WHAT DOES ITV BE AND FITNESS MAGAZINES HAVE IN COMMON?

So what exactly does the TV channel ITV Be and a whole plethora of fitness and diet magazines have in common?

The short and simple answer is that they all have a lot of space to fill, so more often than not they fill that space with rubbish.

Think about it, does the Great British public really have an insatiable appetite for ITV Be shows such as ‘The Real Housewives of Orange County’ or ‘The Real Housewives of Atlanta’ or ‘The Real Housewives of Beverley Hills’ or ‘The Real Housewives of New York City’? (Believe it or not these are actually real shows!).

No they don’t.

It’s just that ITV Be runs for hours every day and that means they have a lot of space to fill. So the TV executives fill that space with rubbish programmes such as ‘The Real Housewives of…wherever’.

And it’s much the same for fitness and diet magazines. Every few weeks a new issue is released.

So every few weeks the editors of these magazines frantically try to fill their pages with new and exciting stories about diet and fitness to keep their readers interested.  Inevitably some of these articles end up being just like the boobs of many of the women in the aforementioned TV shows – false.

 

The secrets to weight loss

For example take a look at any diet magazine and you’ll come across an article on ‘The Secrets of Weight Loss’. Flippin’ ‘eck how many more secrets to weight loss could there possibly be? There are supposedly more secrets to weight loss than there is in a Premier League footballer’s marriage!


And the fitness magazines are not much better either, it seems that barely a month goes by without there being a new and exciting way to ‘get bigger abs’ or ‘get bigger biceps’ or get bigger whatever it maybe.

So what should you do?
You should take these articles the same way as you take your chips…with a pinch of salt and just like a grave digger trying to impress his new boss, you should dig a little deeper. Dig around to find the actual science behind the stories and see if the claims made in these articles are actually true! You’ll be surprised, unfortunately many are not!

 

Now, this is not to say that all of the articles are rubbish, they are not and many of the expert contributors are just that – experts so well worth paying attention to. But please note what I’m saying here, SOME of these articles are worth paying attention to, but please DO NOT follow them dogmatically and without question!

For advice on how to set up your own exercise and nutrition plan that actually works please don’t hesitate to get in touch.

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

Matt

        matt@mlrpt.co.uk                            www.mlrpt.co.uk                                              07939316401 www.facebook.com/mlrpt                www.twitter.com/mlrpt                        www.youtube.com/mlrpt

 

THE MOST AM-AZ-ING DIET EVER

Don’t you feel the term ‘A-MAZ-ING’ is just too overused? I certainly do.

It’s so commonly used that when I hear it uttered in a sentence I immediately switch off knowing full well that what I’m going to hear won’t be amazing at all. It may be mildly surprising, or even moderately amusing but almost certainly not A-MAZ-ING!

And this brings me to the actual point of my article, recently a new client told me she had begun the most AMAZING diet ever and had literally lost 4lbs overnight. Obviously I was intrigued, so just like a determined metal detectorist I dug  a little further. It turns out she had literally cut out all carbohydrates from her diet. And as you’ve probably guessed from the tenant of my article so far this initial weight loss was not AMAZING at all; and let me explain why...

LOSE FAT, NOT WATER                                                                                                    When trying to lose weight, ideally, what you really want to do is change the composition of your body. You want to lose body fat, and the way you do this is by creating a calorie deficit. This can be done by eating less (consuming less calories) or by burning more calories (increasing your activity levels) or ideally, by a combination of the two

TIME FOR ME TO GET ALL RACHEL RILEY ON YOU...                                                 And by that I don't mean that I'm Strictly, leaving my spouse and shacking up with an attractive Russian dance partner, I mean it's time for some maths... 

If we accept the commonly held notion that 1lb of fat is the equivalent to 3500 calories, 4lbs of fat would equal 14000 calories (4 x 3500 = 14000).

