Category Archives: Training
Hungry? You Should Be
If you are trying to change your body composition, hunger is a good thing.
hun·ger
verb /ˈhəNGgər/
(1) Feel or suffer hunger through lack of food
If your goal is to get lean, you will likely be on a dietary plan that restricts the amount of food you eat. This will undoubtedly result in some amount of hunger as your body learns to function with fewer calories than its used to. And whether you eat three moderate sized meals per day or six smaller meals per day, the reality is that with less food, at some point you will be physically HUNGRY.
What do you do when this happens? If you are serious about losing weight, you deal with it. A certain amount of physical hunger is a good thing, because it means you are consuming less than what your body “needs” to maintain its current weight.
I’m not saying you should be famished or hungry to the point of feeling faint, as that would clearly mean you’re not eating enough for basic functioning; however, a little growl of your tummy at night before you go to bed (because dinner was 3 hours ago) can be a friendly reminder that you are doing the right thing. Resist the urge to have a snack before bed…you’re just going to sleep anyway, you don’t need to eat! You’ll have a nice healthy breakfast when you wake up in the morning.
Your diet will likely also restrict the kinds of foods you are allowed to eat, and as such you’re also likely to be “hungry” for things that are not on your diet plan. While most of these pains will be psychological (you don’t need Kettle Chips), some of them may be true physical withdrawals from highly addictive foods, like sugar. What do you do when you want something that you can’t have? Again, if you’re serious about your goal, you deal with it. Many of the things we love to eat – full of fat, sugar, and salt – are precisely what will hold us back from reaching our physique goals. I’m not saying you can never again have chocolate cake, linguine, or whatever it is that you love (shh…don’t tell Nate I said that!); however, during this “lean-up” phase, you must stay the course and not give in to the call (or scream) of these cravings.
How can you manage these nagging physical signals that keep coming at you? With yet another kind of hunger.
hun·ger
verb /ˈhəNGgər/
(2) Have a strong desire or craving for
How strong is your desire to reach your physique goals? In order to succeed, it must be greater than that of both kinds of hunger above (combined!). That’s a pretty tall order.
This is where it truly is mind over matter. This is the hunger you want to feed, and to use to your benefit. Believe in your mental fortitude, and use the motivation that is guiding you to make this change in your life. Are you training for an athletic competition? Do you have a special event coming up? Or are you finally putting you and your health at the top of your list of priorities? Whatever your reason, always keep this in the forefront of your mind, and use it as a shield to deflect – or sword to slay – the temptations when they attack. Who is more worthy of coming out victorious, you or that Oreo cookie? (See Nate, I can write with the Warrior theme!)
Whatever your reason, whatever your motivation, grab onto it and hold tight. Use some of the recommendations on our site to help you through the challenges and temptations you will face (stick with us, there will be more!). In time, the physical hunger will become more manageable, and by learning to harness your mental hunger, your desire for success will fuel your efforts to persevere, and help you achieve your goals.
If we were to meet The Most Interesting Woman in the Universe she might just say, “Stay Hungry, My Friends.”
Q: Is “Body-For-Life” a good way to get ripped?
ANSWER:
Well first off, I gotta’ question for you, and those following this. Does anyone else think the new T-mobile girl is hot? Is it just me? Some of my friends think I’m crazy, which makes me think I may be going crazy. That is entirely possible.
Ok Body For Life? Lets get this thing rolling.
If your goals are purely cosmetic (appearance first, performance second or not at all) which it sounds like they are, and you plan to consistently engage in a regular strength training program — which it sounds like you do, then I think Body For Life is one of the best commercial programs out there. I’d take it over any of the new trends towards low-carb or Paleo eating, or cross fit/cross-training.
Again, this is assuming regular anaerobic activity and appearance-based goals. If you are sedentary, a low-carb/Paleo-style diet is more appropriate because you aren’t burning a ton of carbohydrates and don’t need to replenish glycogen stores (a car sitting in the garage doesn’t need gas).
And if you have performace-based goals (improving strength, power, or muscular endurance), a cross-training program may be more appropriate. Programs geared towards performance should be different than those geared towards hypertrophy and fat loss. This reiterates what I’ve been saying on all along. There is no one universal program that is right for everyone, everywhere. The fitness industry needs to stop trying to slot everyone into one diet or training program. It should be the other way around. Every person needs to make sure their training program and diet MATCH their individual goals. Or in other words, prioritization necessitates specificity.
I’d say my nutrition advice has been influenced by several different resources: Paleo Nutrition, Sports Nutrition, the traditional Japanese Diet, and various authors in the fitness and bodybuilding communities — Bill Phillips and Body For Life being one of them. With your specific goals, I’d say you are heading down the right path. But pulling from my research and professional experiences, I’d say Body For Life is far from perfect. So I figured the best way to help you out is to go over the pros and cons of both the diet and training recommendations. You can decide from there what you think is the best approach.
Since diet has, by far, the biggest impact on body composition transformation, lets start there first.
BODY FOR LIFE DIET PROS:
1. Overall the diet composition and macronutrient ratios are basically a higher protein, moderate carbohydrate, lower fat approach. I think this is the best plan for anaerobic athletes. Sedentary folks (or those who are obese and/or diabetic, pre-diabetic, insulin resistant) would follow a more moderate protein, lower carbohydrate, higher healthy fat approach. But you ain’t sedentary right?
2. Each meal/snack is centered around a LEAN protein source. This helps provide the steady stream of amino acids you will need to initiate protein synthesis and build/maintain muscle. It also helps control blood sugar, hunger cravings, and feelings of satiety.
3. You are instructed to include a serving of complex carbohydrate with each meal/snack. This provides the glucose your body needs to refill glycogen stores. Essentially, it provides the fuel you need for training, and provides the anabolic stimulus your body needs to build muscle and respond to training sessions (carbs, and the resulting insulin release, shuttle amino acids into the muscle cell to initiate protein synthesis). So despite what you’ve heard, insulin is not all bad, especially for the athlete. No NATURAL hormone your body makes is all good or all bad, you just have to use diet and lifestyle factors to control them. The combination with protein helps to moderate insulin release better than eating carbs alone.
