Crop Tops and Cattyness

Crop Tops! There here with a vengeance, apparently this summer anyone who is anyone will be wearing a crop top. But really, theres not gonna be many any anyones out there, is there? Even though my stomach is flat I certainly won't be wearing one (well we shall see). I mean, come on. . . even your skinniest of skinniest girls now have muffin tops. I cringe when I see females showing off the stomach area in a bid to show more flesh, I can't fathom how some girls thing they can do this and it would be attractive, maybe i'm all about high standards but i'm not that bad. so heres is some advice. If your want to show your stomach this is what to do. Slightly lower your carbohydrate intake, ditch the chocolate, the crisps, forget easter, your take-aways. Infact the only carbs you should have is All Bran in the morning with soya milk. Have a probiotic everyday, get a body brush and scrub that tum, buy a toning cream. Get a decent fake tan, do a 4 mile run a day with 500 real sit ups and POW! Stomach of your dreams. It's easy isn't it? NOT! So if you do decide to be a fashion victim then please get with the programme and be honest with yourself ask a pal for honest advice as just doing sit ups wont do diddly if your abs are hidden under 3 inches of adipose. Not only that, one of the clubs in Glasgow now has jacuzzis in it. With a shop where you can buy a bikini, so really us girls are not getting to hide much these days are we. What happened to "Leave it to the imagination" I admit it, i'm no prude but I certainly believe in the rules. . . . You know the ones i'm talking about. . . . . . . You don't? . . . . Oh well I better explain. A girl should choose one or the other to show off, her cleavage . . . . or her legs. So the rule goes, if your out wearing a belt for a skirt please wear a respectable top, Or vice versa. So Bla

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.

Repetitive Repititions

When I am training someone I have to count the reps they do, this can be quite hard sometimes 1,2,3,4, good work, 3,4,5 keep going 12,13,14 I get all mixed up, or else I float away into a fantasy land, conjuring up an imaginary story where I can have my own big cupboard in the house for all my equipment, instead of everywhere, honestly, you walk into our home and there is equipment all around you. Things I hardly use but I wont put them in the hut in case I need to use them immediately, like right this second. I love buying new equipment and have loads of nifty bits and bobs that I could use when I train people. My clients on a weekly basis usually hear the words "Andrew iss going to kill me" because I've went and bought another weird piece of equipment that I have no room for and we have to climb over just to get in the door!

I digress.... It's funny though, just smile and say 5 more reps to someone and they automatically believe you (even if they've already did 50) Sometimes I get the answer "Really, phew" and a simple YEP does the trick, it's brills! Cue evil laugh Mwwahhh ha ha ha I have the power! However, I do have a few clients who are really observant, that can be a tricky one. That's me at 20?!? What yeah two more then! How observant are you? Let me know.

Too tired to live

So are you tired? Don't you just love it when folk say that they're tired? I hate it. I hate when you ask people how they are and they tell you they are OK but tired, exhausted , too busy to sleep. I mean fair enough if you have a medical condition but seriously. . . . Take some time for yourself. Surely by now you know how to "work" your body? Surely you don't need instructions? Step one. Put food in this hole, Step two. Inhale, Step three. Go to sleep. Step four food comes out this. . . . You have to feed it, wash it, put it to sleep. Hunger thirst and of course tiredness is your bodies alarms telling you what to do. So if your tired. . . . Get some sleep, don't work so hard, feed your body correctly (not a takeaway). I know it's easier said than done. My Nana is constantly telling me to "slow down" to "relax" but I do. . . . When I sleep. Otherwise my exercise is my "me" time (I have been seen walking Mia and Juno with my Ipod in, singing at the top of my voice, oblivious to my mum tooting her horn at me or Linda peeing herself laughing whilst I jig along the street) and because I feed my body correctly and train it to be able to cope then I can and I will keep going. Guys. It's not OK to be tired all the time, no matter how hard your work is. Everyone has the odd tired spell. But all the time is a no no! If you work all the time, exercise, look after a baby a dog and your partner then why worry in the middle of the night that the windows are dirty, the grass needs cut or what your are making for the dinner. Sleep is paramount. Shut off all that electrical crap in your room, it's zapping your life and interrupting your sleep, don't read in bed or watch TV in bed, make sure your bedroom is completely void of light when the blinds are shut, The bedroom should only be used for 2 things Sleeping and er . . . . . . . . Resting. What did you think I was going to say? Tut Tut. So what if you turn down a night out, what exactly are you missing anyways? Feeling like a burst couch the next day, with a headache that could kill a donkey. The anxiety that fills you when you can't remember what you did (is that just me). It might sound boring but trust me. . . It wont be by morning.

