Author Archives: John

Why Diets Don’t Work……..Ever!

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You’ve all been there. You look in the mirror and sigh, try to pull on a pair of jeans or skirt you haven’t worn for a while and mysteriously can’t get the zip done up no matter how hard you tug. “That’s it, I’m going on a diet” you say. On a Diet, those three words sum up the problem with diets and the reason they just don’t, won’t, can’t work….not in the long term anyway. It doesn’t matter if it’s the Atkins, the Cabbage Soup or the Caveman diet, ultimately they will fail and you will gain back any weight you lost. Why? Well because the whole phrase going on a diet implies that at some point you will come OFF of that diet, and what happens then? Inevitably the bad habits come back and the weight starts to creep back on.

Also the whole psychology behind dieting creates a negative mindset. It’s all about denial. Denying yourself the foods you’d like to eat, being hungry all the time, forcing yourself to do something you aren’t mad keen about in a desperate drive to lose some weight. If you have that mind set how does it make you feel. Anxious? Depressed? Stressed? At some point you are going to crack. No matter how much will power you have you can’t keep that up for the rest of your life.

Wouldn’t it be soooooo much better to feel positive about your food, what you eat and how you eat? Wouldn’t it be better to east tasty, fun foods, eat decent sized portions and also NOT to feel guilty or beat yourself up when you occasionally tuck into something bad like a sticky toffee pudding with cream. “What, how can i eat that on a diet?”.  Well on a diet you can’t, but if you follow what I’m about to say you CAN!

What you need to do is change your whole outlook and attitude to food. You need to change how you eat and what you eat FOREVER. You aren’t going on a difficult diet, you are going to change your lifestyle and become a HEALTHY EATER. This really isn’t rocket science, in fact it’s absolute common sense and to be honest our grandparents generations and the ones before that did it as a matter of course.

It’s really really simple to do. Basically you just need to eat fresh food. That’s it. “It can’t be that simple?”  Well actually it pretty much is with a couple of rules. The key is to avoid processed and packaged produce as much as you possibly can. Avoid sweet or packaged snacks as much as you can and avoid fizzy or sweetened drinks as much as you can, and cut back slightly on Carbs such as potatoes, bread and pasta. That is pretty much it. Other than that you can still eat 2 to 3 meals a day and for your main dinner you can eat pretty healthy/large portions.

So what do i mean by processed foods? Again it’s simple. Anything that comes in a packet or packaging that has a list of ingredients needs either to be avoided or the label carefully studied. ALL ready meals, most childrens meals, ALL fizzy drinks, anything that has lists of chemicals, sweeteners or E numbers on the label. “Hmmmm, so what can i eat?” As i said, basically it is fresh stuff. Meat, Fish, Poultry, Eggs, Beans, Nuts and Vegetables / Salad / Fruit. Within reason you can eat as much of these as you like. Throw in some exercise and you will either lose weight (if you are currently overweight), or maintain a healthy weight (if you are not really that overweight).

Is it a bit more difficult, less convenient in this busy modern world. Yes it is slightly but would you prefer the slight inconvenience of having to buy and prepare fresh food and healthy meals that you can eat a lot of and enjoy, or suffer the misery of continually being on a deny yourself everything type diet?

So what does this mean in practical terms? The best way to illustrate that is probably to tell you what I’m eating at the moment. I am on a drive to lose some weight and strip some blub from around my middle area. I’m not overweight at all really. I was about 12 stone 5 pounds  and want to get down to about 11 stone 10 if possible. Why? Well because as I’ve already told you I’m vain and would love once in my life to have some proper 6 pack abs. So I’m training quite hard and want to lose some weight but at the same time don’t want to lose any muscle and therefore need to eat well and decent portions. So here is what i ate yesterday and will eat today.

Yesterday: Went to the Gym first thing. When i got back i had a medium bowl of Greek Yoghurt (the real stuff, not Greek style) with a large handful of blueberries thrown in and a drizzle of honey over the top. This was washed down with a double scoop protein shake. Late morning i had a Banana. At lunch i had 2 eggs, simply cracked into a bowl, salt and pepper and microwaved for 1 minute. Mid afternoon a large handful of mixed nuts. Then for dinner we sat down as a family and smashed into 3 beautiful lamb cutlets (with the lovely crispy fat as well) and a large salad. The salad was mixed leaves, loads of tomato’s, red pepper, spring onion and a large avocado. It took ten minutes to make the salad and about 7 minutes to cook the chops, what’s hard about that? I was full and very happy.

