It’s been one of those months again.  You know…when I go to a million different places and have a million different conversations with a million different people.  How’s that for exaggerating?  I am serious, though.  I feel like I’ve spent the whole month talking which is kind of funny because I am one serious introvert.  I know—it’s hard for you to believe–but I am.  If you leave me to my own devices, I’ll stay in my office all day long alone with the ringer off on my phone.  That is pure heaven to me.   But I didn’t stay in my office; instead I was out and about being pegged with a bunch of questions I feel are more on the review side but worth a quick mention again:

Do I need a multi vitamin?

Yes!  And get a good one, too.  Good does not mean expensive.  My favorite?  GNC Ultra Mega for Women original.  They got all crazy and started coming out with ridiculous variations such as one for dog walkers, those who use hair gel and for anyone who still watches Survivor.  Honestly, you don’t need all that.  Plus the amounts that they add for things like that are so small it’s not worth it.

Do I need to take __________?

Most likely no.  This conversation usually starts off with all the things you need to take/buy and then ends a little later on with you telling me that you don’t have a pot to pee in or a window to throw it out of.  Let me say this for the record:  unless you are in a MAJOR endurance event , cutting for a MAJOR event or just won the lottery save your money.  There are only 4 things I advise people to take long term:  multi, BCAA’s, fish oil and magnesium.  Anything else is a specialty item that is being taken for a specific reason.

I hate swallowing pills.

Really?  Because I know of at least 10 people who’ve told me how much they love it and wish that their food came that way, too.  Ok, done with the sarcasm but this really is a non issue nowadays.  You can get just about anything as a tincture/liquid or a chewable online or in a vitamin store so knock yourself out finding what you need.

What’s a good brand?

Who the heck knows!  Seriously!  They change vitamin brands by the hour.  I have been in stores standing in front of a display and someone has come over and relabeled the vitamins while I stood there.  Ok, that’s a lie but I have been pumping gas before while the price was going up.  You get my point, though.  So here are some general tips that I’m sure if you try hard enough you can find the exception to the rule so please bear with me:  go national (Nature’s Way) but not commercial (One A Day).  Do not buy the 50 pound container of vitamins at Costco or BJ’s.  Go middle of the road for price.  Too expensive is usually over the top (USANA or Nutralife—the Coach brand of vitamins) and too cheap is just that (Walgreen’s version).   Don’t read the label like you know what you’re doing, you have not a clue what you’re looking at.  Admit it.  Go for sustained release if you can find it and last but not least, if you can get pregnancy vitamins do it because they are typically of great quality.

Do you recommend any fat burners?

WHAT?  Put the crack pipe down girl!  No!  Listen, I spent a very long time at a weight that I wished to holy heck I was never at and STILL didn’t take a fat burner then.  THAT alone should tell you how I feel about them!  Put the bottle down and run.

What should I take post workout?

This will be a series.  Hang tight for this.

There’s more.  Today was all the supplement questions.  I had others and I’ll post those tomorrow.  It’s been a busy month.  If you have any questions I don’t answer over the next few days, hit me up via email and I’ll see what I can do.  Woop woop!

Next Post in Series

Since I laid some ground rules down for nutrition in terms of an obstacle race, I feel it only prudent to do the same for active recovery and injuries.  The only thing that tops being injured is being sick.  I have had a sick 6 year old at home now for 3 days and he is reminding how miserable it is to be sick.  But injuries are annoying because you really want to work out at full capacity but you can’t and the whole time you can hear the pounds collecting on the scale.  So let’s put this in perspective, shall we?

Active Recovery

Active recovery is a fancy schmancy word for “knock it off and rest, will ya?”  In support of us psychos who feel like we’re being lazy because we only worked out 7 days this week (as opposed to the 8 days available to us overachievers), this is a vital tool to be added to our tool box.  Unlike a regular athlete who has full calories available to them at all times, we have to recover in two ways:  fake “high” caloric days and consolidating exercise.

Since our lives are guided by the motto “less is more”, our prep for the race should be a bit less than the average athlete.  For one, a ton of running will kill a physique.  Therefore, that should cut the schedule back a bit.  Secondly, we will need to consolidate lifts with functional training because lifting more would be hard to due to the lack of food in the diet.  And lastly, we do not have enough starch in the diet to go hog wild in terms of energy output without wondering if we’re burning through some major muscle so we need to get smart about adding fat.  Here are some ways to manipulate your schedule:

• Go to full body lifts for now.
• Add functional movements in between the lifts.
• Wear a weighted vest in your workout instead of heavy DB’s or BB’s.
• Leave at least 2 days completely free from all exercise and instead, make them stretch days.
• Eat the most on those days, but not so much that you break the caloric bank.
• Add sprints to your schedule (like 200’s and 400’s) but do not put them after a killer leg workout.  Even if you are doing full body workouts, you may have more of a “leg day” than another day.  Avoid sprinting after that.
• You can make the high cal days high by adding more Omega 3 fats instead of adding more starch.  This will definitely aid in active recovery.
• Drop a day of cardio and make your lifts more dynamic so you suck wind during them.

