Have yourself a merry little Christmas
We’re approaching the end of another year and many of you will now be with loved ones as the festive celebrations get into full swing. It’s a time for family and friends, traditional food and drink, and films and TV shows you’ve probably seen many times before. For many, it’s a difficult time because of these things. There’s a mixture of thoughts and feelings – you want to relax, unwind, celebrate and enjoy it, but at the same time, there’s a worry about weight gain, health, energy, guilt and generally feeling bad. This conflict is always present but this time of year exaggerates these thoughts and feelings even more. The thing is, however you choose to spend your Christmas and New Year, remember that it’s just a week. Health and fitness don’t happen overnight and neither does being unhealthy or unfit. They are an accumulation of behaviours over time. “You are the sum of your behaviours.” Eating chocolate or drinking alcohol isn’t bad for you. It’s bad if you do it too much, too often. So if you decide this week to go wild, the most important thing to do is to enjoy it and remember that you can’t do great harm if you get back to balance afterwards. It’s only an issue if the less healthy behaviours continue for longer. You may decide to enjoy a few less healthy things or you may feel that you’d rather have a healthier week so you come out the other side feeling positive and energised. The choice really is yours. Whatever you decide, here are a four ideas you might consider that can help add a little balance to your Christmas and New Year: Go for a walk – even a small amount of exercise helps. Five minutes of walking outdoors improves mood as much as an hour-long workout, just 30 minutes of moderate intensity can decrease blood pressure for a few hours and control blood sugar levels for 12 hours. If you’re feeling lethargic or sleepy it’s a great way of getting a bit more energy. Drink water – dehydration is one of the major reasons why you end up with a hangover, so just try mixing in some water or squash in between the drinks. Eat something healthy – fruit, vegetables, nuts, seeds, there are lots of healthier foods popular at Christmas too, so just try to include some each day in between the festive treats. Enjoy it – the worst thing you can do is go for the less healthy options and then feel bad about it. If you’re going to go for booze, chocolate, mince pies, christmas cake or christmas put, at least savour the moment. If you have in mind you’re getting back on it after Christmas or once the New Year begins, you’ll have 51 weeks to balance it out and all will be well. Whatever you do, I hope that you have yourself a merry little Christmas. Yours in balance (or out of it for a few days), Paul
Why should your diet be like a Christmas candle?
It seems an odd combination doesn’t it; what could a candle and eating to lose weight possibly have in common. Well the answer is that to work effectively they both need the same three things. For a candle to burn it needs: 1) Wax 2) A wick 3) A flame The wax is the source of energy for the candle. It is the wax that when heated up begins to melt, but it can’t work on its own. The wick is essential too; as the wax of the candle melts, the liquid wax is drawn up the wick. As it does so it becomes increasingly hotter until it turns into a gas. It is this gas that is ignited by the flame and keeps it burning brightly, in turn generating more heat and melting more wax from the candle beneath. The wick plays a vital role in keeping the melted wax in the flame long enough to turn into a gas and allow it to burn. Without the wick, heated wax would simply melt but no flame would be created and as such the wax would not vaporise (become gas). As such at the end you’d juts be left with the same amount of wax but it wouldn’t look as pretty any more. The final piece of the jigsaw of course was the initial spark, the flame that set the wick alight and began the process. Without this the candle obviously can’t burn. All well and good you say, but what’s this got to do with my diet? Well, in recent years there’s been a trend towards low carbohydrate diets. Why is this? Well, according to some, carbs cause diabetes, they make you fat and you don’t need them to burn fat. However, if you take the analogy of our little Christmas Candle, you’ll see that this isn’t right at all. To burn body fat you need three things: 1) Some body fat to burn (the wax) 2) Some carbohydrates (the wick) 3) Movement (the flame) Much like the candle, your body’s biggest energy source is its fat. In fact, even the leanest individuals store plenty of energy as fat. If we take an average, fairly ‘elfy’ individual as an example: Buddy weighs 80 kilo’s and his body fat percentage is 20 per cent. This means that 16 kilo’s of buddy are fat, or 35 pounds. Knowing that a pound of fat is equivalent to around 3,500 calories, that means Buddy has around 123,200 calories of energy to draw on when needed from fat. That’s enough in theory to run around 50 marathons! So we’ve established that we’ve got energy to burn. Now let’s see how carbohydrate is involved, time for a little trip to the chemistry lab. When glucose is broken down, a substance known as pyruvate is produced. This in turn creates oxaloacetate, which is a vital substance in the process of fat breakdown. If carbohydrate levels are low, less pyruvate is produced, so less oxaloacetate is produced, and therefore less fat is broken down, or rather fat is broken down inefficiently. In simple terms, remove the carbohydrates and you remove the wick that allows the fat to burn. Finally of course, you need a spark to create the flame, ignite the wick and begin the process. This is exercise or movement. The more you move the higher your metabolism, meaning your flame burns brighter. So if you want to burn your wax, sorry body fat, effectively, be sure to keep some healthy carbohydrates in your diet. Examples might be whole grain rice, pasta or bread, quinoa, couscous, bulgar wheat and fruit and vegetables. And of course remember to move, aim for 30 minutes exercise every day and your flame will burn brightly. Merry Christmas everyone, Paul
Stressed? Here’s how to find some balance.
