Genes! Pah!

It’s not in your genes. I promise you, this fitness malarkey is not something you are born with, you didn’t come out the womb with the sweat bands, flexing shouting “I‘ll show you the way to the beach maw“ , it’s an interest, a hobby, a task, job, struggle but it’s not natural. I don’t care who you are or if you train 3 times a day or run 100 miles a week. Fitness is something you picked up, acquired or were pushed into. Everyone always has a starting point.
   I was getting a tad nostalgic today reading through some old report cards from school. As I sat reminiscing on the floor in my grandparents spare room I noticed something I had forgotten. I was god awful at P:E. Some of the reports are vague with a kindly “Always tries hard” or “an able pupil”. Going on to the early years in high school the teachers were less constructive however “maximum effort required” and “struggling to pass practical aspects of the class” was the general consensus. Reading through these is an embarrassing task. But my teachers also comment on my social development? Oh…… yeah they do “One of the quieter members of the class” and of more note “perhaps a little shy to express her opinion”. On the plus side though one of my teachers said my overall school work was SATISFACTORY don’t ya just hate that word? It’s not exactly inspiring, I’d never say that to a client, But I digress….
      All this shows that indeed, we change, we develop. And for me people like me, getting beat in a race by the weird girl called Trisha with a head full of nits and a penchant for wooly jumpers at the school sports day, this is fantastic news. My family are NOT into fitness, or sports in any way but for me it was my gramps when he would put me on his shoulders as he was doing his press ups (I’d love to see him do that now) and because of that small act I formed an interest.

       Some of you may have had to kick start your fitness due to a random person in public calling out “hide yer chips” as you walked past or you noticing as you walked you were making footprints in the concrete. For others it’s work fitness tests, charity events or seeing their favourite actor on the front of Men’s Health. Whatever it is once we start you can’t deny the good feeling it gives you. A natural high (no I’m not talking about the rush you get when you eat a full box of krispie kremes) a high like no other, then you curse it the next day when you are so stiff you struggle to get you butt on the toilet seat. But whatever got you into it, trust me when I say stick it out, don’t phone it in. Oh and don’t let the weird girl with nits beat you in a race!

Tracy Who? (Am I just jealous of her success?)

So maybe you’ve heard of Personal trainer Tracy Anderson. Apparently she is responsible for Madonna’s arms and for Gwyneth’s skinny bod She’s just opened up a studio with Gwyneth, for all of £600 per month you too can learn the secrets to ultra-thin wiryness. Oh, you don’t have £600 to spare? Cheap ass! Lol! Well, don’t worry because I have the skinny (get it?) on Ms Anderson’s method. I have watched her workout videos, signed up to the free* videos on her website so maybe you should grab a notepad or something. You ready? Starve yourself and work out twelve hours every week. (Please don't take this serious) Oh, there’s some more details too, of course. Make sure you turn the heat way up when you do her workout. Don’t worry about why, it’s "science". Also, never lift anything heavier than 1.5kg! Because everyone knows the worst way to build muscles is to lift heavy things. You’ll need some help carrying your messages, picking up your kids, using dictionaries, making spaghetti, doing laundry, washing the dog…. but that’s fine. You don’t want to bulk up, do you? Speaking of no bulk. I didn’t know spices made you fat? WOW! Science revolution going on here. I don’t think there’s a day where your intake would go over 1000 calories. But don’t worry because Dr. Tracy did a double-blind five year study of this method on her own, she assures us and I’m sure she would have no reason to just completely make some shit up. Yeah right. You better hope you can manage to eat all that food though because Tracy’s six two-hour workouts each week will be using every bit of energy you’ve taken in(literally.) Her signature method: a blend of dance, pilates and secret moves given to her by some Nigerian prince she met through the internet is the only way to get results. No other type of workout, if done for 12 hours a week, could result in weight loss. Not really. Now, some people might tell you that you can just lift heavy things, make small changes to your diet and not pay thousands of poundsto get results. *You’ll also have to pay an initiation fee, of course. I mean, you can’t expect to join a gym for less than £1000 a year, can you? For your information Because this entry keeps getting a lot of hits from people searching for things like “how to eat like tracy anderson” or “gwyneth paltrow’s diet” and lots of outgoing traffic to the article on Tracy Anderson’s diet plan, I felt like I needed to say something. This woman, Tracy Anderson, does not have any kind of special magic knowledge. I don’t care that she’s skinny or that Gwyneth and Madonna are also skinny. I don’t care that she was on Oprah or that she has a jaw the size of Scotlands east coast. I don’t care that there are people out there desperate, rich and/or stupid enough to pay £600 month to train at her gym. There is absolutely nothing new or revolutionary about what she is doing. If you eat much less food than you need (aka: starve yourself) and workout 12 hours per week, then you will lose weight. You could eat all of you daily calories from cakes and exercise only by doing a gentle walk for two hours, you would still lose weight. What has Tracy Anderson actually done? She has kept two women who have always been thin, thin. She spends hours each week working out with them personally. They both have people that can prepare fresh, possibly tasty food for them. Wow, give me two women who have never even been overweight, give me hours to train with them and give them each a chef and I too will keep them thin. If you want to fit into kids jeans then I can do it for you too! I don’t know why we are interested in this woman. Maybe, like me, you are fascinated and frustrated by how it always seems to be that the people in the fitness industry who know the least get the most attention. Maybe you’ve convinced yourself that beauty only happens between sizes 6 or 8. Maybe you’re not healthy or happy and you’re desperate to feel better. If you’re in the last two categories, do yourself a favor and don’t waste your time or especially your money on people like Ms Anderson, spend it on trainers like me ;-). Really, starving yourself and spending 2 hours a day, six days every week on exercise is not a revolution, it’s a disorder. There is good information out there on how to improve health regardless of weight. So go ahead and eat plenty of nourishing and delicious food, feel free to pick up things that are heavier than 1.5kg and don’t give people like Tracy Anderson any more undeserved attention or money. Rant Complete!

