Top Tips From Top Trainers – Make 2011 Your Fittest Year Ever!

Fitness professionals can make it look all too easy to be in great shape. What I can attest to with this group though,  is that they all walk the walk. They work out hard, eat well and consistently make good choices when it comes to staying active, taking care of themselves and continuing to be healthy. And that’s inspiring!

Lucky girl that I am, I get to be inspired by these great trainers every day since they are both friends and colleagues of mine at Peak Performance gym in NYC. As we all try to make 2011 a fit and healthy year, I asked them to share their best  get or stay in shape tips:

Joe Dowdell owner of Peak and my co-author for Ultimate You says, “Schedule your workouts like appointments. Put them right into your calendar like you would any other meeting.” One of the things I hear most often is that people are too busy to make it to the gym, you pencil in a haircut in order to make that happen, right? Do the same with your workouts – even if you don’t have a trainer, schedule it in. Same goes for meals. Many of my patients simply get too busy and forget to eat. Schedule in those 5 small meals per day – and your workout  – so you are reminded to take care of yourself.

Matt McGorry is one of my favorite trainers and favorite people. Read an interview I did with Matt after his body building competition, where we talked about what’s possible when you are simply compliant. Matt says, “To keep injury free and healthy, foam rolling should be as much a daily habit as brushing your teeth.” Get a foam roller from Perform Better and make it part of your pre and post workout routine. Many trainers feel this is even more important than stretching. It can be painful at first, but eventually you’ll really look forward to this practice – it’s sorta like self massage. It will keep you able to keep working out hard.

Sarah Petroski is a trainer and yoga teacher who says: “High quality, organic food is my Prada bag. It’s where I spend my extra money cuz I deserve it!” This may be my favorite of the tips ever! We love the best when it comes to clothes, cars, shoes, etc – why settle for less than the very best when it comes to what you put in your mouth? It costs more but the benefits are more than worth it when it comes to your health and you waistline.

Holly Rilinger, one of the buffest bods at Peak and Flywheel Spin Studio across the street, reminds us to “Not only set goals, but write them down!” January 1 you’re clear on your goal, but it fades. You’re often clear on your goal first thing in the morning, but come coffee break time you scarf down a muffin only to feel guilty afterwards.  Write down your goals, post them on your mirror and fridge, but more important: carry them with you in your wallet. Pull them out and review before meals, snacks, a night out with friends and when you try to talk yourself out of going to the gym.

Finally, my trainer: Joe Larson says “Fitness should be fun.” Sounds about right for a comedian, huh? But he’s right. We take the gym, the diet, and all that goes with it so serious. We need to remember to have fun while we’re working that hard. If we dread the gym, hate eating vegetables and feel restricted, obligated or stressed, then we’ve turned a healthy thing like working out or eating well into one more thing to worry and be unhappy about. So while you might not love every exercise, be sure you’re doing some activities you enjoy and keep a positive attitude about the ones you don’t. 

Here’s to a very fit 2011!

The Only New Years Resolution You Should Keep

It’s that time of year where we swear off sugar, vow to be a regular at the gym and announce to friends and family our grand plans to get into tip top shape. It’s that time of year we are right back where we started last January.

Very few of us are setting a get in shape or get healthy goal for the first time. We stand at the precipice of the New Year and declare that “this year is THE YEAR!” And we mean it. We believe it. We have every intention of pulling it off. We don’t set out to fail, but we often do. Should we just say “screw it”? Decide we can just live with this body as is? Accept that this is as good as it gets? Nope. Wanting to be healthy, and let’s be honest: wanting to be hot, is not the problem. The problem is often the bigness of our grand plan.

The goal is big: transform our sluggish selves into the fit, lean, vibrant, energetic, sexy person we’ve always wished we could be. A big goal like that needs a big plan: giving up sugar, alcohol and carbs; working out 6 or more times per week; signing up to run a race or other event; giving up our Friday night drinks with friends; and learning to say no to all your cravings and bad ol’ habits.

It’s tough – but that’s what it takes. We have to be overwhelmed, do a complete overhaul, make sweeping changes.

Right?

Sometimes an abrupt shift is just what we need….but sometimes, most of the time actually, we need to take a slower, more steady approach.  Just look at your gym this week, it’s packed with new faces. Then look again in March or April – it will soon back to the same crowd that was there in December, save a few new converts.  So the big, grand New Year’s resolution to lose weight doesn’t work so well.

But this doesn’t mean we are doomed to feel badly about our bodies and that we’ll never make the kinds of changes that give us the look and health we want, it means we need to change our plan about how to get it. Take a little of the bigness out of it.  

