Tuesday 20th September

The rest intervals in between your exercises are one of the best ways to increase intensity in your workouts, burn body fat, build lung capacity and increase muscular endurance.

Intensity for your workouts are done in several ways, but i really trust this way of doing things as its tried and tested.

An old saying is that fitness can be defined as the ability to get up after being knocked down, and do it again straight away! This may be more of a rugby example but the example holds true.

When you transfer that to the gym or home workout imagine it like this.

You do a press up and the most people have a rest for a couple of minutes, maybe five minutes then do another exercise.

If you try to do two exercises back to back for a change, it automatically becomes harder of course, and your muscles feel much better worked, you get out of breath easier, and the whole thing becomes a much bigger effort, leading to overall better results.

This is a good way to start, press ups followed straight away by arm dips, then rest for a minute, then try another two exercises, you will be able to build up over the weeks.

Ultimately, you want to be targeting 6 exercises and up to 8 exercises in a row.

For example, if you are working at home

press ups

arm dips

alternate squat thrusts

squats

sit ups

lunges

If you were in a gym, it may be

bench press

lat pulldowns

leg press

upright rows

tricep pushdowns

curls.

This is just a small example of what you can do, and your programmes and workout ideas are only limited by your imagination!!!

Just concentrate by working on one exercise per body part and you won’t go far wrong, you can literally have a different workout every time you train!!!

So tempo of workout is everything for me, the less rest you have the better (as long as you are well conditioned first!), and once you get used to training this way, you will never go back!!!

Monday, September 19th

How many of you are finding reasons TO exercise instead of finding reasons NOT to exercise?!!!

I can tell you right now its only a mindset change that you need to change things around right now.

I have had some hilarious and unbelievable reasons from a lot of people on why they can’t exercise.

From needed an hour to get ready first thing in the morning for a workout, to not having time to exercise at all, to not having the right trainers or time to get a pair of trainers, to not being the “type” to train, to not having a training partner, to exercise “not being for me”, to just about anything!!!

The ONE thing  that these individuals have in common every single time, is that THEY ARE NOT IN SHAPE!!!! So the problem lies in that!!! They cannot offer a position for their comments because they are deeply unhappy anyway because they are not in shape, the worst thing about it all is that they CAN get in shape with a bit of effort and commitment, but somehow it is beyond them?!!!

So find me someone really out of shape and i will show you ten excuses on why they aren’t (according to them anyway).

Change your mindset RIGHT now and the excuses will stop, the action will start and excellent progress will naturally follow!!! This is a sure thing!! Time after time i have seen individuals change their state of mind and start looking for reasons to train, to eat well and get to bed early.

THIS IS ALL YOU NEED AND THE SOONER YOU ACCEPT IT ALL, THE QUICKER YOU WILL GET IN SHAPE AND FEEL AS ENERGETIC AS YOU WERE WHEN YOU WERE A CHILD!!!

This is monday, its the start of the week and your start of the big mindset change that can literally change your life. No time for negatives because the positives will always crush the negatives in my book.

If you have started already then congratulations, if you haven’t then don’t delay and waste another day, the time is now and less than 14 weeks to christmas already

Friday 16th September

Congratulate yourself today if you’re doing something positive about your health and i really mean that!

From individuals i know currently having pulminory rehabilitation to those who have just done the Tenby Ironman race, the efforts on both counts have been hugely impressive, and in some cases relatively the same considering the starting point of the individuals!!!

Anytime you show up and do some exercise, life will become better and move in the right direction for you.

Anytime you get up saturday morning and you start grilling your breakfast instead of frying, you’re improving your health if you can make it lasting change.

Anytime you can say that you’re not going to go through the motions anymore, and you want to do different things in your training that will bring you some great results, life will change for you for the better because you will be focused on continuous improvement.

Anytime you decide that instead of staying in bed saturday and sunday morning, you walk up some hill or even small mountain that you never even thought of, you’re going to be improving at a speed that will shock you!

Anytime you start thinking that just because you have hit 40, 50 or 60 years of age, you are finished in physical terms you are doomed!!! TURN IT AROUND RIGHT NOW, cut that thinking right out of your mind and start realising that these ages offer OPPORTUNITY and not the end of the road!!! I have countless examples who have proved me right, and its their experience that inspires me every day!!

So we are on friday and traditionally the end of the week for most, start seeing it as the beginning of your enjoyment if you have been stuck in an office or house all week, this weekend is the beginning of your opportunity to feel alive again and get in shape so lets give it your best shot!!!!

Thursday 15th September

14 weeks to Christmas and an ideal opportunity to put a sequence of events in place to make sure you’re in great shape by then.

Number one is that you have to WANT to do it. Of course everyone WANTS to be in shape, but how many of you are really willing to go through the kind of effort needed to do so?

I see so many people believe it or not asking for OTHER people to get into shape. If someone else has to ask for you to get into shape, then there is a sincere lack of will to do it in the first place.

If you have a lack of will, then what hope have you got?

The abundance of will and NEED to do something will be the driving force when times get tough.

For example, I was talking to the coach of an under-achieving rugby team the other day, and complained that they always start off well, falter big time mid-season and then fall away completely at the end of the year.

When I dug under the surface of the problem, the issues on why these performances were falling away soon became apparent.

The most amount of players they had out for training was in the summer months just before the season started, which explained their excellent start to the year, in fact 30-35 players.

Then when the bad weather came, it went down to 10 players believe it or not.

Then because of under preparation, they start losing and the turn out’s dwindle to sometimes 4-6 players!!!

Then you don’t have to guess too hard that the season more or less collapses due some heavy losses. The players who were then tempted to come back often just write that season off and promise to  come back the next season!!!

So does that team “want it” enough?

 Definitely not it seems.

You will find the most successful teams or individuals are the ones who practice the most, with most intensity and don’t have big gaps in terms of weeks or months in the time they train or play.

UP TO YOU!!! 14 WEEKS TO GO!!!!

Wednesday 14th September

Great things happen to happen to individuals who take action.

Those who hide and bury their heads under the sand will undoubtedly worsen their plight.

Okay, so once you have decided to take action, you will probably realise that you don’t have a whole lot of time to do it.

This is because life has become faster, people don’t have time anymore for things they used to take for granted.

Just look at most people’s days now, they still have to put their time into work but you are expected to do more in that time.

You are expected to do the job quicker and more accurately, and if you don’t like it, then with the current grim economic climate, then there’s usually someone right behind you prepared to take your job!!!

When you go to see the doctor, they say that they usually have 6 minutes for you according to research!

6 minutes is unbelievable so hopefully its not a complicated condition!!!!

We want to drive our more powerful cars quicker so we can get to places quicker, even if there’s speed cameras everywhere!!

We want to shop quicker, we have much more limited attention spans so pick shorter programmes, so hopefully you get the picture with all of this!!!

So when it comes to taking action in workout terms, your exercise session had BETTER be short but at the same time of course, you WANT AND NEED results!!!

So whenever i go through a session, i insist i give the absolutely best session i can!!! This means a high tempo and a lot of variety, including making sure each and every session is 100% safe!!! NOBODY has time to get injured these days!!

So wheneve you’re picking your workouts, make sure you make it count and give it your very best. Nobody has all day to train anymore so pick your time and hit it hard!!!