Injuries

Injuries are a pain in the butt.  And I mean that literally!  I would rather (yes! I got my “I’d rather” in) remove a deep splinter with a butter knife than sit through my summer (again!) with a major injury like a broken limb.  I broke my foot last June and it was miserable.  I refused to be sidelined so I hobbled all over Boston with a huge boot, but it still wasn’t the same.  Because we are on a compromised diet in the first place, our joints and tendons are ripe for the picking in terms of injury.  Fat is scarce in our diet and it is what lubricates our joint capsules  so we have little give and take when we misstep or land funny.  Rolling ankles are almost a given as well as rotator cuff issues.  Be smart!  Make sure you recover and get plenty of sleep.  Should an injury occur, here is what you need to know:

• Your first reaction is to cut all the starch out of your diet.  Don’t do it.  Go to 1/day at least 4 days/week.
• Eat exactly what you need each day.  This means do not go to bed hungry or full.  Either one is bad for different reasons.
• Do not work out on the injured body part until you are completely well.  Trust me when I say this.  We heal jacked up if we do not fully recover.  For the rest of your life, your knee will ache every time you turn on the garbage disposal.  Seriously.
• You will not gain weight if you keep the junk out.  This is not the time to “munchy” yourself into next week.   With that being said, do not try to starve yourself, either.  See above.
• You will feel smooshy.  Itiswhatitis.  You are not losing muscle.  You are losing your “pump”.  Accept it and just know when you lift the right way again, all will be well.
• Don’t be a cardio hero.  If you can’t lift right but somehow can still do cardio, don’t try to make up for lifting with cardio.  Baaaaaaad decision right there.  Just say no.

I feel better now that I put this on paper.  If you go out and act crazy on the course, I have nothing to do with it.   You have been warned.  Hahaha!  Let me know if you are doing one any time soon.  I’d love to know.  Woop woop. )

It’s 3 pounds per starch serving!

No, honestly.  Some of y’alls think you gain 3 pounds per starch serving.  Sound familiar?

• “My body is just sensitive to carbohydrates.”
• “Every time I eat a carb I gain weight.”
• “I think I’m gluten intolerant because I become puffy and bloated when I eat bread.”

This scary thing about these statements is that I think some of you are actually standing on the scale while eating and give me an up-to-the-minute report as to what that number is doing.  It’s frightening.  And very few of us are truly “sensitive” to carbohydrates.  First, let’s be honest and say when we turn the carb fountain on, we don’t shut it off.  The only sensitivity we have is that we can detect one in the room if we were blindfolded and devoid of smell.  Law enforcement should use us for our carb tracking abilities with the TSA or something.  There has to be a use for that kind of sensitivity to starch.  I pray that you know by now that we do not instantaneously gain weight from starch, we gain water.  One of the best tools that you have for making your body look great at an event is the manipulation of starch in your diet.  If you take that away permanently, that’s a huge loss for the dress up world.  Lastly, you are not gluten intolerant because you had bread; you are puffy because you had the LOAF of bread.  Just sayin’.  Flour absolutely can wreak havoc on you more than sweet potatoes or oatmeal, but that’s only when you initially bring it back into your diet (I will explain this one day—I promise).  I am not advocating eating bread every day, I am just not going to let you poo poo it for the wrong reasons.

You know I had to go there because for us to be able to do an obstacle course race, we need to eat some starch.  However, this is easier said than done if you are in the middle of a diet or if you are carb-phobic.  Signing up for an endurance event while dieting is like a guy trying to maintain bachelor status as he’s planning his wedding.  Sounds good in theory but…

There is a huge difference between the leanness of an elite endurance athlete who got that way in spite of eating a high carb diet to an amateur physique athlete who wants to maintain the leanness while entering in to a high carb diet.  They are not the same and you will be very disappointed about your results if you do not know that before training starts.  More than I want to yap your ears off for hours about starches and such, I want to give you some ground rules:

Bring starches into your diet at least 4 weeks before the event. You do this because your body must get used to processing them again.  You will find that you will be tired the first week you bring them in.  You do not need a lot so easy, killah.  Whoa, Nelly.  Steady as she goes…  An extra 50g of carbohydrates can seriously go a long way in our training.  We have trained our bodies to do more on less so it is not necessary to go crazy here.

Eat the heartier starches on the days you train hard. Limit heavy starches like bread, rice or oatmeal to the days you train.  Have them first thing in the morning and post workout.  I would fool around with pre-workout starches first before relying on them because we tend to not draw our energy directly from starches.  We are low carb on a natural basis, so having them pre can sometimes bog you down.  I find fruit works best here but see what works for you.

Up until 75 minutes, it’s still just cardio. Don’t get drawn into the hype that you need to eat extra and do all kinds of gu’s and gels just because you are doing an endurance event.  For us, it’s just cardio until the 75 min mark and then we need to think about supplementation.

Sodium is a necessity in your diet. Eating clean means we do not get enough sodium in our diets.  If I had my way, you would keep a salt lick by your bed and run your tongue down it every morning.  Now there’s a nasty visual for you. (Speaking of that, I’m short on an “I’d rather”.  I’ll work one in this series somehow, hang on.)  But this is where we get into trouble.  We mistake the negative effects of not enough sodium (dizziness and lethargy) with not enough sugar so when the symptoms hit, we’re eating the wrong thing.  Make sure you have enough electrolytes in your body before you train.

