Tag Archives: inspiration

Exercise 1 – Bulge 0

Posted on by
1

CHF member Claire Richardson updates us on her progress with Personal Trainer Caroline and tells us all about her new found fondness for exercise…

Read Claire’s first blog - Winning the Battle of the Bulge

PT sessions with Caroline are well under way with another 8 to be booked.  Who’d have thought that I’d actually enjoy it?  It’s always struck me as something only those people with complete confidence in themselves with little or no concerns about how they look would do. You can’t hide at the back when it’s just you and the trainer!  You can’t keep your head down and hope you don’t get noticed.

So why do it then?  Because……

Before picture and measurements

Bicep – 39.5cm
Chest – 115cm
Hips – 127cm
Waist – 104cm
Thigh – 67cm

All my preconceived ideas of personal training have been well and truly shattered.  It’s not about someone shouting in your face telling you you’re not good enough or screaming at you to “drop and give me 20.”  Don’t get me wrong , I still get anxious before a session and question if I can do it as I know that I will be worked hard, and I certainly feel it at the end of the session!! However, instead of screaming at me or trying to make me feel like a failure, Caroline has helped me through it with nothing but support and encouragement.  I get 100% of her time during the session; we have a laugh, which certainly helps, and the cheesy music that’s played at the weekend’s means that the sessions have become a fun part of my week.

That’s not to say it hasn’t been tough or that I’ve found it easy getting off the sofa and getting myself down to the gym.  Every time I’ve thought I can’t do it, I’m not strong enough, I’ve not got it in me or I’m  too tired, with the right amount of pushing from Caroline I’ve managed to find the strength, or should that be sheer stubbornness, to dig a little deeper and push through and it’s starting to pay off.

Current pictures and measurements

Bicep – 36.5cm
Chest – 113cm
Hips – 123cm
Waist – 103.5cm
Thigh – 66cm

A Recent visit to the doctors has seen my blood pressure results come back normal, as was my Cholesterol, and with a 1% chance of being at risk of a heart attack I’m no longer on the tablets.  I’m delighted by this as I hate having to take pills!  My waist size has reduced and my BMI has gone down at least 6 points moving me into a new “category”.

Claire Richardson, Club CHF Member

————————————————————————————————
“Since first meeting Claire I have watched her confidence grow and grow and she has achieved so much in the time she has been coming to the gym. Her determination and desire to achieve her goals is really very admirable. It has been a real pleasure to work with her and I look forward to helping her continue on her journey.”
Caroline Riddall, Personal Trainer, Caversham Health & Fitness

Ask a member of the CHF Fitness Team about our Personal Training packages.

Diary of a Fitness Manager Getting Healthy – Entry 4

Posted on by
Reply

Week 4 & 5

Weight: Let’s no go there!

Body fat: Not good

Basically not good past two weeks, have been very run down lack of energy just feeling a bit rubbish and that is down to not having the right foods in the house and the biggest problem for me is lunch times. Going down to Waitrose or Tesco’s and seeing all the lovely looking sandwiches and not much else.

Bread and I really have a love hate relationship. I love bread and bread hates me. Just feel so energetic if I don’t have it and eat salads, meats and vegetables but that’s in a perfect world. One of the biggest problems I have is its all or nothing for me so in the beginning it was all but now it’s nothing!

Mark Willis one of our Personal Trainers here at the gym said to me about the 80/20 rule so I looked into it and here are the basics, more to follow as it is very interesting.

“The point of the 80/20 Rule is that you need to focus primarily on the critical 20% to achieve 80% satisfaction. Of course this is a general rule, not an irrefutable statistic; for some actions, the breakdown may be closer to 90/10 or 70/30. But the point is the same, and it can be eerily accurate when you measure the variables in your life.

The challenge, however, comes from identifying that critical 20%. With some areas that have measurable metrics, such as the number of clients, amount of income and time spent on each of your services, it’s a no-brainer. But it can be difficult to take the same analysis and apply it to your daily life, especially when you have a lengthy to-do list with lots of items that still need to get done.”

Taken from http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2010/01/14/pareto-principle-80-20-rule/

But this is it I have to get focused as I will never achieve my goal if I do not focus some of my time on them. Say 20%?

Jason, Fitness Manager

Diary of a Fitness Manager Getting Healthy – Entry 3

Posted on by
1

  • Weight 12st 1lb
  • Body fat levels: 18.5%

While on the subject of weight and body fat. Always try to take your body fat levels at the same time everyday. I take my weight first thing in the morning and body fat using bioimpendance scales around 4pm as this is your most stable time for your body fat as it’s always higher first thing in the morning.

