Look out for the next episode of ..... "Fantastic 4+4"
Monday, November 19, 2007
Introducing..."Fantastic 4+4"
*Open Picture in seperate new windows to follow the flow of the story
Look out for the next episode of ..... "Fantastic 4+4"
Look out for the next episode of ..... "Fantastic 4+4"
News from Sydney !!
Howdy folks!
It’s Rizal from Sydney, feeling engaged and energized with the Fitness Challenge you guys & gals are participating in. Reading PLT’s “skinny” on Corporate Athlete (CA) reminds me of the time when I asked him to train me on CA. Although daunting at first, having your Country Manager as a personal trainer helps to keep the motivation to stay on the program :-P Interval training is very effective and sure-fire way to get maximum output in minimum time. I remember one time (after doing the program for a few months) – I overestimated my fitness level and started to up the tempo. It’s a guy / macho / ego thing as there was this girl who was running faster beside my machine. I couldn’t even finish one interval!!! Had to stop, took a shower and borrowed Mahboob’s car to drive home. I had an ashtma attack and my ventolin inhaler was at home… lesson learned รจ stick to the program and listen to your Polar Heart Rate monitor!!!
The folks here in P&G Australia are now running Boot Camps as part of our wellness program. Generally, the people here are more health aware and more willing to participate on such programs. We had 2 of our employees here trained to be a CA trainer. During our last annual offsite ala NatCon, we launched the CA program to the whole organization. We had outstanding response to it with 90% of the organization signing up for the full CA program training.
Have I been keeping up with the program? I’ve modified my program to suit my personal needs here. I now cycle-commute to work (about 10-15km return route) and do about 70km long weekend rides. Having little access to mamak stalls and halal food has helped me tremendously. I’ve lost approx. 10kg since I came here and started cycling. I’m hovering around 75kg mark now with the aim to drop below 70kg. I’m trying to see how much I can improve my hill climbing ability. I’ve also recently learned how to swim. Again, it’s a macho thing as my boys have been taking classes and can swim better than me!
Best cycling achievement? Recently completed a 85km Sydney Spring Cycle and 96km Sydney to Wollongong (Gong) ride (both after not doing a lot of training during Ramadhan). I recently joined my local cycling club to learn group riding techniques and potentially enter some races. Will update you with more progress on that later. Sharing some photos from my Gong ride and my most coveted toy right now.
Net – it’s good to feel connected back home. Keep up with the program folks! Kalau ada kelapangan, jemputlah datang ke Sydney. You’re more than welcome to stay at my house.
Rizal
Thursday, November 15, 2007
The "Skinny" on Corporate Athlete
Folks, having attended the Corporate Athlete training program the other day, I recalled a very good summary written by PLT (Patrick) sometime in 2005. Sharing with you folks the " skinny" he wrote =)...enjoy...
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Corporate Athlete: The Basic Principles and Learnings - by Patrick Lockwood-Taylor
A number of you have asked about my Corporate Athlete experience. As such, I thought it would be useful to document and share some of my learnings. I have found it to be a very rewarding program. I am thinner, fitter, more engaged across more of the more important things in my life, and can sustain my attention and energy far longer. if you are interested in why, read on ...
This shares some of the basic principles from Corporate Athlete: I have tried to distill 2.5 days to two pages or so.
The basic mission of Corporate Athlete is to teach students to sustain high performance “during the storm.” By that, our individual capacity is expanded beyond the storm; Each storm can then be managed effectively. The basic premise:- the pathway from ordinary to extraordinary is the energy you bring to the time you put against a given issue/need. This is full engagement. 75% of people are assessed as disengaged; they have insufficient energy capacity and poor energy management skills.
The program objective therefore, to build and sustain energy capacity to perform in all high stress situations. To improve energy mngt skills individually and organizationally. Manage energy, not time, is the ethos.