Now in the case of my client, for her to have lost 4lbs of FAT overnight it would have meant her somehow creating a deficit of 14000 calories. Which is near impossible when you consider that 14000 calories is the equivalent of 1 weeks’ worth of calories for the average women (the NHS recommends the average women should consume 2000 calories per day).

I’m sure you’ll agree this isn’t likely to happen.

SO WHERE IS THE WEIGHT LOSS COMING FROM IF IT’S NOT FROM FAT?

The likely answer is water. When you eat carbohydrate, it is stored in your body with water (1 gram of carbohydrate can store 3-4grams of water). Once you stop eating carbohydrates and your body uses all of the carbohydrate that it has stored, the water which was stored with it simply gets excreted from the body, thus giving dramatic weight loss results!

To keep things simple, think of water's relationship with carbohydrate in the same way as a 'hangers on' relationship is with a famous person: When a person is famous there are plenty of 'hangers on' around clinging to that fame. When there is carbohydrate in the body there is plenty water hanging around clinging onto to that too. When the carbs get used up and go, so does the water. When the famous person has a fall from grace and the fame goes, so do the hangers on! 

This initial weight loss looks A-MAZ-ING on the scales but it does nothing for your fat loss. You are simply LOSING WATER, NOT FAT!

HEY PRESTO THE WEIGHT RETURNS!

In my experience most people find it difficult to stick to a no, or very low carbohydrate diet for long. So once they eat carbs again the water comes back and hey presto so does the weight!

NO OR LOW CARBOHYDRATES ARE A CON THEN?

No, low or no carbohydrate diets can, and do work for people who are able to sustain them beyond the initial few days of water loss and into the phase where the body uses fat and even protein to provide energy. 

However, whether the weight loss comes about because the diet controls the body's insulin levels better, or simply because it's restrictive nature limits the types of foods which most people generally overeat is open to debate. 

What is not open to debate is that, for many people, a low or no carbohydrate diet proves very difficult to sustain; and that the dramatic, initial weight loss is due to water loss not fat loss!

IN CONCLUSION...

Low or no carb diets can work for some people (as do many other types of diet) provided they are able to stick with it. However, such diets do not come without their pro's and con's and I urge you to do further research as to what these are and how they could possibly effect you.

But if you do opt to go for such a diet please don't fall into the trap that many ill-informed people fall into:

In a bid to lose weight, they cut their carbs drastically. For the first few days the are really impressed with their weight loss (believing it to be fat loss, not water loss). As the days progress and the weight loss slows (as the final remnants of water and carbs leaves the body) their compulsion to chomp on some carbs is higher than the wage demands of your average Premier League footballer. They give in, and wolf down lots of bread, pasta, potatoes, in fact they eat more or less anything beige (watch out Essex boys, you'd better hide those beige, tailored chino shorts that your so fond of or they'll have them too!)

And at this point as the carbs are reintroduced to the diet, the water comes back and so does the weight. Depressed at this, they revert to their old eating habits (pre the low carb diet) until eventually, some point in the future, they decide to lose some weight again. Surprise, surprise they opt to go low or no carb again and so the cycle continues!

Thanks for reading,

Matt

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    matt@mlrpt.co.uk                 www.mlrpt.co.uk                          07939316401 www.twitter.com/mlrpt      www.facebook.com/mlrpt        www.twitter.com/mlrpt

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THE SAGGY BOTTOM PROBLEM

Before I tell you what the saggy bottom problem is, I’ll explain what it isn’t.

It isn’t anything to do with a SOGGY bottom which has plagued the lives of bakers for years (watch an episode of The British Bake Off if you want proof of this).

 

No, the problem of the SAGGY bottom has affected long distance runners for years and years, primarily female long distance runners who have lost weight and have an irrational fear of resistance training.

 

You probably know such a person, we’ve all got a friend or family member like it, or if not you’ve definitely seen one trudging the streets.  They are the person who very admirably begins running as a cheap and effective way to get fit. They get hooked on the running bug and they keep running ever longer distances, ever more frequently, in turn this causes them to burn calories like Lewis Hamilton burns rubber!

