I am a nudge.  I won’t deny it.  Many of you who know me are thinking the same thing right now.  Actually, you’re thinking:  “I love you, girl, but you annoy me.  You always say the thing I want to hear least that day (always said with pure love).”  That I do.  So why should today be any different?  I figure, as long as I am fulfilling your need (i.e. supplying you with butt changing info), then it’s okay for me to fulfill my needs (i.e. get you to see how destructive chasing a body part can be).

I always say I love what I do but today I want to be more specific:  I love you.  No, seriously, I do.  I love you tremendously—even if I have never met you.  Why?  Because you are just like me and I love that.  Whatever you do now, I’ve done before and probably twenty times more than whatever you are doing now.  I love to talk to you.  I love to know what makes you tick. I love to hear about all of your successes.  And I love to see you happy.  NOTHING, and I mean NOTHING (in the context of my line of work) makes me more happy than to call a woman who is having a “ah-hah” moment.  It’s like music to my ears.  You can hear my smile over the phone.  It’s crazy.

But now think of the flip side of that.  When you’re unhappy, I’m concerned.  My heart aches because I remember what it was like to be in a not-so-good place and how isolating it can feel.  It’s not like we want to talk about it because we feel like people will think we’re crazy, whiny or the worst of them all—weak.  We don’t want to admit we have some faults or somehow can’t get it together so we just “keep on keepin’ on” hoping that no one notices we just ate an entire package of double stuff oreos in two days.  We’ll quickly regroup from that only to be the most rigid dieter this side of the buffet display and after a while it all gets so annoying doesn’t it?  Somewhere in all that lunacy, we find balance and we settle into a body that is good…decent…not bad–however you want to describe it, please do so.  It’s not like we’re super disgusted, it’s more like we’re just not satisfied.  This is where body part obsession takes root and becomes a bit alarming.

Our bodies can be nice to look at so it’s great to keep them well oiled and maintained but their primary purpose is to function for us not appear as trophies.  We have bums for a reason and it’s not to serve as a beacon of failure for our diets or our lives.  They are meant to hinge us at the hips, move us from side to side and help us get the heck out of Dodge when necessary.  They have a primary function in the body; not a secondary function like our tummies (yes, tummies are our core, but ideally our abs and back serve as our core/trunk and nutrition makes a great tummy—not crunches).   This is a huge thing to think about, seriously, because as you pound away at your booty you may be setting yourself up for some major surgery later on.

Although I love writing, I stress when I set out to write articles like this because on the screen they can read as preachy or judgmental.  I can tell you without a doubt that nothing like that is going through my head right now.  What’s running through my mind is what I was like when I wanted nicer shoulders and the only word that I can think of is “fixated”.  It was my main focus and I cared about nothing else besides my shoulders.   Fortunately, I was interrupted from destroying my neck/shoulder region (or unfortunately if you know why I was interrupted) because I really do think that if I continued on I would have had two grapefruits sitting at the top of my arms like a dot on an i.  Of course, reaching over my head or putting a shirt on wouldn’t be possible but dang it all, I’d’ve looked good! (I made that double contraction up. Work with it.

Function matters.  A lot.  I know we do not all have access to the top physical therapists out there (or have the awesome Heather on their staff) but it is worth it if you can at least once in your fitness career be evaluated for your weaknesses.  If you have tight hip flexors and weak glutes to begin with, when you go to do any of the exercises mentioned you run a high risk of not engaging your glutes properly thereby killing your progress.  You think that you aren’t doing enough so you keep doing more of the same and your weaknesses snowball from there.  If you train for function more than you train for form, you will be much better off.   The catch here is twofold:  1) to get over yourself enough to embrace a new way to train other than strict body part training and 2) to take the time off from hard training to do any necessary mobility work if need be.  How many of us really do anything preventative?

I know what you’re thinking.  “Then teach me to do it the right way, Jodi.  What am I missing?”  I can’t, it’s not my gig, but I know whose it is and I will give you that info at the end of this series.  I have a little more to talk about and I don’t want you to lose your focus by focusing on your bum which is the focus of this series.  You need to focus!  We haven’t even touched dieting, yet, and how you diet does make a difference in what your bum looks like.

Where does this leave you then?  What’s my point in drawing your attention to function and not form?  Balance.  Make sure that your program has balance.  Spread out the butt stuff throughout the week or do a good butt workout once, maybe twice in a week.  But do not go crazy and make every day a butt day by putting in something in every workout.  That’s not good.   Here are some guidelines for you:

1)      Limit the plyometric activity to no more than twice a week. This means sprints as well as pure plyos.  The pounding action of sprints and plyos take a toll on your spine and your feet.  Ease up, killah, before you look like your Aunt Ethel who is all of 4ft 3in by the time you’re done jumping.

2)      Have someone take a look at your program for obvious imbalances. You want to cover all planes of motion in a full body and have something with lateral movement if just a lower body.  Whether you do this in the warm up or in the program itself it doesn’t matter.  Just make sure your workout is not one big variation of the step up.