Today is a no Gym day. So far I’ve had the same bowl of Yoghurt, Blueberries and Honey plus one banana. For lunch i plan a couple of Ryvita’s smeared in delicious Nut butter, probably another Banana and some Melon I’ve got in the fridge. Mid afternoon I’ll probably break cover, be bad and have a cup of coffee with a biscuit. Then for dinner it will be similar to last night. We have some marinated spicy turkey breast steaks with a different type of salad and maybe some couscous.

Is it working? Absolutely! I’m down to 12 stone 1 pound. Feel great and am seeing some Abs appear (although long way to go yet). Also the trick here is that I don’t deny myself. We have got a few social nights out coming up in the next few weeks and on those nights I’m going to eat and drink what the hell i like, no denial whatsoever. Can you do that on a diet? No. However on a lifelong healthy eating plan you can cut yourself some slack and break loose now and then.

To just go back over this and make things very clear. The critical thing you need to change is not just your diet, it’s your attitude to food and eating. Be proud of the fact that you are changing your life for the better. In the book I’m writing I talk about pride as being a big motivating factor and maybe my next post will be about pride and other tools you can use for motivation. Your attitude needs to be “I am going to eat well, eat healthily, prepare my food myself instead of letting the supermarket do it, and I can eat big portions and be bad now and again”. It’s just common sense, it’s just going back to what our Grandparent did and adopting their “meat and two veg” lifestyle but making it more fun.

Future posts will start to give recipe advice, tips on how to prepare food in advance to cut down on time and if you want I’m happy to give more examples of what I’m eating.

Take Care,

John

 

Todays Training- Sunday & Monday

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Sunday Training

Hello All,

I’ve decided that for now at least this will be the last update of my daily training diary. It’s been going for around 2 weeks and hopefully given you an idea of what i do and how i train. It was never intended to go on forever and I’d hate to get to the stage where I am boring you. I’ll do it again as and when i change my training drastically. As always if you have any questions please feel free to ask or drop in some comments.

Sunday: Yes Sunday….I don’t normally train on Sundays but the kids were out, I had 50 minutes to kill so i thought why not. I feel that my Chest is lagging behind a bit compared to some other parts so this was a good chance to give it an extra session. So here we go.

Incline Barbell bench press. This is not an exercise i do too often but thought I’d give it a go and hit it hard. I tried to hit 10 sets although struggled a bit on the last 2. I did 2 warm up sets of 12 reps@40kg, 2 sets of 10 reps@50kg, 2 sets of 6 reps at 60kg, 2 sets of 6@50kg and then 2 sets to failure @40kg which only got to 10 and then 7 reps.

Then onto a flat bench and some dumbbells. I picked up 2 sets, a 22kg set and a 14kg set. I then supersetted dumbbell press (alternate 1 arm then the other) with the 22kg’s which also strengthens the core, with dumbbell fly’s with the 14kg’s, 4 sets in total.

Finally over to the cable machine and 4 sets of standing cable crossover. This was not too heavy (25kg on each side) but with real concentration on squeezing the Pec’s as much as possible.

That was me pretty much done but i just wanted to finish with some cardio/HiiT. Out into the Gym car park which was pretty empty and did some sprints. The distance was about 50m. Sprinted the distance at about 90% capacity and to a slow walk back to the start. Repeated 8 times, then got in the car and went home, Sunday training finished.

Monday: Today i wanted to hit back, abs and possibly some biceps if i had time. Last week i did heavy deadlifts and have come to the conclusion that i need to be more careful with them as my lower back and left hip hurts and i still have some sciatica down my left leg and into my calf…..so no Deadlifts for me today.

I started wide grip pull ups. I’m not good at these but they are gradually improving. I cranked out 5 sets of 7 reps, although the last 2 sets were more like 6 and a bit.