So what’s the only resolution you need to keep? It’s not to never have dessert or never miss a workout. It’s simple, sustainable and will give you quick and lasting results.  Dying to know? It will surprise you: simply do better than you did yesterday.

Today shouldn’t be so hard right? After days of holiday cookies and too much champagne last night, choose a big salad with protein for dinner tonight and take a walk. Today? It’s already better than yesterday. Then the next day, do a little more.  Go grocery shopping for the week and cook more meals in than dining out.  Hit the gym. Then do a little more. Look into a new class, go “more” organic, or drink more water.

Just keep doing better every day, bit by bit and come this time next year you’ll be loving your fit, healthy body; be a regular at your gym; and have mastered 100s of new healthy habits.  

You don’t have to be perfect every day. You just need to be better.

This year, simply resolve to be better. Be better today than you were yesterday.

For tips, recipes, motivation, and more be sure to follow BETTER by Dr Brooke on Facebook! Gonna be an amazing year!

The Coffee Conundrum – Does Coffee Help You Burn Fat?

Keep your morning cup of coffee – it’s loaded with antioxidants and you’ll lose more weight when hopped up on caffeine. No wait – all that caffeine might cause diabetes and is bad for weight loss. What should you do? Opinions on both sides are strong – strong like a piping hot cup of French Roast, and there is research backing both sides of this argument. And it’s an argument indeed – take away a cup of Starbucks from a java junkie and you might not live to tell the tale.

When it comes to weight loss, popular advice based on interpretation of current research poses several problems. First, like any other plant ‘medicine” coffee seems to behave differently that caffeine alone – meaning that’s its other constituents and antioxidants play a role in how one responds (Translation: studies done on caffeine alone shouldn’t be directly applied to coffee and often times caffeine dosed in these studies is well in excess of what the average coffee drinker consumes). Next, studies pertaining to insulin sensitivity and diabetes are done on so called healthy subjects – ignoring the fact that there may be subtle derangements in their insulin function but they are not overtly diabetic or full blown insulin resistant.

Caffeine’s effect on insulin is where coffee plays into fat loss. Here’s what you need to know:

* Caffeine appears to acutely lower insulin sensitivity, but the effect is not chronic. Meaning that in the healthy, exercising individual, coffee drinking does not lead to diabetes . However, it does lower your insulin sensitivity in the short term so avoid drinking it with starches (optimal or allowable and for sure skip the muffin at your coffee break). If you have insulin resistance, diabetes or are not following a lower carb diet, caffeine can make insulin matters worse.

* Raising epinephrine is one mechanism by which caffeine perks you up, a preworkout coffee or tea will allow you to perform better, exercise harder and burn more fat at the gym. Avoid post workout caffeine to avoid thwarting the effects of your Recovery Shake. And  if you have anxiety, insomnia or are at all aggravated from caffeine it’s wise to avoid coffee and caffeinated beverages in general.

* The fat in cream or Half & Half will slow caffeine release into your system making it a better fat burner. But keep it light as to not pile on the calories and saturated fat. 1 tbsp or less is fine.

* Finally, caffeine appears to be less of a diuretic than once thought – meaning it isn’t as significant of a factor in dehydration.

Can You Sleep Your Way Slim?

Western society is characterized by high stress, lack of exercise, lack of sleep and overeating – but that’s not all of us. Some of us regularly hit the gym and try to eat well – but who isn’t guilty of getting too stressed out from time to time? How about missing a few hours of sleep when we’re having a week like this:  trying to work, get the kids to soccer, cook dinner and grocery shop for a big Thanksgiving meal?

Last week I discussed a study on how even small amounts of light in our sleep environment can pack on the pounds, and it turns out if we miss sleep several nights in a row – that’s not helping either.

A study in the Journal Of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism looked at 11 middle aged subjects (6 females and 5 males) who prior to the study averaged about 7.5 hours of sleep per night.  For 14 days they slept prescribed amounts (either 8.5 hours or 5.5 hours), didn’t exercise and had ample food available – in effort to mimic typical Western lifestyle of sitting at a desk, vending machine down the hall, and stress keeping us up at night.

Previous research has shown that you had to pull and all-nighter to see changes in insulin sensitivity, but this small study showed that repeated nights that were simply short on sleep also decreased insulin sensitivity.  Past data illustrates that those who sleep at least 7 hours per night are at decreased risk for developing metabolic diseases such as Metabolic Syndrome and Diabetes, and those that sleep less than 6 are at increased risk for these diseases. This more recent study, shows that only 2 weeks of not getting enough sleep shifts our metabolism towards a less insulin sensitive state.

