*all measurement are obviously subject to different clothes designers discretion and therefore may not be entirely accurate, but at least it gives us an idea.

Remember to checkout upcoming events for the next scheduled weigh in

Did you know that regularly missing meals can scupper your weight loss results?

Most people think and the press would have you believe that weight loss is a simple process of calories in and calories out but this is simply not true. If it were half of my client base would never have called or emailed me or even looked for my services.

I know lots of people who miss meals to lose weight and others who miss meals due to busy schedules or bad planning. I know all of these people because they are trying to lose weight, but most are struggling and many are moving in the wrong direction.

But why?

Why are they putting on weight or at best staying stable?

This is a question that I’m asked by these people all the time?

I want to share with you the reasons why, why people starve themselves and missing meal only to find that the scales are not showing them what they want to see.

To explore why calorie restriction does not work we have to look at our position on the planet and our evolutionary path to it.

We are the most dominant species on the planet, we are number 1 the top of the food chain. To get to this point we have under gone millions of years of evolution. During this time our ancestors have been through some real hard times such as ice ages, droughts and famines. To allow us to survive the trials and tribulations that nature throws at us we have evolved mechanisms to help us to cope.

When it comes to a lack of food the body has the ability to reduce its metabolic rate which means it can reduce the amount of calories that it uses for the various functions that are required for you to survive.

Your body also looks to store food so that you have reserves in case the famine is going to be prolonged due to seasonal conditions or natural disasters.

Missing meals and or dramatically reducing your calorie consumption leads to your body thinking that food is scarce and that you are in a period of famine.

So it slows down your metabolism and stores the food that you eat for later.

The next problem that you are going to face on low calorie diets or he regular missing of meals is the resumption of your normal eating pattern.

It will take a couple of days for your body to realise that you are no longer in a state of famine and food is now readily available again. During this time your body is going to store everything that you consume, especially as your metabolism is slow and you do not need the extra calories that you are now consuming. You therefore pile the pounds back on often becoming heavier then you were to start with!

It’s important for you to eat 3 meals a day, breakfast, lunch and dinner to make sure that your metabolism is running well and you are supplying it with all the nutrients that it needs.

Over the next couple of posts I’m going to talk more about the problems of low calorie diets or missing meal and I’m going to give you strategies to overcome your problems with meals.

The regular problems that clients bring to me are;

• I don’t feel like breakfast in the morning / it makes me feel sick / I’m not hungry
• I don’t have time for meal X because Y

So, eat 3 meal a day!

And I’ll be back with some more pitfalls and solutions for you.

Committed to your success

Keith

Many of you have been in even though you were sore. Well done and kudos to you!!!

Many wondered if you were doing the right thing and I’m sure that many more of you avoided coming training. Although it’s a little counter intuitive research has show that it is fine to train on stiff and sore muscles if they are suffering from D.O.M.S.

D.O.M.S stands for delayed onset muscle soreness and can last from 3 to 5 days. Many of you know this already!

The studies have shown 2 things;

1. Full metabolic recovery occurs within 48 hours even if still sore

2. Training on muscles suffering from DOMS does not affect their recovery time

As far as weight loss in concerned you want to be back in training the very next day so that you keep stoking up your metabolism and burn twice as much fat. If you do a training session and then take the next 5 day off you are never going to get the metabolism of its ass and doing its job. FAT BURNING!

The painful truth is the more you train the less you’re going to suffer in the long run as your body adjust and therefore gets used to it.

For myself I rate the quality of the training session on how stiff and sore I am. If I’m not it was not a good session and not as productive as it could have been.

What can you do to relieve the pain?

Many people have asked me what they can do to relieve the symptoms. The honest answer is that your body has to do it in its own time but you can help it to do its best job by doing the following;

1. Eat good quality foods

2. Make sure that your meals are based around good quality protein

3. Drink plenty of fresh clean water

4. Plenty or rest and good quality sleep

5. Have a hot/warm bath

6. Light massage of the area

These will either bring you light short term relief (bath or massage) or will help the repair process, therefore shortening it slightly.

See you at the next boot camp session

Committed to your success

Keith, Clare and the team

No messing here we go!

1. I going to attack main stream ‘health food’ such as microwave meals and low fat options and I can add to that many slimming shakes. These are often cleverly disguised junk foods. Yes they are fast and they are convenient but they are nutritionally deficient and are more likely to stimulate you storage mechanisms increasing the about of fat you store around your belly. Remember the diet and food industry only have one agenda…… MAXAMISED PROFITS!