There are four governing principles:
1) Full engagement means drawing on four distinct dimensions of energy : physical, emotional, mental and spiritual. To increase energy you have to increase each source.
2) Full engagement requires that we balance energy expenditure with energy recovery in each of the four sources. How can you recover in each cell for 10 minutes?
3) Full engagement requires that we push beyond our normal limits, in each source, training like a corporate athlete every day.
4) Full engagement requires positive rituals that become automatic over time.
There are three barriers to instilling the Corporate Athlete in each of us.
1) Personal barriers to achieving full engagement. This could include lack of confidence, multi tasking, indecisiveness, etc (these can be derived from broad based 360 feedback from peers, family, suppliers, customers, etc.)
2) Nutritional barriers to achieving full engagement.
3) Fitness barriers to achieving full engagement. (If you want to develop detailed feedback for the more personal barriers section, I will happily work with you individually on how and when we do that. The W&DP feedback is the perfect occasion.)
For the nutritional piece, here’s the skinny (sorry=) ) It’s all about keeping your glucose within tolerance limits. When you understand how glucose works you understand 75% of nutrition. If you don’t eat enough your glucose depletes. You will feel grumpy, disengaged and impatient, unable to concentrate as your body moves to a self preserve / highly selfish mode. (Ever had that?? Some people say you become unapproachable—it’s just a physiological reaction. Funnily enough, we often see it when children get hungry-they start to misbehave, become highly irritable.) Your body then takes nutrients from your muscles (and not fat cells) increasing your body fat %. Worse, it then initiates a chemical reaction forcing you to crave food. Result you gorge food, much of which goes to fat.If you over eat the reaction is not dissimilar: your glucose shoots up, the body produces insulin to break it down , causing you to feel drowsy and irritable (ever had this after a big meal??) Net effect from both, is, your body fat % goes up and your ability to fully engage, reduced!
Here’s the principles:- Eat light and often.- 80/20 rule. No more than 20% of what you eat should be “want” foods (those with low nutrients Vs quantity of calories.) The other 80% are need foods. (That’s 4 or so handfuls of want foods a day!!!)- Eat every 3 hrs (+/- 1 hr.)
- Eat breakfast, lunch and dinner. Eat 5 handfuls of food per meal. 1 protein (size and thickness of palm of hand); 2 grain; 2 fruit and veg. Physiologically, this is what your body needs. If not balanced, then food gets broken down into glucose quicker, spiking your glucose and initiating the cycle above. Substitute want foods (and each glass of wine!) for grain allocations. Drink alcohol with meals.
- Snack with low glycemic foods (I have lists) at 100-150 cals.
- Eat 1 hour before going to gym.
- Eat for what you will be doing over the next 2-3 hours.- Don’t binge. The body does not recognize that you have not eaten for a few hours so it’s NOT OK to binge. Think of I like medication: if you miss taking a tablet it can be dangerous to double dose to compensate. The metabolism also doesn’t work that way ! Your glucose will spike, and the excess will be deposited as fat. L
Fitness:
Fitness plays a critical role in making you a better more effective person in relation to those things that matter to you.
The principles here are straightforward:- exercise is good for you as it reduces fat, stress, etc; but, in the corporate athlete context, it increases your energy capacity and thus engagement potential. Other characteristics are faster recovery times, greater tolerance (of storms, stress,etc.)
There are 3 expectations:
1) 30 mins interval training 3 x pw. This is where you run/row/ride etc hard for 3 mins, mid/high for next 3 mins etc up to 30 mins. It’s all about getting your heart to target heart rate for the full 30 mins (THR= .)
2) Ideally 2x 30 min weight lifting sessions pw.As you pass 30, you lose 2% of your muscle mass every year (increasing your % body fat.) You have to offset this through resistance training (ie lifting weights.)
3) Flexibility training: stretch down after each exercise session using a broad range of stretches.
If you can, you can combine an interval and resistance session.
From dream to reality: you have to create the positive rituals to habitualise the Corporate athlete behaviours.