Then over to a bench and some heavy bent over single arm rows with 35kg. I concentrated on really pulling with my back and rowing the weight up and back to my hip rather than pulling with bicep. 4 sets of 8 reps on each side.

Then over to the Lat pulldown machine. 3 sets of wide grip pulldowns with palms forward super setted with close grip pulldowns with palms facing backwards towards my face. Again the concentration was on pulling down with the Lats and squeezing the scapular together.

Finally to the cable machine for some high level face pulls with a rope, again concentrating on squeezing the rear Delts and Traps. That was back done.

Next on to Abs. I like to work Abs in a circuit to really fry them and also because it saves time.

Hanging leg raises 8 reps, straight into V sit type sit ups where you touch hands to toes, but using a 6kg medicine ball for 12 reps, and then finally a 45 second plank. No rest between exercises and 4 sets.

I had 10 minutes left so just grabbed an EZ curl bar and banged out 6 sets of 10 reps with 30kg.

Job done, time to head home. My back is killing me today so may have a day off from training tomorrow.

Take Care,

John

Todays Training – Shoulders & Some Legs!

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arnold-shoulder-pressingHi Guys, here is todays quick training update. Please let me know if you are getting bored with these. It was always intended to be just a quick insight into what i do but I’m not here to preach and definitely not to bore you. I’m now struggling with a couple of niggles so not quite able to do exactly what i want in the Gym. However that is not an excuse and you can always do something. My left shoulder is still very sore, and now so is my left hip and lower back which is causing a sciatica type pain down my left leg…..I think I’m just getting old!!

So due to the slight injuries i wanted to avoid doing any further damage. I’m usually a big advocate of free weights over machines but went the machine route today because of the more limited range of motion and control they give you. Once I’m rocking again I’ll be back onto the Barbells and Dumbbells. So here is todays programme.

Firstly over to the Smith Machine for some seated overhead press to hit shoulders. I did 10 sets, 5 behind neck and 5 in front Military press style. I kept the weight fairly low at 30kg (+ the bar) and concentrated on really squeezing and isolating my shoulders rather than pushing with my Triceps. It worked and by the ninth and tenth set i was struggling to get to the full 10 reps.

Next over to Lateral raises. For these i DID use Dumbbells but kept the weight low and instead did Giant drop sets. So i grabbed 3 sets of Dumbbells at 10kg, 6kg and 3kg. I did a set of 10 reps with the 9’s, dropped them, straight into 10 reps with the 6’s and then straight into 10 with the 3’s and for the final set with the 3’s tried to squeeze my deltoids as hard as possible. That was one set and I did 4 in total.

I then sat on a bench, leant forward and did exactly the same routine, same weights, reps and sets for bent over laterals to work on the posterior head of the Delts. That was it, shoulders almost done.

Next up were some shrugs to build up the Traps. 32kg dumbbell in each hand and did 3 sets of 15.

Next some leg work although I didn’t want to go mad as they were still sore from earlier in the week. I went over to the Leg press machine. I cranked out 2 sets with both legs at 70kg. I then dropped the weight to 30kg and did single leg presses. 3 sets of 10 for each leg. I also moved my foot up and down the foot board to try to change which part of the muscles it worked and tried to focus on the Glutes as much as possible.

I then stayed sitting where i was and proceeded to do Calf presses. One leg at a time, 4 sets for each leg at 25kg.

That was it, i was sort of done. However it felt like a bit of a feeble session. I’d wimped out on the legs and didn’t want to leave it like that. My arms felt fine so thought I’d have a very quick superset blast on Biceps and Triceps. In a previous post (here) i talke4d about a Cable based Bicep and Tricep ladder workout where you go up in weights on Triceps whilst coming down on Biceps. So i did that. Started at 20kg on Triceps and 55kg on Biceps and then came down/up in 5 or 10kg increments, supersetted with no rest at all. It worked out at 5 sets each side. That was it, i was done and felt better having added that in at the end.

Let’s see what tomorrow brings. I seem to have a few broken bits at the moment but will see how i feel in the morning before deciding what to do or maybe just having a day off.

Take Care,

John

The Fastest Way to Lose Fat- Sprinting!!