Have a separate menu for the different training days. You should eat the most on days you lift and the day after your long run or hardest training.  You eat moderately on the long run or hardest training day and you eat the least on every other day.  This keeps your physique sharp and your hunger dull.  It also stabilizes your energy levels so that you’re not all hyped up at the wrong time.   Nothing is more annoying than an overly hyped athlete on a non-training day.  We drive our family nuts.   Honestly.

So there you have it.  Tomorrow we talk about active recovery and injuries.  Remember who you are and you will head into this the right way.  Cool?  Woop woop!!

Ahhh…there’s nothing like a fresh batch of peer pressure to make us do something completely uninformed and irrational.  Gotta love it.

Everybody loves a challenge—especially us.  We love them more than the average person does, to be honest with you.  We can seriously get a little sick with it by setting crazy goals like 5 marathons in 5 weeks and of course, at the time it sounds completely rational.  It even sounds doable.  However, about halfway through the goal we know we are in trouble but we keep on going for pride sake. How about we avoid this calamity by giving you some things to take into account as we head into another year of the obstacle course races?

Let me remind you of who you are.   If you are reading this blog, then you are someone who may or may not realize that you are an athlete but you definitely realize that your physique is part of your overall health and fitness goal.  So it’s not ‘by any means necessary’ to reach the finish line because none of us here would be willing to go up 10 pounds to make the goal happen.  Instead, we will rethink it when we realize that it could take weeks to get the 10 pounds off again and we’ll most likely move on to another goal.  It is what it is.  This gives you an idea of what this series is about because it is not about getting you ready for the Tough Mudder or any other killer race.  No, it is about getting you ready for them safely while taking into account that you will need to be smart about how you fuel for the training, actively recover from the training and psychologically deal with the training. This is not the same as just plain old running or bodybuilding type lifting and if you are not aware of that you may either blow your diet, go crazy or the worst of them all: get injured.

Over the next three days I want to tackle 4 things:

• Tough Guy syndrome
• Nutritional challenges (how to work the STarch thing)
• Active recovery
• Injuries and their ramifications

In less than a month I turn 42 years old.  WOW.  I don’t feel a day over 41 30 yo when I do things, but the next day I feel like I am 75.  I honestly remember the time when I could wake up, decide to run a 10K that day (even though I was not training for one and never ran more than the 10 feet it takes me to get into the shower) and then get up the next morning and do it all over again.  Crazy.  If I did that today someone would be peeling me off the asphalt—and that would be at registration!  Shame.  I need to warm up for my warm up and I know that’s from years of abuse brought on by Tough Guy syndrome.  This malady affects almost all trainers, some group fitness instructors, avid runners and nearly every single physique athlete out there.

Tough Guy syndrome (TGS) is a peculiar syndrome because it crosses the blood brain barrier and renders us dumb as dirt as to the workings of the body and metabolism even though we could school a client on it in a heartbeat.  Somehow, we’re impervious to this information.  We can dispense it, but we can’t use it and because of this, we tend to do some of the dumbest things known to mankind.  It’s unbelievable.

TGS’s power is exacted by finding the weak spot in our immune systems: our egos.  Once it finds that chink in the armor, it quickly spreads throughout the Central Nervous System causing awful symptoms like signing up for and completing the Tough Mudder without any training for it and then systematically bragging about it like you’re a hero or something.  Frightening.  Fevers and chills can result if it goes undetected as people are hot with jealously or cold with disdain around you because you decided to just “pop into” the race.  And because TGS is a syndrome, there is no “one-size-fits-all” cure and normally diagnosis comes only with the egregious symptoms coming to light such as injury or accidents.

But there is hope.  You can take preventative measures to keep from developing this syndrome by realizing a few things:

1)      If you are under 18% bodyfat, you are of the lean community.  You cannot, and should not, put your body to the ultimate test without properly preparing it and fueling it.  Do not eat the same diet you are used to now and then just “jump into” an obstacle course type race.

2)      If you are allergic to starchy carbohydrates because you think they make you gain weight and want to just eat starch the week of the event, you’re in for a big surprise.  We’ll talk about this tomorrow.  Just know that you need to eat them long before the week of the event if you want to use them to fuel your race.

3)      You do not recover the same when you are lean.  You have fewer reserves in the tank and you must keep that in mind.  If you deplete them now, they will not be available to you when go back to working on your physique or just even maintaining it.

4)      You run the risk of injury—major injury—when you are leaner.  This truth comes in handy when you feel the urge to bounce out of bed and conquer the world.  One day of heroism could cost you 10 weeks of working out.  There’s a sobering thought.

This will be a short series.  I am only going to yell at you a little bit (I’m really yelling at myself but I’m using you as the punching bag.  Sorry.) so meet me here for the next 2 days as we get ready for an obstacle race.  Cool?  Woop woop!

I know you heard the saying “you are what you eat” but I am here to take it a bit further and say you are what you do, as well.