2. I have said it before and I’ll say it again Ab exercises like crunches, sit-ups will not flatten you belly or give you that allusive six pack. They are more likely to give you a bad back and postural problems, so don’t make them the most important or only exercises that you do.

3. Boring repetitive cardio exercise routines will slow your progress, you could be doing a lot better for your weight loss goals and not have to commit the time that long runs or walk require. How would you like to double or triple your results and only train 30 to 40 mins. In fact the right 20 mins is more effective at burning fat then a 5k run if you do it right. The fit body boot camp or melt the fat Personal Training will give you the tools that you need and the results that you desire.

4. Get yourself on a health promoting nutrition programme such as the Personal nutrition course. Take the power back and learn how food reacts in your body rather than relying on the media. 

5. Low calorie diets! Do they work, well some do and some don’t but generally let’s say yes, you will lose weight on a low calorie diet. But is it the long term answer to your weight problem? I’m going to have to give you the painful truth and say……………………… No, No it’s not. I think that I going to do a whole blog post on this in the near future so I’ll save the low calorie rant for then. Many of our client’s have been on low calorie diets and yet they have still ended up at our door!

So what are the answers, by telling you that these thing don’t work I have probably created more question and therefore more problems.

We’ll I’m going to give you them tomorrow!

Committed to your Success

Keith

As the days get shorter and it gets colder, I don’t know about you but I find it harder to get up. The snooze button comes out of retirement to help me stay in bed for just a bit longer.

For many people including myself at times it often seems like a good plan to have more time in bed and either miss breakfast or have something quick on the run.

Honestly, a good quality breakfast is worth far more than that extra 5/10 minutes between the sheets.

It has been shown in studies time and time again that people who miss breakfast make up the missed calories later on in the day or they get through the day by taking stimulants.

Neither of these approaches are good when it come to either losing weight or improving health.

Most people who miss breakfast end up feeling nibbly throughout the rest of the day, which is made worse by the high sugar snacks which is often the first thing that they have to eat.

For example one of my clients used to miss breakfast, waiting until she got to work at 9 where she would have a croissant or toast with jam and a coffee. By the time an hour had passed she was feeling nibbly again so had a high sugar snack and a coffee at 10 / 10.30ish. By lunch 1.00pm time she would be hungry again and would have a sandwich, fruit and a drink. This would satisfy her more, but by 3 pm she was ready to nibble again so she would only have 1 biscuit and a tea. She would manage to get through until dinner at 7 which would be a stir fry on a bed of white rice, but then throughout the evening she would have a glass of wine…. or 2 and some chocolate/biscuits/crisps and then to bed for 10.30/11pm.

The calories that she missed at breafast were made up plus extra throughout the day. Over a 3 year period she put on 3 stone!

The changes we made to her diet were simple but effective. If you’re not doing these, make a list and start.

1. Plan your food knowing what will happen throughout the week
2. Start your day with a protein based breakfast such as an omelette with meat or vegetables in or cold meats with some cheese and fruit
3. Take a snack with you such as goat’s cheese and grapes, olives, small meat chunks left over from Sundays roast or mixed nuts.
4. Cut the coffee and drink water
5. Take a lunch with you so that you do not buy sandwiches. Prepare it the night before possibly by cooking more dinner. Place it in a container in the fridge and take it with you for lunch. See how much money you will save over buying lunch everyday
6. Only have 2 or 3 spoonfuls of rice with your dinner. To make up the amount on your plate increase the amount of meat and vegetables

On these guidelines most people nibble less throughout the day and the evening, their health improves and they lose weight. If you don’t then you need to take things a little more seriously, come along to the boot camp or book a consultation to find out whats best for you.

Committed to your success

Keith

For my first post I thought that I would tell you a little about myself and the differences between Personal Trainers.

The Fitness Industry is a fantastic industry so many different approaches and so many avenues to go down. In this article I (Amy Black), am going to be talking about my journey to Absolute Training and the difference between Personal Trainers and Renter Friends. These are two completely different things as i will explain, as well as give you a little backround knowledge on myself.

As some of you may know i have just started working with Absolute Training, very different to what I was used to. Do I like it or prefer it? Well you’ll just have to wait and see……!!

I left school at 16 which did get frowned upon slightly by friends but of course I just wanted to earn money so I got a job as a leisure assistant at the Oxford Belfry hotel cleaning the gym and working on reception. I had a lot of fun to and also got qualified as an NVQ level 2 fitness instructor and that’s where the journey begins.