4. SIMPLICITY. The diet basically says to combine a serving of lean protein with a serving of complex carbs at each meal and snack. How simple is that dude? He even gives you serving shortcuts — a serving of protein is about the size of a deck of cards, a serving of carbohydrates is about the size of a fist. No measuring or weighing necessary.
5. There are some cool transformation stories, and pictures of hot bodies (girls in bikini’s, guys in board shorts — whatever you prefer).
BODY FOR LIFE DIET CONS:
1. The author is (or at least was) the owner of the supplement company EAS. So the diet, at least in some part, was created to promote and push supplement sales. He recommends 3 of the 6 meals/snacks come from his protein shakes or bars. I disagree with this. Whole foods are always better than supplements. The shakes and bars can be used for convenience from time to time (its better than a cheeseburger), but they should not be the core foundation of your routine. Too many artificial, chemical ingredients.
2. 6 meals/snacks is too much for most people, and too inconvenient for those living in the real world. I recommend spreading calories over 4-5 meals.
3. FOOD choices. I like the lean proteins, but I don’t like all of the carb selection recommendations. I’m with the Paleo-crowd on this one. He recommends a lot of the whole grain bread and cereal products. These can be problematic for a lot of people because (1) most people have a sensitivity to gluten (the protein in wheat, rye, and barley), if not a full blown allergy and (2) whole grains contain anti-nutrients like lectins and phytates that block mineral absorption and can be very hard on the digestive tract.
I would stick to more natural carbohydrate sources — think caveman or cultural carbs — so things like yams, potatoes, rice varieties, vegetables, and 1-2 pieces of WHOLE fruit.
BODY FOR LIFE TRAINING PROS:
1. It was one of the first commercial programs to acknowledge the importance of strength training for FAT LOSS, not just building muscle. Strength training is crucial for fat loss because it helps build muscle, boost metabolism, improve insulin sensitivity, and stimulates natural lipolytic (fat-burning) hormones like growth hormone.
2. It emphasizes a 3-day a week strength training program, which is great. It is also realistic and sustainable for most people.
3. It uses simple, basic bodybuilding-style exercises, which I believe are the best for transforming a body, not the new-age circus acts that are going on in gyms today (stand on one foot on a Bosu ball, close your eyes, touch your nose, then do a dumbbell curl). That stuff looks cool, and is marketable, but the basics are the basics for a reason — they are far more effective. Just look at the bodies of some of the trainers prescribing some of the more complicated, “innovative” stuff. Do they even look like they work out? Remember, fitness trends come and go, but basic barbell and dumbbell exercises have stood the test of time.
BODY FOR LIFE TRAINING CONS:
1. In addition to the 3-days a week of strength training, he also recommends 3-days a week of high intensity cardio. I think this is way too much for most people to recover from. I think 4 days of high intensity activity is plenty for most NATURAL athletes. Beyond that, you start impairing recovery ability.
2. While I believe strength training should be the core of any fat loss plan, I think traditional cardio is overrated anyway.
3. Modifications. If I were to modify the training program I would just tell you to do 4 days of strength training and cut the traditional cardio. Or you can stick to the 3-days of strength training, and go outside and do some non-exercise specific walking on the days you were supposed to do the high-intensity cardio. Walk for your errands kind of a thing. This will allow you to burn a few extra calories without all of the negative drawbacks of traditional cardio (cortisol elevation, muscle loss, reduced testosterone levels, the need to wear high and tight running shorts, etc.).
*Last tip. You don’t need to buy the book. The website tells you all you need to know, and has the food lists, etc.
Alright, hope that helps.
The Benefits of Walking
I’ve repeated the following statement multiple times on this site and within articles for various publications: most people could cure their overweight blues, reduce insulin resistance, dramatically improve other biomarkers of health, and reach a reasonable, “healthy” bodyweight by improving their diet and WALKING alone, no formal exercise sessions necessary.
That’s something gyms, equipment manufacturers, supplement companies, and trainers don’t want you to hear or believe, because then you’d have no reason to pay for their expensive products or services. All you would need, which is all you really do need, is some knowledge, some personal accountability, and some consistent action. That’s the truth.
It doesn’t have to be getting your butt kicked by Bootcamp Betty/Meathead Mike, or Body Composition Bust. Nor should it be. There are various approaches (some more appropriate than others) depending on where you currently fall under the health and fitness spectrum.
Now, if you are an elite athlete and have higher aspirations of physique development: like toned legs, ripped arms, or a six-pack; that’s one ballgame. You’re going to need some Miyaki-style, samurai warrior-like strength training sessions. In other words, you ARE going to have to put up with a meathead like me, and that a$$-kicking IS what the doctor ordered for developing your cover model body. No mercy for the ridiculously vain (myself included)!
But for those who are overweight, de-conditioned, and just starting out, it’s a whole other ballgame in a vastly different ballpark. You need a much less aggressive plan of action so you don’t burn out, get injured, succumb to soreness misery, get fed up with gym meatheads/divas, and give up. For this demographic, I believe that walking, and a targeted, structured, and disciplined nutrition plan is the most productive and efficient route to results.
The problem is, people don’t want to change their nutritional approach, even though that is the most effective way to improving their overall health AND reaching their body composition goals. They don’t want to sacrifice a little, and stop (or at least cut back on) eating cheese fries, sugar, or the 100 different kinds of breakfast cereals. They think they can make up for that lack of dietary discipline with more or harder time in the fitness penitentiary.
If you are familiar with my philosophy, you know my feelings on that one. You can’t out-work a poor diet — you’ll be stuck in that jail cell forever. Trust me, if you could, I would be willing to go to the gym three hours every day just so I could eat onion rings and M&M’s afterwards. For most of us with average genetics, it just doesn’t work that way. Here is a sad truth, that I hope eventually sinks in with you:
The majority of gym-goers are wasting their time in the gym until they put some effort into improving their diets.