95% of what you do is habit; to create new ones requires intervention and commitment.
These need to be linked to a higher order personal goal to be enduring.
For example:
Vision: To be fully engaged in my life’s priority areas all the time.
Mission: To use exercise and nutrition to lose weight and build energy levels.
Action step: Follow 3x 5 handful rule from today. Become a member of gym and do a 30 min session per day by leaving home 30 mins earlier and starting work 10 mins later.
Measurement: 30 day; 60 day.
That’s about it. Whether you follow any of the above is entirely voluntary. But the people I know who have followed the program have enjoyed and prospered through it in their own way.
Apple anyone? =)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Corporate Athlete: The Basic Principles and Learnings - by Patrick Lockwood-Taylor
A number of you have asked about my Corporate Athlete experience. As such, I thought it would be useful to document and share some of my learnings. I have found it to be a very rewarding program. I am thinner, fitter, more engaged across more of the more important things in my life, and can sustain my attention and energy far longer. if you are interested in why, read on ...
This shares some of the basic principles from Corporate Athlete: I have tried to distill 2.5 days to two pages or so.
The basic mission of Corporate Athlete is to teach students to sustain high performance “during the storm.” By that, our individual capacity is expanded beyond the storm; Each storm can then be managed effectively. The basic premise:- the pathway from ordinary to extraordinary is the energy you bring to the time you put against a given issue/need. This is full engagement. 75% of people are assessed as disengaged; they have insufficient energy capacity and poor energy management skills.
The program objective therefore, to build and sustain energy capacity to perform in all high stress situations. To improve energy mngt skills individually and organizationally. Manage energy, not time, is the ethos.
There are four governing principles:
1) Full engagement means drawing on four distinct dimensions of energy : physical, emotional, mental and spiritual. To increase energy you have to increase each source.
2) Full engagement requires that we balance energy expenditure with energy recovery in each of the four sources. How can you recover in each cell for 10 minutes?
3) Full engagement requires that we push beyond our normal limits, in each source, training like a corporate athlete every day.
4) Full engagement requires positive rituals that become automatic over time.
There are three barriers to instilling the Corporate Athlete in each of us.
1) Personal barriers to achieving full engagement. This could include lack of confidence, multi tasking, indecisiveness, etc (these can be derived from broad based 360 feedback from peers, family, suppliers, customers, etc.)
2) Nutritional barriers to achieving full engagement.
3) Fitness barriers to achieving full engagement. (If you want to develop detailed feedback for the more personal barriers section, I will happily work with you individually on how and when we do that. The W&DP feedback is the perfect occasion.)
For the nutritional piece, here’s the skinny (sorry=) ) It’s all about keeping your glucose within tolerance limits. When you understand how glucose works you understand 75% of nutrition. If you don’t eat enough your glucose depletes. You will feel grumpy, disengaged and impatient, unable to concentrate as your body moves to a self preserve / highly selfish mode. (Ever had that?? Some people say you become unapproachable—it’s just a physiological reaction. Funnily enough, we often see it when children get hungry-they start to misbehave, become highly irritable.) Your body then takes nutrients from your muscles (and not fat cells) increasing your body fat %. Worse, it then initiates a chemical reaction forcing you to crave food. Result you gorge food, much of which goes to fat.If you over eat the reaction is not dissimilar: your glucose shoots up, the body produces insulin to break it down , causing you to feel drowsy and irritable (ever had this after a big meal??) Net effect from both, is, your body fat % goes up and your ability to fully engage, reduced!
Here’s the principles:- Eat light and often.- 80/20 rule. No more than 20% of what you eat should be “want” foods (those with low nutrients Vs quantity of calories.) The other 80% are need foods. (That’s 4 or so handfuls of want foods a day!!!)- Eat every 3 hrs (+/- 1 hr.)