What this means for your health is increased risk for heart and kidney disease as longer term complications of Diabetes. But what it means for your physique is more fat storage.  Insulin shuttles nutrients, including glucose, out of your blood and into your cells for use.  When your fuel stores are full or glucose simply can’t get in, which is the case with insulin resistance, that extra glucose goes to fat storage. 

This is why I tell my clients, that at each meal they have the opportunity to create a fat burning or a fat storing environment in their body by choosing the right foods. A high fiber, protein rich, managed starchy carb meal with some healthy fat encourages fat burning – whereas a high carb meal in the average person (athletes excluded of course, performance nutrition is very different from fat loss nutrition) promotes fat storage.

Turns out, missing just a few nights of shut-eye, also creates a fat storing environment. So do what you can to get at 7-9 hours of quality sleep each night.  Eat balanced meals of fiber, protein, healthy fat and a manageable carb load (see last week’s post for details).

Stress is the #1 reason I hear from my patients as to why they can’t sleep.  They lay in bed at night stressing over work, finances, etc. With Thanksgiving just a few days away, de-stress and sleep sounder by making a list before you hit the hay of 5 things you are grateful for. It will help assure you that no matter what you’re stressing over, there’s a lot in life to feel good about.

Is Your Alarm Clock Making You Fat?

Is there a digital clock on your nightstand? Do you fall asleep to the TV? How about the flashing light on a wireless modem? Or like me, is there the light from the City That Never Sleeps streaming through your window? New research shows that even if you can fall asleep with the lights or TV on, if you’re trying to lose weight – you probably shouldn’t. 

Researchers at Ohio State University looked at how light exposure during sleep affected  food intake, glucose tolerance (how well insulin clears glucose, getting it  into cells for use) and body mass increases in mice – and what they found might have us all reaching for the eye masks.

In the study, the mice were housed in one of three conditions: 24 hours of constant light, a standard light-dark cycle (16 hours of light and eight hours of darkness) or 16 hours of light and eight hours low light. The results showed that, compared with mice in the normal cycle of light-dark, those in the dim light had a significantly greater increase in body mass.

The researchers found that mice exposed to a dim light at night for eight weeks had a weight gain of 12g, which was about 50 percent more than mice that lived in a standard light and dark period. This dim light scenario is most like the seemingly negligible light in our bedrooms which may be thwarting our weight loss efforts.

Interestingly, even with no difference in activity or food consumption, the mice exposed to dim light ate more at night and gained more weight. This illuminates the notion that a big dinner or late night snacks is not ideal for leaning up.

The mice that were in exposed in constant bright light also gained more than the mice under normal light dark cycle, which shows us how metabolism is affected by abnormal sleep schedules like shift work, for example.

The link between sleep and body fat is slowly unraveling as we understand more about the body’s internal clock (known as circadian rhythm) and the actions of hormones like leptin and human growth hormone (both of which rise during sleep) and known light sensitive hormones like melatonin. 

While we learn more, note that light leaking into your sleep environment could be causing:

Increased appetite at night

Difficulty regulating meal timing during the day

Difficulty losing weight in general

Excessive cravings or overeating

Block out any light leaks and get leaner by:

Replacing  or covering up digital clocks

Turn off electric devices with lights such as computers, stereo systems, cell phones, etc

Consider black out shades, particularly if you have street light coming in your bedroom windows

Use an eye mask

Don’t sleep with the TV on

Try candlelight only during the evening, or at least 1 hour before bed turn off electric lights

And finally, unless your blood sugar dips too low during the night (causing you to wake frequently) then aim to have your last meal  2-3 hours before bedtime to allow leptin and growth hormone to rise.  Healthy hormone patterns and a good night sleep are essential to a healthy, fit body – so lights out!

Black and White, Meet Gray

This perhaps doesn’t  apply to us all….but it applies to nearly every woman that sits across the desk from me at my office. Black or white. On or off. All or nothing. I want results and I want them now.

Much of the time we are either turned on 110%, giving our all on a plan or we are feeling out of control and way off track. We go, go, go; restrict, restrict, restrict; exercise, exercise, exercise – this usually gives some quick results, which we love! But then….then we hit the wall, often landing head first in a pint of ice cream.

This radical on and off mentality sets us up for the dreaded – yet oh so popular – yo-yo dieting. We work our tails off – literally – and lose 10 pounds only to gain back 15.  By the time we come to and realize we’ve not only hit the wall, but bounced back off it farther than where we started in the first place, the guilt sets in, followed by a bit of panic.

