Posted on

That monday feeling!

That monday feeling works in the opposite way for me.

Most people are very tired on a monday, life can be dreary and not much fun, and it can take a while simply to get going monday!

I use  monday as my day when i cleanse myself and give myself energy for the rest of the week.

My multiple runs start on a monday, all my emails start on a monday, all my multiple phone calls start on a monday, all this gives me energy and power, and does not drain me as you may have thought.

The minute i have a shower on monday evening, i feel better and i feel energised, i use exercise as a tool to give me all the power i will ever need.

Monday is a great day to straighten your eating out too, it feels fantastic right now to have eaten pasta with salmon steaks, along with some vegetables, im serious, i feel that good right now and its all down to monday being the day when im back in a routine and im super-charged to get going all over again.

Lots of water cleans my system out too, and i feel that great about it that i want to broadcast it loud and proud right now!

I get lots of energy of others too on a monday, i feed off their enthusiasm and their progress, and it inspires me to get more and more out of them, and myself too!

Monday should be used as the start to a new week, and a fresh beginning to make you feel amazing, and to renew yourself from the excesses of the weekend.

Its in your power to do it, so lets go!!

Twitt
Posted on

The train has left the station!

Getting some momentum in your training makes all the difference, as debbie is obviously discovering now that she is off the alcohol. Things are moving in the right direction for her, and she says she hasn’t had to make this  huge kind of effort to get there. Once she got into a new routine, and one that she has been very familiar with in the past, she is continuing to make the right choices and she is confident to post it here, and to inspire others.

She says its never too late, and although she didn’t do as well as she could have in the challenge, she is certainly making up for it now!

It’s like a train leaving the station, it chuggs away very slowly and with a lot of noise when it leaves the station, but when it leaves eventually, it gathers momentum and when at full pace, is a sight to behold and has huge momentum and nothing’s going to stop it!!! That sounds like what debbie is moving like now, and with that kind of mometum, the results and overall progress could be huge.

Now if you ask someone what feels better, is it a few beers and a life of takeways and chocolates? Or a life of feeling good about yourself 24 hours a day, full of energy, occasional treats and a good balance in your life of eating well 80% of the time, exercising well 80% of the time and sleeping well?

Heck of a choice there and i know some of you will go with the beers and takeways!! And its your choice because we are still a free country and you can make any choice you want. However long it takes you, as long as you get your life on a more healthy level, then thats great news to me and it will be for you i’m sure!

All i know is that anyone who has had a few years of eating rubbish, and not training at all, and THEN changing it around by eating the right things, and suddenly putting exercising into their life, ALWAYS TELL ME that their life is now better, and should have done it years ago, THIS HAPPENS 100% OF THE TIME!

If you haven’t tried it yet, give it a go, you never know you may like it!!

Twitt
Posted on

Benefits of being strong!

Back on my schedule today again, the 6.10am run and the day off yesterday did me no end of good so im hitting this message today with no end of energy too!

 I like to talk about balancing your schedule throughout the week, and how important it is to have your week planned in a broad sense to make sure you are successful each week full stop.

You always need to be doing some strength work a minimum twice a week to boost your metabolism, increase the rate your body burns calories 24 hours per day, really firm you up all over, get you stronger and fitter all round.

For many years, doctors argued that weight training and resistance work of all kinds would simply give you a heart attack if you pushed it too hard and would give you high blood pressure too. We all know now that the opposite is true.

Making gains in your health and fitness plan is impossible without having resistance training in your plan.

Another myth that used to be put around was that strength training slowed you down a lot.

The heaviest users of weight training in the running world are always the sprinters. Try telling someone who can run under 10 seconds for the 100 metres that weight training/resistance training slows you down!

The realities are that the athletes were the ones finding out first what worked before the doctors. The doctors would then research the claims made by athletes and then verify all the amazing benefits that they were constantly reporting.

Now any sport from tennis, to football, to squash, to canoeing all use strength training as vital parts of their weekly training, year round!! None of this rubbish “i don’t want to get too big”!! If only that was possible that easy!!! Sportsmen are discovering the benefits of strength training in all sorts of different ways for their chosen sport, and are not “getting big and slow”, they are getting sharper, fitter and lasting a lot longer into their 30’s than ever before.

