Be Challenged Be Changed

Are you ready to take your Fitness to the next level? Tired of the same old routine? Not getting the results your looking for? We all train with different goals but we all have one thing in common, we are looking for CHANGE! Are you looking to get faster, stronger, more flexible, increased endurance or weight loss well it is all CHANGE!

Now its time to step out of your comfort zone and start creating CHANGE with improvements to your strength, endurance and flexibility.

Personal Training and/or Outdoor classes are the answers your looking for. The workouts are always changing. Some times we use Body Weight exercises, other times using Kettle Bells, Battle Ropes, Steel Mace, Medicine Balls, Bands, Suspension Training and many other variables.

Whether your training for a particular sport or weight loss or that upcoming 5K or maybe an Obstacle Course Race. I will help you be at your very best!

Personal Training can be one on one or team up with a friend for added accountability. Get a group of your friends together and train for that special upcoming event!

Call me now or send me a text to set up your free initial consultation at 623-302-4944. Or fill out the contact me information on the right side of this page.

BE CHALLENGED! BE CHANGED!!!

Monday, July 23, 2012

Study: Sports Drinks Are a Waste of Money, Contribute to Childhood Obesity

For years, athletes and the public have been told to prehydrate before exercise, “drink ahead of thirst,” and train their gut to tolerate far more fluid than their brain thinks they need to avoid the dangers of dehydration. As sports-drink companies are pitching their products as performance boosters in ads timed for the Olympics, startling new research in the British Medical Journal (BMJ)throws cold water on many of their claims.
Seven scathing new BMJ reports investigate everything from the sports-drink industry’s financial ties to scientists who study hydration to what researchers call “a striking lack of evidence to support the vast majority of claims related to enhanced performance or recovery.”
The researchers also contend that much of the science behind sports drinks is biased or inconclusive and that empty calories from sports drinks are major contributors to childhood obesity and tooth decay. The investigation concludes that dehydration has been overblown into a “dreaded disease of exercise,” due to fear mongering by marketers, rather than solid, independent science.

Biased Science Spreads False Fear

An accompanying commentary by investigations editor Deborah Cohen states, “An investigation by the BMJ has found that companies have sponsored scientists, who have gone on to develop a whole area of science dedicated to hydration,” spreading often groundless “fear about the dangers of dehydration.”
The American College of Sports Medicine accepted a $250,000 donation from Gatorade in 1992. Four years later, the college developed new guidelines adopting a “zero percent dehydration” rule telling athletes to “drink as much as tolerable,” Cohen reports. The guideline originated in a 1993 roundtable meeting supported by Gatorade, according to Atlantic Monthly.

Ad Claims Lacking in Research

In one of the BMJ studies, researchers from the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine at the University of Oxford examined 431 ads making performance-enhancing claims about 104 sports products, including sports drinks.
For more than half of the advertized claims made, the researchers found no studies on the websites listed in the ads to support the claims. GlaxoSmithKline was the only company that provided the BMJ with a list of studies attesting to the benefits of sports drinks, but the publication identified a number of flaws in their methodology.
The researchers concluded that, "only three (2.7%) of the studies the team was able to assess were judged to be of high quality and at low risk of bias." Overall, they found that 85 percent of scientific studies cited by manufacturers to support claimed performance-enhancing benefits of their products have a very high risk of bias (such as research sponsored by the company).

