Ask the Fitness Expert
May 2012 Article
How to Get Runners Legs
Running is one of my favorite forms of cardio exercise and is great for the heart and of course, your legs! It is truly one of the simplest ways to get in shape and be active yet is often underestimated. Whether you run for 15 minutes or for a couple of hours, indoors or outdoors; running is certainly one of the most simple and versatile ways to get your heart pumping and your legs moving.
The President’s Council on Fitness and Sports considers running as one of the most popular activities for cardio respiratory endurance. Running is a great way to burn calories but also has numerous other benefits such as:
• Strengthening your heart and lungs
• Working all the muscles of the legs – your hamstrings, quadriceps, gluts and calves
• Helping lower your blood pressure
• Helping your arteries maintain their elasticity and strength
• Helping slow down the aging process
• Helping improve your mood and lower stress by the release of endorphins
Something to keep in mind if you are an avid runner is that you can become prone to muscle imbalances. For example, the gluteus medius and piriformis muscles are often imbalanced in runners that don’t include stretching and strength training in their workout regimes. Another common imbalance is the quadriceps and hamstrings.
In order to prevent injury and get a great set of legs, it’s important to be aware of potential muscle imbalances and also include strength training 2-3 times per week. Strength training helps us build and main strength, increase coordination, strengthens tendons and ligaments, increase bone density and increase our speed. Training with weights also tones our muscles and gives our legs the shapely look we are after.
Here is a great exercise to try out and add to your regime!
Gorilla Walk
• Stand with your feet slightly wider than hip width apart with your knees and feet turned out at 45 degrees holding 8lb dumbbells in each hand
• Keep your chest proud, shoulders back and abs engaged, lower down so that your knees are bent at 90 degrees are in line with your toes
• Stay low, keeping your spine neutral, chest tall and abs engaged. Step forward with your right leg, then left so that you are alternating 4 steps forward with your weights touching the ground at the same time as you are stepping forward
• Stay low and take 4 alternating right and left step backwards
• Repeat walking forwards and back staying low the whole time
• Repeat 1-3 sets of 15-20 reps of walking forward and back. Take a 30 second break in between each set.
The gorilla walk, along with other innovative compound moves can be found in Get Extremely RIPPED! Revved to the Max. To see a preview, check out the trailer online at www.jarilove.com! We also have live RIPPED! classes offered regularly at Fitness Plus which has two locations in Calgary. Check out www.fitnesspluscalgary.ca to see how you can try a class for free!
April 2012 Article
Slim Down for Summer and Learn to Love Cardio!
We all know that cardio workouts are essential for our health and wellness but how many of us get really excited to log hours at the gym in the cardio room? Treadmills and ellipticals are among the most popular cardio machines we see used at our gyms and they are both great tools to help you get an amazing cardio workout. The first step of course, is getting onto the machine.
A common misconception with cardio equipment is that using the elliptical trainer is like taking the ‘easy way out’. This couldn’t be further from the truth! According to recent studies, you can burn roughly the same amount of calories using either machine. The lack of impact with the elliptical trainer gives the illusion that you are putting forth less effort, but you can still get your heart rate up just as well as if you were running. Below are a list of benefits of each device… you’ll notice that they are practically the same!
Benefits of Treadmills
• High impact which strengthens bones
• Great indoor option for runners and joggers who want to train all year long
• Burns lots of calories
• Offers lots of variety with incline and intensity
• Perfect for pace training and practicing your runs at certain speeds
Benefits of Elliptical Trainers
• Impact-free which is perfect for those with joint problems or who experience pain from impact
• Great option for seniors, novice exercisers and people recovering from injury
• Offers a great total body workout
• Lots of workout options available by altering speed, tension and pedaling direction
• Awesome indoor workout option
• Burns lots of calories
• Great for total body muscle toning
• Helps you lose weight and burn fat
• Provides an indoor option for hill training which helps improve your power and overall running performance
• Great full-body workout
• Awesome for muscle toning – especially in the lower body
All of this is great news – but wouldn’t it be even more exciting if you could just get motivated to get on one of those machines? Luckily, we have the answer for you. If you want to learn how to love your cardio workouts, improve your fitness level, burn tons of calories and blast fat, then the Get RIPPED! Shredmill Program is just what you need. Each week you will be coached through a new workout that is specially choreographed to amazing music! You’ll stay motivated by the high energy tunes and your body will be continuously challenged by the changing routines. Shredmill can be done on both the elliptical and the treadmill – so people of all ages and abilities can participate. This program is exclusive to Calgary Fitness Plus locations and it fills up fast. If you are interested, I urge you to call today and secure your spot!
Hope to see you there!
March 2012 Article
A few diet tweaks leads to a major transformation!