We rush out to buy a new workout DVD, hire a new trainer, or end up at Barnes and Noble rifling through the heaped table of weight loss books – all promising the latest and greatest in fat loss. We’re feeling anxious, even a little desperate to get back on track – usually blaming the last regimen we tried, thinking it failed us.

Perhaps it’s not a flawed nutrition plan or an ineffective workout regimen, but maybe it’s our harsh black and white palette that’s messing us up. Rather than on and off like a light bulb, think of your health and fitness as being on a dimmer switch. A dimmer can be turned up or down depending on your goals and state of mind, and it doesn’t ever have to be ON or OFF.  This is the gray between black and white.

Some of you may have mastered the art of gray and know how to use your dimmer switch. You’ve found a middle ground that keeps you on track to your body comp goals over the long haul – for the rest of us, life is colored starkly in black or white and we swing abruptly between them.

When we are on, we are way on – but when we are off, we can get way off. We over exercise and end up injured or exhausted. We restrict our “treat foods” so much that we end up binging on them.  We view a single cookie as a sin, but end up eating the whole bag eventually. And then comes the guilt…which can bring on even more binges or just more bad feelings.

This black and white attitude is not only bad for us emotionally, it seriously wreaks havoc on our hormones. Strict dieting, especially followed by a binge, sends a very mixed message to hormones like leptin that regulate hunger, and hormones like insulin that regulate fat storage. And let’s not forget our sex hormones – progesterone often wanes during strict dieting causing our periods to get light or stop all together.

Cortisol is yet another hormone that gets perturbed when we strictly diet or over-exercise. A rising cortisol can cause us to stall or “hit a plateau”. If you’re already burnt out from stress or a past history of yo-yo dieting, a very restrictive phase can really affect blood sugar causing you to have serious carb cravings or it can give a wicked case of insomnia (Remember, cortisol breaks down stored fuel to raise blood sugar between meal and during the night. When your adrenals are sluggish your cortisol reserves can be low, meaning you have to rely on adrenaline to keep your blood sugar stable while you sleep. If you need a burst of adrenaline during the night guess what? You wake up and have a hard time going back to sleep.)  

Shades of Gray

Gray is a mix of black and white.  Gray means better hormonal balance, less anxiety, less feelings of restriction and less guilt from falling off the wagon –  what it doesn’t mean is no results.  When I first meet with a patient and we discuss their goals I often ask them how important this is to them, what their level of commitment is and how soon they want results.  They typically respond with: “It’s a 10 of 10 – or even a 12 or 10! I want all you’ve got – diet, exercise, supplements – everything and I want results NOW!”

How many times have we jumped on board with a new book or a new plan and did great for a few months? Seriously, how many times???? If it’s more than once then what you did wasn’t sustainable and didn’t  give you lasting results.  It’s not to say that that particular plan was full of poor advice or that it didn’t work – but perhaps you went into the plan 110% and “blacked out”, so to say, and next ended up all “white washed” and totally off the wagon and most likely back to many of your old habits.

You’re not alone. Even my youngest patients, even 20 year old women, have tried at least one diet in the past and yet here we all are again – looking for the next, best way to shed pounds.

Learn to Use Your Dimmer Switch

Don’t black out. Pick a plan and incorporate 1-3 habits per week. Master them and then move on – trying to do everything at once is usually too overwhelming. For example, start eating a protein based breakfast everyday or figure out how to order out a healthy lunch. Or even drink more water.

Don’t white wash. When you get off track it doesn’t have to be a total disaster! You are one meal away, one workout away, even one positive thought about your body away from being back on plan. So you ate the bagel, don’t have it with a side of guilt and self defeat – have it with some lox to balance out the insulin response and get right back on track.

Guilt is optional in the gray zone.  Life will happen, you won’t be perfect everyday – but self correcting and not letting the guilt set in will help keep a bad meal or even a bad day from turning to weeks or months off plan.

Sometimes your gray will be darker than other times, you’ll be move motivated and supported and find it easier to make progress. When it lightens up, don’t panic and don’t feel guilty – if you are ready to get back on track, go for it. If you aren’t, find the gray zone that feels maintainable for now rather than holding on so tight to the idea that you have to be perfectly on plan that you lose your grip and drift away.

Know when you have the stamina to turn up the heat.  When you are ready for a big push towards your goal, be sure you are feeling healthy, injury free and supported before you jump in.

If you struggle with stamina on a plan, know when it’s a good time to start. Maybe planning to lose 20 pounds between Halloween and Christmas isn’t feasible for you, but losing 10 pounds and having 12 new habits by the New Year might be. 