I know other trainers would disagree — “lets burn it off Betty, give me a B, a U, a R, a N, what’s that spell?” — but that has been my personal experience with my client base (and those of my closest colleagues) over the last ten years.
THE CAVEMAN THEME RETURNS
But this is a “training” habit, not a “diet” habit, so lets leave the nutrition preaching behind and get this Zoolander-style walk-off going.
What’s wrong with modern society? We just sit around too much. Human beings were made to move. We can always look back to caveman times, to what we evolved from, to see what we should be doing for optimum health. We are hunters and gatherers. Back in the days, our ancestors walked miles a day searching for animals to hunt or vegetables to gather. We didn’t sit in front of a computer screen all day. With modernization, we are wolves trapped in white collars’ clothing.
And we certainly didn’t ride a stationary bike, pedal away on an elliptical, run on a treadmill to exercise for the sake of exercising, or to try and formally “burn off” calories to make up for last night’s ice cream bender. Most of the time we walked, just as part of normal daily activities — to get stuff done. We may have sprinted towards prey or away from predators (anaerobic activity — like adding interval cardio or strength training), but 90% of our activity came in the form of walking.
Most people underestimate the power of at least partially returning to this caveman-style habit, and simply attempting to walk more during a typical day. They think that’s a B.S., “cheesy” fitness tip, or that it’s an aerobic class or 2-hour cardio session, or bust.
They think if they don’t have time to get to the gym, they might as well just do nothing and sit on their butts watching TV, playing video games, or surfing the internet. They sit around reading health and fitness magazines or websites to “research” the complicated routines they are going to do when they finally do get to the gym (which ends up being never, or rarely). They don’t think smaller, simpler steps, like just starting up walking every morning or evening, or adding some non-exercise specific activity into their day — like taking the stairs, etc.
THE BENEFITS OF WALKING
The fittest people I know understand the power of walking. They know that walking is a small yet powerful tool in their fitness arsenal. Here are some of the benefits:
1. Walking can give us many of the same benefits as traditional cardio — calorie burn, increased cardiovascular efficiency, lowered blood pressure, etc. — without all of the drawbacks — joint wear and tear, repetitive strain, negative hormonal impact (overdoing traditional cardio can lead to increased cortisol output and testosterone suppression). You may want to check out our “Best Damn Cardio Article” Series in our articles section.
2. It is convenient — it can be done anytime, anywhere, and can be squeezed in to any part of the day (even multiple times), not as a “formal” training session you have to plan for. No equipment or commute to the gym are necessary.
3. It is not as boring as staring at a wall. With some outdoor walking, you get varied stimulus — buildings, trees, restaurants, blue sky, hot girls or guys (whatever you prefer) out on the town, etc., all depending on where you decide to go.
4. It is a good stress reliever. With the high stress of corporate jobs and modern living, walking is a good way to unwind, take your mind off things, let your brain relax, etc. If work is stressing you out, you are anxious and tense, and you feel like you are going to kill your boss or yourself, take a walk to clear your head. It helps.
Listen, I’m too much of a stubborn, meathead athlete (I ain’t sitting or lying around on a yoga mat for extended periods of time), a workaholic (that’s where my mind goes these days when there’s free time), and a pervert (I think you know what I’m saying with this one), to meditate. It just doesn’t work for me.
But somehow when I’m walking, I’m able to clear my mind and relax a little bit. It is kind of like my active meditation — my body needs to be moving in order for the WB cartoon I have going on up in my head to shut off for half an hour. Maybe it will work for you too.
5. Because it is a leisurely activity, you can multi-task. You can take a walk with a friend or family member to catch up. You can “talk business” or have an informal meeting with a colleague or client while walking somewhere. It’s an active way to spend some time with your kids — they love to just go out and explore. You can even be annoying cell phone guy or girl while walking.
THE WALK MASTER
Here are some tips to include a little more walking into your life. See if any of them are applicable for you:
1. Get up a half an hour earlier and take a morning walk.
2. Walk to get your coffee or tea on your midmorning or mid-afternoon break, but skip the pastries. You are walking to get rid of the muffin top, not add to it.
3. Take a walk at lunch and then eat at your desk.
4. Walk with the kids before dinner.
5. Walk to take care of some errands (i.e., drop mail off, etc.)
6. Catch up with someone over a walk.
7. If you live in a city, walk to your destination instead of driving or taking public transportation.
8. Do something active on the weekend: walk on the beach, go for a hike, walk to the grocery store, etc.
9. Cliché I know, but take the stairs instead of the elevator.
I’m sure you could think of some more opportunities within your specific daily routine to fit in a little more movement.
WRAP-UP
I know I ramble a lot, so I want to leave you with a little slogan to remember.
Stop eating refined/processed foods, Start walking more, and “every little (health & fitness) thing is gonna be alright.”
Principle #4 – The Riddle of Iron
Thulsa Doom: Ah. It must have been when I was younger. There was a time, boy, when I searched for steel, when steel meant more to me than gold or jewels.
Conan: The riddle… of steel.
Thulsa Doom: Yes! You know what it is, don’t you boy? Shall I tell you? It’s the least I can do. Steel isn’t strong, boy. Flesh is stronger! Look around you. There, on the rocks, a beautiful girl. Come to me, my child…
Thulsa Doom: [coaxes the girl to jump to her death]
Thulsa Doom: That is strength, boy! That is power! What is steel compared to the hand that wields it? Look at the strength in your body. The desire in your heart — I gave you this! –Conan the Barbarian
As Conan slashes his way to revenge, we learn two universal truths via his character arc/journey. (1) A man is in complete control of the weapons he commands. (2) A man’s spirit is far more powerful than any weapons he stands against.
That’s why two were able to stand against many in the final battle scene. Conan didn’t need Crom. He only needed his sword, some personal accountability for making his own destiny, and belief in himself. With that realization, he fearlessly jumps into battle and conquers his enemies with a warrior’s fury, despite the seemingly insurmountable odds. This lesson can be applied to all things.
