Great-Workout Blog

Nutrition is an important part of living a healthy lifestyle - as the old adage goes, “You are what you eat!”.

But, nutrition is more than just eating the “right” food versus the “wrong” food.

Nutrition Is Not “One Size Fits All”

Everybody’s nutrition requirements are different. If they weren’t, then surely somebody would have come up with the perfect diet for everyone. OK, coming to think of it, lots of people have been pushing their diet as the “perfect diet” for everyone! But, do you really believe them?

The reason that everyone’s nutritional requirements differ, is because, we are all different. Some of us are big, some of us are small. Some of us play competitve sports, some of us hardly move all day.

Our lifestyle and environment in which we live, play a large part in what we eat. If you are a sports person who competes at the highest level, your body will need more nutrients than someone who lazes around all day.

In any case, regardless of your nutritional requirements, eating healthy food is better than eating unhealthy food.

And, if you’re not feeding your body with the nutritients it needs, your body is going to start complaining. You won’t feel as good as you could be feeling, had you been eating healthy foods. 

What Is Healthy Eating?

Generally, healthy eating refers to eating healthy food. Typically, healthy food is food that contains plenty of high quality nutrients (such as fiber and protein) and is low in poor quality nutrients (such as sugars and saturated fat).

You should also try to eat a balanced diet. Don’t go too heavy on a single food group. Make sure you eat food from the five major food groups. The five major food groups are:

• Fruit
• Vegetables, legumes
• Lean meat, fish, poultry, eggs, nuts, legumes
• Bread, cereals, rice, pasta, noodles
• Milk, yoghurt, cheese

For a list of food and corresponding nutritional values, check out these nutrition facts.

About two thirds of adults in the United States are overweight, and almost one third is obese, according to data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) 2001 to 2004.

Definition of “Overweight”

Overweight refers to having a body weight that is higher than set standards. This could be due to muscle, fat, bone, or even excess water. This can be a little confusing for some people. Many body builders are technically “overweight”, but this is purely due to the size of their muscles!

Definition of “Obese”

Obesity is when a person has an abnormally high proportion of body fat. High proportions of body fat often results in poor health. Even a person who is “only” overweight (but not obese) could still have a high risk of poor health. Being obese certainly doesn’t make things any better.

Effects of Overweight and Obesity

Here are some common risk factors for people who are overweight or obese:

• diabetes
• coronary heart disease
• high blood cholesterol
• stroke
• hypertension
• gallbladder disease
• osteoarthritis (degeneration of cartilage and bone of joints)
• sleep apnea and other breathing problems
• some forms of cancer (breast, colorectal, endometrial, and kidney)

Furthermore, obesity is also associated with:

• complications of pregnancy
• menstrual irregularities
• hirsutism (presence of excess body and facial hair)
• stress incontinence (urine leakage caused by weak pelvic floor muscles)
• psychological disorders, such as depression
• increased surgical risk
• increased mortality

Prevention?

The best way to reduce your risk of becoming another “obesity statistic” is to exercise regularly and eat the right food. Cardiovascular exercise is great for eliminating body fat and strengthening your heart.

Also, as great as exercise is, you’ll get much better results with proper nutrition. Wholesome, low fat foods are best. Avoid fast-food like the plague! Did you know that there are actually foods that burn fat. Try including some of these in your diet.

And one of the most important things is to create a workout plan. A good plan will help you develop healthy habits. Without a plan, you’ll find yourself falling back into old habits. And you wouldn’t want that now, would you?

What’s My Ideal Weight?

To help you create your goals, check out this body weight chart. It will help you figure out how much weight you should lose (or gain!).

A recent study highlights the fact that it is very important to decide what your fitness/weight loss goals are. The study found that, while Weight Watchers is a great program for losing weight, it might not be the best for general fitness.

So, although losing weight can be a great goal in itself, “weight loss” does not automatically equate to “good health”.