Undermining a Natural Body Signal: Thirst

During the first New York marathon, in 1970, Cohen reports, “marathon runners were discouraged from drinking fluids for fear that it would slow them down.”
The BMJ investigation contends that one of the “greatest successes” of the Gatorade Sports Sciences Institute, established in 1985, was “to undermine the idea that the body has a perfectly good homeostatic mechanism for detecting and responding to dehydration—thirst.” Instead the mantra became that thirst was a dangerously unreliable indicator of hydration, and sales of sports drinks quickly soared to a $2 billion industry in the US.
BMJ analyzed current hydration guidelines for marathon runners and found that, “drinking according to the dictate of thirst throughout a marathon seems to confer no major disadvantage over drinking to replace all fluid losses, and there is no evidence that full fluid replacement is superior to drinking to thirst.”
An earlier study by the same researchers compared runners who did three two-hour workouts, in which they either quaffed a sports beverage according to thirst (about 13 oz. per hour), at a moderate timed rate (about 4 oz. every 15 to 20 minutes) and at a high rate (about 10 oz every 15 to 20 minutes). There were no significant differences in core body temperature or finishing time.
“The idea that thirst comes too late is a marketing ploy of the sports-drink industry," says Tim Noakes, M.D., professor of sport and exercise science at University of Cape Town, South Africa, and author of the BMJ study.

Sports Drinks and Childhood Obesity

BMJ also reports that sports drink companies, including Gatorade, have school outreach programs that encourage kids to swig their products during exercise. The investigation also reports that studies either directly funded by or involving authors with financial ties to the sports drink industry make claims designed to worry parents and sell more sports drinks, such as, “children are particularly likely to forget to drink unless reminded to do so."
Because these high-calorie drinks are promoted as part of fitness, parents and kids often view them as much healthier than other sugar-laden beverages. The American Academy of Pediatrics, however, warns that sugar in sports drinks contributes to both obesity and tooth decay in kids.
"The way sports beverages have been marketed to children is astonishing. They're almost seen as an essential part of participation in sports, when the best beverage for a child participating in any physical activity is just plain water,” Dr. Goutham Rao, clinical director of the Weight Management and Wellness Center at Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh told ABC News.
Experts say that to need an electrolyte-replenishing sports drink, kids need to have been exercising at high intensity, and sweating heavily, for at least 90 minutes. And even then, an 8-ounce drink should usually be ample to replace lost fluids.

Tuesday, May 1, 2012

How A Training Journal Can Help You Make More Consistent Gains

Keeping a record of what you do and how you do it is vital to bodybuilding success. I think keeping a journal is one of the best things I’ve done to help myself consistently improve. If you keep track of what you’ve done in the past, it will be easier for you to see what works for you. You can then repeat these actions to insure your future success.
Remember:
“The palest of ink is better than the best memory.”
I’ve never understood why people want to come to the gym time after time, repeating exactly what they’ve done before. That is not progress, my friend.
In order to improve and make gains, your training must be progressive in some manner. You can make progress 3 different ways:
1. Do more weight than the previous session
2. Do more reps with the same weight
3. Do more work within a set time frame
If you don’t remember exactly what you did in your previous training sessions, how do you expect to exceed it?
I’ll be willing to bet if you just finally discipline yourself to start keeping a training journal, you’ll increase your gains within 30 days or less.
You’ve known for years you should be keeping a training journal and you’ve told yourself you’re gonna do it…but you still haven’t done it!
Just do it, OK?!!!

Tips on How To Keep a Good Journal

1. Write down the time of day you worked out.
2. Write down how much weight you used in your exercises and the number of reps.
3. Write down how the movements felt, i.e. “50s are too light.”
4. Write down how you looked and what was going on in your mind.
5. Write down what you wore or what music you listened to.
6. Write down what you ate and when you ate it.
7. Write down how you looked when you woke up, went to sleep, etc.
8. Write down how much cardio you did.
9. Write down how much you weigh.
10. Write down the other aspects of you life i.e., if you had a good day, a bad day, it was raining, you had a fight with your girlfriend/wife, etc.  This will help you attribute outside factors into your performance in the gym.
Let’s suppose you had a bad workout on February 1st and you can’t figure out why since your diet and supplementation were the same as your last training session. If you see an entry in your journal that you got a bad grade on a test that morning or things at work weren’t so great, you might find the reason your training sucked that day was that your head wasn’t into it. This would stop you from radically changing your training, diet or supplementation based on inaccurate in incomplete information.
A training and dietary journal will be your best friend when assessing progress as long as you’re consistent in following it and making it a habit of your training.
Trust me – if you’re not writing it down, you WON’T make the progress you could be if you were disciplined enough to do it each and every workout.
Test it out…try it for 2 months and you’ll be blown away by the difference.
I know it’s simple, but sometimes it’s the simple things that make the biggest differences.

