Your Athletic body awaits....

Hey campers,

I train a lot of women and moms. However my background is more in the arena of training athletes. Now that I have been training 'non-athletes' for several years, I have come to realize something:

We all have an athlete inside of us!

Now that may sound a little corny, but its true:

• We all have a desire to better ourselves, and constantly pushing our own comfort zones to achieve this (at least you do if you read this journal)
• We all have weaknesses that we must work on to achieve our goals
• We all want to look better to some degree
• Thirst for competition (against others or against ourselves)

Looking at the above descriptions, its easy to see that many of us are athletes but perhaps didn't know it.

When I realized this, I stopped seperating the two groups (athletes, and non-athletes) and began training all of my clients as if they were athletes, hence the generation of fitness boot camp.

The principles remain the same for fat loss, muscle strength, and endurance if you are an athlete or a non-athlete. Of course there are different levels of intensity involved but everyone can benefit from training as an athlete.

A Note on Competition

Competition can scare a lot of people. We all either fear or embrace competition at some level. When striving to reach a desired goal whether it be fat loss, applying for a job, or bidding on a home, competition is all around us.

This can often be overwhelming for many individuals, and often they will shy away from it. And I agree there are healthy and non-healthy forms of competition. Healthy competition mostly derives from within yourself. You are competing with yourself and perhaps secretly with those around you. Whether you are striving to beat your time in a race or striving to beat that one person you have had a 'private' competition with all along in your mind. It is often celebrated by others cheering others on as they are able to relate to the hard work others are putting in to succeed. Healthy competition is not gloated and many times not voiced at all. It remains within and builds a strong will to succeed.

Unhealthy competition is often seen in professional sports where there is a lot of taunting, their feelings and emotions are known by everyone around them, and everyone cheers for only their friends or teammates. This creates a lack of community togetherness, and segregation.

Bottom line: If you fear competition at any level ask yourself if you are ready to make a change, then make it within yourself. Avoid unhealthy competition at all costs as it will only regress your achievements. Surround yourself with like minded individuals all striving to better themselves and are supportive of you trying to do the same.

Motivational Quote of the Week

If you can imagine it, you can achieve it; if you can dream it, you can become it.
William Arthur Ward

Basal Metabolic Rate vs. Calories In

Too often I encounter someone who believes eating 500 calories a day will help them lose weight.

It is unfortunate but a lack of truthful information is streaming through the media.

And diet companies are not the only ones to blame.

Every day we are inundated with information contradicting itself that it gets so frustrating, you don't know what to believe.

Honestly, I'm not surprised that we are in the situation we are as a country.

When I deliver information, I make sure it is scientifically proven and from a viable source.

This one is no different.

Basal Metabolic Rate

Your basal metabolic rate is how many calories you will burn at complete rest (calories you burn sitting on the couch all day long). These calories are expended performing functions in your body so you stay alive.

Unfortunately the Basal Metabolic Rate is often taken out of the equation when trying to balance the whole calories in versus calories out equation (I suppose unbalance would be a better word here).

So the mentality is that training for 1-2 hours and burning 1200 calories is going to be the calories out while taking in 1000 calories in a day creates the calorie deficit we are looking for.

Theoretically this is true, but here is why it doesn't work.

Your basal metabolic rate is your metabolism. Your metabolism is dependent upon several factors: body size, activity level, diet, and amount of lean muscle tissue to name a few.

If you were a 40 year old 140 pound female who was 5 feet 6 inches tall, your basal metabolic rate would be 1532.36.

That's 1500 calories doing absolutely nothing!

If you add that the example above has a desk job, so is a pretty sedentary person, her calorie output just working and sitting on the couch would be 1838.832!

And that is without any exercise.

Makes eating 500 calories a day seem a little absurd doesn't it?

The great thing about the basal metabolic rate is that you can increase it so that you burn more calories at rest.

Weight training will do that. Your muscle IS your metabolism

Supportive nutrition will do that. Make the food work for you by burning more calories just to digest it.

Looks like the impossible just became a little more realistic:)

Hey bootcampers,

if you feel the your bootcamp is the best!! Go to this site and vote. It's in the Etobicoke Guardian "Best of section". under bootcamp

Thanks for your support.


www.tcnreaderschoice.com

I have no time for exercise???

Hi bootcampers,

I used to think it was true.

I didn't think I would ever have time to exercise with such a busy schedule.

Boy was I uneducated!

I didn't know that a four minute workout could continue to provide an 'afterburn' long after my exercise session was over. And if I didn't know, how would other people know who don't have exercise and fitness as a profession!

The truth is I got sucked in rather than looking at the science. The media, the magazines, and even other 'fitness professionals' promote long bouts of exercise as being the most effective means of burning body fat.

In fact, just last week I had a client come to me to ask me the very same question as they heard from an exercise physiologist that long cardio sessions are the way to go to burn body fat.

You know what I told my client?

The exercise physiologist is right.

Now, before you delete this journal for me contradicting everything I have ever said, let me explain:

We are taught in school to look at the exercise session and the exercise session only. We are taught to look at the effects on the body within the exercise session only. We are NOT taught to look at the effects of the exercise session on the body AFTER exercise.

But science is starting to catch up to those of us who have been using these principles for years.

A long cardio session WILL burn MORE fat than a short interval training session DURING the workout. AFTER the workout is finished the individual performing long cardio sessions will have their core body temperature and heart rate return to normal about 30 minutes after a workout.

When performing interval training this is not the case. Due to the drastic changes in intensity during the workout, some studies show your heart rate to be elevated and your body attempting to return to a resting state for up to 36 hours post exercise session!

Yup, you read that right. You can be burning an elevated amount of calories from interval training 36 hours after a workout!

As a result you will burn 9 times more calories performing interval training than with a steady state cardio session.

Start looking outside the workout session to the recovery portion of your workout and the rest of your day. Your body and the amount of time it takes to recover from a workout will define the amount of results you achieve.

Getting back to my main topic of not having enough time to workout effectively, its a bunch of crap. Even if you have five or ten minutes here and there during the day, you can stimulate your body to cause 'turbulence' and elevate your heart rate and metabolism.

Motivational Quote of the week:

"Time is limited, so I better wake up every morning fresh and know that I have just one chance to live this particular day right, and to string my days together into a life of action, and purpose"

Does Weight Watchers work??

Please feel free to forward this email to anyone whom you feel might benefit from its contents.

I wish I had a nickel each time I heard it, bootcampers.

The painful statement my clients say time and time again.

'I used to go to weight watchers and lost weight fast. But when I stopped, I gained it all back and then some.'

I'm not here to bash Weight Watchers, rather I want to shed some light on what works and what doesn't.

And I mean for the long term.

I'm not about temporary solutions or a band-aid especially on a problem like being overweight.

Knowing WHY you are doing something and HOW to sustain a habit for the long term are two key points that are overlooked by most weight loss programs.

If you don't know WHY you are doing the habits you are doing, then how are you going to maintain them for the long term?

If you do know why, then you can take action steps toward fixing the issues that will arise long into the future.

I mean sure there is a point system that puts foods on a hierarchy of healthfulness.

But it never says to stay away from foods that will do nothing for you.

It just jacks up the point value for them.

So you can still have them, but it will cost you points.

How about it can cost you your life if you eat them, because that is the reality.

How about it will slow down your metabolism to the point that your muscle tissue will starve of nutrients.

Why are they starving? Who knows they haven't taught that. So how do we know how to fix it?

Good question...