 

Before they know it they have shed bucket loads of weight and feel great. They keep running and running and losing more and more weight, by now they could never in a million years be described as being overweight but yet in their quest for aesthetic beauty they bemoan the fact that they have either ‘lost’ their bum completely or complain that it has become saggy (even though it could never be described as being big).

INCIDENTALLY THIS PROBLEM ALSO AFFECTS THOSE WHO DECIDE TO LOSE WEIGHT JUST BY CUTTING THIER CALORIES AND NOT DOING ANY EXERCISE. THEY END UP LOOSING A LOT OF MUSCLE MASS, WHICH CAN MAKE THEIR BODIES APPEAR 'SAGGY'. 

SO WHATS THE ANSWER TO THIS SAGGY BOTTOM PROBLEM?

The simple answer is weight training, and if as a women reading this you’re recoiling in disgust at the misguided thought that pumping some iron will leave you looking like Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson wearing a wig, bear this in mind - women produce much less testosterone than men, therefore they cannot and will not build muscle at anywhere near the same rate.

 

The few female bodybuilders you do see with very masculine physiques have, sshhhh don’t say it too loudly almost certainly been on the juice. Incidentally so have most of the really big men you see but once again keep that to yourselves I wouldn’t want that secret getting out!

SO WHAT SORT OR WEIGHT TRAINING SHOULD YOU DO?

Personally I would recommend a whole body approach to weight training but if you specifically wanted to improve the appearance of your bum you can’t look much further than the work of Brett Contreras AKA The Glute Guy and his hip thrust exercises. Allied to this I would recommend you do a whole host other lower body closed chain leg exercises too such as squats, dead Lifts, lunges and Bulgarian split squats as this will help shape the whole of the muscles of the leg, it will also boost performance too!

 

A DOUBLE WHAMMY, IT WILL HELP ME LOOK GOOD AND BOOST PERFORMANCE!

That’s right not only does lifting heavy weights improve the appearance of your legs it will also make you run faster too by allowing you to impart more power into the ground, (remember Newton’s 3^rd law? Every action has an equal and opposite reaction). Well the more power you can impart into the ground with each step, the longer each of you’re strides will be, which all else being equal means improved speed.

ALONG WITH THE WEIGHTS I’D ASLO RECOMMEND SOME SPRINTING TOO!

Recent studies have shown that the gluteus maximus (the major muscle of the bum) is much more active when sprinting as opposed to when running, so if you want to give your butt a bit of workout do some sprinting along with the weights it will add some variety to your training too!

For more detailed, bespoke advice on weight training or sprint training please do not hesitate to get in touch.

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

Good luck with your training.

Matt

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GET ON YOUR BIKE - THE NORMAN TEBBIT APPROACH TO MARATHON TRAINING

Now that Christmas is out of the way, and the New Year festivities are as distant-a-memory as Man United winning the league, thousands of people who’ve entered the annual spring slog-fest known as the London Marathon will turn their attentions away from drinking, dancing and cavorting to, well, running, running and, er more running!

And therein lies the problem,

For your average untrained Joe Schmoe simply running for hour after hour in a bid to ready themselves for the 26.2 mile course may not be the smartest way forward.

No, no, no, the smartest way maybe to listen to former Tory MP Norman Tebbit.

Now, you may be a fan of his politics, you may not (I, of course, couldn't comment either way through fear offending future clients) but when discussing ways of tackling unemployment he famously uttered the words ‘Get on your bike’ (incidentally he did not actually say that exactly but that has become the legend over the years, so in keeping with The Sun's ethos I’m not going to let the truth get in the way of a story!).

Although Tebbit was talking about unemployment he could quite have easily have been talking about marathon training. As I’ve already alluded to, if the average untrained individual goes from doing nothing to running a shed load of miles each week, he or she will be walking, or should I say running an injury tightrope!

