Posted on

Tuesday 7th June

We talked about yesterday the ability to work around injuries, instead of working through them which tends to make the injuries worse of course. Being flexible and being able to change your programme is very important.

The other issue is recovery and how important sleep and eating well is.

If you eat a variety of fresh natural foods, this usually means you will be ingesting a lot of vital nutrients that your body needs and when your body is down, such as when you are injured, these nutrients are even more important not only to make you feel better but to heal the damage that has already been done by the injury.

The process of an injury usually starts with your twisting or pulling something quite badly, then usually depending on the severity of the injury, your point of injury will bleed internally and the damage still goes on.

This is why ice is applied as soon as possible to injuries so the healing process can begin immediately, and you don’t waste time.

The ice will also bring inflammation down quickly of course, further speeding up the healing journey.

Then when you injury has stabilised, its important to keep bringing in, as I keep saying all the time, fresh natural food when possible to enable food to have its true healing power. People may scoff at this but your cells really appreciate good food coming in all the time because then it can go about fixing the injury, and much quicker than if you went on some kind of junk food diet which will only delay the process!!!

So if you can follow these rules, sleep then becomes paramount. If you get as much uninterrupted sleep as possible, your body will be in full recovery mode and will do its very best to fix itself in record time!

Its also paramount NOT to antagonise the injury again by working through it, you need to work AROUND it and train smart not to upset the incredible healing process your body is now on.

For the record, alcohol is the worst thing you can consume, as your body has to get rid of this foreign substance before it can heal again!

Some injuries are worse than others but these principles will help A LOT every time you have the misfortune of injury!!

Twitt
Posted on

Monday June 6th

Monday starts off with a few of you struggling with aches and pains of different kinds, the big question is can you still have a successful week? The big answer must be of course you can!!!

For example, if you have a bad knee, theres a million other things you can do APART from running, which is guaranteed to put further stress on an already bad situation!! You have to work around it!

I like to totally go against the “no pain no gain” saying, in fact whoever made it up needs to be shot!!

If you have a bad knee, you should pick activities that WILL NOT put any strain on your knee at all.

Options include working on the bike on flat surfaces, or working on a stationery bike, the rowing machine MAY be okay if you can pull more with your upper body rather than your lower body.

You can do lots of weight training exercises that DO NOT put any strain on your knees whatsoever, this can be quite easy to do, and still means you can have a very intense workout, which will be highly beneficial to you of course. I have been in this situation many times and the ability to “work around” injuries will be one of the most valuable things you can have.

If you have a bad back, this tends to be tougher because your back is involved in everything you do. I would recommend some swiss ball work, which can help your back a lot and there are numerous options on this ball. If you can cycle again on a flat surface, AND you have no pain whatsoever, i would work at a moderate intensity and you WILL again get some seriously good benefits from this. I would avoid any weight training with a bad back.

The bottom line is that are numerous alternatives of training even if you have injuries, you just have to be more selective and train smarter. We all have aches and pains from time to time, but they are definitely not a reason to give up on yourself as many do.

Its not about whether you get knocked down, its whether you get up again so your choice entirely!!!

Twitt
Posted on

Friday 3rd June

A brutally hot day today, but not hot enough to put you off your training hopefully!!!

Famously on days like these, you have the hideous sight of tops off at the local pub and beer drinkers pretending as if its christmas!

Nothing wrong at all with having a drink on days or nights like these, but it shouldn’t be your sole reason or only goal on days like these, lets get down the pub at all costs because they’re not going to be serving beer ever again!!!!

Its up to 25 degrees today, but that could be classed as a normal day in australia or california, and it actually ENCOURAGES people to exercise because its a great day to get out and about. I dont recommend you get out there and do marathon runs in this weather, but like yesterday, i do recommend you get out there again in the morning early or in the evening when its somewhat cooler.