- Eat breakfast, lunch and dinner. Eat 5 handfuls of food per meal. 1 protein (size and thickness of palm of hand); 2 grain; 2 fruit and veg. Physiologically, this is what your body needs. If not balanced, then food gets broken down into glucose quicker, spiking your glucose and initiating the cycle above. Substitute want foods (and each glass of wine!) for grain allocations. Drink alcohol with meals.
- Snack with low glycemic foods (I have lists) at 100-150 cals.
- Eat 1 hour before going to gym.
- Eat for what you will be doing over the next 2-3 hours.- Don’t binge. The body does not recognize that you have not eaten for a few hours so it’s NOT OK to binge. Think of I like medication: if you miss taking a tablet it can be dangerous to double dose to compensate. The metabolism also doesn’t work that way ! Your glucose will spike, and the excess will be deposited as fat. L
Fitness:
Fitness plays a critical role in making you a better more effective person in relation to those things that matter to you.
The principles here are straightforward:- exercise is good for you as it reduces fat, stress, etc; but, in the corporate athlete context, it increases your energy capacity and thus engagement potential. Other characteristics are faster recovery times, greater tolerance (of storms, stress,etc.)
There are 3 expectations:
1) 30 mins interval training 3 x pw. This is where you run/row/ride etc hard for 3 mins, mid/high for next 3 mins etc up to 30 mins. It’s all about getting your heart to target heart rate for the full 30 mins (THR= .)
2) Ideally 2x 30 min weight lifting sessions pw.As you pass 30, you lose 2% of your muscle mass every year (increasing your % body fat.) You have to offset this through resistance training (ie lifting weights.)
3) Flexibility training: stretch down after each exercise session using a broad range of stretches.
If you can, you can combine an interval and resistance session.
From dream to reality: you have to create the positive rituals to habitualise the Corporate athlete behaviours.
95% of what you do is habit; to create new ones requires intervention and commitment.
These need to be linked to a higher order personal goal to be enduring.
For example:
Vision: To be fully engaged in my life’s priority areas all the time.
Mission: To use exercise and nutrition to lose weight and build energy levels.
Action step: Follow 3x 5 handful rule from today. Become a member of gym and do a 30 min session per day by leaving home 30 mins earlier and starting work 10 mins later.
Measurement: 30 day; 60 day.
That’s about it. Whether you follow any of the above is entirely voluntary. But the people I know who have followed the program have enjoyed and prospered through it in their own way.
Apple anyone? =)
Cute, Sexy and Active having fun with Hot & Ripped !!!
In the spirit of Building Diverse, Collaborative Relationship, the Cute, Sexy & Active Team decided to train together with the Hot & Ripped Team (well, actually 2 members from the latter came to join the former session). Though there were cries of pain & begging the PT to reduce the count, we persevered & completed the cycle (mostly :-)). It was a very comprehensive workout at the Fitness Network, covering:
lower body exercise (squat-touch the dumbell - man, this was hard!!),
mid-section exercise (1-minute "tummy" stretch (though it felt like forever), and a 3-phase ab crunch for guys, 2 for ladies)
upper body - 3-phase strength training with the dumbells
flexing & stretching - shoulders, thighs, butt and back (ala "Superman").
All in all, the session was gooood, with:
sweat pouring
calories burning
cardio rate hitting targets
muscles flexing & tightening at the right places.
and most importantly, lots of fun, laughter, pains & words of encouragements from each other.
Participants were seen feeling/touching & admiring each others muscles after the workout.
On how to improve heart rate !!
Dear HnR team,
Recovery rate is directly related to the fitness of your heart which is reflected by your stamina level. In order to improve the fitness of your heard, you have no other option but to do your cardio training. By the way, the word cardio = heart. So, what you need to do is work out your heart, push it a little bit at a time, not too much at one time though, else you'll get heart attack. As you introduce more physical activity and endurance work to your body, your heart will start to adapt to that new load of work by getting stronger. Your heart is like any other muscles in your body cause it's made out of muscles. The more you train it, the stronger it gets.
