Fab Fit Squad

This past weekend I had the opportunity to go to my grandmother’s 90th birthday. When asked how it felt to be 90. She said she felt like James Brown. She felt good.  How about you do you feel? Do feel tired or achy ALL THE TIME.

Stop your behavior today and listen to some of my 90 year old grandmother’s 7 tips for exercise and diet.

1. Exercise daily — she walks 1 mile each day
2. Get fresh air — she lives on a farm and make sure she sits outside for at least 1 hour
3. Stay Active — when we went to pick her up for her party she was mopping the floor (she’s 90 and still cleaning her own house)
4. Eat oatmeal daily — maybe that’s where I get it =)
5. Eat fresh fruit, veggies and sweet potatoes — she grows most of her own food
6. Drink plenty of water
7. Eat healthy meals

A pretty simple way to live, huh. She’s one of the healthiest people I know. Just this week she’s got her 1st hearing aid — ps. I think its hearing issue is selective.

What steps can you make today to reach 90?

You might be surprised to know that there are simple lifestyle changes you can make to lose weight.

Sleep More!
Did you know that people who regularly get a good night’s sleep, we’re talking about 7-9 uninterrupted hours each night, weigh less than those who don’t get good sleep.  How do you get good sleep? Set a bed time. Count back from when you need to wake up and that will be your bed time.  For years my bedtime ritual has been in bed by 9pm – 9:30pm at the latest. Lights out 10pm. When I do that, my 5:30 AM wake up aren’t that bad. (more…)

I’m really fortunate that the people who read my site have two things in common:

• a passion to lead a healthy lifestyle
• goal(s) that they are striving to achieve

One of things I hope that I can provide to my readers as well as my clients is prescriptive guidance to help them achieve their goals. One of their main question is cardio?

I live in Boston right next to the Charles River as soon as the snow melts the runners, joggers and walkers come out in droves.  Do you know why they run — I mean at least 85% of them, come on you the answer, think about it!! That’s right its to LOSE WEIGHT!

Running is cardio right, running is hard for me so it must be good for me, running will help me lose weight, right.  Well…. Long distance running is the worst thing for weight loss.

SAY WHAT!!!

Most of you run because you’ve seen pictures of elite runners who are lean and mean and want to get the physique or you have a friend who has the physique that you want and you ask hey what are you doing and then they say or I just run x number of miles a day. You think to yourself — running that’s easy I’ll lace up and get moving.

I’m here to tell you unless you competing in an endurance event, running will not give you that lean toned physique. I’m sorry to report that continuous long slow steady state cardio just doesn’t get the metabolism fired up the way a strength training session coupled with interval training does.  Did know that interval training is 9xs more effective than steady state cardio? Getting your metabolism fired up is EXACTLY what is needed to get that lean and toned physique. Intervals keep your body guessing and stops it from going on autopilot.

Long slow steady state cardio does just that, it puts the body on autopilot. Your body knows exactly what to expect, how much effort to give you and therefore only gives you what you need. I’m not saying these workouts won’t be hard, but your body doesn’t have to give you as much. What’s even worse as you build up your mileage you begin to burn more fat, but guess what your body adapts to help you become more efficient at running so it begins to “store more fat”!  Yup — you heard that right.  Don’t believe me take a look at any finish line of any race; you’ll see far more average Joe physiques than you’ll see Kara Goucher physiques. They’ll be a few Kara Goucher’s, but I’ll let you in on little secret they looked like that before they started running.

You can’t run to get fit; you need to be fit to run.” – Diane Lee, Canadian Physical Therapist

When you are training for a long distance endurance race your body is recruiting different muscles to make sure that you are efficient at running.  When you are training to change your body composition you are looking to make your body’s efficient at strength training. Training for both throws your body into tug of war.  As you get more efficient at running you may experience that your fat stores tend overtake your muscle stores. Most people experience loss of muscularity in their quads and then in their tushies. Now depending on where you hold your weight, you may also experience fat gains around your mid-section.

I don’t say this to discourage your fitness goals. I tell you this so that you can make informed choices.

Need more proof – here are a few studies.

• J Clin Endocrinol Metab. Jan 2
  Effect of calorie restriction with or without exercise on body composition and fat distribution.
  This is a six month study. Aerobic training group performed 50 minutes of aerobics 5 times a week for the entire duration. Results:  No additional effects of aerobic exercise on weight or body fat levels.
• Obesity 2007 June – 15:1496-1512.
  Exercise Effect on Weight and Body Fat in Men and Women.
• McTiernan et al
  For 1 year they had a test group do six hours of steady state cardio for 60 min, six days per week. In one year, the group lost 3 lbs.
• According to a British study, levels of Human Growth Hormone, which assists in building muscle and burning fat, skyrocketed 530% in subjects after just thirty seconds of sprinting as fast as they could on a stationary bike.