I left to work in Cannons now Nuffield Health. It was like a dream a massive gym and a 20 metre pool, classes, inductions, health assessments loads to do.

Well for the first few months.

Then it was standing on the gym floor for about seven hours a day cleaning. Have you ever walked into a gym and seen fitness instructers look like anywhere else would be better than where they are now?

Well that’s how i felt. I went on to my level 3 in advanced training to allow me to do Personal Training. I had been there a year and started to build a client base but things weren’t making any sense to me. On my course we got told machines are rubbish leisure centres aren’t doing the right job, trainers don’t train people properly. My head was just in a whirl wind I’m being told so many different things. I was looking around and was seeing clients achieve nothing although they had been with there trainer for two or three years.

Is that possible?

Trainers were taking their clients from machine to machine each week counting to 15. In my head I was thinking ‘surely this cant be my future job’ ‘Do I want to do this’. The answer was NO!!

Yet another Health assessment to do ‘GREAT’ but little did I know this was the health assessment that would change my future. I had the Clare that we all no and love.

 As two normal girls we got chatting about the industry and hormonal issues, from that health assessment I met Keith. I got to know him more when I attended the Personal Nutrition Course where I learnt heaps and felt so positive about life in general.

WOW food has a massive impact on our lives, something I’m sure I’ll be writing about in the future.

We got chatting and then the next thing i know I’m looking after his clients for a week while he is in America.

I have to admit there were times when I freaked and didn’t want to do it or felt I couldn’t but I just took a deep breath and got on with it this then led me to working with Keith and Clare, becoming part of the Absolute Training Team.

‘I’ll be ok I’ve done Personal Training before,’ or so i thought.

But in actual fact i had been a renter friend not really taking an interest in there posture or lifestyle I was there to talk to them have a laugh and watch them exercise.

Now I have people with injuries, stress issues, poor posture and muscle imbalances. Gone are the days where I ignored that, it has to be dealt with to get any results. AHHHHHHHHH it can be a complicated nightmare!

More days come where I thought I can’t do this im out of my depth. But by watching Keith listening and learning and discussion I have built on the solid foundation of my qualifications, so much information so fast!  

The early mornings are hard although I am getting there. We are working with real people not lycra gym bunnies, people with real worries and injuries. I have learnt that you need to start with the inside before the outside gets focused on.

Building real relationships with the clients working together to help build a better quality of life. That is why I can get quite tiered because you build a relationship with that person and you can go away still thinking of ways to help them. No client is ever forgotten about.

So The Differences between a Personal Trainer and a Renter Friend:

# Renter friends think its all about the exercise.

# Personal trainers build a relationship and coach’s people with all aspects that affect health.

# Your health and your results is the most important thing for a Personal Trainer

# Renter friends have lots of machines

# Personal Training is not ‘JUST A JOB’ we have a passion to making you feel fantastic inside and out.

The answer to which one do I prefer…..

Well a renter friend is a whole lot easier but who wants easy, so of course there is no doubt it is working with Absolute training being a Personal Trainer!!!

Hope to see you soon

Amy

It’s the sprinter, did you get it right?

On average a sprinter is between 5 and 6% body fat and the marathon runner is about 14%.

Now this gives you some clues as to the best way to train to reduce your body fat %, decreasing your weight and giving you a toned, strong body.

Knowing this also means that you don’t need to run/walk for mega long periods of time each day to get your desired body shape. Short sharp explosive work is far more effective as stripping the fat off you then long slow (boring) endurance based exercise. You could be in and out in 40 minutes having had the most effective work out of your life.

But how do you do this?

Well one way is to use a professional fitness team such as us the Absolute Training team and train one on one doing short 30/40 minutes cost effective workouts, saving you time and money but getting you the results that you want.

If one on one is too daunting or you have budgetary concerns, than your best bet is the Fit Body Bootcamp. You will still be working with qualified personal trainers and they will guide you through the exercises that are required to get you the figure that you need.

If you can’t get to either of these you need to ask you gym team about the correct exercises - exercises such as mat flipping/ running, single leg press, dead lift, clean and press etc. If this is not an option you could try the killer workout that we have videoed for you, which you can find featured just on the right hand side of this page.

Committed to your success

Keith

P.S well done to Bruce for doing the Killer work out the other evening! Awesome!

Have you ever noticed how doing sit ups or crunches never seem to give people a six pack no matter how many they do. You may be one of the people who are experiencing this problem.