A stronger heart need not pump so rapidly to get the required amount of blood through your body cause with each pump, more blood is pushed out. That can be measured by counting your resting heart rate.
As for the resting heart rate, MrX is 102 and MrY 146. That shows that after some exerting the heart, MrX's heart slows down and come back to his resting heart rate quicker cause 1) since his heart is fitter, it did not need to go very high during that 3 mins step test anyway and 2) the work load is considered light and easy for his body so no need for the heart to keep pumping on high for so long so it slows down and return to resting quicker. So as you deligently work on your cardio, your heart will eventually get stronger and hence, your resting and recovery rate will improve. Genetic, age, gender.... etc... do contribute in how fit you are but though you can't change those factor, you still can improve on your current condition.
Although it's good to belong to a gym so you have convinient access to exercise facilities, it doesn't mean that you can't exercise and stay fit without it. However, it does take you some extra effort and initiative to get yourself to go do some exercise if you can't go to the gym. What you can do in situations like this is to team up with some buddies. Get yourselve involved in some group sports like futsal or basketball. Whatever sports you like. Be apart of a team that meet up regularly to play. Chances are, if you have people to do your activities with and have fun at the same time, you'll adhere better.
Another thing is, you'll have to schedule your workout in your diary. You can't say that you'll workout when or if you have time. Make time for it. Maybe you can write a note that you'll wake up half hour earlier each day, take out a jump robe and jump 100x, do 50 push ups, 30 step ups, 50 crunches, stretch for 5 minutes. Write that down, stick it somewhere visible (eg: the bathroom mirror, at the side of computer monitor, next to tv), set your alarm clock to ring on a default time, 30 mins earlier than usual daily.
Do surround yourself with people who are enthusiatic about their exercise and get some inspiration from them. If you consistently hear people talking about eating right and exercise, chances are, you'll get influence as well. You can also stick the result of your "not-so-impresive" fitness age report on your office desk to constantly remind you of how much work you need to do on yourself. Write out some specific goals eg: I want to lose 2kgs a month, increase my push up by 2 a week and be able to reach my toes with legs straight by Christmas. Make it a mini project for yourself and tackle it one step at a time within your self given timeframe.
At the end of the day, it comes down to how much you want it and how much you're willing to sacrifice to achieve your fitness goals. I'm sure if you've set out a goal and make that as the purpose of your hard work, you're more likely to succeed. If you have very vague goals or don't understand the reasons behind what you're doing, your work will not worth up to anything much. No one likes to work hard aimlessly. So, set your aim/ target/ goal and constantly remind yourself of it. Subconciously, you'll start removing your butt off the chair and take actions that would bring you your desired results.
Ok, before i get carried away with typing and end up sending a long mail that takes up too much time to read, i better stop here and continue some other time.
All the best,
AMY
Recovery rate is directly related to the fitness of your heart which is reflected by your stamina level. In order to improve the fitness of your heard, you have no other option but to do your cardio training. By the way, the word cardio = heart. So, what you need to do is work out your heart, push it a little bit at a time, not too much at one time though, else you'll get heart attack. As you introduce more physical activity and endurance work to your body, your heart will start to adapt to that new load of work by getting stronger. Your heart is like any other muscles in your body cause it's made out of muscles. The more you train it, the stronger it gets.
A stronger heart need not pump so rapidly to get the required amount of blood through your body cause with each pump, more blood is pushed out. That can be measured by counting your resting heart rate.
As for the resting heart rate, MrX is 102 and MrY 146. That shows that after some exerting the heart, MrX's heart slows down and come back to his resting heart rate quicker cause 1) since his heart is fitter, it did not need to go very high during that 3 mins step test anyway and 2) the work load is considered light and easy for his body so no need for the heart to keep pumping on high for so long so it slows down and return to resting quicker. So as you deligently work on your cardio, your heart will eventually get stronger and hence, your resting and recovery rate will improve. Genetic, age, gender.... etc... do contribute in how fit you are but though you can't change those factor, you still can improve on your current condition.