I would love to hear your thoughts leave me some comments below.

So here were are 6 months into 2011 and I’m revisiting what I’m doing for me this year. This is the longest that I have gone without a fitness goal.  I got to tell you I’m a feeling a little out of sorts.

This past week I sat down and got clear about what I want to accomplish between now and the end of 2011.

1. Finish the Falmouth Road Race

• I’d like to run this in under 1 hour
• I’d like to properly train for this race, the past few years I’ve done a half ass job training for it. (more…)

The magical way to lose weight is taking consistent action.  My favorite quote is by Cher ~

If having a perfect body was easy everyone would have one.

To have your perfect body, you will need to take consistent action. Taking consistent action requires the following.

• Change your eating habits
  • remove sugary drinks – sorry ladies, those sweet coffee drinks sure look and taste great but they can pack on the pounds. (more…)

I am passionate about my goals. My passion drives me forward to live the life of my dreams. I know what I want in life and I set goals to get me there.

I know that each goal I achieve brings me in union with what I desire. I feel truly invigorated with each success! Meeting a goal, no matter how big or small, strengthens my confidence and self-esteem. I enjoy these feelings and strive to receive them as often as possible. (more…)

To get the future you want, you need to let go of the past. Review your baggage and see if those old beliefs you have been holding onto are holding you back.  Take time to reflect and then say those are old beliefs and I let them go.

1. Set a deadline – nothing springs you into action like a deadline.  I recommend picking 3 dates (short roughly 6 weeks, medium roughly 12 weeks and long roughly 24 weeks). This way you’ll have something to celebrate yet keep you motivated.
2. Review past behaviors – As I said earlier, look at your past, if what you were doing wasn’t getting you to where you want to be, then you need to stop doing them. What I mean is if you want to lose weight and you are not exercising and/or watching what you eat, guess what?  You are not going to see results.

Now is the time to take your dream and put it into action.  I am hosting a Shape Up For Summer teleconference call.  I will be discussing actions you can take to flatten your belly, tone your legs, tightened your tushy and what’s the best thing to eat on a hot summer night. To attend, just register here.

In the next 30 days what actions will you take to make your dreams come true?

For those of you who don’t play golf, a mulligan is a do over. You hit a bad shot and then you get to do it over again.  Well here we are coming off a long weekend filled with fun activities that may have included lots of food and alcohol.

You wake up today look in the mirror reflect on your weekend. You say to yourself,  I’m going to the gym and hit the weights the little harder, do a little more cardio or skip a meal or to to make up for all this past weekend’s bad behavior.

Do you think it will help?  Sorry to inform you, but no. I tell my clients that you need to live the 80/20 rule. Eat cleanly 80% of the time and have some treats 20% of the time.  If you go over that limit then there is no make-up.  You need to step up and take responsibility for your actions. If you eat you own it!

The lesson is before you eat or drink it. Think about it. Are your actions moving you toward your goals or away from you goals.

If you really want to do something, you’ll find a way. If you don’t, you’ll find an excuse.

I am a personal weight loss coach. This is my job to help you succeed at your weight loss goals. What’s really interesting is that when it’s time for the rubber to meet the road a few of my clients retreat into excuseville.

This is what it’s like to live in excuseville. You can’t workout or take care of yourself because….

Your kids need your help with _____________.

Your husband comes home with ___________ take out and  you don’t want it to go to waste.

It’s your friend’s ________________ and you’d be rude if you didn’t.

You’ll start ______________.

It’s only one______________. It can’t hurt, right?

What excuse are you using to keep you from living a healthy lifestyle?

Here’s one way to get started. You don’t need to do every thing at once, commit to change one thing! If you tomorrow was day 1 what is the one thing you would change?  Now that you make that change can you keep it up for 21 days.  It take 21 days to make a habit.

Are you done making excuses and ready to get real? Give me a call.

I saw this in a blog post that was so unrelated to nutrition, but it get me thinking. Do we go through our lives and just want to get through the day.
You know what I’m talking about. You think if I just keep my head down it will all be okay. Now if I asked you is that surviving or thriving what would you say? Pick me — it’s surviving I know that Gloria Gaynor’s I Will Survive song is so suppose to be the female national anthem, but it’s all about surviving. Once you survive is there more? Can you then THRIVE?

Do you want to thrive? Just follow these 7 steps.

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