3)      Pay attention to injuries! So many times I talk to girls and they are working through some major junk like it’s nothing talking about, “I just need to look good for my…”  Listen, if you show up walking like Quasimodo, was it worth it to you?  Knock it off and see a physical therapist!

Nutrition is next.  Some radical supplementation talk for you butter butts and a few other things.  Hang tight.  Woop woop! )

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Emotion is a force that drives harder than a stampede of buffalo and is as secure as a tall glass of water sitting on the edge of a table…

I have wanted to do this series since the beginning of last year and have danced around the topic in a few posts since then but have never really “gone there” because this is so close to me.  Whenever I’m this close to a topic, it never really comes out the way I want because I struggle with getting the point out and making sense at the same time.  It’s like I have a conversation in my head and you’re supposed hop in at any time and figure that out. Ha!  Good luck with that.  With this series, though, I know what the hard part is going to be so why not tell you what that is beforehand so you may be prepared in case I begin to become confusing or go over your head in some way?  If you are going to successfully navigate through this series, there are 3 things you will need to recognize as you follow along all week:

There is an internal GPS device that drives us goal oriented folk, whether we acknowledge it or not.  Some of us are super aware of it and it almost seems obvious and silly to mention, sort of like, “Duh. I’m goal oriented.”  However, some of us never realize how much it is driving us until it suddenly stops working one day and then we’re left thinking, “What the heck was that?”  Everything about us operates around that GPS device.  How we treat others, how we treat ourselves, how we handle our jobs/career and even how we handle our relationships is all preprogrammed into that device that is hidden away in us somewhere way out of our view.

To be fair, the less psycho, goal oriented folk have it, too.  It’s not like they are doomed to a life of aimlessness because they are not taskmasters like us.  It’s more like they have compasses, though, or paper charts and trip-tiks than they have GPS devices.  Ours seem to be much more precise, much more focused which cause us to move with a force and speed in life that is undeniable.  This doesn’t mean that we are super successful or anything because that is not a prerequisite.  It means that if we’re hanging laundry somewhere, we’re hanging laundry somewhere.  It will be done efficiently, with fervor, purpose and zeal.  We may measure out the space or research the best place to hang our laundry.  We may hang more laundry at one time than the average woman would ever hang.  Or we work on several techniques to hang the laundry, visiting other laundromats to make sure we were doing a good job.    Then we move on to hanging laundry while folding at the same time, too.  Then we master folding.  Then we master hanging and folding in several different formats making sure that we stay current in both the hanging world and the folding world.  THEN we want people to know that we are the masters of the hanging world, the folding world *and* the hanging and folding world together.   Most importantly, we want to be recognized for it.  Make no mistake about that.  It’s not enough to do this or learn about it; someone somewhere needs to recognize it.

I use laundry as an example on purpose because the mode in which you burned yourself out has nothing to do with the fact that you burned yourself out.  You may be tempted to blow off this whole series as not pertaining to you if I used an athlete as an example and you don’t feel athletic at all.  Or if I used dieting as an example, you may think that that wasn’t what kept you from running that race so this is about someone other than you because you are the athlete.  I want to make sure I emphasize that it doesn’t matter what you were driven about or whether or not you accomplished your goal, what matters is that your drive is gone.  The GPS signal went dead and now you have no idea where you are going because you have no compass of your own, no paper map to fall back on and no drive to make it happen.

Recognition #1: It’s not about {XYZ}, it’s about my GPS device.  And the question is, “Why did it burn out?”

Once we have lost our way, the chaos and mayhem that follows can be overwhelming:  up and down eating, in and out of the gym, no type of normalcy in our eating or exercising, endless guilt, confusion, questioning our worth, countless attempts to get going again only to have them end in failure.  Each time we try to go back to where we left off but fail to make it happen, we sink deeper into a pit that may show up as anger, depression, resentment or passivity.  It’s either we’re mad at the world, beaten down by the world, sticking our middle finger up at the world or we walk away from the world.  No matter what, we cannot get back who we once were no matter how hard we try.

Recognition #2: No matter what I do, the woman who once was, is now gone and I have to own that.  However, that’s not a bad thing.

It is at this point that all of our stories begin to go in different directions.  Whether we choose to be introspective or stay more on the surface and become more task driven, the journey we take is ours and ours alone.  For me, I went so deep inside that I almost got stuck in my colon for a minute there and wasn’t sure I could get out again.  It has been awesome and hard all at the same time and I want the same thing for you.  But there is work to be done and it is more than just picking another event.  There is a bit of soul searching to do and some realizations that need to be made about ourselves if we are ever to get that drive back again to the degree that was there before AND in a healthier way.  Not everything I say is going to ring true for you, but some aspect of it will.  Take what is yours, leave all else on the screen.

Recognition #3: Ok, I get it.  This series is not “my answer” but the beginning to “my process”.  Getting my drive back is directly related to the amount of digging I am willing to do.

As always, ladies, I cannot wait to hear from you.  Email me, comment below or send a carrier pigeon to my house.  Who cares.  But let me know what you’re thinking…  Cool?  Woop woop!