Leigh Chmilar is a recent Get RIPPED! Instructor Certification graduate and has been actively teaching RIPPED! classes and bootcamp classes since the beginning of 2012. Leigh has always been very physically active, participating in running, cycling, downhill skiing and women’s competitive basketball. Even though Leigh was happy with her body, she found that she could never really get that toned and trim look that she was after even though she was active six days per week. Once gaining her RIPPED! Certification, Leigh decided that enough was enough! She wanted to see the results of her many hours of exercise show up in the mirror.
Knowing that the missing equation was proper nutrition, Leigh came to me for help. She told me that her inspiration was Kirsten Lojek, the ‘ripped’ DVD star that has been in my last eight videos. What motivated Leigh about Kirsten’s physique was that “she looks very strong and healthy, without looking artificial or too extreme like many fitness models that are in magazines.” Below are the tips that Leigh took away from our meeting and implemented in her life to help her shed 10 pounds!
• Cut out alcohol almost completely.
• Cut out all added sugars, which is any food that doesn’t naturally contain sugars already. This included all junk food, sugary drinks (including juice), sauces and dips.
• Limited the foods that are naturally high in sugars including bananas, mangos, pineapples and grapes.
• Cut out high-fat foods, such as oils, cheese (unless low-fat), red/dark meat and butter/margarine.
• Limited high-fat “healthy oils” to only one serving per day. This included nuts, avocado and egg yolks.
• Started eating only lean meats such as chicken breast, shrimp, fish and pork tenderloin.
• Started eating higher-fibre foods to increase her fibre intake from 15 g/day to 33 g/day.
• Ate starchy foods only once per day and usually not at dinner time.
• Kept her daily calorie intake to 1300-1500 calories per day.
As with any change, the first few weeks were a challenge. But Leigh soon found that she craved her old favorites less and less. In less than two months she has dropped down to a size four and has more energy than ever!
If you feel like you are stuck in a rut or just aren’t seeing the results you are looking for, it might be time to take a good look at what you are eating. Leigh’s story just goes to show that nutrition is paramount in our health and well-being! Check out www.GetRIPPEDBootcamp.com or email inquiries@jarilove.com to find out more on all of our programs and services.
February 2012 Article
Plateau Myth Busters
Has this ever happened to you? You start a new exercise and diet plan and you immediately start losing weight. Then bam! Out of the blue you stop seeing results.
Why does this happen? When we start a new activity, our cardiovascular system and muscles are challenged to increase calorie burn and muscle development. But after doing the same thing for months, our bodies get used to the activity.
Frustrating? Absolutely! Hopeless? No way! Follow these five principles to blast through your fitness plateau.
#1. Watch your plate
Science has shown that people don’t actually plateau until about 6 months into a new diet and exercise plan. So if you are only a couple weeks into your regimen and already the weight loss has halted, you likely need to pay closer attention to your diet.
#2. Eat more, eat less
Drastically cutting calories is not the way to lose the most weight. When we eat too little, our overall metabolism slows and actually holds on to fat. A much better approach is to “eat more” often in the day, but “eat less” food at one time. So, instead of 3 big meals, eat 5-6 small meals throughout the day.
#3. Change is good
Rather than changing how long you work out, try changing how you work out. Add high intensity intervals to your existing cardio plan or switch up the exercises you are doing to break through a plateau. If you are doing compound exercises, switch to isolation or vice versa.
# 4. Add resistance
The most effective way to lose weight is to include both cardio and weights in your routine. One study found that people who did 15 minutes each of cycling and weight training each day lost more fat and gained more muscle than those who just cycled for 30 minutes daily. Lean muscle tissue burns calories even while at rest!
# 5. Add intensity
The bottom line for weight loss is “calories in vs. calories out”.
While it is true that working out at low intensity does burn more fat, doing high intensity exercise burns more overall calories. For example, when a 150 lb woman runs for 20 minutes, she burns 25% more calories than if she were to walk for the same amount of time. Because she is burning more overall calories, she is actually also burning more fat.
Now that you are armed with the best strategies to break through a weight loss plateau, you are ready to get the scale moving in the right direction. So grab some water and some weights, up the intensity of your cardio and get ready to show off the results!
October 2011 Article
Gobble, gobble, gobble!
Most of us look forward to the holidays that bring turkey to the table, and with obvious reason. Turkey is delicious and great for you too! Did you know that just one serving of turkey provides 65 % of your recommended daily intake of protein? One serving of turkey meat has 36% of the daily allowance of Vitamin B3, or niacin, which plays a critical role in the processing of fats in the body and 27% of your recommended intake of B6, a vitamin that helps maintain steady blood sugar levels. It’s also a good source of selenium which is essential for the healthy function of the thyroid and the immune system.
Not only is turkey a great tasting food that’s incredibly healthy for you, it’ll help put you in a good mood too! The amino acid serotonin is proven to improve your mood and give you that sense of well-being. Not a huge fan of the white meat that turkey has to offer? No worries, because dark meat has a lot to offer too in both taste and nutritional value. Did you know that dark meat is a good source of iron? Iron is a vital element of muscle function because it helps supply oxygen required for muscle contraction. When we are low in iron, we can become fatigued and irritable, and our immune system suffers.