BETTER Body Thoughts:

Ugh! I ate ______ , I might as well just start again next week!

BETTER: Ok, I ate _____ and that was a temptation for me because _______.  One off plan food doesn’t make or break anything – a week of plan will so I’m recommitted as of RIGHT NOW.

I wasn’t perfect this week, I missed workouts and didn’t eat well; this will never work so why bother.

BETTER: I did do _______ and _______ this week and I’ll continue to do those and include ______ next week. Doing something for my health is better than nothing – good habits build upon themselves. 

For example: I did get 3 workouts (but aimed for 6) and I got plenty of sleep this week. Next week I will schedule my workouts in like appointments to be sure they happen and I will drink more water.

How Does It Feel To Be Called Fat?

Well it doesn’t feel good. I can attest to that.  

Recently on Amazon.com I got slammed for being too fat to have written an effective fat loss program in Ultimate You. It was upsetting of course, and I’ll admit, it was one of my biggest fears come true.   

I’m no athlete and I’m no model, so being part of the experts in the fitness community, at times I felt a little out of place. I’m a regular woman who eats well and workouts regularly….and I’ve had my share of body image issues. 

I’m only 5’3″ and have complained about my legs being too short. I’m curvy and have done my time hating my booty. And thanks to my Czech background, I’ve got a very round face and the cheeks to go with it. 

As I’ve grown from a girl into a woman, I’ve laid to rest most of my body image issues and reveled in the fact that I can lift weights with the boys, do a few pull-ups and have even come to appreciate the shape my curves give me. But I’ll admit, when I read “…the fat neck and cheeks of Dr. Kalanick…” – all those issues came flooding back. 

Now, maybe you’ve never had your issues called out on the World Wide Web, but most of us at one time or another has been the victim of someone’s nastiness – whether their words were true or not, it feels like crap.  
 
You can shrug it off and say “They are a jerk, so what”.  But let’s be honest, the biggest trash talk usually comes from our own heads.  Fat neck? Ha! What an amateur. I’ve probably done better than that in the last hour or so.  

So why can we look at what someone else says and see clearly that being nasty is…well, nasty, and not see our own thoughts so clearly? The nasty, negative chatter in our own minds is often so mean we wouldn’t utter it out loud to our worst enemy – and we really need to knock it off. 

But it’s on autoplay, it’s hard to stop and often when we get a handle on it and we’re feeling good something happens to trigger it all again. Our therapists will tell us, it’s been there for a long time – since childhood probably – and our adult relationships and experiences just add layer upon layer to our unhealthy and unhelpful beliefs about ourselves and our bodies. And let’s not forget the ever popular villain: the media. Most women feel they don’t or can’t measure up to images of the female body they see on TV and in magazines. But guess what ladies? I work with a number of these women and they have body issues too. 

Sowhat gives? Why are we all (or at least most of us) walking around most days hating this or that about our thighs or our bellies? Blame it on culture or the media or our mothers – but we’ve got a lot of hatin’ going on! 

The truth for me is that when Ultimate You was released I was in the best shape I’d ever been in, so to hear those comments about how I looked was very frustrating. But then I thought about it – was I feeling happy and completely satisfied with my body during that time? Well, yes I was happy with my body then but I’m not going to lie, I’d catch a glimpse of a trouble spot like the back of my thigh and think “ugh!”  And there would be days when those thoughts or the pressure I put on myself to look a certain way would get the best of me – and you know what? It’s BS. For most women our bodies are a work in progress, and that’s exactly what we do – we work on them. 

We work at the gym, we work to order a salad instead of a sandwich at a restaurant, we work when we pass up the dessert tray, we work not have another cocktail when we’ve gone out for just “a drink”. We work and we work – and most of the time it feels like just that: a lot of work.

How often do you order the salad with chicken instead of the slice of pizza for lunch and feel overwhelmed with contentment, satisfaction and joy (yeah, I’m using salad and joy in the same sentence)? With each bite you feel more and more satisfied knowing you’re eating something so good for you. Its fiber is filling up your tummy and aiding digestion, its nutrients reacting away in biochemical pathways, and the protein is balancing out your blood sugar so your cravings stay on an even keel. It’s sort of amazing actually – but how often do we feel it was easy and effortless to make the choice to feed ourselves very well?

How about at the gym – are you at the gym putting in your time, much like serving a jail sentence? Or are you there feeling powerful, strong, healthy and filled with self love when you catch a glimpse of your muscles in the mirror.