Do you often feel stressed? How do you know? What do you feel? How do you feel? What do you see and hear? The word stress is one that you’ll probably hear many times these days, but its meaning is probably more complex and controversial than you may imagine. The word stress comes from the Latin word stringere, meaning to draw tight. This is a good analogy, as it’s true meaning is to put strain on something. When thinking of it in relation to you, it relates to anything that challenges your body and takes it out of its comfort zone. This could be a mental stress, challenging your brain, a physical stress challenging your body, or both. When most people think of and use the word stress these days, it generally carries a negative meaning, yet that does not always have to be the case. There are in fact two distinct types of stress: Eustress This is good stress. What’s that you say? How can stress be good? Well let’s look at a few examples. Exercise – you know it’s good for you, or you do if you’ve been reading the balance blog and Facebook posts! Exercise involves physical exertion, placing stress upon your body. In fact, one of the key principles of exercise that any fitness professional can tell you about is called overload. In simple terms, your body will not adapt and get fitter unless you challenge it. Why would it? If you’ve ever taken up exercise, you’ll know that feeling of discomfort in the first few sessions, then after a while you don’t find it so hard. You have stressed your body enough that it’s decided to change, primarily because it’s quite lazy and doesn’t want to have to work hard. Suddenly you find the same exercise session pretty easy, and the only way to get more changes from your body is, you guessed it, to work harder still. Of course, you need to do this sensibly and gradually or you place your body under too much stress and increase the likelihood of overtraining and injury. Challenge – ever had a job that was just too easy and you were bored? Many of you will have experienced this and will have spent time trying to get promoted or looking for a career change. You’re basically trying deliberately to add more stress to yourself, but that’s because you need it and want it. Imagine if there was no challenge to life, what would be the motivation to continue? It could easily be argued that stress is actually what keeps you alive. However, as with all things in life, it’s all about balance. Too much stress, or unwanted stresses can have a negative impact. Distress This is the term for bad stress, any stressor that puts your body under too much strain or has a negative effect. This is what most people think of when they use the term stress. What causes distress? Work – being overworked, not enjoying your job, demanding deadlines, pressure passed on by your boss or by targets set for your team, bonus schemes, long hours, there’s a whole host of reasons why work can stress people both mentally and physically. Money – life these days can be expensive and throws up unexpected costs when the car breaks down or a utility bill is bigger than you thought. Family life – it’s hard to get on with the people you love all the time. Even when you do, you want to look after them and time apart, exam pressure for children, job interviews, university placements, holidays, illness and a million other things can make life feel complicated and stressful. Lack of sleep, too much exercise, exposure to electrical and chemical radiation, taking exams, and even sitting down place stresses on your body, the latter putting your knee joint under strain by tightening the muscles that attach around it. Whether you are affected by stress (I mean distress) depends on a number of things: 1) Your balance of eustress and distress. 2) The coping mechanisms you have in place. Let’s have a look at these and see what can be done. Firstly, it can be useful for you to identify all of the things that create good stress and bad stress in your life. Make a list like the one below. Eustress My gym visits Taking exams for my courses Rehearsing for a play that you’re going to be appearing in Preparing to go self-employed Distress Lack of sleep Work pressures Getting the kids to school on time in the morning Flying on holiday next week and hate flying Fitting in visits to the family around after-school clubs, visits to the doctors, going shopping, picking up a prescription, posting your tax return on time and a million other things you struggle to make time for Spending 10 hours a day sat in front of a computer Now you’ve got your list, don’t get stressed if you think you’ve missed something, you can add it at another time, it’s worth looking at the balance of good and bad and asking yourself two questions: 1) Can I add more things that will give me eustress to my life? Take up yoga or meditate Go for a walk outside at lunchtimes or at least get away from my desk more often Book a race to raise money for charity Spend time playing sports with my children Go to sleep half an hour earlier These are just a few examples, you’ll have plenty of your own. 2) How can I manage or remove the things that cause me distress? Some would call this stress management or stress reduction, you can call it distress disposal, Fred or whatever you like that makes most sense to you. Let’s choose one possible cause of distress and look at ways to reduce it; in this case the fear or hatred of flying. Hate is a strong word so it must be pretty stressful.