Monday, January 30, 2012

3 Surprising Reasons to Give Up Soda (from Mens Health)

America has a drinking problem. No, not booze. I'm talking about soft drinks. According to the Beverage Marketing Corporation, the average American guzzles 44.7 gallons of the sweet stuff every year. Not sure what 44.7 gallons looks like? It's about what you'd need to fill a small kiddie pool.
But the truth is, you don't need me to tell you that soda isn't healthy. We all know that America’s drink of choice contributes to our country's ever-expanding obesity problem. But, as Rodale.com writer Leah Zerbe discovered, love handles are just the beginning. Read on for her report on three shocking soda facts that will have you saying “Just water, please” from now on.

Shocking Soda Fact #1: Soda fattens up your organs

A recent Danish study revealed that drinking non-diet soda leads to dramatic increases in dangerous hard-to-detect fats. Researchers asked participants to drink either regular soda, milk containing the same amount of calories as regular soda, diet cola, or water every day for six months. The results? Total fat mass remained the same across all beverage-consuming groups, but regular-soda drinkers experienced dramatic increases in harmful hidden fats, including liver fat and skeletal fat. The regular-soda group also experienced an 11 percent increase in cholesterol compared to the other groups! And don’t think switching to diet varieties will save you from harm: Artificial sweeteners and food dyes have been linked to brain cell damage and hyperactivity, and research has shown that people who drink diet soda have a higher risk of developing diabetes.


FIX IT WITH FOOD: The average American drinks 450 calories a day. By switching to water as your go-to beverage, you'll make room in your diet for these 40 Foods with Superpowers—foods that, even in moderation, can strengthen your heart, fortify your bones, and boost your metabolism so you can lose weight more quickly.

Shocking Soda Fact #2: Soda contains flame retardants

Some popular soda brands, including Mountain Dew, use brominated vegetable oil—a toxic flame retardant—to keep the artificial flavoring from separating from the rest of the liquid. This hazardous ingredient—sometimes listed as BVO on soda and sports drinks—can cause bromide poisoning symptoms like skin lesions and memory loss, as well as nerve disorders. If that’s not a good enough reason not to “Do the Dew,” I don’t know what is.


DRINK DISASTERS: Soda isn’t the only dubious drink you have to watch out for. Many bottled beverages pack enough sugar and calories to foil your get-fit plans in one fell sip.

Shocking Soda Fact #3: Drinking soda makes you a lab rat

Many American soda brands are sweetened with high-fructose corn syrup, a heart-harming man-made compound derived mainly from genetically engineered corn. The problem? Genetically engineered ingredients have only been in our food chain since the 1990s, and we don't know their long-term health impacts because the corporations that developed the crops never had to test them for long-term safety. Case in point: Some recent findings suggest that genetically engineered crops are linked to digestive tract damage, accelerated aging, and even infertility!