I think many of us sort of evolved down the same path to the way we eat and workout:  we wanted more out of our body and whatever we were doing at the time just didn’t cut it.  Like I mentioned in my last post, there are two types of weight gain out there and you would probably think then that there would be two types of weight loss, too, but no…there’s a bunch.  (There are also more types of weight gain but that really gives a good synopsis.)

Ok, so maybe you’re not running in the Olympics but some of you are racking up that kind of mileage without any “Olympic” results.

One of the ways I see all the time (and watch endless frustration with) is running to get a great body.  Now notice I did not say to lose weight.  You definitely can decide to get up tomorrow and start running and possibly lose some weight but the odds of you getting that body that you desire are slim and the risk you run with injury and overuse is quite high.  Running for a hot body without a concise plan is like heading to the bakery “to pick something up” for a party you’re going to later on—we all know that ends badly with bread tasting and cupcake snacking so let’s just be honest about it.  Go with a dessert already set in your mind, get in and get out or bring someone with you to bail you out when you go down hard.

Running is addictive to many women.  It’s easy, cheap, hard in the beginning so it is a great challenge, relaxing, rewarding and… *completely unsatisfying in the weight maintenance department* so the more we run, the more we have to.  We keep looking at the covers of the running magazines wondering why they have a hot body and we don’t although we log mile after mile after mile.  Yes, from the waist up you are getting there…from the waist down though you look like a Land O Lakes advertisement for their latest cheese product.  With cellulite and dimples abound, you run and run and run and run.  You have every color capris there is to own and you are an expert at tying your jacket around your waist.

But now you have solved that problem—or so you thought–because you became a savvy reader.  You started following the girls out there who have the hot bodies and began to mimic what they do.  You dropped your starches, cleaned up the diet, you lift now and yet, still…nothing.  Instead, you have no energy, you binge on carbs every 2 or 3 days because you just can’t take not eating them and you don’t know how to fit lifting into your schedule the way they do it.  What gives??

YOU HAVE AN IDENTITY CRISIS

• You are not a runner. You are a woman who enjoys using running as a means to getting the body that she desires.

• You are not a figure girl. You have no desire to get on stage—you want to run—but you want that body too.

• You are not your average consumer. You are willing to put in the work of eating clean and working out so following magazines that are telling you the same ole same ole like “top 10 superfoods” and so on is not helping much.

• You’re not a world class runner. You are quite competitive and have no desire to be the slowest runner out there but you are not a run-nut either.  You don’t own the latest heart rate monitor and you just want to enjoy your run.

Honestly, girl.  You need to know who you are so you can get what you want.  Taking pieces of everyone’s plans and trying to make them work is frustrating and unproductive.  I’m sure you’ve also noticed that the more you run the harder it is to lose weight.  So what does the running world say about that?  Run more.  Ummm…how’s that working for you?  Because at some point, you need to go to work.

We have much to develop over the next few weeks: nutrition, training, psychological warfare, supplements and so on.

Obviously this is an issue we need to really put on the table with some serious solutions for you.  This is one of the top questions I am asking no matter where I go.  Follow this series that I will talk about over the next few weeks and we’ll talk about taking off 5 pounds per 5K and tightening that bum.  Cool?

I’m looking forward to it!!  Woop woop!

Next Post in Series

Every so often I think about professions that have it tough because of TV:  Doctors, cops, teachers…you get the idea.  TV adds this flare to their occupation that makes it hard for them to do their job in real life.  Either they make it seem super simple to solve a crime or they have these miraculous diagnoses for patients in a nick of time so that when you go through something like it in real life, your view is jaded.  It has to make a doctor’s life impossible or a detective’s job stressful dealing with folks who have outrageous expectations because every week they look at life packed up nice and neat in an one hour TV show.  There’s no fuss, no muss…nothing.  You have an issue, the team will solve it.  You have a missing child, look—we found them!  But reality is so much more different for those folks:  crimes go unsolved, people get sick with things that are not always “solvable” and are sometimes fatal and the people who work there are not happy-go-lucky robots loving every minute of their jobs. 

 Ok, now that I have sufficiently set you up in fear as to where this article is going, let me move on and make my point.  TV is to doctors as the Six O’Clock news is to fitness professionals.

 I cannot watch the “healthbeat” section of any news broadcast because of the blatant misinformation and I cry any time a medical study comes out because they butcher the conclusion of the study to create a sensational news story.  Let me say this right now and be very clear:

 YOU CAN FIND A STUDY TO SUPPORT *ANY*–I REPEAT–*ANY* COCKAMAMIE THEORY YOU HAVE ABOUT HEALTH AND FITNESS AND A COMMERCIAL DIET TO BACK IT UP.  THAT DOES NOT MEAN IT REALLY WORKS.  JUST SAYIN’. 

 I also loathe magazines.  I will not name any in particular because they are all the same to me but just know that they have to say the same thing to you month after month after month so to keep it “fresh”  they begin to add twists and catches to their stories to keep you coming back.  Because let’s face it, how many different ways can you “tighten” the booty or “flatten” the tummy?   Although they have the right to make a living, they do it at the expense of their honesty and your health.  