Do I understand that others may potentially find it sad or pathetic that I’ve learned important life lessons from fictional characters? Yes. Do I care? Not really. Whatever can motivate you and help you become a better athlete — or man/woman in general — is valuable regardless of the source. Red Sonja motivated me in a whole other way…
In Conan’s world, it was the riddle of steel. In our world, it is the riddle of iron. What is the answer to the riddle? The twofold answer is the same as what Conan discovered:
1. A man is in complete control of the weapons he commands. You can use the iron for whatever you desire: to get stronger, to get bigger, to get faster, to get shredded, to rehabilitate an injury, to let out some aggression, for personal sanity in a chaotic life, and everything and anything in between. Don’t let others try to dictate what is the right way, or push their personal goals onto you. Don’t follow the trends or conventions if you don’t believe in them.
Training needs to be a personal, individualized endeavor. Simply identify your personal goals at this moment in time — whatever they may be and regardless of what anyone else thinks (especially society), find the right coach/mentor, and commit 100% to an appropriately designed program.
2. A man’s spirit is far more powerful than any weapons he stands against. A spiritless man/woman may crumble before plastic-coated, pink weights. But no bar, no matter how many plates or pounds are loaded onto it, is any match for a real man/woman. Attack your training with confidence, not with fear.
Borrowing from another warrior culture — the samurai — remember this, “No matter what it is, there is nothing that cannot be done. If one manifests the determination, he can move heaven and earth as he pleases.” — Hagakure.
Until next time, crush your enemies — the squats, deadlifts, rows, and presses that stand before you.
Q: Which is more effective for fat loss – 20 min of high intensity interval training or 60 min of cardio in the fat burning zone?
ANSWER:
The short answer is that the 20 minutes of higher intensity intervals would probably do more for fat loss in the long run than the 60 minutes of low intensity cardio. But I’m not one for short, easy answers, because you will never truly understand the complicated fat loss process, and thus you will never learn how to separate fact from myth, efficient plans from inefficient ones. Trust me, its worth educating yourself a little bit if you truly care about getting real results.
Changing your body/losing fat is not just about how many calories you burn while exercising, or what percentage of those calories come from fat as a fuel source. Its about the positive effects exercise can have on (1) your resting metabolic rate (Technically, this is your truest “fat burning zone”, as the body burns predominantly fatty acids at rest, or in other words, the greatest percentage of fat as a contributing fuel source occurs under resting conditions, not exercising ones) (2) muscle building/fat burning hormonal release — the true key to physical change. High intensity intervals has a more dramatic effect on these processes than low intensity cardio, but there is another MODE of exercise that has a greater effect than both combined. Thus there is a more efficient way to go about your fat loss business. What if you tried 40 minutes of STRENGTH TRAINING?
Compared to strength training, cardio (any form of cardio) is inferior for body composition change. Strength training is not just for meatheads trying to get huge, its also the most efficient way to get your body to burn fat — AT REST. How? Strength training causes microscopic damage in the muscle cell. The repair process can take up to 72 hours to complete. And all of the cellular processes that happen during this phase require energy = CALORIES. And since all of this happens at rest, a large percentage of those calories will come from fat. So even though you may burn more calories during an hour of low intensity cardio or 20 minutes of intervals than an hour of strength training, you will burn more calories in the 71 hours that follow after a strength training session. Which do you think has the biggest impact on your goals?
And yes, intervals will give you a nice fat burning growth hormone surge/release, but so does strength training if you do it right. And the strength training has a much more profound, sustained metabolic effect in the recovery period — as described above. Fat burning hormone release, elevated met rate, and the opportunities to wear spandex, grunt really loud, and wear sunglasses inside the gym, you can’t beat that (I hope you know I’m kidding).
So curls are good for the girls, and also good for the guys trying to get the girls.
If you enjoy the science, here is a little more about what goes on in response to a strength training session:
- Satellite cells are activated when muscle fibers receive trauma or damage.
- Satellite cells fuse to existing muscle fibers and help to
repair/regenerate the damage by increasing the size and number of
contractile proteins (called actin & myosin) within those fibers. - The body restores cell fluids, electrolytes, and minerals lost during training.
- The body must refill muscle glycogen stores as glycogen is the
primary fuel used during high intensity training. - The immune system responds with a sequence of actions leading to
inflammation. This inflammation is what causes muscle soreness. The
purpose of this inflammation is to contain the damage within the muscle
cells, increase blood flow and nutrient delivery to the damaged area,
repair the damage, and clean up the injured area of waste products. - Antioxidants scavenge free radicals and repair oxidative stress
caused by the increased rate of oxygen consumption during the training
session. - Growth factors (such as IGF-1) regulate insulin metabolism and stimulate protein synthesis.
- Testosterone, cortisol, and growth hormone levels rise, fall, and
return to baseline levels in their own respective patterns (assuming you
are training naturally without performance enhancing drugs). - All of the above processes can take up to 48-72 hours under normal
circumstances but can be delayed by many factors including poor dietary
decisions, lack of sleep, and high stress levels just to name a few. - All of the above actions require energy (calories).
This is why we say that strength training boosts the metabolism (the
rate at which your body burns calories on a daily basis) and is so
crucial to the body composition change process.
If you still don’t believe me, and would rather hit the treadmill instead of the dumbbells, despite everything I’ve just taught you, there may be nothing I can do for you. But I wish you luck nonetheless.
Making Diet and Exercise a Priority
The amount of time and effort you are willing to put into something is directly proportional to either (1) its importance to you or, (2) the enjoyment that is derived from it. Since we know that the process of changing your body composition may not be so enjoyable, your motivation to eat well and exercise likely comes from the importance you place on either being healthy or looking good (or both!).
But with all we have going on in our lives today, how can we justify spending our already-limited time on something so self-absorbed as looking good? Isn’t it okay to get take out or go through a drive-thru as long as we eat from the menu of healthy items? If you are content with the current status of your body and health, then sure, go ahead and keep doing what you’re doing. If not, check this out…
If it’s really important to you, you’ll make the time for it.
Look at all the things into which we put effort and time, even if it isn’t always enjoyable (so it must be important somehow):
- Academics – Some people spend 12+ hours a day for up to 25 years of their life studying. That’s a long time!
