Did you write out your fitness goals at the start of this year?

Are you on track to achieve them?

If not, let us help to get you there.

If you wanted to lose 5 kilos:

-        Diet, diet, diet. You can’t train the weight off. Write yourself out a plan that includes plenty of vegetables, fruits and lean proteins and you’re on the right track.

-        Don’t go for the latest shake diet, lemon detox or mega-blast super ripped fad diet program. Just cut out your alcohol, sugar and processed food and stay consistent for six weeks.

-        Prepare as many meals as you can yourself. Most processed foods now have a ridiculous amount of salt, sugar and trans fats. Base your meals on lean proteins, vegetables, good fats and legumes (chickpeas, beans, lentils etc)

-        Drink more water and cut out all calorie containing drinks (Soft drinks, cordials, alcohol and extra large soy-achinos). Carry a water bottle around with you all the time.

If you wanted to improve your running:

-        Lean forwards, start running on the balls of your feet and pretend you’re running on hot coals. It’s called pose running and it will completely change the way you run. Over cushioned, over supported running shoes have taught us to run on our heels and your body is not supposed to work that way. Build up your pose running gradually though as it will put more pressure on your calf muscles and Achilles tendon when you first start out.

-        Book in a fun run and get a trainer to write you out a fitness plan. You should be aiming to build your distance up gradually each week and do at least 75% of your goal distance in training.

-        You can’t get any fitter in the week before a fun run, but you can go backwards. The last week should be about resting your body and preparing for the event. Just do a few easy runs to keep your legs in shape. Any hard training you do in the last week will just make you feel worse on the day.

If you wanted to tone up:

-        Stop rushing through your exercises and do them properly. Developing muscle tone is all about getting your exercise form correct. If you rush through your exercises or do them wrong  you won’t get the full benefit from them.

-        Go through a full range of motion. That means going all the way down and all the way up while you’re exercising. Training this way will also help to increase your flexibility and stop you from getting postural problems later on.

-        Make sure you know which muscles each exercise is working, and adjust your technique to suit. If you’re unsure about the correct technique then ask your Bodysharp trainer. Just be aware that some exercises are designed to challenge specific muscles, others work the whole body at once.

And finally, if you’re not getting the results you want then please let us know. Everyone can get to the fitness level that they want with the right plan. Let us help you to get into the best shape of your life.

What you can learn from The Biggest Loser

Well, it’s time for another season of The Biggest Loser. Another year of watching psycho personal trainers abuse and starve their teams into losing ridiculous amounts of weight in a few weeks. We’ve done enough bagging of this show in the past though, and I think most people realize by now that it’s a bit of a joke. So this year we thought we’d look at the positive aspects of the show, and what you can learn from it:

-    It’s all about the diet: In an episode the other night the trainers showed the contestants that they could exercise all week, but if they ate rubbish they wouldn’t lose a gram. This is an important message to take with you. Exercise will make you feel better, stronger and give you more energy but it won’t help you lose weight if you don’t get your diet sorted out.

-        You need to have an emotional goal: We all hate the boring and long winded scenes where the contestants talk about why they want to lose weight. You should have a think about what they’re saying though if you’re looking to drop a few pant sizes. It’s all well and good to say you’re going to lose 5 kilos but if you don’t have an emotional reason for doing it you’re destined to fail. Think about why you really want to lose weight and write it down where you can see it as a constant reminder

-        It helps to have a supportive group: It’s funny how much closer people become when they’re put into a team. Next time you come to Bodysharp have a look around you and you’ll see some familiar faces. I’ll bet you a lot of those people have the same goals as you. Start the ball rolling and ask some people what they’re working towards.

And remember, everything in moderation. Sometimes it looks like the trainers on that show have as many issues as the contestants, with one of them admitting last season that she’s never touched alcohol or eaten junk food in her life. The key to a happy and healthy existence is to give yourself a treat every now and then, but know when to stop.

Training in the heat

Keeping in mind that February is generally the hottest month of the year in Melbourne, just a quick note about training in the heat. It’s important that you modify your training to suit the warmer weather, don’t go as hard as usual and take some extra rest breaks.

It’s also important to wear the right gear to training. Every time we have a 30+ degree day there’s always someone that shoes up in track pants. Really??? Get yourself some shorts, or three quarter length pants at least. Your legs are probably begging for some sunlight.