Wednesday, January 11, 2012

Busting Strength Training Myths for Women

The mountain of evidence showing the positive impact of strength training for women is growing every day.  Among the myriad of benefits, it can increase metabolism, have a positive impact on bone density, have positive mental health and mood benefits, prevent injury, and may even boost your libido. Yet, the National Center for Health Statistics shows that only two out of 10 women strength train two or more times a week. And, even of those that do participate, many unknowingly proceed in such a way that they aren’t reaping the full benefits.
Strength training for women is a subject overrun with myths and misunderstandings, so let’s put some of those myths to rest once and for all.
Myth #1: Strength Training will make me look like a bodybuilder! First, it’s important to realize that the amount of muscle a woman can put on is metabolically limited by a number of factors. First, women don’t have the testosterone needed to build a lot of muscle. Second, many women coming to strength training are eating at a deficit for fat loss, and thus won’t be building much, if any, new muscle—the goal of strength training while eating at a deficit is to retain the muscle mass you already have and skew the percentage of weight loss towards fat and away from lean body mass. 
The fact is: “Looking like a bodybuilder” doesn’t happen accidentally. A personal favorite tough-love article on the subject of women and strength training equates saying you don’t want to end up accidentally looking like a bodybuilder to saying, "Eh, I don't want to do any sprints today because I don't want to win the 100m gold medal next week."  Looking like a bodybuilder, especially for women, requires a phenomenal lifestyle commitment.
Myth #2: I get bulky when I lift weights! Fat overtop and inside the muscle can look a lot like muscle bulk when it’s not. Case in point- if you’ve ever seen an early episode of The Biggest Loser, you can often see what looks like muscle definition showing through on contestants that are still in the 40% bodyfat range with more than a hundred pounds of fat to lose, yet none of those contestants look anything near “bulky” at the final reveal.  I encourage women concerned about bulk to worry about getting the fat off first and foremost—I have yet to meet a woman who has gotten down to her ideal bodyfat and still said “I shouldn’t have lifted those weights!” Even if you do end up not liking the definition of a particular muscle group once the fat’s off, you can always fine-tune that later. But the fact is, a necessary part of creating a metabolism that will maximize fat burn is through including strength training to retain lean muscle.
Myth #3: I lift low-weight, high-reps to get lean! Many women who do use weights fall prey to “pink dumbbell syndrome”--  lifting 3-pound dumbbells for countless reps, year-after-year, and never hitting a point of muscle fatigue. This isn’t “strength training,” it’s aerobic exercise.  To reap the benefits of strength training, you should lift in the 10-12 reps-to-failure range, and should need to add weight every month or so to continually hit the appropriate level of muscle fatigue.
Myth #4: The scale’s not moving, but it’s OK because muscle weighs more than fat! Going back to the metabolic limitations of muscle gain for women, the best research I’ve bubbled up shows that a female bodybuilder who is living the lifestyle required to put on the maximum amount of muscle possible—this means not eating at a deficit, supplementing, lifting extremely heavy—would be considered very successful if she were able to put on about .8 of a pound of lean muscle mass per month.  And, as we’ve discussed, if you are eating at a deficit for fat loss, you are putting on vastly less than that. 
So, the tough truth is… if you are successfully achieving a calorie deficit to realize even a pound of fat loss per week, your “muscle gain” would never obscure scale movement.  The two most likely reasons the scale’s not moving? 1) The new stimulus has moved some water into the muscles as part of the repair cycle.  You’ll know this is the case if some weight comes on quite suddenly after starting a weight training program and then your weight loss progresses as expected from there. Or, 2) You are overestimating the calories you are burning and/or underestimating the calories you are consuming and aren’t actually at a calorie deficit for weight loss. You’ll know this is the case if your weight is staying the same or creeping up over time.
In case you can’t tell, I am a huge proponent of strength training for women.  I hope by putting some of these myths to rest, you’ll feel more comfortable adding an effective strength training element to your fitness regimen.

Tuesday, December 27, 2011

10 Rules of Healthy Living

STICK TO THE BASICS
I’ve spent a lot of time trying to figure out the best ways to help people get in better shape. And the more exercises I perform, the more programs I experiment with, the more I become convinced that a simplified approach provides the best results. Every year people are trying to reinvent the wheel. And while some of those exercises are fun and challenging, and many diets actually work (more on that soon), making change starts with learning and mastering the basics. 