A lot of strength training is about avoiding injury too. Most people dont know that you are strengthening your bones and joints when you use resistance too. This makes your body work together in harmomy more, making the chance of injury much less.

When you get in old age, you want strong tendons and ligaments, as well as strong joints and bones to avoid falls for instance, and to do things that will still give you a high quality of life. We all want to be active into old age but you have to create a strong base and foundation first.

You need to do your strength work AND cardiovascular work (running, walking, cycling, swimming etc), thats a perfect balance!!

Have a great sunday and thanks for visiting!

Twitt
Posted on

With a purpose

If something is worth doing, then its worth doing well.

If you’re planning a workout, make sure you put some effort into it, and you’re not guilty of going through the motions.

If you struggle to get going some days, then get going anyway. I find if i get a day like this, i feel a whole lot better 5-10 minutes into the workout. After the workout, i am really so glad i got going in the first place, and everything feels better after the event!

We all would like to act on some of the takeaway leaflets that come through the door sometimes, wondering in fact if we are really missing something? When we fall for it again, the reverse is true of how we feel after a workout. We feel all groggy, sluggish and generally terrible, exactly how we didn’t want to feel!

Doing things for a purpose works on a time basis too. We all have constraints on our time from time to time, and if we train with a purpose, we usually have to train LESS than most people do, because we have a purpose in mind and simply we want “to get the job done”!

Making changes in our body fat, and energy levels can be done with eating with a purpose too. I gave you the pizza example earlier, or just about any takeaway, when we feel terrible after junk. The opposite can be done with “good” and “clean” eating, we automatically feel better when we do this, but we have to shop with a purpose too, this means pre-written shopping lists with intent on being healthy and being well-nourished. This is easily done and you don’t have to think about it too much.

Good planning is often imperitive if we are aiming for some impressive results. When this planning becomes second nature, then good results and a good standard of health and fitness becomes natural, and almost like being no effort at all.

Most people are impatient and unwilling to give it time. This is a common reason for failure. If you give anything enough time, you will do well as long as you’re sure what you are doing contains common sense and has every chance of working.

One of the secrets of success is simply showing up time after time, remember the 80% rule about doing everything right. Then 20% of the time, do whatever you want and enjoy the treats in life on all sorts of levels.

Twitt
Posted on

Day 84 The end of the 12 weeks

Here we are, the last day, day 84 which means 12 weeks since the start and hasn’t it gone quickly for some, or very long for others!

We have all learned from this of course. I have discovered how hard it is for most of you, to create the foundations needed to be successful in the future and right now. Some of you have done very well, such as ever-present Cyril, who seems to be enjoying the programme much more now, and is starting to show confidence in his abilities.

 From cycling in the snow and ice, he is thoroughly enjoying his time cycling now that the weather is getting warmer and the track is not actually dangerous anymore!!

Whatever your progress over the last 12 weeks, its important to recognise how much you have improved and where exactly you are now.

If you pin-point the areas where you need to improve, then progress should automatically follow because you now know the areas where you can make gains on by making simple changes in your life. It’s easier when you have this kind of awareness. The hardest part is of course when you don’t have this kind of awareness. If you don’t know where you are going wrong, then how are you supposed to fix it?

This site is all about making progress, spotting how you can improve and spotting trouble sometimes before it happens. If trouble and struggle does come (most of the time it does), then not allowing it to get out of control is the difference between keeping your progress and programme on track, and the difference between going off the rails and not doing any exercise plan for years sometimes.

The confidence to carry on with a health and fitness programme can make all the difference to you. When we have little or no confidence in ourselves and our abilities, our likelyhood of carrying on doing something and doing it well are going to be greatly reduced.

The great news is that i will continue posting each day starting from tomorrow, and use this site as kind of a research and development site to health others. We are all learning and we are all here to learn off each other. We are all after the whole truth on how to get into shape, and live a better quality of life.

See you tomorrow and thanks for the last 12 weeks. Be interesting to know some of your results, even if they are up and down a bit, the rest of the year awaits!

Thanks for supporting the site and we still have at least 100 people here daily, more of you actually posting would be great!

Twitt