Make sure you drink more water than usual, you may even want to bring two drink bottles if you sweat a lot. Remember that your body can lose up to 1.5 litres of water per hour through sweating so it’s important to replace that lost fluid.

Finally, stay out of the sun especially during the middle of the day. This usually isn’t a problem for us since we don’t run classes between 11am and 5pm, but on especially hot days you might want to go to an earlier or later class than normal to beat the heat.

R4KI Entries Are Now Open

Run For The Kids entries are open now, get in early to secure your place. We usually get a good turn out to this event and it’s a lot of fun. It’s also a great event if you’ve done a few 10km runs but don’t feel like you’re ready to tackle a half-marathon just yet.

You can enter Run For The Kids here. 

Timetable Changes – Important

The Saturday sessions at Glen Iris are going to change from 1^st Feb to:

6.00am Running Group (all levels)

7.00am Strength & Tone

8.15am Bootcamp

9.00am Boxing Fitness

Hopefully the sessions are early enough for you to squeeze in a quick workout before you take the kids to Saturday morning sport.

Also, just a reminder that we are back to full session timetable on Feb 6^th now that school holidays are coming to an end.

Let’s think about it this way, the average Joe will tell you that if you burn more calories than you consume you will lose weight.

CORRECT!

However, dieting takes this theory to the extreme and relies on the principal that if you drop your calorie intake significantly, whilst maintaining the same level of activity you will lose even more weight.

Unfortunately, due to the fact that your body has evolved to survive and adapt to all climates and conditions your total calories burned for the day will drop too.

In addition, any energy that does go into the body will be preferably turned into fat to use as a fuel source during the long periods of time you don’t consume food.

This results in you being lethargic, grumpy, irritable, and lowers your concentration levels for a start.

Thus, you end up unhealthy.

Once you do finally succumb to eating regularly your body stores as much fat as possible to ensure there is ample energy storage the next time you decide to go on a crash course diet.

OR…

We can take the healthy option.

Fill our bodies with high quality natural foods that increase your metabolism, concentration levels, mood, self-confidence, social skills, and decrease your risk of illness and cancer.

When taking this option you should have a structure and routine to ensure you have access to healthy food at all times throughout the day. This avoids the situation of eating poorly due to the unavailability of good food.

You should never be physically hungry, when living like this it isn’t hunger you fight but emotional eating.

You MUST always have a support network of friends and family to help you in the times when you feel low and just want to binge, if they truly want the best for you they will steer you clear. Obviously no one likes a health Nazi however, we all need someone to steer us clear when are clearly over indulging.

So this is all great but how do I lose weight if I’m eating regularly?

Because, your body knows it will have regular high quality food supplies there is no need for it to latch on to every kilogram of fat thus, it can let it go willingly.

Finally, it is agreed we will need to burn more calories than we consume but, not to the extreme of dieters.

If you’d like to know what some of the healthiest food choices are check out our brief article, Optimal Nutrition.

What’s your goal for this year?

 If you’ve let your fitness go a bit over the Christmas break the best way to get back on track is to set your self some solid goals to achieve this year.

When you’re writing out your fitness goals, there’s a few things you need to consider:

Make them specific and set an end date. Don’t just say “I’m going to get better at running”. Say: “I will do a 5km fun run before 1^st April 2012”. There are some great fun runs coming up this year including The 2012 Running Fit Super Sunset Series. The great thing about this series is it’s run at twilight, so it should suit everyone that likes to have a bit of a sleep in. It’s a 3 event series starting on 1^st Feb, and it’s suitable for beginner and intermediate runners. All three events are either 4km or 8km.

Set a realistic goal, and aim to achieve it in small steps. We all want results to come quickly, but it just doesn’t happen like that. If you go too hard too early you’ll just get injured, then you’ll be stuck sitting on the couch while everyone else is getting in to shape. As a general rule, you shouldn’t try to increase your volume (distance, time or weight) by more than 5% per week. Your muscles can adapt quickly, but quite often your tendons and ligaments can’t keep up with the extra strain.

Make it your #1 priority to back into a routine. It’s easy to lose your routine after a holiday, so now is the time to get back into it. Focus on exercising at least three times per week consistently for the next month, don’t worry about what type of exercise or how hard you’re working. It won’t take long to get into a rhythm, then you can start to increase the intensity of your training to improve your results.