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For the sake of keeping in line with Heather’s hot legs Monday’s post…

It’s getting warmer.

I love it. I am feeling human again.

Can you smell it? Can you hear it? (Honestly, I may hurt the bird that has made his new residence right under my bedroom window. Love nature but really?) Can you feel it?

It’s Sprint time! I mean…spring time!

It is that awesome time of the year when we get outside, shake off the dust from the forced hot air heaters in our houses and live a little. YAY!! I am like a completely different person in the summer and you would think that I would move to a warmer climate but alas, I cannot. Things like bugs, tornadoes, hurricanes, earthquakes and tsunamis keep me in New England so instead I just worship the warmth when it shows up briefly 4 to 5 months out of the year.

But now is the time when most of y’alls fall into the same old 3 to 5 mile run that you do every day because it helps you to “think” or “it’s the only thing that helped (notice past tense) me lose weight” or “it wipes me out (yet you haven’t lost a pound for months)” and you refuse to change or cross train because you either do not want to or you do not know how. Let me help you out with that…

Here are 2 simple ways to liven up your everyday run and add enough intensity change to get your body to respond:

Short Distance Sprint
If you have a 3 to 5 mile flat course that you run every day, change it up with sprints by adding them in the middle of your run. You can do these two ways: stop and pick an area to run a set of sprints or incorporate them into the run and they are part of the overall distance. Either way, instead of racking your brain for distance (50m, 100m, etc), do it for time. If you want to do this separate from your run, after running a 1 mile warm up, find a remote straight away and perform 9—12 sec sprints. Run 3 sprints back to back with a 30 sec rest in between and then rest a full 3 to 5 min by walking around the area slowly. Repeat that whole sequence 2 more times to complete 9 sprints in total. If you want to do this in the run, warm up the same and sprint for 12 secs but now add a min rest in between each sprint and be sure to slow down between them more than your base pace.

Longer Distance Sprint
Take the above scenario in terms of distance and terrain. Now add a bunch of “400’s” instead of “100’s” into the mix. Truly, you cannot do many of these if you do them right. In the beginning, shoot for 3—400’s, if that doesn’t make you bleed from an orifice then try 4—400’s and so on. I would incorporate these into the run—not separately—so make sure you have a good idea of what your base pace is so that you know the distinction between the speeds you are about to run at. After your warm up, you are going to run at your fastest pace JUST short of all out. This means you will not run as fast as the 100 but you will run much faster than your 5 mile pace. Do not rack your brain for distance, instead, run for 1:45 and you will be pretty close to 400m. Once you complete it, drastically slow your run down but do not go to a walk if you can help it. Stay there for 4 min and then complete the next 400. Do that one more time and finish off your run at normal pace. Your legs should feel like jello.

Get out there and get moving if you live up north. Let us know how you do, all of us are sprinters at heart here and we’d love to know how you’re doing. Have fun! Woop woop!

 This is a reprint of my one of my favorite posts from MP4.  I picked it because I needed a reason to put this chick’s photo on the blog again.  Holy mother of pearl…

1. Be on a team.
Yes…you are a badass. You have incredible talent and you are gunning for number one. But when you get there and you are all alone, or you miss it and you are all alone, you will begin to wonder ‘why’ you are doing what you are doing. Teams fill in the “why”. Having fun, camaraderie, personal bonds, learning to be selfless is what a team is all about. Pushing harder because it helps others or giving more because it benefits the whole gives you a feeling of satisfaction that you cannot describe to anyone and one that you will always treasure. At some point every athlete should be on a team and learn how to take direction, move as a unit and go beyond what they could ever achieve as a solo athlete.
2. Be solo.
So you have always been on a team all of your life and you love it. You know how to fight for the greater good and give it your all for the team but now I have some questions for you: Are you hiding behind your team? Do you think that you do not *deserve* to do better because others on your team are “better” than you? Do you depend on your team so much that you no longer know how to be self sufficient? What make teams effective are individuals. Yes, you work as a group but you bring your own thing to the table. If you have been on a team so long that you no longer have an identity of your own, you are not helping the team—you are weighing them down. Know who you are as a person/athlete and then bring those assets to your team on a silver platter as a presentation (sort of like what cats do when they leave dead birds at your doorstep.) You are meant to contribute. You are meant to count. You won’t know what you are made of and how good you are until you only have you to count on.
3. Learn.
Before I even go here and talk about this I need to say, “Get over yourself”. Every athlete thinks they are great learners. They know the best supplements, the best methods to achieve “fill in the blank” and so on. They are in every book and on every website and if this is you then you *know* a lot but you may have not learned anything. No, you know you have learned something when you have had your butt handed to you by someone else because you thought you knew everything. The faster you realize that there is a vast difference between book knowledge and application, the quicker you will go from knowing to learning. Drop the know-it-all, humble yourself and learn.
4. Forget.
This is a hard one but man do you need to know how to do it as fast as possible. Forget that loss. Forget the time you wasted following the latest trend. Forget the money you spent on some new fangled piece of equipment that didn’t get you anywhere. Forget your past mistakes on the emotional level so that you may learn from them on the rational level. If you cannot do this, you will spend a ginormous amount of time in the land of would-a, could-a, should-a and what a shame that will be. Your pride, your emotion, as much as a fuel as it can be it can also be the heaviest anchor in your life. Know how to let those things go emotionally. Carrying baggage around with you from 2 seasons before is not going to help you out. Drop the pity party and run with the experience you will begin to see the benefits of the past mistakes instead of just the past mistakes.
5. Forgive.
You must know how to cut yourself some slack. Yes, you missed the winning goal, you slept late and missed practice and now the team will suffer for your slackdom, you didn’t know XYZ was a banned substance and now you feel like a fool. You are going to make mistakes. Lots of them. You are going to be preoccupied with life at times and not give your all—you’re human. You are not Arnie the All Star Athlete so you cannot push through the pain of your injury—no worries, heal up in time for the next game. Basically what I am saying here is “get off of your back”. Now your once positive self talk is becoming mindless negative chatter. Forgive. Forget emotion. Learn. Perform. Cool? No one is thinking anywhere NEAR as bad about you the way you are and it’s not doing anything for you.