Although it's good to belong to a gym so you have convinient access to exercise facilities, it doesn't mean that you can't exercise and stay fit without it. However, it does take you some extra effort and initiative to get yourself to go do some exercise if you can't go to the gym. What you can do in situations like this is to team up with some buddies. Get yourselve involved in some group sports like futsal or basketball. Whatever sports you like. Be apart of a team that meet up regularly to play. Chances are, if you have people to do your activities with and have fun at the same time, you'll adhere better.
Another thing is, you'll have to schedule your workout in your diary. You can't say that you'll workout when or if you have time. Make time for it. Maybe you can write a note that you'll wake up half hour earlier each day, take out a jump robe and jump 100x, do 50 push ups, 30 step ups, 50 crunches, stretch for 5 minutes. Write that down, stick it somewhere visible (eg: the bathroom mirror, at the side of computer monitor, next to tv), set your alarm clock to ring on a default time, 30 mins earlier than usual daily.
Do surround yourself with people who are enthusiatic about their exercise and get some inspiration from them. If you consistently hear people talking about eating right and exercise, chances are, you'll get influence as well. You can also stick the result of your "not-so-impresive" fitness age report on your office desk to constantly remind you of how much work you need to do on yourself. Write out some specific goals eg: I want to lose 2kgs a month, increase my push up by 2 a week and be able to reach my toes with legs straight by Christmas. Make it a mini project for yourself and tackle it one step at a time within your self given timeframe.
At the end of the day, it comes down to how much you want it and how much you're willing to sacrifice to achieve your fitness goals. I'm sure if you've set out a goal and make that as the purpose of your hard work, you're more likely to succeed. If you have very vague goals or don't understand the reasons behind what you're doing, your work will not worth up to anything much. No one likes to work hard aimlessly. So, set your aim/ target/ goal and constantly remind yourself of it. Subconciously, you'll start removing your butt off the chair and take actions that would bring you your desired results.
Ok, before i get carried away with typing and end up sending a long mail that takes up too much time to read, i better stop here and continue some other time.
All the best,
AMY
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
On interval training !
Dear Mike,
I just realised, while i was driving home just now, that you said you've started doing the interval training that i recommended. However, you said your interval was at speed 8km/hr and 9km/hr. It's not wrong to set your interval at such but you might not gain much of the benefits of an interval training if the speed of each interval are similar or too close together. What i recommended was a interval betweeen speed 8km/hr and 10km/hr or 9km/hr and 11km/hr. Try to have at least 2km/hr or more difference between the intervals. That way, your body can take and adapt to the lower limit as a recovery interval and the higher limit as the peak performance level.
So imagine, if you've been doing intervals of 9km/hr and 11km/hr, eventually you will feel that running at 9km/hr is like a rest, no big deal. So when you're running outside or during your marathon, you'll be very comfortable running at 9km/hr and still have the capacity to push faster. Even when you slow down cause you're tired, you won't fall back below 9km/hr cause you're body is accustomed to taking that speed as a resting speed.
You have only about 2 and half week before your race. There isn't enough time for you to train and improve that much but whatever you do now can still contribute to your race performance. Plan and sign up for another race in near future. This time, with the knowledge and experience that you've gained, you can train smarter and more effectively.
Train hard, very hard till a week before the race. By then i would give you some advise on carbo loading in order to have more energy for the race and how to manage rest and train period so you don't tire and max yourself out before the big day.
Amy Loh (Trainer Hot & Ripped)
I just realised, while i was driving home just now, that you said you've started doing the interval training that i recommended. However, you said your interval was at speed 8km/hr and 9km/hr. It's not wrong to set your interval at such but you might not gain much of the benefits of an interval training if the speed of each interval are similar or too close together. What i recommended was a interval betweeen speed 8km/hr and 10km/hr or 9km/hr and 11km/hr. Try to have at least 2km/hr or more difference between the intervals. That way, your body can take and adapt to the lower limit as a recovery interval and the higher limit as the peak performance level.