The University of Missouri recently conducted the study, which compared two groups of participants. One group participated in a Weight Watchers program for 12 weeks, while the other group took to the gym.

While the Weight Watchers group lost more weight - averaging 5 percent of their body weight - most of the weight lost was lean tissue. This means that they didn’t actually lose much body fat. Lean tissue is not something we should be trying to lose, as it can help keep our metabolism high. A high metabolism in itself can help keep our weight (and body fat) down.

In contrast with the Weight Watchers group, the gym group lost less weight, but they did lose a lot of intraabdominal fat. Intraabdominal surrounds the vital organs and can lead to cardiovascular diseases.

But the study did find that Weight Watchers is a great program for support. Most of the Weight Watchers participants remained in the program for the duration, while many of the gym participants quit.

So, if your goal is to lose weight and maintain good health, remember to eat well and exercise well.

The part of a fitness plan that most people have trouble with is the diet. Even if people find that exercise comes naturally to them, they often have trouble limiting the foods they love if they happen to be very high in calories or fat. So finding the willpower and the desire to eat healthily is a crucial component to making your fitness plan a success. If you have trouble weaning off of unhealthy foods, try these strategies to reduce cravings.

Get More Sleep

If your busy life is causing you to stay up late at night and wake up early every day that is probably the root of your food cravings. Regular sleep is a very important part of hormone regulation. Specifically, your body will produce a lot less of the hormone leptin. This chemical is responsible for helping you feel full, and for helping food make you feel satisfied. So if you have been having a lot more trouble resisting fattening foods, you might try getting to bed earlier. Even an hour of extra sleep can make a huge difference in you leptin. It is also important to improve the quality of your sleep by trying to fall asleep at approximately the same time every night.

Eat the Right Kinds of Carbs

The most common kinds of cravings are for sugary carbs, things like donuts, cupcakes and cookies. Really, this might be your body telling you that it needs the kind of energy that only carbohydrates can provide. If you focus on eating healthy carbohydrates, such as the kind that come from fruits, vegetables, and whole grains, you may just find that your cravings for sweets will go away.

Move Your Body More

One of the most powerful appetite suppressants known to man is exercise. If you are contemplating ordering a pizza for dinner instead of making something healthy at home, you might want to just go for a quick stroll around the block. Even light exercise can activate the production of the hormone dopamine, which increases your sense of well-being and makes you more emotionally equipped to make smart choices about what you eat.

Let Yourself Cave in Occasionally

Though diet is important, it is actually important that you don’t feel constantly deprived. In fact, if you do feel deprived all of the time, you are more likely to binge on bad food. So it is actually a good idea to assign one meal every week as your “cheat meal.” This gives you permission to eat any kind of food that you will like. These occasional indulgences won’t do that much damage to your diet, but they will let off enough steam to let you focus on eating properly for the rest of the week.

Find Healthy Ways to Manage Stress

A lot of people eat as a way of dealing with stress. It is important to find other ways to find release for stress. Make sure that you always set aside some time during the day to engage in activities you enjoy. Finding balance in your life it vital to finding success in your fitness.

Expert fitness trainer Christopher William McCombs runs an intense Fitness Boot Camp in Irvine California. He is radically different in his approach to losing fat. He is also a Personal Trainer Marketing expert and helps fitness trainers all over the county to increase their business.

It’s simply a matter of fact that it is way easier to consume calories than it is to burn them off. So matter how often you work out, or how intensely you work out, it probably won’t help your fitness level much if you primarily eat junk.

But the transition to eating healthy can sometimes be a challenging one. Like all habits, eating bad foods is a tough one to break.

If you have been finding it a tad tough to make the leap into a healthy diet, use these tips to make the change a little bit more smooth.