A balanced view on running for weight loss
Come January, as the New Year’s Resolutions start to kick in, you will see many people hitting the roads for a run, some to get fitter or dreaming of being the next Mo Farah, others because they want to lose weight. You’ll see the same increase in jogger numbers in the weeks after the London Marathon has inspired the British public in the middle of April. So is running a good option for weight loss? We’ll present both sides of the argument for you here and let you decide for yourself, after all, we’re not called balance for nothing! The pros 1) Running burns calories This is an undeniable fact! You’ll hear some say that cardio is no good for weight loss and they’ll upsell the virtues of resistance training (and they’ll be absolutely right to do so on the latter). But let’s be honest, you don’t see very many overweight professional long-distance runners do you??? OK so cardiovascular training doesn’t build muscle and increase calorie burn after workouts in the way that weights training does, but it burns plenty of calories in the process. If you want to know how many calories you burn during a run, Runners World provide a nice simple calculator here: http://www.runnersworld.com/tools/calories-burned-calculator Of course, this is an estimate but it gives you some idea and shows how much of a dent you are making towards your goals. 2) You might like running Doing something you enjoy is fundamental to success in any weight loss or health programme. For those that enjoy running, it may well be a good idea. If you don’t, we guarantee there will be an alternative that is just as effective for you, be it cycling, swimming, walking, weights training or whatever works for you. 3) Running improves health From improvements in blood glucose and blood cholesterol to better control of mood and mental health, running provides a range of health benefits. We’ve also shown many times that getting outside amongst nature has important effects on health and running is a great way of doing this. 4) Running can improve bone density Various studies have shown that bone mass is increased, maintained, or the rate of loss with ageing slowed through running, in both the lower limbs and lumbar spine. Running is of benefit because the strain frequency is high. This means that during a running session the number of times the foot comes into contact with the floor are high, putting repeated stresses on the bones and causing adaptations to occur in order to cope with these stresses and strains. The cons 1) It places stress on joints Yes we know, we just told you that placing stress on bones and joints was a good thing, and it is, for the right people at the right time. If you are overweight and deconditioned however, it may not be the best place to start. When running, up to five times your bodyweight can pass through your joints. For those who are normal weight or slightly overweight, this may not pose too much of a problem, but if you carry more weight then running may place too much stress on your joints, increasing the risk of injuries. 2) It is repetitive The nature of running means that you have to perform the same movement time and time again. This increases the likelihood of overload on specific muscles and joints, again increasing the likelihood of injury, especially if the body is not conditioned enough to undergo these pressures. Running with poor posture or technique, or doing too much, are the things likely to cause issues here. If you have tight muscles, have had injuries, have a predominantly seated job or have not been active for some time, it is well worth conditioning your body first before ploughing straight into the running regime. You can do this through resistance training, stretching, yoga or Pilates. 3) Walking can burn more calories You may be surprised to hear that walking quickly actually burns more calories than running. This means brisk walking (that special type of walk, the type you see in the Olympic Games), at a speed of 8 kilometres per hour or faster. At this speed it is less economical for the body to walk than it is to run, and as such it makes it harder to do, burning more calories in the process. 4) You might not like running See point two in pros. If you prefer another form of exercise, don’t run! There are plenty of other choices available to you. Key messages: 1) If you haven’t exercised for a while, have poor posture or tight muscles, or are very overweight, consider doing something else in the earlier stages of your exercise routine. As you increase your fitness and lose weight, you can gradually add running into your routine. 2) Mix it up. Don’t just run; mix it up with stretching and resistance training to ensure your muscles, bones and joints can take the stresses and strains placed on them. 3) Learn to run – this might sound daft but ensuring you run with good posture and technique, and have the appropriate footwear to suit your style, is key to you getting the most out of it. 4) Run if it’s fun! Don’t slog through exercise if it is a chore, you won’t stick to it in the long-term. Find what you enjoy and mix it up regularly to keep it fun and varied. 5) Little by little – if you are going to take up running, build up gradually and be sure to get yourself a proper programme that includes periods of rest to prevent you overdoing it and to decrease your risk of injury or boredom. If you have a question about your own running programme, get in touch with us and we’ll be happy to offer some friendly advice. balance your exercise routine, balance your scales