 When it comes to general weight loss information, you can find it anywhere.  In fact, it’s getting beyond old and moving into nauseating.  But when it comes to crafting a beautiful body from nature’s resources (devoid of fat burners, diet shakes and pre packaged meals), the nation is severely lacking.  I cannot tell you how stressful that is. 

•  You will find very few studies on how to lose the last five pounds or how to lift your butt up off of your ankles so you can at least walk without tripping. 
• There are no studies on lean going leaner or what it takes to get rid of stretch marks and so on. 
• You will not find much truth about what running REALLY does to the body or how much weight you will gain running your first marathon. 
• There aren’t any resources around that are going to tell you how to lose weight the second time around and how hard it really is because we all gain at least 5 pounds back in our lifetime (I know it’s way more than that but I felt I’d ease up on the doom and gloom). 
• And you definitely aren’t going to find any sites to tell you about what to do when things go wrong (you push it too far) or if you have a special issue (pcos, hypothyroid, etc).   

Why?  Because the mainstream media only cares about losing weight *at any cost* and having the hottest story out there.   Those of us who care about losing body fat and looking good at the end are few and far between but we do exist.  We are out here for sure, but we’re a lonely breed of professionals who rely more on our expertise than we do on studies because the studies just do not exist.  What separates us from the others out there is what we primarily focus on:  realistically looking good naked through all natural means of clean eating and supplementation for those who want the stage body without the stage.

Right now there is this new trend of running articles and information flooding the news circuit.  I am going to assume it’s because the economy is bad and people have to do something.  So they’ve left their gyms and took to the pavement.  That’s not a bad thing and I am glad folks aren’t just lying around but what is a bad thing is the junk the media is now pumping out there about running.  Here’s a news flash:  it is not an effective *long* term weight loss/look good naked solution.  Don’t believe the hype!  We have much to talk about this but for now, just know, this is not your long term solution for keeping the weight off and making a hot body.  Can it be part of it?  Absolutely!  But is it the answer they are toting it as?  NO. And you’ll be mad as a hornet when you have to put humpty dumpty back together again after listening to their advice.

No…don’t believe the hype that you are reading out there.  You aren’t crazy.  These things really happen and no one is talking about them.  And those that are talking, aren’t talking reality.  How about we put some facts out there and have some fun while we’re doing it? 

So you know that means there’s much more to come.   I can’t wait.  Hang tight because we will be solving some problems and answering some nagging issues that main stream media wants to ignore.  I promise I won’t leave you hanging.

As always, keep it clean and keep it active.  Woop woop!

Today is my youngest child’s birthday; he is officially 5 years old. Honestly, time flies when you spend the majority of your days telling your kids to shut the front door (do they honestly think we live in a barn?), stop sitting on the couch that way (Would you do that at your friend’s house? Then don’t do it here.) and to eat what’s in front of them (I’m sorry…it doesn’t say IHOP on the front door. You’ll eat what we serve.). I love my babies—I still call them babies but they are 12, 10 and 5—because they keep me close to my younger days. Not in terms of mentality, although if you want a sight, watch a grown woman have a temper tantrum like she’s 5 year old…no shame here, but in terms of spirit. Hanging out with them reminds me of the times when I didn’t have to care about the horrible things that happen in this world. I can forget about my mortgage, my responsibilities (aside from cleaning my room), the burdens of life, eating right and exercising… Did I say that?

Come on! You know your mind started to drift and you thought of that for a moment. If you didn’t think that you at least thought: I was in shape back then and I didn’t have to think about it. Either one but the theme is the same: it was way easier then to be in shape when we were kids than it is now and it was a whole lot more fun. Remember we ran for the sake of running…in flats…hair all done up…going to someone’s house to put on make up that we had no business putting on…in the rain…and we didn’t care. I can’t be the only one. Remember we walked in a pack—a respectful pack because we got out of the street when a car came…ugh!—EVERYWHERE we went. I mean everywhere. We logged more miles than the first 100 runners across the Boston Marathon finish line. We were in shape. Not because we tried, but because we had to be! Even the most unfit kid was fit in today’s standards. It was ok to be athletic and to be honest, in my neighborhood, it was expected.

And then what happened? We grew up. We became responsible adults who write 4 page to do lists, who schedule loving the family in between picking up the dry cleaning and scrubbing the toilets and who drive around the gym parking lot looking for a spot closest to the door! We taxi little ones to play dates and older ones to basketball practice and then sit in the car writing out invitations to another’s one birthday party. We live at the mall and text happy birthday to our siblings because we’re not sure if we’ll have time to call. At some point we became…old. Not in body, but in mind. But that feeling of being old only lasted a short time for some of you right? One day you woke up and you thought 2 things: I want my body back (or I refuse to let my body go) and I couldn’t get on the elliptical again if you paid me $1000. Off to Bob’s Stores you go to buy a bargain priced, sensible pair of running sneakers while looking up Model Per4mance on your Blackberry. You go, girl!