- Career – Whether you love or just tolerate your job, this activity takes up about 1/3 of your life, often more.
- Money – If increasing your wealth is important to you, you will find ways to achieve it. People take high-paying jobs with long hours even if the lifestyle sucks because money is important to them. When we want to save money, we sacrifice our immediate wants or needs to set money aside for something we hope to acquire later.
- Relationships – How much time did you spend going out, dating around, and kissing frogs before you found your mate? Or maybe you’re still on the prowl, meeting people online, in bars, at parties, or work. This can be a full-time job in and of itself!
- Children/Family – Women make all kinds of changes for the well-being of their growing baby, changes they may not have made just for themselves.
- Athletics, Music, or other activity – Even without the goal of being a professional, you must dedicate a significant amount of time in order to develop your skill.
Where does your own diet and fitness rank among these priorities? How much time are you willing to invest in building and maintaining a strong and healthy body that will ultimately support you in your life’s other endeavors?
Being pulled in so many directions, it may seem like there is no possible way to carve out more time and energy to pay attention to diet and exercise. Aren’t our jobs and family more important? It’s so much easier to hit the fast-food routine than it is to think of (much less prepare) a healthy meal and actually cook it at home. And no way do we have hours to spend at a gym every day; the children need to be tended to, we have too much work to do, we are just too tired.
Actually, a well-designed diet plan and exercise strategy are probably the most time-efficient and results-yielding habits you can apply to your life. Don’t believe me? Read on…
Make Time for your Diet
By planning out your meals in advance, you will save a ton of time when it’s actually time to eat. Nate and I grocery shop and cook the bulk of our food twice a week. On these days we’ll spend about 90 minutes preparing the foods that takes the longest to cook: chicken, fish, potatoes, rice, veggies. With this, we have most of our food ready for the next few days.
An hour and a half? That’s a long time to be slaving over a hot stove! Actually, the only thing that is very labor-intensive is peeling the potatoes, so if you want to just bake them it would take less time. Since these aren’t the kind of dishes that you need to watch over – put the chicken or fish in the oven and turn on the timer, and throw the potatoes in the pot or rice in the cooker and let them go – you can still do other things while the food is cooking. Hooray for multitasking!
Then, each weeknight I cook the egg whites for my breakfast and snacks the next day; while they are on the stove I pack up the rest of my meals: rice cakes or potatoes to go with the eggs, and my lunch of chicken/potatoes or rice/veggies (which are already prepared). Sometimes I’ll hard-boil the eggs so that I don’t have to watch the stove so closely, or sometimes I forego the eggs altogether and have protein shakes. This daily prep only takes about 20 minutes.
All-in, it takes a total of 4 hours per week – just over 30 minutes per day – to prepare ALL my meals for the week. How’s that for efficiency?
More Bang for your Food Prep Buck
More than just being efficient, it’s also more healthful. By making meals at home, you are in direct control of what goes into your food, so you know there’s not a ton of salt, sugar, and fat – all the things you are trying to avoid. You are also in control of the portion sizes, so you know the exact amounts of calories and macronutrients you are consuming with each meal.
But wait, there are even more benefits to making your own meals at home:
- You will save money. We all know that eating out is expensive. Even if you are spending more money at the grocery store, homemade meals like these will always be more cost-effective than trying to find the same food at a restaurant (which you won’t be able to do). How about trying to find a “clean” snack? The cafeteria at my workplace charges 80 cents a hard-boiled egg. That’s $3.20 just for the protein portion of one snack, when I can buy a dozen eggs for less than that.
- You will save time during the workday. With your meals and snacks at hand, you won’t have to waste time going to a restaurant, waiting for them to prepare your meal, and then getting back to the office. That’s an extra hour you can use to do something else at mid-day, like sit outside, go to the gym, run errands, or schedule a lunchtime meeting so you can leave the office a little earlier.
- You will have fewer decisions to make. No longer will you say to yourself “what do I want to eat today?” and then try to find a healthy option to buy somewhere, because you will already have your healthy lunch and snacks with you.
Make Time for Your Workouts
You’ve seen from our exercise plans that we’re not telling you to spend your life in the gym. (Haven’t read them yet? Go check them out!). Heck, you don’t even need to go to the gym; you can do workouts at home using dumbbells, resistance bands, or even just your bodyweight. Workouts never exceed 1 hour per day, and are never done more than 4 days per week. That totals – again – just 4 hours per week!
As a working professional, I know it’s hard to carve out time to get to the gym. I’ve had my own struggles, dealt with commuting, new jobs, meetings that start early and run late in the same day. I’ve tried to fit workouts in every possible timeslot: early morning, lunchtime, and after work.
You know what I’ve found to work the best? First thing in the morning. It is the only time of day that is truly mine, without interruption, and before the day can get away from me. I’ve heard the same from other people, from doctors to teachers to stay-at-home mothers. I think I once read that Oprah works out first thing in the morning for the same reason (and if she can make time to work out, surely we can too). It’s painful at first, but once you get into a rhythm, it’s not that bad, and even has some merits. I find that the gym is less crowded at that time, so I don’t have to fight or wait for equipment, and I’m able to get through my workouts faster (more time-saving!).
I also like the sense of accomplishment I feel on my way to the office…I’ve done something good for my body, and won’t have to worry later in the day about whether I’ll have time to get my workout in (which is good for my mind!) One less thing to think about, and I’ve checked something off my to-do list before 7am. Man, this fitness thing is all kinds of efficient!
Adding It Up – It Doesn’t Take Much
Altogether I spend an average of about one hour per day on my diet and exercise COMBINED. Since this is an average, some days are even less; for example, on the days I don’t work out, I only need 20 minutes to prepare my food for the next day (I love those days).
Think you can’t find an hour in your day? How much time do you spend on Facebook, or watching Sportscenter, or Food Network? Okay not all of us waste time on that kind of thing but you see my point. While getting healthy and fit doesn’t take a ton of time, you do need to make your plan a priority and schedule it into every day. This is no 8-Minute Abs, but it sure is a lot easier than I ever thought it could be.