I know you’re asking, “What does this picture have to do with this post?  And I’ll admit it…nothing.  I’m obsessed with it, though.  Isn’t Heather (Monday girl) hot?   Any chance I get to throw it in, I will.

6. Succeed.
This one seems like everyone knows how to do it but it is so not true. So many people think so low of themselves that success is just a word to them, not an actual thing. You must be able to see yourself achieving something in reality, not just in dreams (you know, where you see people holding a parade for you because you are so amazing.) As necessary as dreams are, they also become limiting by providing you a place to hide. Because you have relegated them to fantasy status, you no longer think of it as something you achieve. I am not saying that you should not dream, I am saying make sure your idea of success matches up with your day dreams and that your everyday action has put you on that course. If not, you really do not believe that you can succeed, you just believe that you can dream.
7. Quit.
Not only do you need to know how to walk away from something with dignity, but you also need to learn how to walk away from something without dignity (refer to #3 when I discuss having your butt handed to you.) I know that people say you shouldn’t quit anything but that is crap. Quit—and by golly, quit fast. Injury, debt, sense of being lost—ie. no purpose to what you are doing, resentment, etc. are signs that you should walk away from whatever it is you are doing and yes, you are quitting but so what. Really you are exercising good judgment by walking away before you truly had a mess on your hands. If you are quitting because it is hard, then no, you do not get a free pass here and that is not the same thing. Get your behind back on the band wagon and stop complaining. No, this message is for those who need to know “when”. When it’s time to ‘call it a day.’ It’s hard, but someone has to do it. And then forgive yourself and forget emotion.
8. Fail.
Don’t hold back on this one. Fail big. The bigger the failure, the better the rebound (that is if you can learn, forgive and forget emotion.) and who doesn’t want an awesome comeback story? If you are always winning then just know that you could be even better than you are now simply because you have not found your Achilles heel, yet. One tough win or loss and you will soon find out what you do not know. Either look for tougher competition or broaden your horizon, but you will not be the best you can be til you fail.
9. Come in second.
You want to have the character that others admire? You want to be the athlete your teammates look up to? Know how to come in second. Losing from a landslide is much easier than losing by one point. Being a figure skater and getting the silver when you think you should have had the gold is hard. Accepting the silver medal with a smile on your face is even harder. Being gracious when you may not feel it is a true sign of character. Turning that “loss” into a win by learning from it is a gift you want to be given. Before you cut up like a clown and claim you were robbed because the referee made a bad call, take a look at all the eyes that are on you. Do you want to show them your worth or your ass? Your choice.
10. Win.
This is a combo of both “success”, where you must know how to do this, and “come in 2nd”, where humility is a rare treat. On the one hand you must know how to win. As a team or an individual, you must be able to see this happening. You must believe you are worthy and you must be confident enough to make this happen. Many a team has fallen apart in the playoffs because they simply didn’t believe they could do it when they really could have. On the other hand, if you are doing the humpty dance at the goal line for 5 minutes and then running around like a complete jackass whooping and hollering because you won, you have just successfully made everyone wish you lost—even your home town. You need to have a good balance of confidence and humility so you can win but then keep your head on tight enough to show excitement without being crass. This is a tough one that I hope everyone has a chance to learn how to do.

This is the longest post you may ever get out of me! Haha! Hope you enjoyed and if you can think of more, please add them below. We love to know what you think.

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!!

Life has a funny way of happening. Just when you think you know what’s going on in the world, it all changes on you…

If you are popping over here for the first time from Model Per4mance, welcome, this is your new home. If you were already reading Jodiojo before Model Per4mance, hi, it’s good to see you again. It feels good to be back and even better to bring my closest friends with me.