Let’s face a fact and this is a hard one for some of you: If you workout then you’re an athlete. If you sweat—and not at 2 in the morning when you rip off all the covers and freeze your husband/mate/pet into oblivion—I mean when working out, you are an athlete. And if you run/jump/hop/bend/lift, etc or even skip out on lunch with your girlfriend…you are an athlete. This is a huge admission whether you realize it or not, mainly because how you diet and/or lose weight is going to be different than the way you would if you didn’t.

I cannot tell you how many times I have heard someone say, “I am going to start running to lose weight.” And normally when I meet these people who say this, who are willing to get up and go out of the house to anywhere in the world faster than if they just walked, they also care about *what* there bodies look like when they are done running. Who wants to do all that work and still have their backside dragging behind them? Amen? The largest growing market in the past 10 years has been the 5k and 10k market and the biggest chunk of that growth is women. Why? To lose weight. But I bet many of you have found out how untrue that can be. The more you run the less weight you lose and the more hungry you become. So your traditional diet mixed with running can be a disaster of epic proportions and to the tune of eight plus pounds per event! Holy moly!
But what if you’re not a runner but a skier? Or a once-a-week hockey player/soccer/player and so on? Your performance is directly tied to what you do eating-wise Monday through Friday. Even if you are not competing in your sport, just playing, you could be jeopardizing your metabolism just from trying to burn the candle on both ends. But do you really need to eat as if you’re about to be drafted into the MLS or an Olympian preparing for the trials? Who represents you ladies in the work force? Who’s providing you with athletic assistance without charging you the Lance Armstrong rate? Girl, you and I both know that you want to take your sport seriously but not to the point where it impedes your lifestyle. You’re busy; you have things to do and they important in your life, but you still need to represent on game day. You know what I’m sayin’.

And I am forgetting the most important thing of all: fun. It has to be fun. When’s the last time you could say your workout was fun? You know…creative without embarrassing you. Interesting without confusing you. Challenging without killing you? Right now you are piecing together workouts like a quilting club in November. A little lifting here, a lot of running here, no stretching there… Doesn’t sound too successful when it’s presented that way so can we all agree that we need something more than the free sites that give us lots of info but no way to put it together for ourselves?

www.modelper4mance.com

Now before you race over there and start clicking away, what we offer is not on the site yet. Yes. I am ashamed to type that. In fact, my embarrassment is going to be your gain because I will make it up to you when the page goes live but in the mean time, here it is in a nutshell:

Running, skiing, playing recreational fill-in-the-blank or a weekend warrior?
We have programs that are as low as $67 down and $39 per month, you can cancel at any time and they include everything under the sun: nutrition, training, cardio, supplementation and stretching and are customized to you. Everything is done for you so all you have to do is make it happen.

Have an actual event planned? Maybe a 5k, 10k or ½ marathon? A tennis tournament? Crossfit Throwdown?
We have plans that count you down to the event (for running we will include the race plan, as well) and fully customized ones that tailor to your every need. These begin at the same price range as above but come may come with time constraints.

Each plan, no matter which you choose, has their training updated monthly and all else when necessary.

We are very unique in that we can customize the package to your needs but are speedy enough to get you up and going almost immediately.

We also care. We can’t help it—we’re women. And softies at that. You, the person, are our first thought and your satisfaction is our first priority. We are consumers just like you. We are moms/entrepreneurs/professionals/girlfriends and so on just like you. We are not some huge site where you are not sure who wrote the plan and no one can answer your question nor are we some rogue trainer that just cropped up with a site last week. If you’re struggling…we’ll call you. If you fall off the wagon…we’ll run you over with it and snap you back in shape. It’s all about you.

If you can’t wait for the page to go live—and honestly I cannot blame you—hit us up at info@modelper4mance.com and I will tell you all about what we offer and how much it costs. If you can wait, though, God bless you because I have as much patience as an empty hospital, then stay tuned because we’re in production now of changing the site over and all of this in its full glory will be there soon enough.

As always, it’s been my pleasure to serve you. Tomorrow I will tell you all about you hot mamas who just like to be hot for the sake of being hot. Woop woop!!

Adding supplements to your daily regimen while worthwhile can be expensive and a shot in the dark if you are not sure what you are doing.  Try not to add in every supplement you read about in your favorite monthly magazines.  I find athletes are privy to fake food supplements more than pills and dieters are more likely to pop a pill than select a drink.  Before you decide to put any of these things in your diet, know why you are doing it and how you should put them in to be safe.

The Fabulous Four:

Multivitamins

Although you may hear that you can get all you need from your food that is pure fiction.  You would have to eat the broad side of a barn to get enough vitamins in a multi and that’s not very comfortable.  As an athlete, you need more than the general public in terms of nutrients so find a high quality, USP certified multivitamin to add into your regimen.

Fish Oils

Can’t say enough about fish oil capsules.  Buying a good one goes a long way towards avoiding the burps and such, so look for pharmaceutical grade quality and it should be 3^rd party tested.  Besides making you more insulin sensitive, fish oils help boost your memory, soften your skin and shine up your hair.  They are invaluable but not the same as good fat so don’t try to sub one for the other. 