Don’t ignore your diet. We’ve all been guilty of eating or drinking something naughty while thinking “It’s ok, I’ve been to training today.” Unfortunately, you’re probably going to consume more calories than you actually burned off in the training session and end up worse off. Weight loss is 80% Diet, 20% exercise so keep your food in check if you want to look good this summer. Give yourself one day off a week though, so you can still have some fun.

This year, we’d like to put the ‘personal touch’ back into Bodysharp so we’re offering private consultations with our trainers. Working one on one  with your  Bodysharp trainer can help you:

-        Create a training plan for you to achieve results

-        Modify your diet to lose weight or tone up

-        Refine your exercise technique to focus on your problem areas

-        Get your motivation back

The cost of a private consultation with your trainer is $39.00 for a half hour or $59.00 for a full hour.

This month we’re going to give away ten FREE consultations (one per person), so if you’re interested in trying one out then contact us here.

Booked out classes

Well it’s only January and already we’ve got some classes that are booked out or close to:

-        5.30am Glen Iris class on Monday, Wednesday and Friday (these classes will not be accepting new members).

-        The 6.15am Classes in Camberwell and Glen Iris have only a couple of spots left

If you’ve got any friends or family that are interested in doing any of these classes then let us know ASAP!

January Timetable

Just a quick reminder that we’re still on a limited timetable until the end of school holidays.

You can find our January Timetable here.

Refer a friend to Bodysharp and get $50.00 off your next debit

Just like any small business, the way we grow is from word of mouth. It’s only because of our fantastic fit members spreading the word that Bodysharp has become the business it is today.

This is the time of year when everyone’s thinking about getting in to shape, so if you’ve got a friend who’s whinging about how unfit they are then send them along to our 7 day FREE trial. We’ll give you $50.00 off your next debit to say thanks.

See you soon!

The Bodysharp Team

These foods are packed with nutrients to suppress cravings and aid your body whilst it attempts to maintain energy levels with limited food supplies.

This begs the question, what are the healthiest foods?

They are called super foods and are judged based on nutrient density, anti-cancer properties and antioxidant density.

Here are the 25 Super Foods (in no particular order):

All of the foods above are packed with antioxidents that slow the 7 signs of ageing, have anti-cancerous properties keeping you strong and confident for years to come, plus they taste amazing.

Mix up your dinner, lunch, or breakfast with ingredients that you’ve never tried before from the above list. The options are endless!

For breakfast you could have oats with honey and berrys, then snack on a mixture of almond, raisins and other mixed nuts until midday.

For Lunch splash out a bit with a Salmon Salad or perhaps if you dislike fish a Quinoa Salad with Zucchini and Tomatoes.

And for Dinner finish it all off indulge in a warm Pumkin Soup leaving a few berries for desert.

Enjoy!

I vow NOT to have the worst breakfast of all… No breakfast at all!

I vow to prepare my food in advance to ensure I don’t find myself starving with only a takeout store insight.

 I vow to use only fresh, (if it comes in a can it’s unlikely to be fresh!) non-processed ingredients when preparing my meals and try a vegetable I never tasted once a week… You’ll be surprised how many there are out there!

I vow NOT to hold my partner back from being active, I will be supportive & thus they will support me. (This means saying YES I will come for a walk, run or even go rock climbing with you
because, the happier you are the happier I am)

I vow to find 45 minutes in almost every day to be active.

Play cricket with the kids, go for a walk or jog with your partner, dog or just to clear your mind.

If you are going to attempt these vows get started now by writing down 5 behaviors you currently do with 5 new healthy behaviors.

If by the end of the week you have held strong on one of those congratulations, it all starts with the first step!

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYBODY!!!

1. Simplify your diet: Eating healthy isn’t complicated, all you need to to is eat foods as close as possible to their natural state. Load up on fruit and vegies, with a few raw nuts and lean proteins. If you can, try and eat as as much of your food raw so you don’t lose the nutrients in the cooking process. Now that the weather is warmer, there’s plenty of fruit in season and it’s great to enjoy some raw vegies with healthy dips like salsa and hummus.