For most people it makes sense to them that if they exercise a specific muscle surely they should lose the fat from that area….. They are often surprised to find that 1 year of doing sit ups later they can do 1000, have a bad back but still have not shifted the extra weight on their stomach that they were hoping to.

You CAN’T spot tone!

I know, it’s a complete bugger but your body just doesn’t work like that. I want you to think about it in a different way. Think of your muscle as engines and your fat cells as the fuel tanks. For good consistent weight loss you need to make all of your engine work so that they all have increased fuel demands…. Let me explain;

If your arm is working hard and requires more fuel to keep working, fat will be broken down from where ever you store it, let’s say for instance round your waist. The fat is transported by the blood to the liver the liver turns it into glycogen and transports the fuel to the arm where it is used to keep the arm moving.

If all your muscle require more energy the fuel (fat) is taken from your reserves to feed them.

Working one muscle or muscle group like you abdominals is not going to use up enough calories to make a difference to the fat reserves around your body. Your body will also choose which fuel (fat) site to take the fuel from, therefore no spot toning.

The best exercises to use to burn the fat from your body are those that require your whole body to do them. Exercises such as dead lifts, cleans, walking lunges, lunges with dumbbell presses, pulls and raises. These exercises burn up tones of calories and require you body access its fuel stores.

At the fit body boot camp we use exercises that get some increasable results. This is because they are full body, full on, fully committed exercises. This is not to say that they are only for fit people, they aren’t. In your free body diagnostic we will identify your level of fitness and injury risk so that in every boot camp session you can work to your maximum potential with the exercises that are right for you.

The fit body boot camps combination of full body movement and interval training we will get you the results that you are looking for.

To see a video of the Sunday boot campers then click on the link below

www.fitbodybootcamp.co.uk

And then sign up and join in the fun!

Committed to your success

Keith, Clare and the Team

Some of you will be training early morning, others mid morning, lunch time or evening. Whenever your bootcamp session is be sure to get as many of these things right and you’ll see the weight loss, body shaping and tone and health results that you desire and deserve.

1.Nutrition

Make sure that you eat 2 hours or more before your bootcamp session. If you eat too close to the training session, you may find that your food gives you a stitch, makes you feel sick or you may even be sick if you’re not careful.

Spare some though to what you are eating! Burger and chips with a beer at lunchtime is not going to give you a great  boot camp session! (I have watched more than one person being sick form a burger, chips and beer lunch! Not pretty!), sandwich, crisps and a coke also is not the way forwards.

A better meal would be cold meat with salad sticks and 2 or 3 spoonfuls of cuscus or cold meat, salad with a banana or other fruit to finish.
I understand that you may not feel like eating early in the morning before a 6 or 7 am bootcamp, but you must promise me that you will have a good meal before bed the night before and take fruit with you or make a protein shake to have straight after your boot camp session. Do I sound like your mother????!!!

I’ll have to give you some recipes for protein shake or 2 in a blog post soon.

Nutrition is of critical importance to your results, if you are looking to get the best from your diet then you need to go here down load the course information and then book yourself a place; http://absolute-training.org/personal-nutrition/. Many people tell me that they know what they should be eating, but are often SO wrong when pressed on the subject. Lean the real power of food here! http://absolute-training.org/personal-nutrition/

2. Hydration

Make sure that you are well hydrated, sip water throughout the day, but stop sipping about an hour before your boot camp session. This is to stop it from sloshing around in your stomach or giving you a stitch.

If you are attending an early morning bootcamp have some water before you go to bed and sip some when you get up before the bootcamp session.

Drink water during the bootcamp session, but make sure that it’s room temperature and not too cold. Cold water can cause you problems with absorbtion, it can bring digestion to a halt and cause your gut to shiver sending it into spasm.
3. Get yourself a Heart Rate monitor!

Go to your local Sports shop or to Argos and pick yourself up a heart rate monitor so that you can see how hard you and your heart are working. Most watches also let you see how many calories you have burned up. In a  bootcamp session you are looking to get you heart rate as close to your maximum as possible and burn as many calories as you can. In the 45ish mins that you’ll be working out you want to try and do at least 300 calories, push hard and see if you can increase it to 500!

The higher the heart rate the more total calories will be burnt, both in the session and after. High intensity workouts are far better for fat burning then long slow ones. I’ll give you the where’s and whys about this really soon.

4. What’s on your feet

You don’t need to spend a fortune, but make sure that you are not wearing months or years old trainers. If you use your trainer nearly every day and do some high intensity work in them, they will be good for about 3 months. After this they may cause you problems, such as ankle, knee and back pain.

