Articles
"Watching Your Diet"
This is an excerpt from Steve's book "Fitness And
More"
Watching your diet
is an interesting part of the program. So much has been written
about diets that most people really don’t know what’s right or
wrong. We’re going to try to fix that problem with this section.
What you have to understand about diet is a calorie is a
calorie. You can’t change that fact no matter how hard you try.
Let me illustrate how this point relates to weight loss. If you
need 2000 calories per day to maintain your existing bodyweight
and you eat the most nutritious foods around, but you eat 2200
calories, guess what—you’re not going to lose weight. If, on the
other hand, you eat nothing but 1700 calories in the form of
candy you will lose weight. The reason is that fat is basically
stored food. If you eat more food than you need, it will be
stored at fat. If you eat less food than you need, your body
will use some of the previously stored food for energy, thereby
reducing your fat levels. Now, I’m not advocating that you eat
candy bars all day long, I’m just trying to make a point. The
best thing to do would be to eat fewer calories, but in the form
of nutritious food.
Exercise Only for Weight Loss
"A Common Mistake"
If you are trying to use exercise as a primary means for weight loss you are making a huge mistake. I have had a lot of people come to me and say that they are just not able to lose weight even though they exercise everyday. Exercise plays an important role in our weight loss but the role that it plays is secondary. The primary role for weight loss is watching your diet. The extra exercise that people do for weight loss usually fails because they do not reduce their daily caloric intake. Moreover, it dips into ones recovery system and adds undue stress. Exercise is a form of stress; too much exercise equals too much stress. That takes away from a healthy lifestyle. The problem can be alleviated with administering the proper amount of exercise and finding a particular eating plan that works for the individual.
I know that sounds rather simplistic but it is true. The hardest part with helping people to put together a practical and sound fitness plan is trying to retrain old thought patterns. Here is what I mean. A person recently came to me with this very problem. I explained to this individual the fact that you generally cannot exercise away body fat. I explained the simple approach of weight training, walking and watching your diet to them. After that explanation this person still wanted to do aerobic exercise for at least one hour per day and take a haphazard approach to diet. It was if I had not said anything to them at all! The point? The 3-W approach to fitness is the safest, sanest, healthiest and most practical way to go. It is so simple that people have trouble believing that it actually works. Yet, it does work. So use the system and watch the results come!
Once A Week Training
"Can it Work for You?"
A hot topic in the fitness world is training with weights just one time per week. Some people have said that you don’t need aerobic work at all if you follow this method.
In the field of fitness more than any other field “gimmicks” sell. So you need to be very careful of the “new” products and services that come to the market. However, I have had great results with training people one time per week. Now, the argument that people can make is that those sedentary, untrained individuals would make gains on any program. To me it makes a lot more sense to train one time per week and get results than to train five times per week and get the same results!
The reason I have used the one time per week training is more of client convenience than anything. I don’t necessarily worry about what people should do; I am more concerned with what people can do! A lot of people do not have time to train more than one time per week, so this regiment works perfect.
As far as weight training only one time per week for total fitness, I would have to disagree. My research and the research of other professional trainers with whom I confer, indicates that some form of low impact aerobic activity is necessary. And if weight loss is the goal, you can’t get around the fact that how much you eat has a more direct affect on how you much you weigh than anything else, exercise included!
Another point to ponder is, does this type of training work for everybody? I would say that although we are the same in a lot of ways, i.e. we need air to breathe food to eat, etc. We differ in the administration and response to exercise. Some people need more exercise than others. This has to do with age, hormone levels, individual recovery time, personal preference and other factors. So one size doesn’t necessarily fit all! However, one time per week training can be a great starting place for beginners. Then you can monitor results and see if you need more training or in some extreme cases, less training!
So don’t take anybody’s word on exercise as the final fact, that includes mine. Think about your training and how you respond to it and make necessary adjustments. Your body is not static it is ever changing! So your exercise prescription must change with it!
To learn more about fitness, request a copy of the manual "Fitness and More".