Eliminate Liquid Calories

“Liquid calories,” that is, calories that come from stuff like milk, alcohol, juice, and soda can ruin on your diet for a number of reasons. Firstly, they can add a bunch of calories to your daily intake without ever thinking about it. If you instinctively grab a coke from the refrigerator when you are thirsty, you are adding one hundred forty calories and forty grams of sugar to your diet very rapidly.

Secondly, liquid calories hurt your diet because they don’t help satiety. Meaning, even though you are getting all of these calories, you don’t feel any more full, so you are more likely to turn to solid foods after drinking liquid calories, which can increase the number of calories you eat in a day even more.

Have Foods that are Both Healthy and Convenient

If you are ever in a rush and are just looking for a “quick bite to eat,” chances are you will reach for something that is high in starchy carbs, sugar, or saturated fat. The reason unhealthy foods creep into the diets of even people who really want to eat well is that these bad foods are just so convenient. No matter where you go, there is bound to be a fast food restaurant willing to give you high calorie food in a matter of minutes after buying it.

Help making eating healthier by stocking your cupboard with foods that are not only healthy, but also very easy to make. For example, you might have a premade fruit salad that you just pull out of your refrigerator when ever you want a snack, or have a selection of healthy canned soups that you can just heat and eat.

Make Things Flexible

The biggest mistake that over ambitious people make while designing their workout is making it just too strict. Just because you will probably lose weight and gain muscle by eating nothing but tuna and oatmeal, that doesn’t mean that you should design your diet like that, because it just isn’t sustainable. After just a few days, you will probably start craving variety and revert back to your old eating ways.

Most dieters designate one meal a week that is their “cheat meal,” that is, a meal where they can eat whatever they please.

Deal with Stress Directly

It is important to deal with the emotional side of dieting head on. In times of stress, especially when you are deviating from what you might typically eat, you are much more likely to start binging on foods in order to feel better. In order to keep from falling into this trap, you should find other ways to deal with this stress. Always set some time aside for yourself every day to do something that you truly enjoy. This will help reduce your stress level sand help you find dieting easier.

Expert fitness trainer Christopher William McCombs runs a Fitness Boot Camp in Irvine California. He is radically different in his approach to losing fat. He is also a Personal Trainer Marketing expert and helps fitness trainers all over the county to increase their business.

Over the years, I’ve met so many people who have started a regular workout routine, only to give it up after a few weeks or months. Usually the reason for giving up is “Not enough time” or something similar. But oftentimes the real reason is that, they weren’t happy with their results.

Many of these people workout 3 - 4 times per week but don’t seem to make much progress. If their goal is to build muscle, their muscles stay the same size week after week. If their goal is to lose weight, they continue to weigh the same no matter how much training they do.

Usually in cases like this, the reason for these people’s lack of progress is… they aren’t eating the right foods.

Many people who decide to get into an exercise routine don’t realize how important nutrition is to their progress. They think that, as long as they exercise 3 or 4 times per week, they’ll see results.

Exercise is only part of the equation.

To Gain Weight/Muscle

If your goal is to put on weight, you need to cram yourself with calories. Eat as much as you can. Don’t worry if it contains fat, protein, carbohydrates… just eat it! This is because, if you aren’t putting on weight, your body is burning more calories than it is taking in. By increasing your calorie intake to more than your body burns, you’ll put on weight. This of course, should be included as part of your workout program, so that you can ensure that your increased body weight goes to something healthy… like muscle!

To Lose Weight

If your goal is to lose weight, you need to ensure you’re burning more calories than you’re eating. So as well as working out, you should be eating foods that have less calories. But don’t be silly. You still need to ensure you’re eating the nutritious foods that your body needs in order to function. The main point is, cut down on unhealthy foods containing lots of calories and instead, start eating healthy foods that are low in calories.

If you’re not sure whether you should lose weight or gain weight, check out this Body Weight Chart. It provides you with an indication of the ideal body weight for your height.

And, if you’re watching your weight, you’ll need to keep an eye on the nutritional value of your favorite foods.