I remember a time when I was a brand new trainer—straight from the world of group fitness—and I absolutely loved the craft. I was a full time engineer during the day and would leave my job to head right to the gym for the rest of the night to train clients and teach class. Eventually I ended up leaving my engineering position to become a full time trainer at night and a stay at home mommy by day. That time was magical. I could not learn enough, fast enough and it was awesome.

As time went on I ventured into nutrition and became a Nutrition Manager at a time when very few people were even thinking about mixing nutrition and personal training. It was still very taboo back then due to liability reasons, lack of adequate certifications and so on. It was a very different time. But it was an exciting time: the industry was booming, information was new and accurate, people really cared about the welfare of the client, there was a tradeshow around every corner to get the newest info out there and it was hot. Flash forward to today and you have a very different picture of the industry. Trust me when I say I am not going to sit here and go on and on about all of the things that are wrong with my true passion today–I honestly love it too much to do that. But I will say that it is not the same and I know that you notice it, too.

I am not sure if you are like me, but I am going to have to go out on a limb and think that you are pretty close and assume that you are bombarded day after day with this harsh world. In fact, traffic alone could beat you down for the day never mind coming in contact with folks at the grocery store who are in a hurry or the six o’clock news tragedies which bring us down even further. Then when we arrive home we have to face the mail, a demanding house of laundry, etc. and for some of us, little ones who need us to encourage and edify their lives. Oh, and can you hurry up and make dinner? By the end of the night we fall into bed wondering what in Heaven’s name we are doing and is this all that life has truly promised us? Really?

Somewhere in all that mess of the day you find yourself wanting more for your health and your body. You’re not happy with the way it looks: it’s either out of shape from neglect/illness/medication, not what it used to be no matter what you try, heavier than you would like although you continue to try every diet/exercise program or right size but nothing is in the same place anymore. What’s your answer? This current industry which seems to have the quick fix for you or the latest scientific reason as to “why” you are not losing weight: you should be eating like a caveman, enjoying South Beach, running from starches, no wait—it’s dairy, sugar, gluten, fill-in-the-blank and for some us it’s everything I just listed?! They are shouting from every roof top and they are getting louder by the minute. Meanwhile, you’re getting a headache or heavier—or both. You are not sure which one to try or you are tired of trying them all because no matter what happens you don’t have the time to cook, track, pay attention, keep up with, follow, stay consistent with and so on. So the industry tries to answer that problem by making each diet plan/exercise plan either more extreme to beat you into shape faster (doing high intensity workouts 5 days/week for 3 months straight is not the answer) or more restrictive to make it easier for you to follow (limiting you to 3 out of the 4 food groups with a bunch of rules is a great way to set up some eating issues instead long term success). What really ends up happening is you just become a bucket of guilt because you can’t stay focused and you think everyone else can and how is everyone else getting it done and why can’t you get it done and is it my metabolism or I’m not working out hard enough or…is this sounding familiar?

Let me let you in on a secret: you don’t live in a vacuum. Honestly. You do not live independent of your surroundings and they are going to affect you much more than you give them credit for. You are also not a motor moron. You really do want to learn some truth out there without having to take a course in physiology 101 (I know it helps to understand why you do what you do, but can we at least make it fun?) from your local trainer but where in heaven’s name can you do that? Jeez! I thought you would never ask (and quite frankly, I couldn’t go on too much longer with the story, haha!)…

Welcome to JODIOJO and Company. We are a group of women dedicated to nutrition, training and lifestyle and not in the way that you are used to seeing it. Whenever you find a lifestyle site it is always something like ‘choose this more often’ or ‘walk instead of blah blah’ or very rudimentary tips that you have moved past years ago. And actually, even better example of what I mean is they are always in the form of “tips”. I love a good tip just as much as the next gal but when I have 10 tips and no cohesive way to put them together, what I really have is frustration about 2 weeks later when I can now only remember 3 of 10 tips I was just given. How about learning how to live life an effective way? A healthy way. A sustainable way. There is more to life than just choosing the right foods. There is choosing the right foods after a long day when you failed to plan ahead because your son told you the night before that he needed help with a project he just started and it was due the next day and he told you while you sitting in the middle of your daughter’s recital that was going until 8 pm and you, yourself, have to at least start laundry because you are down to your last pair of underwear and *gasp* (take in as much air as possible here)… have I made my point? How do you continue to get it done when life won’t let you and why do you not have the motivation to do so?

Journey with us as we find our voice here, introduce ourselves to you—5 very unique women with very different stories of how to get it done—and teach you a thing or two about health and fitness in the process.

Monday Heather
Tuesday Amy
Wednesday Seanna
Thursday Jodi
Friday Nicole

For the next four days I will tell you all about our passions through the companies all of us represent through Jodiojo:

www.ModelPer4mance.com
Thinking about a 5K, 10K or ½ marathon? Avid skier? Want the career and the recreational goal to keep you going? I will talk about this one tomorrow.

www.trans4mationstation.com (coming Jan 2011)
Want a body that looks good in or out of the jeans? If looking good naked is a thing that you desire, here’s your solution. I will tell you all about this on Wednesday.

www.jonesin4fitness.com (coming Mar 2011 or sooner)
Have you already reached your goal and just want to some fun workouts? Do you want to know how to fit it all in through hearing someone talk about it? Or maybe just learn some new stuff in the industry? This is our online store of workout packs, mp3’s, webinars and so on. More info and background on how this all fits together on Thursday.

www.Body4Christonline.com (blog coming Jan 2011, site Feb 2011)
I have so much to say on this one that I invite you to join me on Friday as to what this is going to be and what it’s all about. I cannot wait!