The Basics – Exercise/Training
Now that you have the diet down, here are our recommendations for your workouts. These recommendations will differ depending on your current weight and level of general fitness.
If you are severely overweight and deconditioned:
- Most people can reach a natural, healthy bodyweight with proper nutrition and walking alone; no gym or formal exercise sessions are necessary. You may move to the structured when you reach a healthier weight
- Focus on cleaning up your diet and walking more. Walking can be done anywhere! Being a member of a gym or having a home treadmill may come in handy during inclement weather, but it is not necessary.
- Avoid high intensity aerobic activity or heavy weights
- Exercise 4-5 days per week. Give yourself 2-3 days per week off per week to optimize recovery and prevent burnout.
If you are a healthy individual who wants to change his/her body composition:
- Your goal is to increase lean muscle mass through weight training. Having more muscle mass increases your body’s resting metabolic rate. Fat loss will be the result of (1) your clean diet and appropriate caloric intake; and (2) increased metabolic “burn” from muscle mass
- Emphasize strength training; To a lesser extent, interval-based cardio and outdoor recreational walking is okay. Avoid low-intensity, long distance endurance training (e.g., jogging and cardio machines)
- Training options: 2 days per week for full body routines (also known as “splits”), 3 days per week for push/legs/pull splits, or 4-5 days per week for individual body part splits. Give yourself 2-3 days off per week to optimize recovery and prevent burnout
- It’s ideal to work out at a gym facility, since they will have all the weights you need for your workouts. However, you can achieve excellent results at home too, using your body weight, resistance bands, or dumbells.
Training Principles for All:
- Ideally, you will want to exercise at a regularly scheduled time during specific days of the week. This will help to make it part of your routine and automatic, instead of something that is a chore or can be pushed aside. When strength training, it is also ideal to eat at least one meal at least one hour before working out.
- Use mostly free weights; supplement with machines only if necessary.
- Train from a stable base. DON’T use unstable surfaces (balls, wobble boards, standing on one foot, etc.).
- Focus on basic exercises – lunge and squat movements, dumbbell and barbell rowing and pressing motions, pull-up/dip movements, etc. The human body is a simple lever system and does not need “complicated” or “innovative” exercises to produce results.
- During each session, train 1-3 muscle groups (body splits). Perform 3-5 exercises for large muscle groups, 2-3 exercises for small muscle groups.
- Perform 2-4 sets of 5-15 repetitions (reps).
- Rest 30-120 seconds in between each set.
- Keep the rep tempos (speed at which you lift/move the weights) around 2-0-2-0 (2 seconds up, 2 seconds down).
- Lift and lower weights under control, and keep CONSTANT TENSION on the muscle. Don’t pause or lockout to rest in between reps, and don’t cheat by swinging or using rebound/momentum; this puts you at risk for injury.
- It’s not just about how much weight you lift. Focus on stimulating and overloading the muscle. This is better for the muscles, better for the joints, and better for overall safety.
- Focus on feeling the muscle work during the set, not just on moving a weight from point A to point B. Think of this as bodybuilding or body shaping as opposed to power lifting. Check your macho (or diva) ego at the door.
- Switch training variables — within the confines of the overall parameters — regularly (exercises, order of exercises, reps, interest rest, etc.) in order to vary the training stimulus and prevent boredom/training plateaus.
- Don’t get sucked into fitness trends, and cool-looking “innovative” stuff you see in the gym or TV. The basics are the basics for a reason — THEY WORK.
From Runner to Ripped
Before I talk about my bikini contest prep, I should give you some history about my fitness and athletic background…
I started playing volleyball in middle school, and continued through high school and college. Being on the NCAA Division III team of an institution that prized research over athletics – and had torn its former Division I football stadium down to build a library – our training sessions weren’t terribly hard-core. Nonetheless, I always gave it my all and stayed in decent enough shape (after I recovered from gaining the “Freshman 20”).
When my collegiate “career” ended, I started jogging. Slowly. With basketball players whose advanced cardiovascular conditioning meant they would run and talk to each other, thereby distracting me from my own heavy breathing, while I simply listened but didn’t have to respond (not like I could anyway).
I kept it up, and in my own time I grew to like jogging (or dare I call it running? How fast do you need to go for it to count as “running”?) This was peculiar to me, since one of the reasons I stopped playing basketball in high school was because we ran too much. I would get anxiety attacks before the timed mile, and wanted to stay home sick when we had the dreaded “6-lap run”, which is 1.5 miles. But I digress.
Having been an athlete, I was no stranger to the weight room, but sometimes I just didn’t feel like going to the gym, and when crunched for time I figured a cardio session would give me better results than lifting weights. Cardio burns more calories, right? And burning calories burns fat, and then you lose weight. I thought if I ran enough, I could eat whatever I wanted and still control my weight. In my 20′s, this was certainly the case. Once the clock struck 30, however, not so much. Thankfully, this is about the time I met Nate.
Nate’s vocation and his passion for weight training made me more aware of my own workouts, and I asked for his help. In the beginning, he created plans for me with a significant amount of weight training, but also included cardio to make me happy. This made for long sessions at the gym, up to 90 minutes, just so I could get my cardio in at the end.
He tried to get me to curtail my cardio numerous times, but I was always resistant. For a while we compromised by switching from endurance cardio (30-60 minutes) to high-intensity interval training (a.k.a. HIIT, which lasted 20-30 minutes). I could still run, got my heart pounding, and I thought sure, HIIT makes you burn more calories in a shorter period of time! That’s good!
As Nate did more research on diet and exercise and the effects of both on body composition, he became more and more convinced that the extra cardio I was doing was actually hindering my goals of getting/staying lean. When I decided to compete in the bikini contest, he would only train me under the condition that I follow his instructions without question. I was completely in his hands.