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Sprinting 1  Sprinting 2

 

 

So you are getting yourself fit, going to the gym and starting to eat more healthily but just don’t seem able to burn off those last couple of inches of fat. Well here is a surefire way to do it. It’s not easy and can be hard work but it is quick, both in terms of time taken and results.

Firstly let me ask you a question. How many fat and/or skinny sprinters have you seen? In fact would you agree with me that most sprinters or explosive short distance runners , both male and female, tend to have bodies we would all die for. They are muscular, lean and generally just RIPPED!

That isn’t a coincidence, its entirely down to the type of training and exercise they do. Sprinting overloads many of the muscles in the body and sends your metabolism and production of Human Growth Hormone (HGH) into overdrive. All of these factors combine to burn calories and help you shed fat at a ferocious rate.

That all sounds great, but “What do i need to do?” you ask. It really couldn’t be any simpler. Pull on your trainers, tie up your laces and Sprint! Seriously, you can do it anywhere. The road outside your house, your local park, the car park at your Gym, school playground etc.

Here is what i would recommend. Measure out a distance of only 40-60 metres. Sprint at about 90% of your capacity for that distance then turn around and walk back to the start. Depending on your level of fitness repeat it 5-12 times. That’s it, job done. It may take 10 minutes at most. Do it two or three times a week and watch as the fat melts away. In fact take a look at this video Here by Jeff Cavaliere that explains things perfectly. I make no secret of the fact that I pretty much stole the concept of this blog post from him, but the secret of health and fitness is applying the knowledge that you gain from a variety of sources.

The great thing about this is that it applies to all ages, abilities and fitness levels. It isn’t a race. It is about pushing yourself hard and overloading your body. A quick word of warning. Don’t go straight into this unless you have done a few weeks of fitness work first and especially with a little focus on your legs and hamstrings. If you just go out and sprint flat out having done nothing for 2 years you may tear a muscle and you definitely won’t burn fat sitting on the sofa waiting for your injury to heal. In fact I would suggest that the first 3 or 4 times you do this just run at about 60% capacity, a fast trot. It will still work, still burn some fat but will also allow your body to acclimatise.

I know that a lot of people don’t like running but just 10 minutes 2 or 3 times a week will make the world of difference to your cardiovascular fitness, heart, lungs and best of all will melt away the spare inches that you want to lose and reveal those hard worked for muscles.

Take Care,

John

 

Todays Training- Resistance Super Sets, HiiT stylie!

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CircuitsSummer is coming, I have a holiday booked and I freely admit I’m vain. I like to look as good as i can in my beach shorts so need to start adjusting my training accordingly. Therefore I’ll still be hitting the weights but will be making some changes to how i train a couple of time a week. Generally speaking I’ll be throwing in some weights based resistance circuits, a bit more HiiT and just aiming to burn some fat and get a bit leaner. Also trying to be good when it comes to food and diet so bye bye to the Wine, Beer and Crisps that I love (well at least to some extent, I’m not an angel after all).

So here is todays training workout. Basically i picked sets of two exercises at a time and did them as Supersets with very little rest.

I started with Hanging Leg raises supersetted with Chest/Tricep dips on parallel bars. 8 hanging leg raises, straight into 12 dips. Then rest for around 45 seconds and repeat. 3 sets in total.

Next was standing alternate arm shoulder press with 15kg dumbbells supersetted with Kettlebell swings (2 hands between legs). Concentrate on bracing the core when doing the shoulder press and pushing with the shoulders not the triceps and then thrusting forward with the hips and glutes when doing the swing. 10 reps each side for the dumbbell press and then 12 reps for the Kettlebell swings.3 sets in total.

Next bent over Dumbbell rows supersetted with Goblet squats. Again using the same 15kg Dumbells in each hand concentrate on squeezing the weight up, back and into the side and pulling with the back rather than the Bicep, then standard Goblet squats with a fairly wide Sumo stance and going down as deep as possible to stretch the Glutes and Hamstrings. 3 sets in total.

