Posted on

Tuesday, 22nd November

A massive amount of colds, flu you name it, its around in a big way at the moment, and a huge amount of people have got some illness one way or another!

This is the first big wave of illness to hit us this winter, and undoubtedly, not the last. Some people have already had it for a couple of weeks, some people havent been out of the house at all.

We usually talk about how being fit makes us look better and lose body fat and weight, but its exactly at times like this that we need to talk about the importance of a health and fitness programme for our immune system.

Without a healthy immune system, our bodies would break down and make us vulnerable to the biggest and most threatening illnesses. This is why hospitals have become much more responible for cleanliness and not passing germs/viruses on, because when you are ill in hospital, your immune system is down and you are highly vulnerable to infection, which has even killed some patients in the past of course unfortunately.

So if you are one of those who are ill or have been ill lately, being healthy and feeling just “normal” again would be an achievement! Weight loss and fat loss may not be on your priority list right now, and getting your immune system back up to speed is the most important thing you can do right now!

I bang on about fresh, natural healthy foods where possible, and these happen to be the most important foods when it comes to boosting your immune system. These are often called “superfoods” and they are becoming more and more appreciated, and you can usually read about them at least once a week in the national newspapers.

These foods will form the foundation not only for your immune system and how healthy you feel, but for your entire future success, they are that important!!!

Twitt
Posted on

Monday, 21st November

Under five weeks to go now and i find there is huge momentum with everyone i train now coming up to the festive period.

Most people i know want to be in their best shape for the end of the year.

There has been a cultural shift the last few years too. Years ago, christmas used to be all about the parties begining at the start of december. Now because of the changing culture of people not going out so much, and there not being so many parties for whatever reason, people’s health has become much more important again, which is great news!!

People are also becoming much more aware of the health in general too, more check ups and more preventative measures are being taken. People are also more aware of the need to be in shape in december to avoid the folly of going on some kind of faddy drastic diet in januuary.

Most people realise now that if you’re in shape during december, then theres no need to diet in january, maybe lose a few pounds but no monumental effort needed!!

Once you manage to get over the “let’s get in shape for this or that season/holiday”, you will really understand that its the best overall strategy to be in shape ALL YEAR LONG!!!

Your body will thank you too!!! One of the most destructive things you can do to your body is diet hard and lose lots of weights, then don’t care for a while and pile lots of weight on. Then the more times you repeat this process, the more resistant your body becomes to losing weight in the future, which is a very negative situation!!

So under five weeks left, you don’t need major efforts, all you need to do is use common sense, eat sensible portion sizes and try to keep your food as natural and as fresh as possible. No salt, very little refined sugars and little saturated fat.

Start your week off well, stay positive and you’re off to a flyer!!!

Twitt
Posted on

Friday, 18th November

Finishing off the week in style is always a good feeling, and if you have started to adopt some of the habits i suggest, then you should be improving quite a lot by now.

Its usually this session, the last one of the week, that usually defines the way we feel about ourselves going into the weekend. If we have a big productive session on a friday, we usually feel good about ourselves and end up on a big high.

Like a football match, we feel we are only as good as our last session!! If we have been consistent for weeks and months, our last session is likely to be first class unless we have felt ill or something that hinders our performance.

I feel exactly the same way when i’m giving out the session and instructing it.

If i don’t give value for money, and i don’t produce quality sessions, then i would be out of business straight away. Unfortunately, in the fitness industry there are a lot people who rely on marketing and telling you in the media how “good they are and how they can change your life”. Some people do believe them but are often let down when they find out there is little substance to their claims. These people often then go to another job or industry peddling their outlandish and false claims!

I always laugh at the charlatans who claim they train so called famous people. I remember jenifer lopez’s trainer telling all the world’s media how he “created her famous bum”, WHAT RUBBISH AND PHYSICALLY IMPOSSIBLE to create that shape without her genetics!

Then 6 months later there was another trainer claiming the success, and last year i saw yet another trainer trying to claim the same success! The facts are that these trainers only usually work with these people a couple of months, and these people or so called celebrities and go off to do their own thing. You cannot sustain a business on such short term ventures.

I try to value my everyday people who have given back a lot to me emotionally and physically for many, many years, and any trainer who has been in the game with a sustainable clientele for many, many years will tell you the same thing! If i mentioned so called famous people i trained or other media/TV ventures, i would consider myself detracting from my every day, every week, every year, every ten years individuals i have been training, some have been training for over 15 years straight now which is all credit to them!

So back to your training, judge yourself by your last session or week’s training. Unless you have been ill, this shows exactly where you are RIGHT now and what you need to do to improve from here. There has never been a more important workout than today so lets get out there and really give it your best. I feel exactly the same because i will be giving out many before the weekend starts and i want to make them of huge quality!!!!

Twitt
Posted on

Wednesday, 15th November

On from yesterday means more about the importance of proper nutrition for sports.

So we assuming the client is 14 years of age again and looking to get bigger for rugby.

Then we explained how important it was still important to eat good quality food, and in bigger portions gradually over time.

Now we have to explain why you need to eat every 3 hours ideally, and its importance in rugby and sports in general.

When you play rugby usually on a saturday, its a tough sport and you will naturally break down muscle tissue in all the mauling, ripping of the ball and wrestling and big hits all over the field for 80 minutes! You need to recover from this on the saturday night and sunday and this is done by showing great interest in the power of food in recuperation terms.

Whenever you break down muscle tissue, you need to replace it again through the power of food and the power of good sleep.

So putting a meal together of good protein and good carbs, along with vegetables will replace a lot of the broken down muscle tissue and help you not only recover, but make fresh gains.

This same principle applies to weight training too, as we have talked about in the last few days.

Whenever you do a weights session, you naturally break down muscle tissue. So guess what? Yes, its the good quality protein, good carbs and vegetables you need to put back into your system again within an hour of finishing weight training and throughout the day.

You need your porridge for breakfast, wholemeal bread, wholegrain pasta throughout the day packed with lean proteins such as white meats and fish, and try to pack in a meal with veggies included in it at least once a day. This will make sure your body is in fine shape inside and out!

Tomorrow we have an insight on how important water is in your diet and how it affects your performance and health overall.

Twitt
Posted on

Tuesday, 15th November

Going back to last week and the 14 year old’s question about how to get bigger and stronger for rugby, we talked about the necesssary weight training programme and the big do’s and don’ts of the programme.

Now we move on to eating and to explode the myths on why kids don’t seem to be able to put on the muscle and weight they need for rugby. Eating is at least 50% of the equation and if you ignore this side of things, then there’s absolutely NO WAY you can hope to reach your goals!

The important start is to make sure you and your family shop for good foods. For years, rugby players thought they could eat almost anything as long as it was long in calories, and “any weight” was “good weight”!! This right there is probably the biggest mistake most rugby players used to do and still do.

You have to consume good foods such as white meats, fish, red meat once a week, cottage cheese, milk for protein, you need wholegrain pasta, brown rice, jacket new and sweet potatoes for good carbs, plenty of fruit and vegetables as you need your internal functions working smoothly and properly and you still need to keep your energy levels very high of course.

You need good fats for your body such as oily fish including salmon, trout, mackerel etc, a handful of nuts would be good each day and these essential fatty acids will support everything you try and do in your physique building programme for rugby.

The difference between a rugby player looking for size and the average healthy person in the street is that the rugby player needs bigger portion sizes in his training, not too much for starters but building up over time. This way the quality of muscle built will be long lasting and all the extra food won’t deposit as fat, so slowly increasing portion size and meal frequency is the shape of things to come.

More of proper nutrition for rugby and sport in general tomorrow!!

Twitt