So imagine, if you've been doing intervals of 9km/hr and 11km/hr, eventually you will feel that running at 9km/hr is like a rest, no big deal. So when you're running outside or during your marathon, you'll be very comfortable running at 9km/hr and still have the capacity to push faster. Even when you slow down cause you're tired, you won't fall back below 9km/hr cause you're body is accustomed to taking that speed as a resting speed.
You have only about 2 and half week before your race. There isn't enough time for you to train and improve that much but whatever you do now can still contribute to your race performance. Plan and sign up for another race in near future. This time, with the knowledge and experience that you've gained, you can train smarter and more effectively.
Train hard, very hard till a week before the race. By then i would give you some advise on carbo loading in order to have more energy for the race and how to manage rest and train period so you don't tire and max yourself out before the big day.
Amy Loh (Trainer Hot & Ripped)
Hot 'n' Ripped (in the making)...
Yea yea yea... I know.. some of you are commenting on our team name.. but hey, it's a ideal state and it's not saying the current state! So here are some pictures from one of our PT sessions...
Initial Assessment Pictures
Here are some pictures from the initial assessment session.. More contributions in terms of blog posts from all other teams are highly encouraged! Looking forward to see more pictures from the PT sessions, mid assessment and the final assessment! Oh ya! How about before and after pictures? =)
Monday, November 12, 2007
What is OUR FitnessAge?
How "Old" Are We?
We are coming to our 3rd week of Get Fit! Challenge... Are you seeing results? Are you making full use of your PT (personal training) sessions? I hope you are.
By now, you should know what is your fitnessage. Surprise? The truth hurt sometimes.... :-)
You would probably know what is your team-mate's fitnessage... but do you know what is the average fitnessage of P&G Malaysia??
Drumrolls please ....... Our average fitnessage is 52 years old !!!
This is older than the real-age of the oldest participant in the program! Furthermore our average "real-age" is only 32 years old. You do the math....
Here's an overview of the Average Fitnessage of your teams:
Note: As you read the above, please bear in mind that we have people in different ages in each team - from as young as 22 to 52. So use the fitnessage data above to set the ideal target age for your team!
Remember, the Winning team would be the team with the Highest Index of FitnessAge Reduction
Well done to the groups which have been consistent in the PT sessions. I am sure you can see the benefits of the "pain" by now. So, keep it burning!!
If you have not, you better get started! We are moving into full throttle now.
As always, have fun, be safe..... for more information consult your Personal Trainer.
We are coming to our 3rd week of Get Fit! Challenge... Are you seeing results? Are you making full use of your PT (personal training) sessions? I hope you are.
By now, you should know what is your fitnessage. Surprise? The truth hurt sometimes.... :-)
You would probably know what is your team-mate's fitnessage... but do you know what is the average fitnessage of P&G Malaysia??
Drumrolls please ....... Our average fitnessage is 52 years old !!!
This is older than the real-age of the oldest participant in the program! Furthermore our average "real-age" is only 32 years old. You do the math....
Here's an overview of the Average Fitnessage of your teams:
Note: As you read the above, please bear in mind that we have people in different ages in each team - from as young as 22 to 52. So use the fitnessage data above to set the ideal target age for your team!
Remember, the Winning team would be the team with the Highest Index of FitnessAge Reduction
Well done to the groups which have been consistent in the PT sessions. I am sure you can see the benefits of the "pain" by now. So, keep it burning!!
If you have not, you better get started! We are moving into full throttle now.
As always, have fun, be safe..... for more information consult your Personal Trainer.