Eat well. Move more. Sleep. Repeat.
It sounds almost too simple to be true, but good health begins and ends with those ingredients. That’s not to say there aren’t other important factors—hormones, stress, and inflammation—are three examples of “hidden” elements that play an important influence on how you look and feel. But before you can begin worrying about the minutiae, you need to establish a healthy foundation.  Once you’re consistent in those three areas, I promise you’ll be amazed by the changes that will occur to your body.

MORE PLANNING, MORE RESULTS
This past year I developed a habit of writing down my goals before each day. And you know what happened? I became more productive than ever. The truth is, everything we do in our lives is dictated by our minds. Whether we roll out of bed and go to the gym, select healthy food or the unhealthy choice, and even pushing yourself to do more at your job or be a better husband/wife/son/daughter/parent/friend—everything is a mind game. 

Listen, it’s easy to lose sight of what we want to accomplish and what we actually achieve. So I remind myself daily. I don’t beat myself up when I fall short of my goals, but writing down expectations is a great way to stay accountable. Maybe you do it once a week, or once a month. But if you focus on the psychology of success rather than the end goal, you’ll probably end up achieving more than you thought you could.

STUBBORNNESS IS STILL STUPIDITY
As the saying goes, “Rome wasn’t built in a day.” Be patient with your body and you will be rewarded. Be impatient, and you’ll always fall short of your true potential. (or hurt yourself repeatedly )

DIETS WORK
I know that most people hate the word “diet.” As I’ve explained earlier, people need to understand that it’s just a word to describe eating habits. But more importantly, it’s essential that you understand that many different diets work very well.  While some are admittedly terrible (see: Cookie Diet), there are many ways to eat healthy, lose weight, and feel great.

Here’s the problem: Diets are filled with too much dogma. Paleo dieters are upset with people who eat grains. People who eat grain are upset with low-carbers. The low-carbers are mad at those who don’t eat fat. On and on it goes. It’s a constant shouting match that drowns out a simple reality—the best diet is the one that works for your lifestyle. And to figure out your lifestyle, you need to develop increased self-awareness.

If you have food sensitivities or allergies, you might need to cut back on certain foods (wheat, dairy, and grains are common problems).  If you love fatty foods, you might want to pick a diet that allows them.  If you can’t live without carbs, well, don’t live without carbs. Take a more balanced approach and see if you lose weight on the plan. If you don’t, then adjust. 

 Don't worry about finding the best solution; only focus on what works for you. The dieting process is fairly simple:

1) Find a plan that is rooted in science. You want some basis of legitimacy. For instance, we know that the calories-in vs. calories-out is a foundational element of weight loss/weight gain. Use that as a baseline and I’d try tracking your calories—at least in the short term—so you can learn portion sizes and understand how much you’re actually consuming. 
2) Learn the details and rules of a specific diet approach and see if you think it’d work for your lifestyle.
3) Try it out and see if it works. 

If I had a better solution, I’d give it to you. And we can talk all day about macronutritents (proteins, carbs, and fats are important), but you have to find something that works for your preferences and your lifestyle. If it’s not sustainable for you, it’s probably not worth doing. 

MENTORS ARE INVALUABLE AND NECESSARY
I would not be where I am today without the help and guidance of many people. And I wouldn’t have the knowledge to share with you if it wasn’t for the lessons I’ve learned from others. I truly do stand on the shoulders of others, and it’s their information that allows me to help so many people. I am a student first and a teacher second, and that mentality allows me to learn more, constantly improve, and fix my errors and mistakes.

My advice: Find someone who is doing what you want, reach out to them, and do all that you can to learn from their model and adjust it to your life and your own style.  

INTERACTION BREEDS INSPIRATION
I recently started my blog and use Facebook and Twitter to interact with everyone. Being able to interact with everyone offers many great insights into your needs, desires, and how I can best help. I will never be able to fully express my gratitude to those who share their thoughts, questions, and stories with me. You inspire me to be better at my job, and I appreciate you all more than you’ll ever know. I will keep working harder to deliver more quality information that helps you. 

