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Wednesday, October 12th

The issue of alcohol and training has never been emphasised more than with the current welsh rugby team.

When I spoke to sports coaches of all levels years ago, as well as sports stars of the 70’s, 80’s and 90’,  and suggested that sports teams needed to abstain from alcohol especially in times of sporting competition, I was ridiculed as being unreasonable and “the players had to have a drink for god sake”!!!

David Beckham at the time was abstaining and resulted in him being in his best shape and extending his career even after an horrendous injury.

It turns out years later that avoiding alcohol in tournament play and a while before that, is HAVING MASSIVE benefits.

Wales look fitter and sharper than anyone else.

They are more powerful than most teams and the last 20 minutes of their games is a strength for them now, instead of being a weakness like it used to be.

This will I believe give them an edge again for this Saturday and hopefully propel them to the final!

With your own training, you will surely see a massive difference when you abstain even for a couple of weeks?

Your body will get tighter, your energy levels will improve a lot, Sundays won’t be “hangover” day and you will feel far more lively, your performance will be hugely improved all week long, and your recovery will be far stronger in between sessions.

A big one is sleep.

Most people think that sleep is enhanced with alcohol but the opposite is in fact true, sleep can be destroyed through alcohol.

There are 120 sleep disorders and 80 are to do with alcohol, a mind blowing statistic so if you are having problems with sleep, this may be a good place to start?!!!!!

If you want maximum performance and want to look your best, the alcohol has to go. It’s a free country so your choice!!!

Twitt
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Tuesday 11th October

Obstacles to your year end targets for your health and fitness are often many, some you can something about, some you can’t.

In the can’t category are illnesses and injuries, both often fall at exactly the wrong time just when you have started getting a run of form in usually!! These happen from time to time and we just have to ride them out, resting completely in most cases but we know we will come back from them.

Then there’s unavoidable family issues that have to be sorted before you continue, but even here if you get up early enough in a day, of course you can still get some exercise in. Stress comes to all of us, and exercise will often be the best way of helping with that stress, and not alcohol or excess food as some do.

Some things you can do a lot about are missed workouts or bad time management. “Something came up” or “i had to nip into town” or “it was too cold, too wet or too hot” are not excuses that are going to cut it with anyone, and are exactly that-excuses!!!!

Your level of desire has more to do with being in shape, and this is how people who run into illness or injury usually come back very strong after it. They miss feeling fit and energetic, they miss being in shape and feeling their body a lot tighter, so they will usually do anything just to get back working out hard again.

If your level of desire is low and you simply think by joining a gym, you are somehow going to get in shape with no real plan, then you’re wasting your time.

The bottom line is that anything can be overcome and these seemingly impossible circumstances should be always seen as challenges and not insurmountable!!! Life will never be easy all the time, or even some of the time. Expect stress and a stress on your time too, just make sure you plan your workouts into your schedule, instead of finding ways not to do them!!!

Twitt
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Monday 10th October

Saturated fat is always the bad boy when it comes to having a bad rap in the press, and with good reason. If too much of that stuff blocks your arteries, you can have a heart attack anytime unfortunately, and is always a danger when consumed at regular intervals.

The other bad twin of the food family is refined sugar and its existence in a lot of foods, this is why i always try to encourage you to eat well! If you consume a lot of products packaged up too much, you can bet your life it has regined sugar in it.

Most cereal boxes are loaded with refined sugar, this is a fact and far from being your best start to the day, it can end up your most sugary start to the day and really trip up your day before its even started. Fruit and fibre for instance is loaded with refined sugar when examined in tests, but tries to mention “your healthiest start to the day” all over the box. Porridge is always a better choice, giving you an excellent slow release of energy and avoiding the temptations of yet more sugar!!!

Anyone who has had to do a diabetes test and carried that thing around when you prick your finger and continually test your blood sugar levels after food, will definitely know what im talking about!!!! Refined sugar is in a lot of foods, too numerous to mention here and the usual suspects contain the most, white bread, biscuits of all kinds, sweets and most man made food, if not all!!! That test is very valuable and any chance you get to take it, the eye opener you get will be extremely revealing and educational for sure!!!

There are refined sugars in fruit of course, and this is why even fruit should be eaten in moderation.

This is also why i always recommend you dillute your organge juice, instead of having a big glass, this brings your refined sugars down substantially while still containing the benefits of the juice.

So its saturated fat and REFINED SUGARS, they are the real bad boys of your food intake, guaranteed to stop fat loss in its tracks and deprive you of any sustained energy!

Twitt
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Friday, October 7th

As we go toward a great weekend of rugby, Wales versus Ireland, England versus France, its important to manage your body’s performance throughout this weekend.

A lot of people will use this weekend to complete trash their body, and forget all about eating healthy habits and say that somehow on monday morning or evening, they will fix it and they will be back to normal on tuesday!!!

Life or fitness doesn’t work like that somehow, and you always need some guidelines and tried and tested strategies to get through a weekend like this.

If friday night is your night, and you’re having “a few” no matter what!!! You had better make sure you do a workout tomorrow m0rning. If you do, your booze leaves your body to a large degree and you feel better.

If you don’t, your spare tyre gets bigger and you feel sorry for yourself all of saturday.

Then if you drink again saturday, you will write off another few drinks, and you usually wont have ANY idea how many extra calories you consumed in food thats usually too high in saturated fat, salt and sugars, THATS THE WAY IT IS when you let it all hang out  the weekend.

Then there’s sunday. Sunday lunch can be preceeded by a fried breakfast, a sleep on sunday afternoon (i miss those days!), and then something that could be called “comfort food” at the end of sunday.

To fix this calorie avalanche, stick to the tried and tested.

If you are out tonight, make sure you get out for a run, hard walk, cycle, inside workout WITHOUT FAIL!!!

Have a good breakfast, nothing fried and nothing greasy!

If you are out saturday, do the same workout sunday (usually outside) and really get a sweat on.

You can STILL enjoy your weekend, you just do not need to end up like a stuffed pig on monday morning, and take until thursday next week until you feel back to normal!!!!! SORT IT OUT SATURDAY AND SUNDAY and there wont be tears on monday morning, and you will be in a much better mood for it!!!

Good luck Wales!!

Twitt
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Thursday 6th October

Steve Jobs, chief executive of Apple, died last night after a courageous battle with cancer, at the relatively young age of 56.

Jobs today has been called an innovator, a genius, a leader in the technology field, someone who created a legacy that will last generations, a true visionary, and just about everything in between.

Never has someone been regarded so high in the technology field, and his legacy will continue in just about everything we use today.

From ipod’s to ipad’s, to apple mac’s to his relationship with Microsoft some years ago when Microsoft actually kept the company going because Microsoft itself didn’t want the company to fold because it would have been broken up itself.

Jobs used to say in many of his speeches, “never let anyone else stop you following your dreams”, “never let negative people put you off you pursuing what you know what to be right”, he often encouraged entrepreneurs of all kinds to have a go at what they thought could work, what they thought the public wanted and what they thought deep down in their hearts to be true.

With your exercise programme and your food intake, you secretly know what is right and true.

You don’t need to read another diet in the paper that you know is faddy, you don’t need to fall for yet another faddy exercise machine, you don’t need to be put off by some of your negative friends who don’t even work out at all  yet are overweight, you don’t need to believe anyone who makes claims you know are too good to be true etc etc.

So whatever the situation you are in, focus on yourself and what you know to be right. There will be times when you feel like giving up on your workouts, on your food, on your alcohol levels, but actually following through every time you doubt yourself instead of giving up will take you a long, long way!!!

Steve Jobs RIP

Twitt