Exercise wise I have managed to get in one game of squash (Which did end up being 1hr 40 min’s!) and use the gym once but have managed  to get out for 3 hour+ walks at a fast pace to the shops then loading my backpack up with groceries the walking home again (5-10kg bag!) Need to do  more resistance (weights) as I need to increase my lean muscle mass

Diet wise I have been better making a food plan is helping but I am going to have to write down everything I am eating for a week just so I can look to see spacing’s between meals, amounts and time of eating. I need to do this as I am leaving too bigger gaps between meals so when I get to my main meal I am eating a lot more than what I need to. Its having an effect on my blood sugar and it’s not helping with my energy levels.

So blood sugar (Blood Glucose is the official term) levels are mainly governed by a hormone called insulin. All carbohydrates we consume are broken down into simple sugars. But starchy foods like potatoes and bread contain long chains of simple sugars that get broken down quickly causing blood glucose to spike. Processed foods, sweets and chocolate are already simple sugars so the carbs in them do not have to get broken down so they have a more or less immediate effect on blood glucose levels. As soon as our glucose levels rise this is detected by the hypothalamus gland which monitors blood levels. Then insulin is released into the blood stream to try and stabilize the glucose levels by driving it into the muscles and the liver any left over is converted into fat and stored.

So with weight gain that is why it comes on gradually. Each time we cause blood glucose to spike insulin is storing it as body fat only a little bit a time but still it keeps adding up!

On the flip side if you miss say breakfast and don’t eat till lunch time that’s around 14 hours with no food, now your glucose levels are going to feel very low and you are a lot more likely to make some bad decisions for your lunch as your energy levels are going to be very low and you are going to want some simple carbs (Sweets, chocolate?) and then your blood sugar levels are going to leap up, hence why it’s best to eat small amounts every few hours.

http://www.annecollins.com/weight-loss/food-cravings.htm Interesting facts on cravings

http://www.naturalnews.com/001978.html on ways to keep blood sugar levels down.

Jason, Fitness Manager

Click here for entry 2

Diary of a Fitness Manager Getting Healthy – Entry 2

Posted on by
1

Keeping a food diary can help with planning a healthy regime

OK.  Figures:

  • First body fat is down by 1%
  • Weight is now 12st 1lb

That’s just from cutting out sugars and processed carbohydrates and, to be honest, not a lot else.

That’s due to one thing: PLANNING! Or, actually, lack of it!

“Setting a goal is not the main thing. It is deciding how you will go about achieving it and staying with that plan” Tom Landry

To say I did not put enough into the planning of my food is an understatement I basically did not plan anything. This is not down to work or being too tired I just did not organize my time better to sort out my food.

So my aims for Saturday to get me ready for a proper healthy week,

  • Step 1: Plan a week’s food diary
  • Step 2: From the food diary write up a shopping list
  • Step 3: Plan a week’s activity diary
  • Step 4: Review plan all the way

All in this plan should take no longer than an hour to get together and having a plan especially for exercise is going to help me stick to my training and lets me map out what exercises I am going to do and when.

Some useful sites:

http://www.vertex42.com/ExcelTemplates/meal-planner.html

http://www.marksdailyapple.com (Primal Blueprint)

I am going to sit down with Mark one of our top personal trainers who is getting some excellent results with his clients using the same principles as I am utilizing.  Hopfully, with the extra motivation that a PT session will give me, will help get on me on the path to achieving my goals in a shorter time frame.

Jason, Fitness Manager

Click here for Entry 1

Click here to Entry 3

A CHF Success Story…

Posted on by
Reply

After seeing an unflattering photo of herself Lois decided it was time to take action…. and now with the help of Caversham Health and Fitness Lois Lee has lost two stone, is fighting fit and more beautiful than ever!

Here CHF find out more about her journery.

CHF: Hi Lois, thanks very much for sharing your story.  So what was your motivation for joining Caversham Health and Fitness?

LL: I joined in mid march after I saw a photo of myself. When I looked at it I wasn’t happy, I was very depressed in fact, so I joined ClubCHF.

Personal Trainer’s Tip: Take a ‘before’ photo at the start of your healthy lifestyle change to celebrate how far you’ve come when you look back and also spur you towards your ideal.

CHF: Why ClubCHF?

LL: I can’t drive so the location was perfect walking distance from work and home. I had in my mind what I wanted to do after researching on the internet. I looked at various bodybuilding websites for hints and tips. I was very organised, I even downloaded a spreadsheet of what exercises to do and for how long.

Personal Trainer’s Tip: It’s all about ‘Location, Location, Location!’ If you have to go pass a gym, you are more likely to stay motivated to go.