ANYONE CAN CHANGE THEIR DESTINY
I’ve always believed in the amazing capabilities of the human body.  I’ve heard and read so many success stories, which details the amazing transformations of many different people, all of who overcame incredible hurdles. Starting in 2012, I will be featuring some of these stories more prominently, and I encourage you to share your story as well. 

LIFTING WEIGHTS IS (STILL) THE BEST WAY TO LOSE FAT
This one is pretty self-explanatory. Just like dieting, there are many ways that you can drop fat and lose weight. But if you’re looking for the best, most efficient way, there’s no doubt resistance training is the answer. Whether you’re a man or woman, hit the weights and your body will change for the better.


TRUE HEALTH IS BALANCED HEATLH
I’m more convinced than ever that a rigid approach to health is unhealthy. Listen, I live, eat, and sleep health and fitness. I love the gym, enjoy cooking healthy meals, and read scientific journals for fun. (don’t judge me) But fitness and nutrition shouldn’t be a pain. It should be an enjoyable part of your life. So that means taking some days off, enjoying food (and desserts sometimes) and finding balance.

Your health should be one of the biggest priorities in your life, but that doesn’t mean it has to control every aspect of your day.  Push yourself hard, set high standards and don't settle for less, but make sure you laugh, smile, enjoy and share your experiences with others. Battling your weight or other health demons is tough enough. Don’t make it harder on yourself. The more mentally relaxed you are, the easier it will be to stay consistent and fight your way to the goals you want to achieve. 

Bonus lesson: PAY IT FORWARD 
You’ll be surprised how many people genuinely want to help inspire people to become healthier. And your willingness to be a mentor or provide assistance can be the change that makes a difference in this world. I’m as committed as ever to help you in any way that I can, and I hope that inspires you to do the same for others.

To everyone: Happy holidays and thank you for a memorable 2011. I am continually humbled by all of you. Thank you for your support, criticism, and feedback. If there’s one thing I can promise it’s this: I won’t quit,  won’t overlook the present, and I will keep listening and doing all I can to help you live strong, healthy and fun lives.

Friday, December 23, 2011

7 Easy Christmas Fat Loss Strategies

With Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year's Eve, and New Year's Day all happening this week, I've put together a list of SEVEN different strategies that you can use to curb the "typical" weight gain. Enjoy!

Strategy #1: Feast On Protein

So you’re scoping out the buffet set-up at a holiday party and you’re contemplating what to eat. I’m betting there’s a turkey there. Or a ham. Or some shrimp cocktail. Eat it, and only that, until you’re full.

Protein is, by nature, very filling. And by filling up on lean protein, you’ll avoid other, potentially more destructive food items at the buffet. And best yet, you still leave satisfied.

Another benefit of protein is that it also helps your body process carbohydrates more effectively by stimulating the release of the hormone glucagon—a hormone which helps to control blood sugar and curb the fat-storage properties of insulin. So if you do indeed add some carbs, they’ll become much less of a threat to your waistline.

Strategy #2: Do NOT Drink Calories

Calories in beverages are wasted calories. They do nothing to increase satiety or fullness, and can very easily tack on a serious amount of caloric damage to any evening. If it has calories, don’t drink it, plain and simple.

If you’d like some variety beyond plain water, go with a flavored water or other diet beverage. Just please, do NOT fall victim to 500 calories of fat-storing high fructose corn syrup. Simple avoidance, great benefit.

Strategy #3: Know Your First Move

While we’re on the topic of beverages, here’s a great tip to go into any holiday party with. As soon as you arrive, before you do anything else, pour yourself a big glass of water, drink it down, and wait 15 minutes before eating anything. Mingle with the crowd, say hello, etc.

This is a simple, extremely effective way to curb your appetite and give yourself a sense of fullness before heading to the dinner line and is sure to make a difference in the amount of food you end up adding to your plate.