2. Cut out your liquid calories and drink more water. You’d be surprised how many calories are in your drinks. Even “healthy” drinks like fruit juice are loaded with sugar. For the next week, try and stick to just water, tea and black coffee. Cut out all soft drinks, cordial, fruit juice, milk based drinks and alcohol. You’ll be surprised how much of a difference it will make.

3. Do something active every day. This doesn’t mean you have to do high intensity exercise every day, it just means you should aim to be active for at least 45 minutes. You could go for a bike ride, swim, a light jog or a brisk walk. The intensity should be high enough that you get out of breath, but you don’t have to kill yourself. The important thing is that you do it consistently.

4. Eat more fibre. Fibre has two fantastic benefits, it cleans out your digestive system and helps you stay full longer. There are no calories in fibre  so it helps to fill out your meals and stop you from getting hungry. When you increase your fibre intake it’s important to drink more water as well. Fibre absorbs water, so it can dehydrate you if you’re not taking in enough fluid. Fibre rich foods include rolled oats, beans, chickpeas, fruit and whole vegies.

Christmas and January Session Timetable

We’ll be staying open right through the holiday period, but we will be running a limited timetable. Please check to see which sessions are running below:

From 26/12 till 8/1 we’ll be running this one:

Session Timetable Xmas 2011

From 9/1 till 6/2 we’ll be running this one:

Session Timetable January 2011

I know it’s a bit confusing so if your unsure at all just give me a call.

Want to Stay in Shape While You’re Away? Try Our Holiday Workout

For those of you that are going away over the next few weeks, try and stay as active as you can while you’re away. We’ve written up a workout for you to do while you’re away to stay in shape. For this workout, it helps if you have a set of exercise bands, but they’re not essential.

You can do this workout up to three days a week, but have a day of rest in between workouts. On your rest days you can still walk, run swim or bike ride so there’s no excuse for being slack.

Make sure you warm up before you start the workout, and stretch afterwards.

Holiday Workout

99c Price Increase From January 1st, 2012

Unfortunately it’s that time of year when our prices must go up. From 1st of Jan all of our memberships will increase by 99c per week. But, if you refer a friend to Bodysharp before the end of Jan we’ll keep your membership at the same rate, it’s the time of year when everyone is trying to get in shape so it should be easy to find someone!

Thank You!

Finally, a big thanks to everyone who’s been a part of Bodysharp this year. We’ve got an amazing team of trainers and a fantastic bunch of members. Let’s hope the tradition continues next year.

Stay safe over Christmas, don’t do anything we wouldn’t do and we’ll see you in the New Year!

Thanks again from the Bodysharp Team. 

3 Quick Tips to Get in Shape Before Christmas

1. Get more exercise outside of training: If you’re only coming to Bodysharp 2x per week that’s fine, but you have to get some exercise outside of training as well. Try and aim to do something active every day for at least 45 minutes. It doesn’t have to be intense exercise, just a walk or light jog is fine. The important thing is that you do it frequently and consistently so it becomes a routine. It will be hard to find time for the extra training in the first few weeks but once you establish a routine you’ll wonder how you ever went without it before.

2. Make training a priority: The silly season is a busy time for everyone. Work and family will start to take priority over everything else and your training might fall by the wayside. Set aside a few hours each week to get to training and you’ll be glad you did. Write them down in your diary so you’re committed. There is going to be so much going on over the next month that if you don’t make training your #1 priority then it just won’t happen.

3. Leave the Festive Food till Christmas: Every year the Christmas celebrations start earlier and earlier. By all means put your Christmas Tree up in October if you like, but lay off the mince pies till December 25th. Those Christmas treats are choc full of calories so it will only take a few to cancel out all the good work you’ve done at training. Stick to fresh summer foods like fruit, salads and nuts for the next few weeks.

If you’d like to drop a few kilos before Christmas then get on board the Bodysharp Quickie Weight Loss Challenge, this challenge will only run for four weeks so it should be a piece of cake. Places are limited to 5 people so contact us here today if you’re interested.

Timetable Changes effective 21/11/11

The 5.45pm sessions on Tuesday and Thursday evenings are changing to a bootcamp session. These sessions are high intensity so they’re not for the faint hearted, if you’re up for a challenge then give them a go. If you’re looking to take your fitness to the next level then these are the sessions for you.