This is where marathon training can be a bit of a quandary.

On one hand the body needs to get used to working for long periods at submaximal levels, on the other, this can lead to a range of acute and chronic injuries.

A method that I now use to great effect with my clients was first brought to my attention by Vern Gambetta in his book ‘Athletic Development’. It is basically combining running with other lower impact cardiovascular exercises such as cycling and rowing in a bid to get the body used to doing ‘work’.

For example if you’re aiming to do a 30 minute run (which may be a tough ask if you’re a novice), go and run and pound the streets for the first 10 of those minutes and get the higher impact stuff done first. Then cycle for the middle 10 minutes and then perhaps go on a rowing machine for the final 10 minutes, thus reducing the overall impact on your joints but still allowing your body to ‘work’ for a relatively long period of time. (Of course if you haven't got access to a bike or a rowing machine you could mix up the running with walking and step aerobic-type activities).

As your fitness improves and your body becomes accustomed to the impact of running you can begin to run for ever longer periods and reduce the time you spend cycling or rowing.

Ultimately you must get used to ‘being on your feet’ and running for hours as the marathon will likely take you between 3 to 4 hours to complete and this method eases you into that gently.

Good luck with your training.

If you enjoyed this article, please check out these articles too:

THE GORDON BROWN APPROACH TO WEIGHT LOSS

THE BUSH AND BLAIR APPROACH TO EXERCISE

TO BOOK YOUR FREE TRIAL PERSONAL TRAINING SESSION, OR TO BOOK A PLACE AT MY BOOT CAMP CLASS, PLEASE DON’T HESITATE TO GET IN TOUCH!

 matt@mlrpt.co.uk                 www.mlrpt.co.uk                          07939316401 www.twitter.com/mlrpt      www.facebook.com/mlrpt        www.twitter.com/mlrpt

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Enjoy Exercise Responsibly This NEW YEAR!

Over the years life has certainly got physically easier, an obvious example is shopping. My grandparent’s generation were used to shopping on the high street going in to many different shops to get their groceries.  My parent’s generation had it easier by doing their shopping all under one roof in a supermarket and nowadays it seems many of my generation feel personally affronted if they have to actually go to the shops, opting to do it all online instead.

WHY ARE YOU BANGING ON ABOUT SHOPPING I HEAR YOU CRY?

Well the point I am getting at is that over the years we have become increasingly used to absolving ourselves of many of our basic responsibilities, instead opting to get others to do stuff for us, and getting someone else to do our shopping is just the tip of the iceberg! Heck, remember back to doing your homework in your school days. I’m sure like me you’d have spent many an hour in the library, nowadays you don’t even have to do that, all you have to do is look on your phone and all of the answers are there in seconds – no hassle, no fuss, no effort!

YOU ONLY TRAIN FOR 1 HOUR PER DAY, WHAT YOU GONNA DO WITH THE OTHER 23?

Now in the New Year in your quest to lose weight I’m sure many of you will begin a new exercise regime, for some of you this will involve joining a gym, for others it may involve using the services of personal trainer. Whatever method you choose do not absolve yourself of your responsibilities. Training (whether in a gym or with a personal trainer) will only take up one hour of the day, you’re still responsible for how much you eat and how much activity you do in the other 23 hours!

During my career, luckily, I’ve only had a few clients who’ve struggled to lose fat, but the one thing they had in common was that they absolved themselves of their responsibilities. During our sessions together they would train hard and have lots of fun but away from the training they would never stick to the physical activity and calorie-reducing nutrition targets we had agreed together.

SHERLOCK HOLMES!

 

They’d often come to me bemoaning the fact that that had done loads of physical activity and really reduced the amount of food they had eaten yet had still not lost any weight.  It didn’t take Sherlock Holmes to work out that they weren’t being entirely truthful! After all if you use more calories than you consume, you will, overtime lose fat as the body starts to use its fat stores as energy.  In short these clients of mine were massively over estimating how many calories they burnt each day and massively underestimating how many calories they consumed, which incidentally is a common theme among individuals who struggle to lose weight.