We invite you to get to know us here at Jodiojo and if you desire to work with us or learn more from us, the above sites are the way to do it. Over the next 3 months we will unveil all of our new endeavors and what we have been doing behind the scenes for over 5 months now. The blog will cover the same relevant topics and much more as now our scope has broadened and we have much more to focus on.

Thank you so much for making 2010 the best year a new company could ever ask for. Your support has meant everything to us. We know you will love the changes and additions that are coming. See you tomorrow (make sure you do not miss it) as I delve into the world of recreational sports. Bye for now!

You ever have one of those days when you just “got nothin’”?  Do you force it in the gym or do you know how to adjust your training?  How in tune are you with your body and your goals to be able to change things up at a moment’s notice?  The robot mindset has got to go.  Read on…

 I get lots of questions all the time about people’s training: when they should train harder or how to get stronger and etc.  And if you have ever been unfortunate enough to ask me whether you should train or not when you are sick, you know it can be as painful as performing a bikini wax on Sasquatch—really, don’t ask! 

 People can talk about common sense and intuition and all that jazz but I want to talk about your goals.  Are they really that important that you lose all sanity and consider hacking up a lung on a cardio machine or tossing an 8 pound weight around because you can’t imagine lifting anything heavier?  Really?  No, really?  And do you really have to ask someone if you have to work out or not?  The fact that you look like the poster child for the H1N1 vaccination is not enough of a deterrent for you; no you have to go and do that work out because your paper says so.  See, it says it right here, “Legs on Monday.”

At some point in your training you are going to have to take responsibility for your results…because they are your results.  No matter how good your trainer is, the results you walk around with are yours.  You did the cardio.  You ate the food.  You lifted the weight.  Yes, we guide you and we love to do it, but we are only with you 1 to 3 hours per week and we guide your plan from afar the rest of the time.  If you have any trainer worth their salt then you should be learning as well as you are doing.  We honestly don’t want you as clients for life that just aimlessly move from exercise to exercise in the gym. (Well the paper said leg press 3 X 10 and the machine was broken so I just skipped it.  OY VEY!)  Instead we want you to own your program and all that comes with it.  If you feel like crap—back it down!  If you feel like a hero and it’s an off day, switch your schedule around!  Start listening to your body and all that it tells you so you can help us to help you more.

I’m not saying add in extra volume or begin to make up a new program, I’m saying if you are scheduled to work out on Monday, Wednesday and Friday and you feel like crap on Wednesday but Superman on Thursday, then switch it up!  Change what you do when you need to so that you have ownership of your results!  Also, if you already know that Thursday is going to be a draining day in work and Friday’s workout is psychotic, change it around ahead of time.

I wish I could predict how you are going to recover from a work out or an activity.  I wish I could look at you and say, “By the 3^rd week you will be ready to progress to the next level.”  Umm, I can’t do that—but you can.  So let’s take this one step further.  What happens if you are on a program that has you upping the intensity the same week that you are moving from one place to another?  Do you really think that you can increase your volume/intensity that week and then on Saturday and Sunday successfully move a bed, 2 couches and a dining room table up two flights of stairs?  Think again killah!  You’ve got another thing coming.  Or better yet, Hercules, you do it but then find yourself on the injured reserve list by Sunday and cannot imagine why.  Now all of the gains you made are out the window because you are now couch bound for 2 weeks.

It’s not that hard to stop and think about what you really want out of your training.  A hot body.  More strength.  Visible muscles.  Basically you want a return for your effort.  You know how I feel about the machine we call the body and how we need to respect it or it will demand that respect from us in a most unpleasant way.  So knowing your goals, your restrictions and knowing that we are entering into the flu/holiday/busy season, all I’m asking is for you to work with us fitness professionals and try a tiny bit of self regulation.  Pull out the common sense, warm up the notion of taking responsibility, shake out the desire to get some real results and become proactive in your life!  Own your training, ya hear me?

With that being said, do you think I should lift tomorrow?  I’m awfully tired…;o)

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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So unrelated to this post but so worth sharing, this morning my husband was in the kitchen making my youngest son’s lunch (yes, read that and weep—woop woop!) when he dropped some of what he was putting in the lunch box on the floor.  My son, in the sweetest tone and facial expression said to him, ”It’s ok daddy.  It’s your fault, but it’s ok any way.” 

Honestly, don’t you wish you could have someone like that follow you around in life and just make you feel better about anything you may do “wrong” knowing you’d have that kind of support? 