I am working on a new project called Nourishing Women (I’m working with some truly amazing women – these smart, strong ladies and their PhDs can bench more than some boys I know!). Since being asked to contribute, that word “nourish” has been stuck in my mind….nourish….hum…how often do any of us feel nourished by what we eat?

When we’re eating to lose weight or even to be healthy, we often feel confined or controlled by a plan – or there’s my favorite: “Dr Brooke is making me.”.  We’re usually not chewing on a mouthful of baked salmon thinking, “wow, I feel so nourished by this food.”.  Nourish is a good word, so is cherish.  How many of us cherish our bodies?  Cherish is defined as:  to treat with affection and tenderness; to hold dear.  How often do we act in ways that “hold ourselves dear?”

Eating healthfully, exercising regularly, committing to a weight loss goal – these are all wonderful things to do for ourselves, but if we are looking in the mirror, noticing every flaw and thinking critical thoughts everyday, well that’s not healthy – no matter what you weigh. 

So instead of just trudging it out at the gym or managing to somehow stomach some steamed veggies, try nourishing and cherishing yourself. While you’re doing that, I’ll be reminding myself that like most women, my body is a work in progress. Like yours, my journey to the perfect body goes on and on, and I can love myself on that journey, nourish myself, be healthy and not give in to nasty comments – including those in my own head – or dwell on the opinion of someone who clearly doesn’t cherish me. But you know what? That’s ok. It’s not their job to cherish me, it’s mine. 

And it’s yours – so while you’re working on creating your Ultimate You, love yourself a bit…it can’t hurt! 

Try these simple steps to start having more positive thoughts about your body: 

*List 3-5 things you love about your body, such as your smile, your skin, your feet, your biceps – anything. When you catch yourself having a negative thought about something you aren’t satisfied with yet, rattle of these things you like. You still had the nasty thought, but you can turn your attitude around with reminding yourself of the things you do like about you. 

*Stay focused on the process and appreciate the little goals.  If you can do a pushup now where you couldn’t before – that’s something to feel great about. If you’ve lost 2 pounds – well it may not be the 10 pounds you want to lose, but it is something and you did accomplish it.  Start each day listing all the things you’ve accomplished in your mind while you brush your teeth. 

*See yourself in your perfect body.  If you’ve been at your ideal weight and size, pull out a picture and place it on the fridge, bathroom mirror, car dashboard or somewhere else where you’ll see it every day.  If you have no idea what your perfect body looks like, just spend some time imaging it.  The more clearly you can see yourself in the body you want the more easily it will start to happen – thoughts do matter.  Thinking about your perfect body doesn’t make it appear overnight but it will help you feel better about yourself and your current body as you work your way towards it.  Spend at least 30 minutes a day (doesn’t have to be all in a row) seeing your fit, healthy, perfect body in your mind’s eye. And the sooner you can start to be the woman with that body, the sooner that body will show up. After all what does the woman with that perfect body do? She works out, she eats lots of veggies and protein and I’d venture to guess that she cherishes herself.

What If We Took Compliance Out of the Equation?

And What Can We Learn From Bodybuilders About Losing Fat? 

You may think you have nothing to learn from these hulks and hulkettes. Many react to that particular physique with, “um, I would never want to look like that”. But let’s face it – body builders, or figure athletes, know how to lose body fat! And that’s something we’d all like to hear a little more about. 

A friend and colleague of mine, Matt McGorry, recently competed in his first body building competition (which by the way – he won!). I sat down with Matt and talked with him about his experience of losing 35 pounds and 12% body fat in about 4 months – which is no small feat, even for someone who was already considered fit. Impressive…but what can us regular folks learn from what these competitors go through to shed fat? 

How did you commit 110% to this goal? When I asked this, Matt didn’t hesitate one bit with this answer: “I knew I needed a good reason to do it. The reason to do it needs to justify the commitment, the hard work and the sacrifice it will take to pull it off….it had to be worth it.” 

Are you committed whole heartedly to leaning up? Or is it a ho-hum attempt that you think about off and on during the week – as in “I meant to hit the gym 5 times this week, oh well”.  Is your goal clear and measurable? Or vague, such as “I want to lose weight”? Instead of a clear, measurable goal with a deadline such as “I will lose 130 pounds by July 4^th.“. This type of goal allows you to know exactly where you are going, sets mileposts along the way and also, you know it will end….and then you’ll get to have a piece of pizza. 

Many of us think we are committing whole heartedly – and in the moment we probably are. Tuesday morning at my office you’re on board 110%, but come Happy Hour on Friday evening you’re 110% committed to unwinding with several cocktails. Next, your buzz leads you to make less that optimal dinner choices and your Saturday-morning-low-blood-sugar-brain has a one track mind: pancakes.

