Build Strength, Lose Fat & Move Better
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Goal setting is universal and not just in Gloucester, ON. Anything you achieve comes from an idea that’ turned into a goal and either kept in your mind or formally written. Setting goals for fitness is an important step and they should be smart goals. What are smart goals? SMART is an acronym for goals that are Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Timely. Each letter in the acronym is important to your success.
A specific goal is important. If you simply say you want to get healthier or fitter, it can mean almost anything from exercising a few times to eating fruit instead of candy. However, saying you want to lose 20 pounds is extremely specific. The more specific you are, the easier it is to know when you’re successful in achieving your goal.
If my goal is to get fitter, how do I know I’ve achieved it? Maybe by changing that goal to being able to run up five flights of stairs without stopping is a good measurement. Just like losing weight, you have created a way to ensure you know when you’ve reached your goal. The goal should also be attainable. Losing weight, if you’re overweight, is attainable, growing taller if you’re an adult, isn’t. If you have a big goal to achieve, break it up to smaller goals that you can achieve quicker, so the faster results will spur you on to continue.
Everything has a price. While you might dream of becoming a famous rock star, spending the time learning to sing or play music isn’t your thing. In other words, it’s not a goal because it’s not relevant and you aren’t willing to pay the price that comes with it. Losing weight and getting into shape also comes with a price tag. It’s the time you spend working out and the determination to eat healthy.
Do you want to get maximum results, plus help prevent injury, you need to stretch for success. That’s right, stretching should be part of everyone’s workout. It’s not only great as a warmup or cool down, it’s also necessary for flexibility. While strength training is definitely important for weight loss and protecting you from injury in some ways, flexibility training, such as stretching, can prevent injury by increasing the range of motion. If you’ve been sitting too long, there’s nothing better than stretching to help relieve the pain and get your circulation going.
Watch a cat wake up. Cats don’t jump straight up, unless they’re scared. Most of the time they reach their paws forward, stretch their back and slowly get moving. You need to do the same thing when you get up each morning. Raise your arms and stretch out. Arch your back and even turn your head side to side. Lunges of all types are good ways to start. Reach your arms in the air and stretch out your body, elongating it as much as possible and then roll your shoulders. Focus on stretching every muscle in your body.
Not only is stretching great as a warm-up, to ensure muscles are adequately warmed, stretching can relieve pain. Kneel on the floor and then raise on leg, putting the sole of your foot flat on the floor with the knee bent at a 90 degree angle. Put your hands on the top of the bent knee and push your body backward to stretch. It feels amazing.
Is your lower back aching from too much sitting. It’s time for a stretch. Get a towel and flip it around until it’s in a roll. Lay on your back with one leg laying straight out and the other bent at the knee with your foot flat on the floor. Lift the foot of the leg with the knee bent an loop the towel around the sole of the foot. Push your foot out as you pull the towel and your foot straight in the air. Do the same on the opposite side. You’ll feel it stretch out your back and relieve any pain your in at the time.
There’s a lot to be said for interval training. My clients in Ottawa find it extremely effective. HIIT—high intensity interval training—is one where you workout at high intensity, for a few minutes and then have a slightly shorter recovery period and back to the high intensity. Regular interval training combines two or more activities, one right after another. Sprint interval training—SIT—-uses ten to thirty seconds of an all out burst of energy followed by three to four minutes of restful recovery. The difference between SIT and HIIT is the shorter, yet more intense periods of heightened activity with SIT and the longer recovery period.
If you move briskly from one exercise to another without resting, it’s interval training. If you run at high speed for a few minutes with a few minutes of rest, it’s HIIT. Push yourself harder on the intensity for a few seconds and then make the recovery long and it’s SIT. It doesn’t matter what the exercise, it’s how you do it that counts.
If you want to get in shape faster and boost your endurance, try interval training. One study showed that just thirty minutes three times a week of interval training was equal to sixty minutes of steady state workouts. HIIT training gets the heart and endurance built faster. In 2011, a study showed the results from two weeks of HIIT training were the same as six to eight weeks of more traditional types of endurance training. HIIT also improved speed as it built stamina and aided your body in burning lactic acid better, so you could exercise longer.
If weight loss is one of your goals, interval training is definitely good. It creates both after-burn, which means the body continues burning extra calories up to 24 hours after your workout. HGH—human growth hormone—is also boosted by HIIT. HGH not only helps you build muscles faster, it also helps you heal faster, burn fat and maintain a more youthful appearance. As you age, the body normally produces less.
While you hear about miracle fat burning foods, they’re a bit of a myth. If all you had to do was eat a bowl of kale or two stalks of celery, obesity wouldn’t be at epidemic proportion. However, there are foods that do boost your metabolism. These are thermogenic foods. They’re lower in calories and use most of the calories you consume to help digest and utilize the nutrients in the food. Celery, for example, has a lot of fiber and water, but very few calories, so digesting it burns off more than you consume.
Capsaicin is what makes peppers hot. It’s located in the pith and ribs in the peppers. While that heat from the pepper will burn your eyes and skin, it also burns your fat by speeding up your metabolism. The increased thermogenesis means an increase in fat and calorie burning. If that weren’t enough, it regulates blood sugar, has anti-inflammatory effects to relieve pain, clears out the sinuses and triggers genes that prevents fat accumulation.
That cup of coffee in the morning not only wakes you up, it also can boost your metabolism to help you lose weight, as long as it’s not filled with sugary flavors and whipped topping. It’s the caffeine that makes it effective. You’ll get a similar boost by starting your day with a cold glass of water that contains a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar—ACV. The cold water makes you body work to warm it and the ACV will keep you feeling full for hours.
The EGCG—a type of catechin—in the green tea, acts like an antioxidant an increases fat oxidation by as much as 25 percent. Green tea also contains caffeine, which boosts your metabolism just like coffee does. One study showed that combining six or seven cup of green tea with a program of exercise helped weight loss, while also flushing out toxins from the system, reducing tooth decay, and reducing the risk of serious conditions like Alzheimer’s, cancer and Parkinson disease.