Next I used an exercise ball as a bench and did Dumbell Chest press. The ball wobbles slightly which means you engage your core to maintain stability and you also get a really deep stretch in your chest as you lower the weight down. 15kg for 10 reps.This was immediately followed by standard exercise ball crunches x 15 reps. 3 sets in total.

The final exercises of the circuit were on the cable machine. I set up a single handle at mid chest level with 20kg on it. Then did Cable twists or woodchoppers as they are sometimes called. 10 reps on the right and then 10 on the left. I supersetted this with Tricep pushdowns on another machine. 12 reps at 50kg.

That was it for the weights. These exercises used pretty much every part of my body – Shoulders, Chest, Back, Legs, Abs etc and gave me a pretty good full body workout but would also have burnt calories due to the superset effect and low rest periods.

Finally i headed over to the running machine. Incline up to 4.5. Speed up to almost sprint level. I jumped on and did 20 seconds running at speed, then stepped off and rested for 30 seconds. Repeated this 6 time. Then did 2 more reps with 30 seconds sprinting and 30 seconds rest so 8 in total.

That’s it, done. Back to doing some mass building stuff tomorrow in training and then something similar to this on Friday maybe. As always, if you have any questions please ask. It’s probably cheeky of me to ask but if you are enjoying these posts, or any of the stuff i put out, then please share or Like them from the website or Facebook, Linked In or wherever you are reading them. I really appreciate it.

Have a good evening.

Take Care,

John

 

Todays Training – Chest, Biceps and Some HiiT

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Kiddie Biceps

Just a very quick training diary update for today. Todays aim was to hit my chest hard, then do some Bicep work and finish with a few rounds of a HiiT type routine. It’s late and I’m knackered so I’ll keep this brief.

Chest: Started with Dumbbell presses on a very low (almost flat incline), maybe around 15 degrees. 1 x warm up set of 12 reps @ 17.5kg in each hand. Then some proper sets. 1 x 10 reps@24kg, 1 x 6 reps@30kg, 1 x 5@30kg, 1 x 8 reps@22kg and 1 x 10@17.5kg. Tried to keep rest to a max 1 minute between sets.

Then put the incline up slightly but still only about 30 degrees. The next exercise was again dumbbell press but alternating from hand to hand. So basically press both dumbbels overhead, then lower one back to your chest whilst keeping the other hand extended overhead. This really works your chest well but has the added advantage of working your core as you need to maintain your balance and prevent rotation of your body.  1 x 10 reps (each side)@22kg, 1 x 8 reps @24kg, 2 x 10 reps @17.5kg.

Then 4 sets of cable crossovers @20kg each side.

Finally I shot across to the seated front bench press machine and knocked out one set of 40 reps at a low weight (think it was about 20kg in total) just to really fatigue the chest.

Biecps: I decided to start with an exercise I am really poor at but which is a great mass builder, close grip chin ups focusing on pulling with Biceps rather than using the back. 5 sets and managed a feeble 6 reps, 6 reps, 5 reps, 5 reps and a final 3 and a bit. Definitely needs work.

Then good old fashioned standing barbell curls. 4 sets of 10 @ 35kg and really focusing on no body movement, squeezing the weight up with the biceps and no body movement with a slow lowering of the weight.

Finally seated incline dumbbell curls with a drop set. 10 reps @10kg per hand, then no rest into 10 reps@6kg, then 10 x 3kg. Repeated this 3 times. I realise the weights sound really low but if you go slow, don’t cheat and really squeeze and isolate your bicep it hurts like crazy by the end.

Finally onto a quick HiiT (High Intensity Interval Training) circuit.

30 jumping jacks, no rest into 12 press ups, into 16 (8 each side) alternate leg jack knives, into 20 twisting slow mountain climbers and then 20 (10 each side) jumping alternate leg lunges. Had about a minutes rest then went again. Did it 4 times.

That’s it, am already feeling the chest tonight but not so much the biceps. Think I’ll probably do some more resistance circuit work tomorrow. Have a good night.

Take Care,

John

Learn how to shrink your belly Instantly!!

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anterior-pelvic-tilt2 Pelvic Tilt.