What is your reason for wanting to lean up and lose weight? It better be something good or it won’t be worth ordering a soda water when your friends are on their fourth drink or eating an on-plan meal before you head out to socialize so you aren’t tempted to get off track. 

Your reason can be whatever you want – but it needs to drive you. It needs to be something worth getting up at 6am to workout for, worth passing up the cookies at a co-worker’s birthday party and worth that effort it takes to drag yourself to the gym on those crazy busy days where it’s 9pm and its either go to bed or keep your commitment to working out that day. 

While losing fat might seem like one isolated aspect of your life, the discipline and fortitude it takes to achieve that goal will bleed into every other area – and people notice. Matt figured this goal would not only make him a better trainer, open up new acting roles, but also demonstrate to everyone that he had what it takes to be incredibly disciplined. 

Set your goal, give it a deadline, get some coaching or help on how to pull it off – then go for it! Do everything you can to achieve it – because honestly, if you do all you can and don’t achieve it you won’t be too bummed out. You will still have lost a lot of fat – even if it wasn’t all that you’d planned on. Disappointment will only come from looking back saying, “if only I wouldn’t have cheated those few times” or “if only I wouldn’t have done only 8 sprints when I was supposed to do 10”. Matt’s goal was to be compliant with his diet and exercise and keep his word to himself that he would do his absolute best – not to win a body building competition. In the end, that was just a bonus. 

With 16 weeks of strict diet and exercise, weren’t you temped to cheat?  Matt was so committed that he did not cheat once during his 16 week prep time. He didn’t sneak even one extra bite of food, nor did he miss even one minute of exercise.  He told me, “I didn’t want to be the kind of person who cheats or sells myself short”. To keep on track he focused on the fact that it was a short term goal – 16 weeks. After that he would not have to be so strict. He used other short term goals as well – like counting the days until his cheat meal and counting the minutes until the end of his cardio session. 

These little goals – even if it was “hey, I’ve done 30 minutes and I’ve got 30 minutes left” – kept him from feeling overwhelmed. Focusing on what you can do right now, in this moment, to get you closer to the goal keeps the bigger picture from becoming too daunting. Everyday make several little, good decisions and they will add up.  

Matt also did something a little scary for most of us – he told everyone what he was doing. He told his clients, other trainers and everyone else what his goal was.  This kept him accountable and got him in pretty deep, he said. “I couldn’t really throw in the towel on the frustrating days because I’d committed not only to myself, but to everyone around me that I was doing this.” Sharing his big goal also garnered some unexpected praise. Everyone who watched Matt go through his contest prep felt inspired by his determination and hard work…and it made several of us wonder just how far we could push ourselves. Matt never set out to inspire or gain more respect, but he certainly felt when it started to happen.  Another bonus. 

But what if you do “cheat”? Just shrug it off and get back on track – don’t let it derail you by beating yourself up over it. It’s done so now troubleshoot why it happened, try to avoid it in the future and get back to business.

I can hear you all now: Matt is a personal trainer….it would be much harder for me to lose 35 pounds. To be honest, losing 35 pounds would’ve been easier for some of you – and harder for some of you. Matt will be the first person to tell you that he loves junk food and can remember a time when it was rare for him to go a whole day without some sort of “treat”. However, he has been working on creating the discipline and building upon his nutrition knowledge for years, “This contest was like the sprint at the end of a marathon”.  

And although he is in the fitness profession and is a competitive power lifter, he’s had a harder time losing fat than his friends or fellow trainers – so he knew he’d have to work for it. He began using a nutrition coach over a year before he took on this project, so he’d cultivated a lot of habits that made this restrictive diet plan doable. “My aim was to be the best client ever. I did everything my nutrition coach asked me to do and it was amazing to see what was possible when I took compliance out of the equation.”

What if we could all do that? Not forever, but let’s say for just 16 weeks. What if for the next 16 weeks you completely adhered to your exercise and nutrition plan? No missed workouts, no unhallowed carbs, not one sip of alcohol….for just 16 weeks? What about just 8 weeks? What would be possible in your health and physique if “not doing what you needed to do” wasn’t an option? It’s something to think about, huh? 

And here come the Big Buts: But I have a job. But I have a child. But I am too busy. Yes it’s true that Matt didn’t have a toddler to chase after and he does work at a gym….but let’s not ignore everything he had to give up to do this. His show was in January, which meant he went through Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s…without cheating. He packed his chicken breast and carefully measured serving of brown rice to Thanksgiving dinner. He attended multiple Christmas parties sipping water or diet soda and staying away from even a taste of holiday cheer or holiday cookies. 