Strategy #4: Be Hospitable

Many times the parties we attend throughout the holidays are “potluck” buffet style where each person is responsible for bringing their own dish to contribute to the menu. If you’ve ever worked in an office, you know what I’m talking about.

This is a great opportunity for you to contribute something healthy to the table, and in turn make it extremely easy for you to make a healthy choice. Simply eat your own meal. This way you KNOW exactly what’s in it and how it was prepared, a huge plus (i.e. everything that looks healthy isn’t necessarily so).

And even if the party isn’t potluck, bring something to contribute anyway. I haven’t met a host yet that doesn’t appreciate help from others when it comes to feeding the guests.

Strategy #5: Arrive “Full”

I’m sure you’ve heard the recommendation that you never go to the grocery store hungry as you’ll just end up buying everything in sight, spending way too much money, and making a bunch of unhealthy choices because everything looks “so good”.  Well, I’m going to give the same suggestion for holiday parties (again, this is for the one or two that don’t fall into your holiday “cheat” schedule).  Instead of showing up with your stomach growling and mouth salivating, take action to ensure you arrive in the exact opposite position. How? Easy. Eat a BIG, healthy meal just prior to heading to the party.

Easy, super effective way to avoid falling into temptation.

Strategy #6: Be “Normal”

This one goes right along with the previous tip. In an effort to avoid the “damage” of a big meal or party, most people don’t eat anything else all day leading up to the big event in order to “save up” the calories. Big mistake, and for several reasons.  First, when you go into a meal or party incredibly hungry, you will absolutely overeat to a much higher degree than you would otherwise.  Bigger portions of calorie dense, fatty/carb-laden food = WAY more calories than you would have naturally eaten throughout the day.

Secondly, eating nothing only to follow it up with a big, high-fat/high-carb/high-calorie meal leads to a greater percentage of those calories than normal to be stored as fat.

Don’t shoot yourself in the foot by starving yourself all day. Eat as you normally would and then hit up the party.

Strategy #8: Deplete Before A “Big” Day

One of the things I teach my clients to do is “prep” for a big day full of food with a depletion workout the day before.  You may or may not know, but there’s plenty of “food” stored within your muscles in the form of both carbohydrate and fats.  Carbohydrate (when stored in muscle, called “glycogen”) and fats (when stored in muscle, called “intracellular triglycerides”) are actually stored within muscle tissue as an energy source to fuel activity.

Fat is a slower energy source, so something as simple as doing a lot of walking the day before a party is a great way to deplete some of your intracellular triglyceride stores.  As for glycogen depletion, go with something akin to circuit-style weight training. Keep the load light, do a lot of repetitions, and really “go for the burn”.

Going into a big meal with depleted intramuscular energy stores (brought about via energy-depleting exercise) will lead to much of that meal refilling those stores as opposed to being tacked onto your waist, hips, and the ol’ gluteus maximus.

Hope that you try one or more of these ideas. You work out hard and eat great during the year, don't blow it all this next week.. You can enjoy the holidays without overeating, be smart!

Thursday, December 22, 2011

Merry Christmas!!

    I would like to thank all the members of my classes and my Personal Training clients at SCG for the wonderful cards and gifts.  I cannot begin to tell you how much I enjoy my time at SCG and all the great friends that I been able to make and looking forward to making many more.

    I wish everyone a Very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.  I look forward to an exciting 2012, and hope to challenge all of you to push a little harder and work toward your goals. I am planning some exciting events for next year, challenging and fun workouts. 
 
   Would like to congratulate a couple of my Personal Training Clients:
  1. Mickey for working so hard and improving her times in her competitive swimming- keep up the good work.
  2. Patty for maxing out the Free Motion squat yesterday for 2 reps. (That's 400lbs by the way and I know that she could of done some more reps). Way to push it!!!
  I have a new Facebook and Email account:  ardensfitness@ymail.com. So lets be friends!


    In Health and Fitness,

      Arden Straw

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