Skipping Sensations

As you know I can go off on a bit of a rant from time to time, well today's post is a bit different, nothing has annoyed me, I'm not on my high horse (or pony as some of you funny buggers out there like to put it) I was in the gym this morning, running away on the treadmill with my Ipod plugged into it. I had the biggest smile on my face and was letting out a giggle every now and then. I have a reputation amongst the gym staff that I laugh at people, well it is totally unjustified because as it turns out, when they thought I was laughing at people I was actually laughing at you've been framed (honest). But today I was laughing at someone (yes I'm ashamed)I know it isn't fair but really I couldn't help it. Someone was on "my treadmill" (talk about this another time)so I had to take another one, one that doesn't quite have the same view I'm accustomed to. This particular treadmill has a view of the exercise studio and in that studio was a man in a grey t-shirt (great sweating colour)he had in his hands a skipping rope, but no, he wasn't skipping. Instead he was waving the ropes in a figure of eight in front of him, stern look on his face. I think he was psyching himself up because after a minute of doing ridiculously stupid patterns with the ropes he went for it, the skip, that first one, always the hardest, most challenging of all skips. Especially to this guy. He failed. . . fell forward a wee bit then started the flailing with the rope again. Another minute passed and as I watched again, there he goes, 1. . . 2 . . . 3. . . Ah Boll*cks. A small spurt of laughter erupts from my mouth. It's a free country OK! AGAIN with the stupid rope dance thing. This time after his minute of nothing he gets at least 5 skips and looks like a 5 year old girl with pigtails in a playground before stumbling aimlessly over the rope. 15 minutes he tried, and tried again, each time he failed he started his rope waving p*sh. When he did get anywhere near a skip the most he got was 8 jumps, ah mean come on! If he had spent 14 of those minutes actually trying to skip and not whipping a rope about the floor, maybe. . .Just maybe he could do 10 skips. Meanwhile I'm trying to catch my training partners eye as he is doing his weights, I have this freakishly happy grin on my face and keep making eyes at the studio for him to look. He is too busy in "the zone". It just tickled me, that's all.

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.

Magic Pills

Magic weight loss pills?!? Anyone?. . . No? Nah you wouldn't admit it. Who doesn't want to be fit and fabulous with no effort or dieting? Wake up in the morning and the bingo wings are gone, you have loads of energy, you can see your. . . . . . feet(get your mind out the gutter). But really we all know there are no such things out there that do that "quick fix" we are all after. And yes I am after it too, I enjoy exercise but I would much prefer to have a "perfect pill" an easy way out. So they don't work without either hard work (exercise supplements) or bad side affects (diet pills) as well as being extortionate.So. . . . Here is the low down. Exercise supplements such as thermobol (maximuscle) or Sida Cordofolia basically either raise your core body temp (so you burn more calories), increase your heart rate (so you burn more calories) make you feel sick (so you wont eat as much) and take the water from your body(so you look slimmer). Diet pills are the ones you can get prescribed or buy online, these pills are the ones that make you tongue numb (so you don't taste foods) or your bum leak. Yes I said it and I'm not joking, the pills break down the enzymes in food and it leaks out your butt like oil so on your pants at the end of each day is a nice coating of what I like to call ass oil. But overall there is no magic pill, if all the supplements and shakes out there that claim to work really did. Then everyone and their granny would be a skinny size 8 and still be eating a nutritious diet of ice cream, cakes, biscuits, chips pizza etc etc. Don't kid yourself! So I am going to give you all a bit of advice for FREE (people love that word, don't get used to it though, I don't say it often) which is the most basic principle in controlling your weight. Follow this closely as it can get confusing. 1lb of body fat is exactly 3500kcals so if you want to loose a 1lb a week then you need to make 500 calories a day disappear. So you can reduce food intake by 250kcals and do 250kcals of exercise. It really is that simple. Here is an example: My 1.1 mile run this morning burned 170kcals and a bar of chocolate or bag of crisps is about 150kcals. You do the math. So I shall leave you on a serious note for the first time but I promise. . . . . . . never again