Jail clerk, “It’s ok Ms. Jones.  You did take a baseball bat to the car in front of you at the light because it cut you off at the previous intersection—so yes it is your fault, but it’s ok any way.  Let me get you a soft pillow for your cell.”  *Sigh*

On to other things like six pack abs and a stellar performance!

“Ordering” your food (and I don’t mean, “I’ll take a large steak and cheese with pickles and tomatoes”) can make the difference in the outcome you want to achieve either aesthetically or performance-wise.  There are many different ways to align your food choices to elicit a different effect such as more definition, greater muscle gain and excellent recovery.  The following will give you some guidance as to how to put your menu together to get the most out of it:

Six Pack Abs:

I am constantly asked not ‘how can I get six pack abs?’ or even ‘can I get six pack abs?’ but ‘Can I have her six pack abs?  I want hers.’  I say the same thing every time I am asked, “Sure, go find her parents and ask them if they have any spare DNA.”  When it comes to definition, musculature, symmetry and etc. you are at the mercy of the genetic gods.  Get over it.  Wait…you missed this…

GET OVER IT.

If you have abs, you have them.  If you don’t, you don’t.  If you are female and 10% bodyfat and smooth as smooth in the belly but ripped up shoulders—guess what…you missed the ab boat.  If you are 18% bodyfat, large on the bottom, nice shoulders with a visible outline of a 6 pack—guess what…you just hit the lottery.  Where you wear your bodyfat is specific to you.  You can alter this (although be careful of what you wish for sometimes) if you stick with it long enough, but it requires due diligence.  So how can you maximize the chances of getting 6 pack abs?  Do not mix your starches with your fats. 

When you order your foods for the day, put a protein and a fruit/veggie in every meal and then decide which meal will get the starch that day and which meal will get the fat.  i.e.

MEAL 1                        ST

MEAL 2                        ST

MEAL 3                       

MEAL 4                        GFAT

MEAL 5                                               

Do you need to have your starches all in the morning?  Not necessarily, depends on when you are working out.  But I would separate them from your major serving of fat by at least one meal.  This does not kick into effect until you get within 5 to 10 pounds of goal weight.  If you have 30 to lose, head over to Order In the Court.

Stronger, Faster:

I am sure you have figured out by now that I do not believe that you need to sacrifice your physique to perform well.  I believe you can go for both without having to have to choose until you want to go to the highest level for either.  Whenever I say this I always get the person who points out many an athlete who is on the national circuit who looks fabulous.  These athletes are always the elite athletes who again, were blessed by the genetic gods in both talent and body.  They don’t count.  However, their parents DNA is for sale–hurry up and get it while it’s in stock. 

Now, if you’re reading this you are not one of them therefore you must think about you and your situation which requires a bit more attention than theirs does.  If you want to perform beautifully, then you need to think in terms of recovering and in terms of dieting.  So you end up with a hodge podge of days:

                    TRAINING                    TRANSITION                    DIETING

MEAL 1             ST                                ST                                ST

MEAL 2             ST                                ST                                ST

MEAL 3             ST/GFAT                      (GFAT)                        

MEAL 4                                                ST                               GFAT

MEAL 5             ST/GFAT                      (GFAT)                                    

MEAL 6 (TR)

Training is a day where your activity extends longer than 90 min. and you need maximum recovery.  Transition is an active day where your training is 90min. or less so you need to fuel but not too much.  Dieting is a day where your activity is an hour or less and you are just like everybody else doing cardio. 

When you mix up your days like this, you are truly serious about performing well and looking good both at the same time.

Behemoth:

Muscle gain.  Man is this a loaded subject or what?  It’s the hardest thing to get folks to understand–even more so than the elusive 6 pack abs.  If you want more muscle you need to eat more food. Simple as that. You know and I know there is more to it than that but 9 out of ten times when I get a client, male or female, who wants to get “bigger” and I check out their diet they are not eating enough.  Why?  “I want to get bigger but I don’t want to gain any weight.”  Really?  I want to pay my mortgage but I don’t want to use my money.  Do you think the bank wants a great diet plan to help them out instead?

I don’t know where this started but I honestly would pay money to make it go away.  Please, resign yourself to the fact that if you want to put on muscle, you will have to gain some weight.  Do you need to go up 25?  No, total waste of your time because you will lose much of what you gain in muscle having to diet that long to get off all that extra poundage.  But you will need to go up by *something*.  That means you cannot have 6 pack abs during a building phase.  So…

GET OVER IT.

Same concept as stronger faster but no transition day:

                        TRAINING                               DIETING

MEAL 1               ST                                          ST

MEAL 2               ST/GFAT                                ST

MEAL 3               ST                                                       

MEAL 4                                                            GFAT

MEAL 5               ST/GFAT                                                         

MEAL 6(TR)     

I Want What I Want

I do understand how this may seem easy to me because I do this all day long and so much work for you because this is the first time you are seeing it, but I cannot stress enough that if you want something more than what you have right now you are going to have to WORK for it.  If you want to do this on your own, you will truly have to learn how to do it.  There are short cuts and diet programs and etc. but they are made for the masses.  If you want to just complete the goal then please go that route.  It will simplify things and give you a foundation for you to build upon.  But if you have done that already and are looking for more, take the time to learn about what works for you and what does not.  You can do it with someone’s guidance or without.  To me, that’s a preference thing. Regardless, it will be work for you none-the-less.  Remember, there is JOY in the completion!

