’t be as good as somebody else at it because we have low confidence levels always before we start.

The low confidence thing is hugely prominent in everyone i have ever started training. I have met some of the nicest people and the biggest egos too sometimes when starting an exercise programme with people. Without fail, and underneath all of that bluster and outward confidence of some, EVERYONE is really under confident when it comes to starting exercise, and don’t let anyone fool you otherwise.

The confidence levels WILL improve when it comes to your health and fitness programme, as long as your initial plan is safe and sound.

To me, fitness is all about improving slowly and steadily, and looking for ways it can improve your everyday life. Nobody i know has failed to improve his/her life by introducing exericise into their lives, ask around and you will probably experience the same answers and results.

If you are thinking of exercising but not sure if it will work for you, i can guarantee 100% it will work every time for you, as long as you are willing to give it some time and apply yourself to giving your best with your eating too, 100% guarantees are hard to find these days!!!!

Twitt