The 7.15pm sessions on Tuesday and Thursday evenings will be changing to our new Low-Impact classes. These sessions are for anyone who has injuries that prevent them from doing our regular sessions. The sessions will have a strong focus on full body toning and core strength.

The 9.00am sessions on Tuesday and Thursday morning will move to Willison Park in Camberwell. If the weather is poor these sessions will be held at Ferndale Park scout Hall. Look out for an SMS on the day.

If you have any questions about the new sessions or timetable changes then please contact us here for more info.

Our New Trainer Damian

Most of you would have met our new trainer Damian (the ultra-marathon runner) by now. A no-nonsense trainer,  he is a believer in the very simple adage of “having a go”, and for that reason will provide encouragement and motivation to anyone trying to improve their fitness. Damian competed at state level in age group athletics, and (unfortunately for him he tells us) hopes to be a competitive Master’s runner in the coming years. He has finished fifth in a gruelling 52k trail ultra marathon in the You Yangs and has recently completed a 104km trail run from Apollo Bay to Warnambool.

The Big Bodysharp Christmas Bash – 3rd of December from 4.30pm

It seems like only yesterday we were having our two year anniversary at Bluestone, but apparently it’s time for another big Bodysharp party!

The sun has finally come out to play so we thought this year we’d have the Christmas party outdoors, the celebrations will be held at the Camberwell Central Bowls club.

We’ll be starting out playing a few games barefoot on the greens, if you’ve never played before then don’t worry, you’ll pick it up quickly. We’ll put on a bbq so you can keep your carbs up, and there’ll be cheap drinks at the bar.

It’s a great chance to have a drink with all the Bodysharp members, and to chuck a bowling ball at your least favourite trainer.

The dress code is casual, anyone in a suit or tie will be thrown out immediately.

The cost of attending this magnificent event will be:

- $11.00 at the door

- Beers $4.50

- Red, White and Sparkling $5.00 per glass

All food will be provided for free, straight off the hotplate. This is your night off, so don’t worry about counting calories.

Keep your fingers crossed for some nice weather, see ya there!

We know enough about diet now that we can write you out a diet plan to get you to virtually any size you want to be. The problem is your adherence to that plan. If you’re struggling to stick to the plan then you need to really think about how you can motivate yourself to achieve your weight loss goal. Anything is possible, you just have to pick the right incentive. For me, the right incentive to lose weight was offering all 140 Bodysharp members a free membership!

Pick and incentive that is meaningful to you, specific and achievable. For most people, “looking better” isn’t enough. You’ll start to look and feel better after you lose the first 1-2kg so you need something to keep you going past that point. Try and take a risk with this one, make a bet with a friend or family member with dire consequences if you don’t achieve your goal. Public declarations are also good, post your goals on facebook so your friends hold you to it.

 Once  you’ve got your incentive to lose weight and stick to your plan, all you need to know is this:

-  All your meals should be based on Fruit, Vegetables, Lean Proteins or Legumes. Nothing else.

- You should never consume liquid calories. No soft drink, cordial, fruit juice, milk or alcohol.

- You should be eating enough to stop you feeling hungry and no more, don’t stuff youself!

- You should never eat any refined carbs. No sugar or sweets, flour, bread, rice, pasta, noodles or pastry.

-  Just think, it’s only for X weeks and then you can start to re-introduce the foods you love.

Have you had a not so great week this week? The excitement of the weight loss challenge is probably started to wear off now you’ve come to the end of your second week. You’re starting to get sick of skipping all your favourite foods and working your butt off to see meagre result on the scales.

The easiest way to get back on track is to visualize your long term goal. What are you doing this for? What do you want to look and feel like at the end of the challenge? Long term planning will also help you put your achievements in perspective. Even if you only lost 100g this week, over a year that would be 5.2kg!

The other thing to remember is that this is going to be harder for you than most people because you probably don’t have that much weight to lose, most of the people that do our weight loss challenges are already at a healthy weight. What this means for you is that you have to take it to the next level.

It’s not enough to simply follow a healthy diet, you were probably doing that before the challenge. You have to step it up, watch everything that goes in your mouth. Stay strong because everyone is going to trying to sabotage your diet plan. And finally, give yourself a splurge meal each week as a reward. Notice I said ‘meal’ and not ‘day’. One meal won’t kill your diet, but a few might.

Hang in there.