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I had a great discussion the other day with a client with whom I have a tremendous amount of respect.  We got to yapping about women and their goals and we hit an impasse.  We ended with us agreeing to disagree in a very respectful manner, but it got me thinking:  how honest are you about your goals?  And not just with other people, more importantly with yourself?

Let me give you what are discussion was about and then I’ll give you some quick background so you can see where I am coming from, and then I REALLY want you to weigh in on this matter.

My client, who I will refer to as Ethel (what? You don’t have a GF named Ethel? Sheesh!), believes that women set performance goals for the challenge.  She trains many of them for endurance events and for her they are driven by the goal.  When they come on to her team she warns them that they are going to gain weight while training for the event—not lose—and she says they are cool with that because it is all about the goal.     

Now I have a thoroughly different opinion.  Honestly, I have been dieting (men and) women for almost 12 years now.  I have a pretty good idea of the human psyche and what women are really like but more importantly, I know what secretly burns within them.  Everyone loves a challenge.  Everyone loves a goal.  Everyone loves a great cause.  And everyone wants to look good.  So to run a marathon for your Aunt Helen to raise money for the “X” Foundation is noble and it is rewarding and in the back of your mind…it is a great way to lose weight.  I feel that no matter what sport a woman plays, participates in or heck, goes to watch (LOL) she is doing it to look good—OH yeah!…and it’s a great challenge. 

Now here’s some background for you so you can understand where I am coming from:  When Ethel (yes, that’s her name!lol) gets a client in, she is their coach.  Her position is one of authority and expertise but it is not what I would call a confidential or confidant-type position.  You could go all the way to marathon day with her and never share much about your personal life with her.  Now does that happen?  Probably not, but hear me out.  My position is also one of authority and expertise, but it is COMPLETELY a position of confidentiality and trust.  Women tell me things they would never ever repeat to another female lest they be judged harshly.  If you have ever met me before you know I am not one to judge and I am not one to talk.  There are items in my house that I may never find again because I won’t tell myself where they are!  So because of this, I have soul bearing conversations with women that I don’t think they would even admit that they had a week later.  All of those conversations center around the fact that at the end of the day, they better look good.

So here are some things that you may hear and I will give you their interpretation:

“I really enjoy the challenge.” 

Or…I would never keep an exercise regimen going on my own to stay looking hot so I chose to do something really hard and tell everyone so I am forced to finish it.  I better lose weight while doing it.

“My girlfriend asked me to do it with her and I said, sure!”

Or…I’ll be damned if that chick gets a head start on me for the summer.  If she can do it, I can too!…Wench!

“I want to see if I can better my time.”

Or…I lost 3 pounds the first time and then gained back 7!  I’m going in for a second time and see if I can’t get rid of it for good!  As long as I blah blah, I’ll lose weight.

“I need a goal.”

Or…I’ll sit my lazy butt on this couch the whole winter if I don’t commit to something.  I cannot gain weight this season!

“I’m doing this for my blah blah.”

Or…and if I can lose a few pounds while supporting Aunt Betty Anne, it’s a win-win for everybody!

“I really need to start and finish something big.”

…other than this bag of chips in front of me.  I better lose at 10 pounds running this race!

“I just want to do it one time to say I did it.”

Or…I am not convinced that I could get hot without it so I am going to sign up for this asinine challenge.  My boyfriend better appreciate what I’m about to go through….bastard!  I better lose cuz I’m only doing this once!

So this is my reality.  Girls will give their friends a lot of good ‘air time’ filled with meaningful platitudes and then they’ll become super intense on me, draw close to me and tell me that if I do not make them hot while they are doing XYZ, that it’s going down!  EEK!

But this all stems from the fact that no one wants to admit to themselves—never mind some total stranger—that they are about to do a life changing event for aesthetic reasons.  The desire and want is there, but why admit it when you can hide behind the noble cause.  Now why does it matter you might ask?  What’s the harm in hiding behind a goal?  A lot.

First, it sets the tone of your training.  So if you really were about your body and not your overall goal of doing well in the event, no matter how well you do in the event you will always be disappointed if you come out heavier than you went in.  Second, you may begin to change your behavior or eating habits to facilitate an unrealistic physique goal thereby jeopardizing a solid performance goal.  Lastly, you may begin to lose sight of rational thinking and have a one track mind that is not setting you on a good path of health and beauty.  No matter what, a goal built on dishonesty is no goal to have.

So I want to know.  How honest are you about your goals?  Seriously.  Are you participating in a sport for the sport or for the hidden benefits like a hot body?  Have you ever thought this much about it?  Would you do an event if it meant that you would gain weight or would you pass on it?  LMK what you think!  Am I off track?  Talk to me!!  Ethel wants to know too!