Calcium

The ultimate fat burner is a definite must in your diet.  Better taken throughout the day than in one big lump, calcium’s primary role is an obvious one with bone health but not so obvious with the other roles it plays in your body.  Flexing muscles, aiding in blood clotting and moving nutrients in and out of cells are other benefits from having enough calcium in your diet.  Since it is not readily absorbed, make sure your supplement has Vitamin D in it to get all the benefits.

BCAA’s

Branched chain amino acids are by far one of the most essential nutrients in an athlete’s diet when it comes to performance.  Leucine, Isoleucine and valine are the amino acids that make up the trio but it’s leucine that’s causing all the hype.  Known to enhance performance in endurance athletes and provide muscle back up for strength athletes, leucine and the other 2 keep the Energizer bunny going long after the energy is gone.

The Notables

Supplement:      Creatine

Worth it?           YES

Backed in studies?        Yes

Benefits:           Athletic performance, increased strength, increased hypertrophy, less muscle soreness, etc.

Downfalls:         Water retention…if you think Willy Wonka with the Oompas you are on the right path…

Supplement:      Caffeine

Worth it?           As a pick me up, yes.  Fat burner? No

Backed in studies:         Yes, but for certain things.  Do your homework here.

Benefits:           Get up and go, improved athletic performance, some weight loss benefit

Downfalls:         There can be many.  When taken in moderation like coffee, not much.  If you decide to venture into the world of designer coffees and energy drinks, know what you are taking before you start.

Supplement:      Glutamine

Worth it?           Yes if you can afford it.  No if you cannot.

Backed in studies:         Yes, but very few correlate directly with exercise.

Benefits:           Increased immunity.  Taking it keeps you from depleting your own.

Downfalls:         You could be increasing the value of your urine and that’s about it.  Very hard to prove it is “working”.

Supplement:      L-Carnitine

Worth it?           Only if you are deficient

Backed in studies:         Not as far as I can see…

Benefits:           Supposed to increase fat burning

Downfalls:         No reported health risks other than what happens to your wallet.

There are many more that I could go on and on with but I am saving that for when I do the series on vitamins and ergogenic aids.  I have not covered any of the performance enhancing supplements or the latest in goos/gels/powders and drinks.  When I do, I will go a bit more into detail and how they are taken.  In the mean time, think about the fab four, run it by your doc and then get to improving your performance immediately!

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We’ve talked about sleep before and how important it is to your well being, but now as an athlete it takes on a whole new dimension.  Your workout plus your recovery equal a training effect.  If you have a workout sans recovery, you really did not do much of anything.  Recovery is where the magic happens.  If you desire to be a better athlete and want to Perform Beautifully, it is important for you to realize that recovery is more than just resting, it’s knowing what to eat, when and when to drop back on intensity and volume with your workouts.

I See You One Hour and I Raise You Two

For all intents and purposes in this post today, I will be addressing the recreational athlete.  Since most of the folks out there are not trying to become the next Lance Armstrong, I am going to tailor this to the girl/guy at the office who likes to run a triathlon or two a year as a hobby.  Knowing that, recovery becomes less scientific (i.e. 2.8g of carbs for every blah blah) in the beginning and more about setting and keeping good habits. 

To start, recovery begins before the workout.  Let me say that again.  Recovery begins before the workout.  Before you go for a long run, a tough hockey game, a pickup basketball game or a grueling leg work out, you had better started fueling your body at least an hour before.  Depending on how long you are going to perform, decides what you are going to eat but for us right now, we are going light.  We have a 90 min. run in front of us and we need some fuel.  Sounds like a good time for a quick shake made with protein powder and juice with a 100% SG WW bagel.  Lightly buttered to perfection, toasted just enough to melt the butter.  YUM.  For the pre and post meals you want to think: 

Small amount of protein, 2 to 3 times the amount of carb.  So pp=approx. 20g of protein and the juice and the bagel provide about 60g of carb.  Keep it simple.

What I really want you to remember is for every hour of exercise you do, you need to have that much time in recovery as well.  So we’re going for a 90 min. run, we’re going to recover a bare min. of 90 min.  Let’s see what that looks like:

Immediately after work out:  Gatorade type drink with a bit of protein added (like ½ scoop)*, or chocolate milk

            *premade versions of this exist already,

Within a half hour:  a plate full of food where 1/3 is filled with a pure protein source and 2/3 of your plate is filled with             starches and veggies.  Small chicken breast with brown rice and roasted root veggies.  A grilled chicken sandwich on 100% whole grain bread stuffed with lettuce and tomatoes and a side salad.

Within an hour of that:  a small snack like a yogurt or high protein granola.

This is great if you work out to enjoy yourself but still be competitive amongst your coworkers and friends.  Your reality is much more different than that of a professional athlete.  You still have to go to work and feed your kids every day.  You have obligations outside of yourself that demand your time.  Because of this, you do not have the desire to sit down and calculate pound for pound what you need to succeed.  You are looking for a quick effective formula that is going to give you that edge over the chic that doesn’t have kids and thinks she’s better than you.  (Make sure she doesn’t read this, too;). 