Nate designed my training plan with the following goals: (1) build muscle up top (I’m sort of pear-shaped, so this would make me look more proportionate), and (2) create some kind of muscle in my lower half, where I previously had none. When I started training for the competition, I had what I called a “butthigh” (pronounced “buh-THIGH”) – my butt ran right into the back of my thigh, with no distinguishing difference between the two! Even when I tried to flex my glutes, nothing happened. So pathetic. But the only way to make it better was to work it out! Here’s a sample of what my training plan looked like at the end of my contest training:
TUES — BACK, LEGS I
- Rack pull-ups 3 x max
- One arm rotating dumbell rows 3 x 10
- Lat pulldowns 3 x 10
- Single stiff leg deadlifts 3 x 15
- Single glute bridges 3 x 15
- Sumo deadlifts 3 x 15
WED – CHEST, ARMS, ABS
- Flat dumbell press 3 x 10
- Push-ups 3 x max
- Rope extensions superset alternate dumbell curls 3 x 10
- Skullcrushers superset concentration curls 3 x 10
- Cable crunch 3 x max
- Decline crunch 3 x max
SAT — LEGS II
- Elevated split squats 3 x 15
- Hyperextensions 3 x 15
- Hamstring curls 3 x 15
- Cable glute kickbacks 3 x 15
- Calf raises 3 x 15
- Seated calf raises 3 x 15
SUN – SHOULDERS, ARMS
- Seated dumbell side laterals 3 x 10
- Seated high rope rows 3 x 10
- Alternate dumbell front raise 3 x 10
- Rope extensions superset Alternate dumbell curls 3 x 10
- Skullcrushers superset hang concentration curls 3 x 10
- Cable crunch 3 x 15-20
- Decline crunch 3 x max
It looks like a lot, but by timing my rest periods between sets (40 seconds in between each set), things moved along quite nicely, and I was never in the gym for more than 45-60 minutes. No different than going to a class at your own gym, right?
What’s missing from these workouts? CARDIO!
That’s right, I did no formal cardio during the 12-week period before my contest. Our focus was building lean muscle mass, and using the caloric deficit from my diet to lose fat. You’ve probably heard that muscle burns more calories in your body than fat. Thus, by increasing the amount of lean muscle mass in my body (by weight training), I not only look better and more “toned” (which is the point of training for a bikini contest, right?), but my body then burns more calories throughout the day, which results in more fat loss, which means looking even BETTER. You see the wonderful cycle here?
Were you afraid you’d get too muscular from lifting all those weights?
I was never worried that I’d get huge like a man, because that is physically impossible without using steroids or growth hormones. However, in the past when I trained with both weights and cardio, I did have concerns of getting bigger than I was comfortable with. Each time I started a program (and there were many “new starts”) I would feel my pants get tighter, and I was convinced that I was getting “bulky” from doing lunges, squats, and leg extensions. My ridiculous way of thinking was this: Muscles will just make me look bigger; when you’re wearing pants no one can see your muscles, they just know that your legs are big! RIDICULOUS, RIGHT? My knee-jerk reaction was to cut the weights and increase the cardio.
What I needed to realize, and finally did in time, was that I had to give my body time to adjust. I started to build muscle, and for some period of time I would feel bigger, but that was only until my body actually started losing fat. Until then I’d have my new muscle plus my old fat…I needed to be patient. Nate promised me that if I would just “stick with the plan”, my body would respond just the way we wanted. As always, he was right.
How long did it take to see results?
My upper body responded the fastest, and soon the trainers at his Nate’s gym would see me working out and make comments to him like “Dude, your wife is ripped!” We went to Hawai’i a few weeks after I had started training for the show, and family members commented on my “guns”, which were apparently visible from a balcony four floors up. The comments made me very self-conscious at first. I wasn’t sure if that was the look I wanted…did I really want to be “ripped”? Did that mean I looked like a guy?
After Nate explained to me that these comments were coming from trainers, who know what they are talking about and what their clients aspire to look like, and family members, who are supportive and encouraging, and I became less worried, and more confident. I enjoyed getting stronger and feeling like I was making progress with my training, and that I was making positive gains in some regard. These gains were a sort of positive reinforcement for me, and inspired me to keep working hard.
My lower body took longer to respond. This was expected, but I was still worried. It was slow going at first, but after 2 months I starting losing fat in my lower half. I didn’t even notice it at first, but suddenly my clothes were getting looser, and eventually nearly all of my pants were hanging on me (and looked borderline horrible). It was like a snowball effect, and was actually quite amazing. The last two weeks before the show were the most significant, and the change most noticeable, and the weight just fell off. Surprisingly to me, the “bulky legs” I feared in the beginning never matriculated. In fact, I could have used a little more muscle and definition.
How much weight did you lose? What was your body fat percentage?
To be honest, while I would periodically get on the scale, I never used my weight as a regular gauge of my progress. A person’s bodyweight fluctuates a lot, even over the course of a single day, based on food and water intake, exercise, and hormones, so to track it frequently would mean nothing. It might have been interesting to have taken regular measurements of weight or body fat percentage for data purposes, but when came down to the bikini contest, none of those things really matter. All that matters is how you look on stage, and how you look in person.
What did you learn from this method of training?
I learned first-hand something that Nate has been telling me for years…that when it comes to body composition change, or losing fat, or just trying to look good, weight training trumps cardio every time. From personal experience I can tell you that I was leaner and had a better physique after training for this bikini contest – with no cardio – than I have ever been in my entire life. If you look at my photos, I don’t look overly muscular at all.
Think about it: compare at the body of a marathon runner vs. that of a figure or fitness model. Which one of the two is leaner with more definition in their muscles? Who looks more “fit” or “defined”? The figure or fitness model, who will unequivocally be lifting more weights in their training programs than the distance athlete.
That’s not to say that cardio doesn’t have value. It absolutely does. But you need to be sure you know WHY you are doing the cardio. If it’s because you like it, it feels good to you, you are trying to get your heart rate up for an extended period of time to increase your cardiovascular endurance, etc., then yes, cardio is the answer. But if you simply want to look good – or great – and lose fat and gain some muscle, then get off the treadmill or stairmaster and pick up some weights!
Q: What’s the best way to train your body to burn fat instead of carbs while exercising?