IF THIS WEREN’T THE CASE NO-ONE WOULD EVER DIE OF STARVATION!

Now please bear in mind here that weight-loss is not linear. If you’re definitely in a calorie deficit (you are using more calories than you are consuming) you will definitely start to lose weight, now you might not lose weight at the same rate each week but over time you will definitely lose weight, there are no two ways about it.  Heck if this didn’t happen (and please don’t think I’m being flippant about the subject) no one would ever die of hunger and starvation.

LOSE FAT, NOT MUSCLE

 

Lastly when it comes to weight loss what you should actually try to do is lose fat and maintain your muscle mass. How you do this is to reduce your calories appropriately whilst maintaining a relatively high protein intake and combine this with resistance training.

If you would like more detailed advice about how to set your appropriate calorie intake or help with designing a balanced resistance training please do not hesitate to get in touch.

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

 

Good luck with your training!

 

Matt

www.mlrpt.co.uk   www.twitter.com/mlrpt   www.facebook.com/mlrpt   www.youtuce.com/mlrpt

 

 

 

WHY ARE SOME SPORTS COACHES LIKE TEENAGE BOYS ON A FIRST DATE?

I was listening to the radio this morning and they were discussing the reported bust up between a fitness coach and a premier league footballer Andros Townsend row, the assistant presenter (an ex-international sportsman) recalled a time when he was forced to do a weight training session (despite his protestations) just days before a match because if not he would have been dropped for the forthcoming game. The said ex-international went on to bemoan the fact that some fitness coaches do stuff just to justify their very existence.

 

And this got me thinking…

How many other people involved in sport (coaches, sports scientists, personal trainers, strength and conditioning coaches etc.) do and say ‘stuff’ just to justify their very existence?

Unfortunately, in my experience quite a few!

Sport is big business, generating lots of money. Unsurprisingly with all this money sloshing around other supporting industries have grown up alongside and of course many of these influences have been beneficial. Improvements in nutrition and physical conditioning are testament to this.

PARALYSIS BY ANALYSIS

Sport is of course a very competitive environment and squeezing out every last drop performance potential is important. But is this systematic, scientific approach to improving performance causing some of the performers to suffer from what I term paralysis by analysis.

Now do not get me wrong I am big fan of science in sport, heck I’m a sports science graduate myself and many of you will be aware that I am a huge fan of research led training. (In fact I despair at how social media posts of people performing crazy training stunts seemingly trump scientific research when it comes to informing the general public of the sensible way to train). But is this rigid scientific approach to sport having unintended consequences?

 

HAPPY ENGLAND CRICKETERS  

Recently I’ve heard ex-England cricketers praise the new management team for their decreased reliance on men with clip-boards analysing every tiny detail of the players’ performance and preparation, and how this has increased the general mood and happiness amongst the players.

This got me thinking of my own experiences with talented young sports people.

 

On numerous occasions I’ve had youngsters come to me feeling worried and anxious about the feedback given by a coach or sports scientists. Desperate to act on this feedback the youngster then sets about completely dismantling his/her training programme (which has helped them become the success they are) to work on a tiny flaw in their technique which in all honesty has very little effect in their performance in the first place!

LIKE A TEENAGE BOY ON A FIRST DATE

I don’t necessarily blame the coach or sports scientist for this, often they will only see a given youngster once in a blue moon and just like a teenage boy on his first date feels under enormous pressure to fill the inevitable moments of silence with idle chit chat, sometimes the sports scientist or coach feeling under pressure to improve performance can find something, anything to critique so that they can justify their position and wages.

 

 

 

I’m certain these people offer their advice in good faith and do so with the best of intentions but sometimes they need to give a little thought to the repercussions of their advice. If they find a flaw, which if corrected will improve performance, most certainly inform the youngster. But if it’s a tiny flaw that will have little or no effect, rather than burdening the youngster with worry, perhaps its better left unsaid and instead allow the youngster to focus on the fundamentals their training!