 

 

 

 

Does your belly protrude no matter how many Ab exercises you do? Can’t seem to lose that stubborn last bit of belly fat, or worse than that, you HAVE lost the weight but you still look fat? Suffer from lower back pain, sore hips or pain down your thighs, knees and even down the side of your calves? When sitting in one position for long periods such as on planes or long car journeys do you suffer from cramps or agonising pains in your legs and back? Does any of this sound like you?

Well you are not alone….I do too and I’d estimate that probably 50% of the population in one way or another suffer from some of these symptoms. So what causes it? Anterior Pelvic Tilt. “What the hell is that, never heard of it?”  Well it’s a very common postural problem that often goes hand in hand with a range of other issues such as tight Hip Flexors, weak Glutes (Bum muscles) and weakness in a little heard of muscle called the Psoas which in conjunction with another muscle forms the Iliopsoas (don’t worry i won’t bore you with science for too long). This muscle which no-one has heard of is crucial. It is the only muscle that joins the top half of your body (lower spine) to the lower half (pelvis and thigh bones). It has a dramatic effect on your lower back, hips and pelvic region and can cause issues right down your legs and up your entire back.

So now onto the good stuff. One of the symptoms of weakness in any of these muscles and regions is Anterior Pelvic Tilt. Take a look at the diagrams at the top. In laymans terms what happens is that your pelvis tips forwards and the front moves down. This causes an un-natural curve in the base of the spine and puts pressure on nerves and muscles throughout the pelvic, lower spine and thigh area that are not meant to have pressure on them. That causes chronic lower back pain, sciatica or pain in the legs, and even pain down as far as the calves and feet. It affects your posture, how you walk and in the long term the health of your entire body. This condition most commonly affects people who spend large periods of time sitting down such as office workers, can or lorry drivers etc.

The title of this article was “how to shrink your belly instantly”. That wasn’t a scam and i can prove it to you right now. One of the other main unfortunate side effects of Anterior Pelvic Tilt is that it forces you to stick your belly out. So even if you are slim, if you constantly stand in an APT pose your belly WILL stick out and you WILL look like you are carrying weight, even if you are not. The good news is you can correct that instantly.

Go and stand near a mirror where you can see you whole body (preferably nude)…ooooh errr! Stand side on and completely relax into a soft pose, don’t tense or hold anything in. If you have APT your body will slump slightly, you will have a fairly pronounced curve in the base of your spine and most likely your belly will drop forwards and lower and stick out much more than you’d like. Correct? Is that belly protruding?

Now try this. Gently clench your buttocks, slightly tense your stomach muscles and concentrate on trying to tip the front of your pelvic/crotch area up and the back of the same area downwards and tuck your bottom in slightly. In effect you are tipping your pelvis back onto a more level plane. Now look sideways in the mirror again. See the difference? Your belly should have disappeared or at the very least significantly shrunk. It shows that your posture and how you hold yourself has a tremendous effect on how you look.

Now of course that is only a temporary fix (but nice to know when you are out and about and want to look your best in that dress or suit). However you can start to work on it yourself right away. You can learn how it feels to control the angle of your Pelvis. Start by holding the position for 5 minutes every 20 minutes or so and work up from there. Do it while standing as well as sitting. in addition to dramatically improving your posture, alleviating back and leg pain, AND shrinking the appearance of your belly it has the added bonus of toning both your Glutes and Abs as you tense and hold them firm.

I would also suggest you watch the video link Here .  Look past what the guy is wearing and style of the video as it actually contains some excellent information and examples of exercises you can do very easily and quickly. Do these exercises regularly, combine them with what i told you earlier and keep at it on a daily basis. Consistency is key. Gradually you will build the mind – body connection that enables you to control your pelvis as well as strengthen your Psoas, hip flexors , lower back and Glute muscles. Your back pain will ease, your legs will feel better and best of all, that hard work and dieting will finally pay off as you will be able to control that belly and look as amazing  and slim as you deserve.

More articles will follow that show exercise programmes that strengthen your Glutes, hips, Hamstrings and lower back so please keep following them. I believe this is one of my most important posts so far as it address the problem of lower back and hip pain which so badly impinges on so many peoples lives. If you like the article then please share it as widely as possible and I’d also welcome your comments.

Take Care,

John