Looking Past Today

The other part of recovery is knowing when to back off so as to improve upon your fitness level.  Almost every athlete I come across thinks the same thing:  every workout needs to harder than hard and the more I do the better I am.  Neither one of these can be further from the truth.  So let’s just cut right to the chase and put it out there:

Yearly

Make sure you have a distinct offseason/recovery time.  It needs to be at least 4 to 8 weeks in length where your exercise does not reach anything close to race/game time or pace. 

Monthly

You need to have one week per month that is easy.  I mean easy.  Go in the gym and kick some tires, run some laps at half of race pace, work on just your shooting—nothing full court, does not matter the sport, just make it easy.  This takes many forms so become a friend of cross training and you will accept this better.

Weekly

You need to have at least one day of a four day schedule to be easy.  You may break a bit of a sweat but you did not set a record here in any way.  In fact, you should feel like you did not work out at all and wonder why you changed your clothes.

If you can incorporate this into your training schedule, you will begin to see changes in your athletic ability and in your body composition as well if your diet is spot on.  That is, of course, assuming you are sleeping and planning your menus!

Stay tuned for more!  WOOP WOOP!:o)

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Food.  Sleep.  Supplements.  Are they important?  You bet they are!  But they take on a whole new meaning when they are wrapped in to your training program and you are actually trying to elicit an effect out of them.  What you find a lot these days are people who read a good amount of information regarding particular topics and then take the pieces that resonated the most with them and incorporate them into their program.  This is not necessarily a bad practice and many good things can come of it until the pieces you are putting together no longer blend together to produce the training effect that you want.  This happens simply because you lost focus and began trying the latest supplement fad or you adopted the “amazing” food plan of your buddy and neither of these had anything to do with your ultimate goal.

When you know what you should be focusing on with your sport, it makes it so much easier to tailor your food plan and gym life to reflect those goals:

BASKETBALL, SOCCER, TENNIS AND ETC.

These sports are power sports.  At some point in the game (mainly from beginning to end, haha) you are going to perform short, powerful moves that require a major shift in direction or some other form of speed/agility.  You need to be strong, quick, alert and fast to be able to be competitive here.  You also need to have endurance as these games last long.  So you need to be able to come back hard and fast time and time again.  This is no easy feat when you are doing it with the steak and cheese sub you had the other day washed down with two beers.  That’s not going to work so let’s try something else:

Performing:                   2 days/week (maybe you’re in a league)

Eating:                          45% more than baseline

Macro Breakdown:         25 to 35% protein

                                    45 to 55% carbs

                                    Fats round out the remainder

Training:                        3 days lifting—powerlifts abound in here!

                                    2 endurance cardio days recommended

                                    1 day functional SAQ type training

Supplements:                One that supports immune function

                                    One that supports recovery

                                    A few that harness alertness and proper cell function

Hydration:                     Critical

MARATHON, TRIATHALON, IRONMAN, CYCLING, ADVENTURE RACING

These sports are all about the endurance factor.  You must be able to go for long periods of activity without losing speed or effectiveness.  You need staying power here and that’s not going to happen with you eating goos and gels like they are breakfast.  Save those for long runs and race days and focus on a plan that’s going to give you all the food you need to be able to perform time and time again.  The take home message for you:  recovery. 

Performing:                   5 days/week

Eating:                          55% more than baseline

Macro Breakdown:         50 to 60% carbs

                                    25 to 35% fat

                                    Protein round outs the remainder

Training:                        2 days lifting—short, full body romps

                                    1 day functional with lots of BW training

Supplements:                Many that support immune function and antioxidant properties

                                    A few that support recovery

                                    One that supports proper cell function

Hydration:                     Crucial

WRESTLER, MMA, POWERLIFTER, RECREATIONAL LIFTER

These sports are all about muscle and strength.  You need to be able to move your weight around here and it needs to be fast for whatever size you are at the time.  This is where you hear terms like “pound for pound” or “powerful for his size” and etc.  You do not need the same type of endurance above; you need to maintain strength for a long time.  See below for a snap shot of your requirements.

Performing:                   3 to 5 days/week

Eating:                          45 to 60% above baseline (depends on weight class and etc.)

Macro Breakdown:         30 to 40% protein

                                    20 to 25% fat

                                    Carbs round out the remainder (high on ST side)

Training:                        4 days lifting—powerlifts, olympic lifts, BW

                                    1 day support lift that nurture grip, neck, rotator function

                                    3 days/week moderate cardio

Supplements:                Many that support proper cell function/growth

                                    One that supports recovery

                                    Some that support immune function

Hydration:                     Important

What you see here are 3 very different programs for 3 very different sports.  What I normally see are the same nutrition and supplement programs for the very different training programs.  Men tend to take care of their training first, nutrition second.  They try to fuel their needs based on “an as needed” basis and that is a huge mistake.  Again, if you want this vessel to perform for you in the manner in which was meant, you need to give it what it needs when it needs it.  You cannot have a one size fits all type of food/supplement mentality when your training is so vastly different.

Next, I’ll show you how women are a bit different.  We want to mother all over our food and what/how/when we eat but do whatever for training but hope to have a different training result every time.  That’ll be fun!  See you tomorrow when I have a recipe treat for you!  WOOP WOOP!:o)

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