I asked Matt what it was like to have to give up so much: “It was miserable at times. It was probably the hardest thing I’ve ever done. But I knew it wasn’t forever and I had committed so much in the beginning that blowing it was not an option. I wanted to be successful more than I wanted to cheat.” 

How do you pull off something that takes so much time, stamina and hard work? Matt simply made it work – he did what he needed to do to get to his goal. Troubleshooting is the key and here’s a few of the things he did to make it work: 

            *Part of his workout regimen was hour long fasting walks on the treadmill, 7 days per week – tedious and boring. So he bought himself a portable DVD player to make it more bearable and said “it was probably the best money I’ve ever spent”.

Do what you need to do to make it work. Figure out another day of childcare, cut back on an hour of TV, solve your insomnia problem so you can get up and get to the gym in the morning – whatever it is get it handled! And of course ask for help if you need it.

            *Matt only ate out at a restaurant one time during the 16 weeks, which meant taking the time to grocery shop, cook and pack up meals – everyday. It does take a bit of time, but cooking for yourself keeps your diet very clean and yields amazing results.

           *One of the things that kept Matt from diving head first into a pint of Ben and Jerry’s was sticking to his meal schedule. Eating smaller, more frequent meals keeps you from getting too hungry and being left with only will power to get you through. Also, always having a meal with you means never having to either eat off plan or be left feeling famished.

            *Schedule, schedule, schedule! You schedule in important meetings and a haircut appointment right? Why treat your meals and workouts with any less importance? Set aside time to shop for and prep your health meals as well as time at the gym – then stick to it.

            *Keep your word to yourself. You said you’d get in 6 workouts this week and here we are at weeks end with only 4 done. What to do? Get them in. Consider a strength training workout in the morning or a fasted walk, and then an interval cardio session later that day. This isn’t ideal, but it keeps your promise.

Because Matt did this over the holidays, he wasn’t only up against holiday junk food but holiday gym hours. Some days because of shorter open hours, he hit the treadmill for his 60minutes of walking, gobble down a meal and 2 hours later was back at the gym for a weight training session.

So what can we learn from Matt’s experience and apply it TODAY to our fat loss goals?

*Commit fully to your goal. Make a solid, clear goal – with a deadline, and have a reason important enough to you that it matches the sacrifice and commitment.

*Share what you’re up to. This will give you support from others around you, keeps you accountable and before you know it you’ll probably inspire someone else to get healthier.

*Prep and pack your meals with you. Spend a little time each week cooking up chicken breasts, chopping up veggies for quick salads or stir-frys – or whatever it takes to have quick, healthy, fat-loss-supportive foods on hand so you can’t use the excuse “but I was exhausted and had nothing healthy to eat” or the all too common “I went out with a friend, was starving, and made terrible choices only to feel sluggish and guilty afterwards”. If you simply can’t cook for yourself, consider a healthy meal delivery service such as 5 Squares.

*If you are just starting out with more healthy, lean-eating habits – don’t sweat the small stuff. So your favorite restaurant doesn’t have organic salads. Still order the salad with chicken or fish instead of the pasta. If you can’t stomach one of Dr Brooke’s favorite snacks, say a can of sardines – what can you do? 3-4 oz organic, deli turkey? A protein shake? Find something that works. Don’t worry so much about if it was 4 or 5 oz of protein in the turkey burger you had for lunch when there was 6 hours between lunch and dinner. Stick with the basics of protein and veggies at every meal, opt for higher fiber carbs such as sweet potato or legumes over breads and cereals, and always eat every 3-4 hours.

*Don’t set yourself up for failure or feeling deprived by going to a social event hungry. Eat something on your plan before you go and always, always stick to the 3-4 hour meal rule – it’s truly the best craving reducer.

*Get some help. If you aren’t sure what you should be eating or have been doing the same tired workout for months – get some help. Matt attributes much of his success to “putting himself in the hands of a trusted nutrition coach”. From there he just had to do what he was told.

*Remember losing fat isn’t forever – you’ll lose it and then you’ll be in maintenance.  If you could possibly commit 110% percent for just a finite period of time – maintenance will be a piece of cake! Literally.

For more info on Matt visit www.mattmcgtraining.com or www.peakperformancenyc.com. To read more about his bodybuilding contest prep, see an interview at: http://elitefts.com/documents/mcgorry-starnes.htm.  And for you guys out there, check out Matt’s article in March’s Men’s Health Magazine about getting that good lookin’ V Shaped Torso.