Off the wagon

Everyone falls off the wagon at some point, and yes, I mean everyone, even me. So I have a blow out every blue moon (sue me)Let me tell you what to do if you find yourself in that situation, I will also explain what not to do. Once upon a time I fell off the wagon with a vengeance. I was actually that bad I woke up to answer the door in the morning to the UPS guy.(delivering health supplements ha ha ha)"Little Miss Fitness?", I force out a grunt and as I stand there I notice my pyjamas back to front. It also occurred to me that I had in fact kept up to date with my food diary by scribbling in a 3yr olds handwriting "Vodka x3, Tia Maria x3, Baileys x3, Wine, Champagne" on the drinks, dinner and snacks columns. There was also some illegible print which I later translated to Chicken, Melon and Cheesecake. So Ladies and Gentlemen, I will give you all this one bit of advice, even though you get in at 5am, totally and utterly trollied, you should still take the time to write in your food diary so you can reflect on your intake over a week. It really does help with the guilt and the shamefulness when you look at that writing and think, those words we have all said to ourselves a thousand times "I am never drinking again". I mean what will my clients think? . . . . . . Especially when I don't even like Tia Maria, Baileys or Melon. But hey! We learn something new every day. The biggest mistake though is when you book a Personal Training client for 8am at Strathclyde park, realising there is not a hope in hell you can drive there, so you run, and when you arrive (if you ever do) the alcohol in your blood stream has heated up to 37 degrees and soaked through your clothes, so now you smell distinctly of a brewery as you saunter green faced up to your client that you have told off a hundred times about the effects of binge drinking on the liver.......Good example Nats, Well done.

Round bowls covered in lycra

I admit it, under my sensible personal trainer persona lurks a dirty secret. The deepest darkest secret ever, but your are privileged, I'm gonna tell you. Whenever I am in a supermarket and I see a magazine that says "How to get Gwyneth's arms" I grab it, I need to find out (it's the professional in me), I will read the story before even getting to the till, it's sad yes. But this information is stuff I have to find out! I know how to make arms look tight and toned yet somehow this way must be better. Some fantastic new concept that will change arms everywhere forever. It's amazing, these celebrities, their bodies, their time? How do they do it? Obviously your answer will be "Because they have a chef, a nutritionist, a trainer a dog trainer". But I have seen it, I've seen women who have it all yet still manage to not hold back the donuts when they are out of the watchful eye. So how do they do it? I do not know, they come from ratbag to ravishing in 5 minutes, easy peasy! Willpower of steel! This obsession is not cheap (but it certainly is cheerful), Fitness magazines are about £4 a pop and I buy Zest, I buy Health and Fitness, Women's Fitness, Ultra Fit, Fitness hers, I even buy the monthly Holland and Barrat magazine and when I can I go to borders and read their magazines, you're allowed to do that are you not? I do try to be sensible though. . . . sometimes I see "Get Britney's Abs" or "Get Colleens bum" and I think, yuk no thanks, come on magazine people your standards have dropped. Britney's stomach is nothing to be desired and neither is Coleen's bum for that matter. What I'm looking for is thighs honed like rockets, arms as taught as a squirrel's, abs so toned they could be used to model bat girls shield. I must find this exercise! That does all that and more, I must. I will not stop until my bum cheeks are like little rounded bowls covered in Lycra.