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Tuesday, 9th July

The temperature has relented just a little bit today, which makes it a little bit more enjoyable to train in than yesterday’s conditions which reminded me of training in some kind of oven!

If you watched andy murray on Sunday, then you will have seen someone who takes full advantage of the heat and the humid conditions.

When he first broke on the scene, he tried playing a 5 setter versus Nalbandian. Despite taking a two set lead, he then run out of steam and was overcome by his far more experienced opponent.

Murray knew then that he needed to be able to cope with the heat and all the demands it brought.

He employed a big team of nutritionist, fitness trainers, yoga teachers, psychologists to get him into the real big time.

A key factor was re-locating to Miami. Anyone who has been there realizes that you are unlikely to get anywhere so humid as Miami, especially in the summer, this is where murray still calls his training base, and has obviously benefitted immensely from it!

He of course plays tennis all over the world, and although the rumoured 50 degrees on court was tortuous even for him, he at least has a lot of experience of those conditions and his experience of it was critical when it came to the crunch.

He was seen putting ice on his shoulders and neck in between games, he took longer to get out of his chair, he made sure he was fully hydrated and the extreme amount of work he put into his body paid off even against a supremely fit champion like Novak Djokovic!

So as we feel a little sorry for ourselves training through the extreme heat (for us anyway), we shou.ld realize that as long as we are sensible, and we take the proper precautions, we should be able to work our way through it, and year in year out, we are likely to get better in how we deal with it just like our new Wimbledon champion!!!

Twitt
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Monday, 1st July

July brings a fresh batch of challenges in terms of training improvements.

You will be usually be in one of two camps.

The first one is the attitude of taking it easy just because it’s july and july is a month of holidays, finishing school for example, stop fortnight for factories, and the weather is usually much warmer and sunnier too (sometimes!). This camp will usually miss a lot of workouts, start drinking alcohol in the week, generally eat much more poorly than normal, and justify all the weight gain on “the time of year”.

The other camp is the one where you have people either who are about to go on holidays, or have just been away. They are now dead keen to get back into their training, they are hitting their workouts hard, never miss a session and maybe about to start pre-season rugby or football. This camp associates july with hard work, tough workouts, and have got accustomed to working out in warmer temperatures, and have got to the stage they actually relish it.

The first camp end up piling on the weight, and often take a long time to get back into their training after their holiday. These are the inconsistent ones who never achieve anywhere like their potential.

The second camp are the more serious trainer, who are used to seeing results and are prepared to keep putting the results in.

July is a critical month for you to change your attitude and mindset to set yourself up for a month of great results, and the months to follow after that. Don’t settle for a lazy july, instead change the course for the rest of the year right now by showing up all the time this month and making every workout count!

Twitt
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Friday 21st June

Finishing off your week is a big task for you today in terms of making sure finish it in the way you really want. There’s a million reasons to put off your workout today, you can’t be bothered as you have trained well enough all week, you are thinking of going out for a meal or drink early, you are too tired, you have had a stressful week in work and can’t face training, friday IS the weekend for you and you’re not going to train as its “relaxing time” and that’s that!!!

Finishing off the week well sends a message that you are a serious trainer, and not the type to make the kind of excuses like i just mentioned above. Those type of excuses hold people back from reaching their true potential, and shut off something in their brain that doesn’t allow them to reach the higher levels of human performance that would bring superior results.

There’s absolutely nothing wrong with going away the weekend, having a great night out etc, but making sure you train before you go sets up your body in terms of pure conditioning.

When you train regular, eat regular good food full of nutreients, when you sleep well regularly, when you don’t eat too much fast food, don’t drink too much alcohol etc, you’re GOING TO IMPROVE FULL STOP!!!

Consistency is king.

Twitt
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Thursday, 1st November

New York is certainly in the headlines this week, with the devastation of probably the biggest storm in the last 100 years hitting it extremely hard.

The destructive power of water and wind is very much in evidence and we wish all the best in their recovery efforts, I have friends there and hope they come back strong soon!

The only downside about visiting the states in my experience, and a lot of people’s experience is the abundance of sugary foods there. Breakfast time for example is traditionally a choice between pancakes full of sugar and sour cream, there are traditional fried options although never as good as our versions, and a marathon of strong coffee options!

Then the cereal options are very high in sugar, and it really seems a tough job especially in eastern states to get something plain and simple. Southern California can be a refreshing and a very healthy change!

The problem is if you fall for all of these options, its easy to get addicted to sugar again!

It can take weeks when you get back from a trip to get your taste buds back to normal, but you won’t shed the weight until you do.

This country is catching it up quickly though, as most of us know, you can forget most of the aisles in the supermarket because they are filled with sugary rubbish!

Obesity is continuing to get higher and higher, because there is a point when some people simply “give up” and can’t be bothered to eat well anymore, or try to eat well, because they have fallen for so many faddy diets that have never worked in the longer term for them, their attempts at exercise have often been futile and this has been caused by all the false information out there, which often destroys people’s health and lives when they get to this unfortunate “giving up phase”!

Its vital then that your food consumption should be a plain and simple as possible, especially when cooking. Cook from scratch when you can (you will know what’s going into the food!), eat natural and fresh when possible and avoid anything high in refined sugar and saturated fat.

This vital strategy will only help your training efforts, and keep your taste buds healthy and not attract you to food that ultimately will pile the weight on and possibly bring diabetes on!

Twitt