CHF: When did you start to see results?

LL: After about 6 weeks, they weren’t dramatic but I started to feel better and fitter, I wasn’t getting so out of breath and my trousers started to fit better. I became more determined. I made sure I came to the gym even if I didn’t enjoy it on the previous occasion.

Personal Trainer’s Tip: It’s important to remember that just as weight doesn’t go on in one week its unrealistic to expect to see visible results immediately.

CHF: So how did you stay motivated?

LL: After about 4 weeks I booked a Personal Training session with Mark, it was really good and focused me a little more and it was good to get an expert opinion on weight loss and toning. I was designed a kettle bell program and shown how to do press ups properly.  I also used the Swiss ball a lot.

I started to do the Body Combat once a week; it was really good for cardio and improved my asthma symptoms and general fitness. After three weeks I also started doing Circuits on Thursday.

Soon after the Personal Training I’d lost one stone!

Personal Trainer’s Tip: Coincidence?! Its important to keep things varied and interesting. So consider Personal Training or joining a class for a change of environment, focus and stimulus.

CHF: That’s great!  Did you measure your progress in other ways?

LL: I started to notice clothes were beginning to droop off me. I made a conscious decision not to weigh myself at the start for I thought I might get discouraged.  On Mark’s recommendation when my confidence had increased I started doing a weekly weigh-in every Monday after my session to gauge my progress.

Personal Trainer’s Tip: Don’t be a slave to the scales, you want to loose fat as opposed to weight per se. Muscle is heavier than fat so you may be putting on weight in the form of muscle that enables you to burn calories more effectively. Take notice of how your clothes fit (or not) to gauge your progress.

CHF: Do you think anything else contributed to your success?

LL: I started to keep a food diary after my first PT session. At the start I ensured I ate 3 main meals a day i.e. breakfast, lunch and dinner which I wasn’t doing before. Then I increased that to 5 small meals. Every Friday I’d treat myself to a lunch of my choice either an M&S burger or Subway but now I don’t always have it nor want it. At the weekend I’d allow myself some chocolate but I don’t even want it now either.

Personal Trainer’s Tip: You can’t out exercise a bad diet. Take note of what you are eating and drinking my keeping a food diary and you’ll be surprised at what it shows!

CHF: What advice would you give to others?

LL: Persevere, if you have a bad day or bad week (a Chinese takeaway or chocolate like I did many times!) start again tomorrow.

Personal Trainer’s Tip: Here! Here! Lois.  Try to abide by the 80/20 rule.   80% stick to your diet and exercise plan but 20% give yourself a little break – life is for living after all.

CHF: It sounds like you’ve had a great journey. What have you learnt?

LL: That it’s not just about weight loss but overall health and fitness and how you feel about yourself. It’s not a 12 week plan but a life style. I didn’t lose the weight all of a sudden. It was a gradual thing, I started really slowly and it took 6 months to get here.  I felt a bit lonely at some points and I found forums on the web really helped support what I was doing.

CHF: What next?

LL: Carry on doing what I’m doing! I love the kettle bell, it’s like no other exercise. It’s not cardio, not weights but everything in one. I also like the fact that not a lot of people know how to use them, that makes me feel a bit special – especially when I pick up the big 16kg one and people are looking at me.

CHF: How are you feeling now compared to when you started?

LL: I’m brimming with confidence physically and mentally, I feel I still have more to lose but in the meantime I’ve booked myself in for a massage with Kevin Mullen to celebrate. I’ve had so many positive comments. The reaction from family and friends has been fantastic. People are shocked, even people I don’t  know are commenting on how I’m  dropping weight like there’s no tomorrow. Just this week the doorman of one of our work buildings looked at me and asked ‘Where are you going?!’

Personal Trainer’s Tip: Keep it up Lois. Very well done! It’s people like yourself that make my job so worthwhile.

Don’t forget if you ever need support or advice with your fitness regime just ask a member of CHF staff who will be more than happy to help you.

Lois’ Weekly Workouts

Mon : Kettlebells

Tue: Bodycombat

Wed: Boxing circuits

Thurs:  Circuit training

Fri:  See how I feel, maybe a kettle bell workout

Sat: Book out a squash court and dance around for 45 mins

Sun:  rest

Lois’ Diet

Breakfast:  weetabix, shreddies, bran based cereal with fruit

Mid morning: Light yogurt

Lunch:  Salad with a source of protein (nuts and/or seeds/fish) and some fruit

Mid afternoon:  Banana

Dinner:  Either lean mince/ fish/ chicken/ with veggies sometimes potatoes