ANSWER:
The actual answer to your question is low intensity aerobic activity, after a period of fasting (so first thing in the morning). The real question, however, is this — is that the most efficient and effective approach for your goals? Assuming your goal is to lose body fat — I would say absolutely not!
Its not about how many calories you burn while exercising, or what percentage of those calories come from fatty acids as fuel. True body composition transformation comes from the number of calories you burn the other 23 hours of the day. We burn predominantly fat at rest, so the question is how do we burn more calories/fat at rest? The calories burned while exercising are relatively small and insignificant compared to that number.
The answer is to increase your resting metabolic rate. The amount of lean muscle you carry is positively correlated with resting metabolic rate. Your best approach is to strength train, build some lean muscle, boost your resting metabolic rate, and burn more calories at rest. The body burns fat as rest like I said, but as the intensity of the activity increases, it starts to burn more glucose. During high intensity activity, the body is deriving 100% of its energy from glucose. So during strength training, you will actually be burning more glucose than fatty acids, but this is exactly what you want (although it might not seem so on the surface).
High intensity strength training causes microscopic damage in your muscle cells. To repair this damage (in the recovery process) requires energy. This repair happens in between training sessions, not during. And what are we burning in between training sessions at rest? FAT. Your body will burn fat in the recovery process from strength training, a hell of a lot more than doing one our of non-challenging aerobic activity.
That just scratches the surface. Strength training also has positive impacts on growth hormone secretion, which is our primary fat burning hormone. Just remember this, fat loss is not about how many calories you burn (or whether or not those calories are coming from fatty acids) its about the metabolic and hormonal responses to exercise. These are far more dramatic with glucose-burning strength training than fat-burning aerobic activity.
To put into practical terms for you:
1. Strength train 3-4 times a week for hormonal release, to build metabolic-boosting lean muscle mass, to cause muscular damage that is energy-costly to repair from, and maybe to look cool in spandex 
2. Don’t worry about what exercise modes burn more fat. That’s meaningless. You will burn plenty of fat at rest assuming you are in a relative calorie deficit, and your metabolic rate is high (from consistently strength training).
I hope that makes sense, no time to edit, heading to a training session. If you have follow up questions fire away.
Like this:
Use Science – Not Scams – to Achieve Your Fitness Goals
“I lost 30lbs in one week without exercising or changing my diet, thanks Mr. Magic Blue Pill. Thanks!” “I went from obese to fitness model in 12 weeks just by using this state-of-the-art abdominal device for 20 minutes, 3 times a week.” “On my revolutionary new diet plan, as long as you don’t eat X, you can eat unlimited quantities of anything and everything else, and the pounds will just fly off.” Does any of this sound familiar?
We’ve all heard the saying, “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.” Most of us seem to be able to apply this common sense logic to everything else in our life except weight loss (and maybe money — the get rich quick schemes abound as well). We want to believe these ridiculous claims because we desperately want to lose fat — oh by the way we expect it to happen quickly and effortlessly. Girl (or dude), I wish it really were that simple.
There are millions of trainers, gurus, gadgets, supplements, books, and diet programs all geared towards helping you lose fat. Some are good, some are bad, and some are flat-out ugly. Some are legitimately trying to help you, some are just trying to capitalize on your vulnerability and scam you out of your hard-earned money. Some are really trying to make your waist slimmer, many are just trying to make your wallet slimmer. The fat loss business is a big business just like any other, driven by profits. Its not always about what works, its about what sells.
And with the magic-pill mentality that dominates our society, ridiculous claims (the more ridiculous the better) sell. 2-minute abs? Take a hike pal.
Don’t follow unsupported claims and hype. Many people look for the diets, training programs, or supplements that promise the fastest results with the least amount of effort. They fall for the advertising flash without investigating the true value and effectiveness of a product or program. They are enticed by the one-in-a-million transformation story without reading the tiny fine print that “these results are not typical”. They don’t realize that many companies pay fitness models and athletes to endorse their product, whether they really use it or not. Lose 20lbs in two days, sign me up!
That’s why there are so many bogus products on the market. They sell well because of people’s misguided hopes. People with this habit believe they just need to find the right miracle pill and all of their weight issues will be magically solved. They want to hear that losing weight will be easy. They want to believe that they won’t have to work hard, or sacrifice, or break bad habits, or be uncomfortable in any way. They want to believe they can party like a rock star and look like a fitness model. If any of that were really true, everyone would be in shape and there wouldn’t be a billion-dollar weight-loss industry getting rich off of false hope.
Fit people are more knowledgeable about the body transformation process and look beyond glossy ads and infomercial miracle stories — if a commercial is running at 3am, it is probably a scam. Fit people know it takes time and effort to attain real, permanent results. Go ahead and ask the fittest person you know in REAL LIFE if the process is easy. I guarantee they’ll give you a sideways look, or at least roll their eyes. It takes some work baby!
That’s why fit people look beyond just mere promises or success stories. They look at scientific research. They want unbiased, credible proof that the products or programs they are using actually work. They want to see legitimate studies backing up any bold claims. They want to know what works in the real world, not just what works in the advertising office or in fitness-fantasyland.
Fit people base their exercise programs on the principles of physics, biomechanics, and physiology, not on the principles of “he said, she said”. They look at the hormonal and metabolic effects of diet, not at whatever the flavor-of-the-month, fad diet touts.
We’re not asking you to become experts in the field. That’s our job. But we are asking you to become slightly more informed so you don’t get caught up in the marketing hype. Some of the content on this site may get technical at times, maybe a little too much for your tastes. That’s cool. You don’t have to digest it all at once. But we do want you to know there is a rhyme or reason for everything we advise. There is a scientific foundation behind all of our content.
We know most people are primarily concerned with the WHAT to do for fat loss. We’ll cover that. That’s a no-brainer. But we also want to give every person the option of learning the WHY.
There are an infinite amount of false claims on the market because people continue to chase them. The sooner you start using real science, and stop chasing pipe dreams, the sooner you can get to work and start achieving real results.
natemiyaki
Kalai Diamond