The old saying that only englishmen and mad dogs go out in the midday sun is true! Lunch time for us IS a nightmare time to be out there and exercising on days like these thats for sure!! The alternative is though as i said exercising at different times of the day.

If you feel you cannot resist any longer and have to go to the pub, then fair enough. You HAVE to make up for it though!!! THIS MEANS GETTING UP EARLY TOMORROW MORNING AND CYCLING, SWIMMING, WALKING HARD, RUNNING WHATEVER!!!! You have to take responsibility for your actions and act like a grown up!!

If you pile all of those calories in today, you have to pay the price by getting a lot of them out of you tomorrow morning, or you have no kind of commitment to a health and fitness lifestyle whatsoever, and you have commitment to big results in your life.

Your life, your choices and that means your results!!! Lets do it!!!

Twitt
Posted on

1st June 2011

The start of the hottest of months if you believe the weather forecasters, and it could be a very hot month for you in terms of overall progress if you’re prepared to fire on all cylinders. You don’t have to be an olympic athlete either to fire on all cylinders, but you do need a very positive attitude to make the kind of changes to your body deep down you really want to happen.

We always talk about fresh natural food, but as we do this, there is a very tedious debate going on in france about the “Dukan diet”. One french government nutritionist calls it a sham, the authors are trying to debate that in court. An interesting case coming up.

This diet has been compared to the famous or infamous (depending on the way you look at it) Atkins diet. Most people know it concentrated on high protein foods, with litte consideration given to the saturated fat running through a person’s arteries.

I know  most people went on the Atkins diet did lost a lot of weight, and most people who go on the Dukan diet are having similar results. Eating mostly protein will lose you weight, but the difficulty remains in  keeping it up long term.

Carbs are always seen as the enemy, but the reality is that if they are consumed in moderation, such as the size of your fist, AND they are of a more natural source, such as wholewheat or wholegrain, in terms of pasta and brown rice for example, they WILL be good for you.

New potatoes, wholemeal bread with little or no spread, wholemeal pitta breads for example will all be good for you in moderation.

The problem comes when they are consumed in much bigger quantities than you need. THEY ARE NOT BAD FOODS FOR YOU, and will offer seriously good energy levels.

The likes of the dukan diet will come and go, and make their author a fortune but where will they be in 3-5 years?

The bottom line is that there are lots of people looking to create the next big thing, the question is will you let them fool you time and time again, when a well balanced diet of more natural foods is always the answer and will last you a lifetime!!

Twitt
Posted on

25th May 2011

Cyril brings a great point up this week about should he split training up into different body parts.

You can do this of course, but having done both myself, i am now a big fan of working the whole body in one session. It used to be extremely fashionable in the 70’s and 80’s, and 90’s for that matter doing a split routine, when you would work chest and arms on one day for example, then the next day you would work legs, and the day after you  would work shoulders and back, then have the next day off.

Then you would repeat the whole cycle again over the next three days and thats how your training was. You would usually do three exercises for your back, then three for your shoulders or even four, then hammer yourself so much, you would think that this was indeed the holy grail of workout programmes, haven’t done both as previously mentioned, i now love working the whole body in one go!!!

The reason for this is that it tends to burn more fat, burn more calories, i end up feeling and looking harder on it, i end up leaner and it just feels like a much better workout.

The other simple fact is that this type of whole body workout is MUCH TOUGHER!!! A lot of people do split routines simply because its easier in my book, i certainly found that. To work your whole body in one workout takes guts and determination, and these are things not everyone’s got time after time, workout after workout, week after week. THIS IS the way to do it though if you’re looking for a leaner, stronger body that is full of huge amounts of energy at all times, the whole body workout is literally the best all rounder you can get!!!

If you are currently on a split routine, try going back to a whole body workout where you work every single body part, you will find you work much harder and therefore are bound to get a much better overall result. Sometimes going back to basics delivers the best results, hard work will always bring its big rewards so what are you waiting for, lets do it!!!!

Twitt