If you use your trainers rarely they could last you up to a year. Check your trainers if they are worn and scruffy then it definitely time to get some new ones. If you intend to do bootcamp and work hard then I’d spend a little money on them and make sure that you get the best ones that your budget allows. It also important to get the best ones for your feet and walking/running style. To find out which trainers would be the best for you, I suggest that you go to a shop called the Sweat shop. There staff and trained to look at the way you walk or run and then suggest trainers for you depending on this information. To find your nearest 2 stores are Milton Keynes and Hatfield. Although you’ll pay more for the trainers you’ll get some great advice about which trainers to buy and why.

Ok, so let’s have those key points;

1. Good quality, well timed food, not beer and burger! (If you wish to know more about the right diet go here http://absolute-training.org/personal-nutrition/

2. Hydration! Water, water everywhere so make sure that you have a drink!
3. Heart rate monitor. Know how hard you are working and what your calorie consumption is.
4. The right foot wear. Important for reducing injury risk, comfort and keep away the blisters! www.thesweatshop.co.uk/storefinder.cfm

Other areas that I need I’ll give you information on for getting the best out of your bootcamp are; sleep, goals setting, measuring and accountability but I think that we can cover these another day.

Committed to your success

Keith Tucker

We have a fitness, weight loss and health craze sweeping the nation at the moment called bootcamp!

In this post I’m going to tell you why the bootcamp is sweeping the nation like a bush fire. I’m going to talk about the benefits of group participation, the variety of the training, how cost effective it can be and how it is great for getting results in double quick time.

So let’s jump in with;

1.       Group Participation

Most people like to be or feel like they are a part of something bigger. This is why we form groups and clubs from the WI to the local football club, there is something for everyone out there. For instance my Mum makes, teaches and participates in lace making groups, in and around the area. Not my bag baby, but I’m told if you can count to 8 you can do it, no problem.

Staying with the group theme, if you have been a gym member or belonged to clubs generally you’ll see the same faces day in and day out. For myself I have run group fitness in gyms and the core of the group can remain the same for years… When I say years, I mean it. I have walked back into gyms that I have not been into for 4 to 8 years, looked into the class and there are the same people in there as there were when I was teach it!

Why are they still there? Friendship, social atmosphere, camaraderie, fun and the pressure that the group exerts on them to attend week after week!

2.       Variety

People can be resistant to big change but the love variety in what they are doing. bootcamp offer massive variety in the exercises, the environment and the programme or theme. For example bootcamp change their theme so that you get to experience different types of training. For example you may start with a timed theme like how much fat can you burn in 4 minutes, but after a while this would get a little boring and stagnant, so it’s time to change, possibly co-inside with a sporting event like the Olympics and theme the workout around specific events or event in the way of a physical job such as a fire fighter or army bootcamp.

As you know variety is the spice of life!

3.       Cost Effective!

You can work with a personal trainer or a personal training team for a fraction of the normal cost of one on one personal training! Let’s look at prices just for a moment although I don’t want to bore you with too many figures.

The average price of personal training in the area is about £45 per hour. If you where to do one session week it would cost you about £195 per month with no guarantee of results as they are just not seeing you often enough.

You can train at a boot camp 3 times a week which would practically guarantee your results for as little as £149.95 or less! If you go here you can get a 3 week trail for £1 . http://fitbodybootcamp.co.uk.  If you trained 3 times per week with that same trainer, it would cost you a mighty £585 per month!

4.       Results!

 bootcamps are great for getting weight loss and body shape and toning results. This is due to many of the aspects that we have discussed earlier. Working with other around you is well proven to bring out the best in most people as they work to keep up or beat the people around them. The exercises that are used in bootcamp are normally of the high calorie burning type which is ideal for those of you who wish to get to better shape by losing body fat. The exercise used are also more functional, which means they are more suited to movements performed in everday life, such as picking you feet up over hurdles, stepping on to steps, squatting down lifting things above your head etc…. Training like this will help you lift the box of paper at work, pull the wet washing out of the washing machine, more the sofa on a Sunday so that you can Hoover or run upstairs when the lift is full so that you don’t miss that meeting! Due to the cost effective nature of the bootcamp it enables you to train more often which is the clincher for getting results. Regularity of training is critically important!

So join  the bootcamp so that you can;

1.       Make friends Have Fun

2.       Never be bored

3.       Cost effective right when we all need it most

4.       Results, Results, Results

Committed to your success

Keith Tucker