In fact, dark turkey meat has a mere 31 calories more than white meat and only four more grams of fat. So if you’re a lover of the drumstick, then go for it! Dark turkey meat is a more nutrient-dense protein source than white turkey meat.
Want to change things up a bit this Thanksgiving?
Try these delicious, low fat Turkey Meatballs.
Turkey Meatballs
3 full packages of ground turkey breast
½ cup of egg whites
1 cup of regular oatmeal
1 package of onion soup mix (optional)
1 large onion finely chopped
3 whole garlic cloves minced
3 tablespoons of hot sauce
1 teaspoon of Miss Dash salt
1 teaspoon of ground pepper
Mix everything together and form into balls. In a pot, simmer low sodium chicken broth.
Add in the turkey balls and cook for 30 minutes,turning them over about every 20 minutes so that they are cooked through.
Serves 6-8 people.
September 2011 Article
A PICTURE SAYS A THOUSAND WORDS
All it took was a photo at his heaviest to shock Colin Maley into action. With his 40th birthday around the corner, he didn’t want to enter a new decade as “one of those overweight 40-year-old guys.” He decided once and for all to lose weight and get healthy. Before signing up for the Get RIPPED! Bootcamp Program, Colin weighed in at 255lbs.
As most of us can relate, weight gain is caused by a number of factors such as not enough time for exercise and overindulging in foods we love. For Colin, a number of personal situations caused emotions to build up inside him to the point where just let himself go. He threw caution to the wind and ate and drank everything he wanted and didn’t exercise.
“My diet was the hardest thing to get under control – especially portion sizes. It was shocking once I started counting calories to see how much I was consuming in a day!”
I am a firm believer that your environment is a powerful influence and has a lot of control over you. Colin runs catering company, so he is constantly dealing with good food and working long hours. By the time he got off work, he found himself making excuses not to workout. Once Bootcamp started and he learned from the RIPPED! Nutrition Seminar, he was able to make some major shifts in his eating plan.
“Once I started eating clean, I really saw a difference in my weight. I love my sauces and dips, but have either cut them out or reduced them greatly. Now they are just to add a bit of flavor, not to smother my food in.”
With the Get RIPPED! Bootcamp Program, Colin started attending intense workout classes three times per week. He found that the instructors played a key role in keeping him on track by supporting and motivating him. Being accountable to people is key!
When Colin started Bootcamp, he became 110% dedicated to his health and fitness goals. When he started to get back into the social scene, jaws dropped at his 70lb weight loss. When asked if he feels any different now Colin says, “I feel like the old me before I gained all the weight. The difference is that I now have more energy, I’m more out there socially and my confidence is coming back.”
Colin’s story is truly inspiring. Not only did he lose a ton of weight and get healthy; he also walked away with our $1000 first place prize! For details on our next Get RIPPED! Weight Loss Challenge, check out www.GetRIPPEDFitnessTraining.com.
August 2011 Article
Bootcamper Loses 100 Pounds & Hits Goal Weight!
Can you imagine losing 100 pounds and fitting into clothes that you never thought you could again? Well, that is just what Shawna Andrechuk did. By setting a goal, putting a plan in place and sticking to it no matter what; she was able to achieve great success. When Shawna started her weight loss journey, it was for her and her alone. She was sick and tired of being sick and tired! As a keen member of the Get RIPPED! Bootcamp Program Shawna enjoyed activities like Shredmill, spin and Get RIPPED! classes at Fitness Plus. To get the weight off she trained six days per week, made friends with the other participants in her classes and became an inspiration to many. Since losing the weight, Shawna has gained energy, confidence and knowledge about leading a healthy lifestyle.
While an exercise program is key for weight loss, a healthy diet is also crucial for both losing weight and keeping it off. As we know, when it comes to weight loss, one of the hardest things to do is maintain your results. For Shawna, keeping track of her diet is key and she continues to be very conscious about what she eats. Research shows that most of us underestimate what we consume by as much as 1000 calories per day! By attending the Get RIPPED! Nutrition Seminars, Shawna learned a lot of information about diet and nutrition. Armed with her new knowledge of portion control, Shawna began eating five small meals a day which kept her feeling full and kept her metabolism going. She also removed processed foods like pretzels and crackers from her diet. While she was allowed to eat fruit as part of her meal plan, she did cut back on high sugar fruits and concentrated more on eating high fiber fruits like berries.
For all of us, plateaus are something we fear and find very frustrating. What keeps Shawna motivated through the tough times is the memory of how she felt when she was overweight.
“I was uncomfortable and self-conscious, and I didn’t feel healthy. I look at pictures of myself from when I started and where I am now, and remind myself that I don’t want to feel or look that way again.”
Shawna did it, and so can you! If you are sick and tired of being sick and tired then now is your chance to change your life and lose the weight for good. Check out the Get RIPPED! Bootcamp Weight Loss Challenge and start on the path to health and happiness today!
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