For much more detailed training advice please do not hesitate to BOOK A FREE TRIAL SESSION or pop along to one of my exercise classes, held every Saturday morning 9.00am at Baddow Rec, Chelmsford.

Many thanks for reading,

Matt

matt@mlrpt.co.uk                                                 www.mlrpt.co.uk                                        07939316401

  

THE 3 BIG SPEED TRAINING MISTAKES

Let me start off by saying I have been developing the speed of young athletes for many years now and during that time have been privileged enough to work with some very talented and committed individuals from the academy sides of many premier league football clubs.

The three most common mistakes I have witnessed during this time are highlighted below (in no particular order). To be honest I have a whole load more I coulda, woulda, shoulda included but I wanted to keep the article quite light hearted and not too technical. With that in mind please enjoy and if you have any further queries please do hesitate to get in touch.

 

1.  NOT ALLOWING ENOUGH RECOVERY TIME BETWEEN ACTIVITIES.
All too often I see coaches asking their athletes to perform repetition after repetition of sprints safe in the knowledge that practice makes perfect. The sad truth is performing lots of repeated sprints will not improve speed at all as the body needs time to recover between runs. If the body does not have adequate recovery time waste products begin to accumulate and the session soon descends into a conditioning session as opposed to a speed session. As a rough guide (and I do stress this a rough guide) I work on a work: rest ratio of 1:5 or 1:6. So if a particular drill takes 5 seconds to complete, the athlete will then have a rest of at least 30 seconds or so (if not longer) before performing again.

 

2. THE OVERUSE OR OVER EMPHASISE ON SPEED LADDERS.
Now do not get me wrong I do use speed ladders regularly and they have proved very successful particularly at improving running technique and also at cutting down on ground contact time (the length of time each foot is in contact with the ground for). But my biggest bugbear comes when I see coaches spending too much focusing on drills which bear more relevance to the river dance than any sporting movement.  Not only that, if the ladders are too long they can actual distort natural stride length. Have a look next time you see someone using a speed ladder,  by time they are nearing the end of it having built up plenty of momentum they actually end up cutting the stride length so that in fits within the spaces of the ladder and looks like they are stuttering as opposed to anything akin to running. To combat these issues I keep most of my ladder drills pretty basic and do not get caught up in getting my athletes to perform fancy drills. I also use a range of different length ladders with many being just 4, 5 or 6 rungs in length.

 

3. FOCUSING ON LEAD LEG QUICKNESS.
I often hear coaches telling their athletes to get their feet down quick, which seems to make perfect sense. After all we want to be moving fast; and it is a cue I use myself from time to time if I see an athlete spending too much time ‘in the air’. However it can make some athletes 'wheel spin', in that their feet are 'turning over' really quickly but they are not actually moving any real distance. To counter act this I ask my athletes to lift the knee of their lead leg just a little higher (whilst leaning forward)  so that the stance leg or back leg reaches triple extension (a straight leg) or at least somewhere closer to it.

Oh, I know I did say 3 but I thought I'd slip in a fourth, and perhaps its the biggest mistake of all...

4. EXPECTING YOUNG ATHLETES TO BECOME SUPERSTAR ATHLETES.
From time to time some coaches expect their athletes to become Olympic and world champions. Heck for that to happen they'd probably have to be on drugs. (Note that I included the word probably in the previous sentence just to ward off any possible legal action from the ever-decreasing number of current or former Olympic and world championships who have not, either failed a drug test or been implicated in a drug scandal). But seriously though expecting massive improvements in speed is a recipe for disaster. Yes speed training, if done correctly will boost performance but it won't make a slow athlete a world beater, yes it will make them faster, a lot faster but it won't make them the next Ussain Bolt!


Thanks for reading,

Matt.