More good advice
Your recovery rate is directly related to the fitness of your heart which is reflected by your stamina level. In order to improve the fitness of your heard, you have no other option but to do your cardio training. By the way, the word cardio = heart. So, what you need to do is work out your heart, push it a little bit at a time, not too much at one time though, else you'll get heart attack. As you introduce more physical activity and endurance work to your body, your heart will start to adapt to that new load of work by getting stronger. Your heart is like any other muscles in your body cause it's made out of muscles. The more you train it, the stronger it gets.
A stronger heart need not pump so rapidly to get the required amount of blood through your body cause with each pump, more blood is pushed out. That can be measured by counting your resting heart rate. For example, Rashid's resting heard rate is 60 and Eric's is 88. That means Rashid's heart is fitter than Eric's cause his heart need only pump 60 times a minute to get all the blood through his body. Eric's heart is weaker and not so efficient, so need to pump more rapidly.
As for the resting heart rate, Rashid's is 102 and Eric's 146. That shows that after some exerting the heart, Rashid's heart slows down and come back to his resting heart rate quicker cause 1) since his heart is fitter, it did not need to go very high during that 3 mins step test anyway and 2) the work load is considered light and easy for his body so no need for the heart to keep pumping on high for so long so it slows down and return to resting quicker. So Eric, as you deligently work on your cardio, your heart will eventually get stronger and hence, your resting and recovery rate will improve. Genetic, age, gender.... etc... do contribute in how fit you are but though you can't change those factor, you still can improve on your current condition.
Although it's good to belong to a gym so you have convinient access to exercise facilities, it doesn't mean that you can't exercise and stay fit without it. However, it does take you some extra effort and initiative to get yourself to go do some exercise if you can't go to the gym. What you can do in situations like this is to team up with some buddies. Get yourselve involved in some group sports like futsal or basketball. Whatever sports you like. Be apart of a team that meet up regularly to play. Chances are, if you have people to do your activities with and have fun at the same time, you'll adhere better.
Another thing is, you'll have to schedule your workout in your diary. You can't say that you'll workout when or if you have time. Make time for it. Maybe you can write a note that you'll wake up half hour earlier each day, take out a jump robe and jump 100x, do 50 push ups, 30 step ups, 50 crunches, stretch for 5 minutes. Write that down, stick it somewhere visible (eg: the bathroom mirror, at the side of computer monitor, next to tv), set your alarm clock to ring on a default time, 30 mins earlier than usual daily.
Do surround yourself with people who are enthusiatic about their exercise and get some inspiration from them. If you consistently hear people talking about eating right and exercise, chances are, you'll get influence as well. You can also stick the result of your "not-so-impresive" fitness age report on your office desk to constantly remind you of how much work you need to do on yourself. Write out some specific goals eg: I want to lose 2kgs a month, increase my push up by 2 a week and be able to reach my toes with legs straight by Christmas. Make it a mini project for yourself and tackle it one step at a time within your self given timeframe.
At the end of the day, it comes down to how much you want it and how much you're willing to sacrifice to achieve your fitness goals. I'm sure if you've set out a goal and make that as the purpose of your hard work, you're more likely to succeed. If you have very vague goals or don't understand the reasons behind what you're doing, your work will not worth up to anything much. No one likes to work hard aimlessly. So, set your aim/ target/ goal and constantly remind yourself of it. Subconciously, you'll start removing your butt off the chair and take actions that would bring you your desired results.
Amy Loh (Personal Trainer Hot & Ripped)
A stronger heart need not pump so rapidly to get the required amount of blood through your body cause with each pump, more blood is pushed out. That can be measured by counting your resting heart rate. For example, Rashid's resting heard rate is 60 and Eric's is 88. That means Rashid's heart is fitter than Eric's cause his heart need only pump 60 times a minute to get all the blood through his body. Eric's heart is weaker and not so efficient, so need to pump more rapidly.
As for the resting heart rate, Rashid's is 102 and Eric's 146. That shows that after some exerting the heart, Rashid's heart slows down and come back to his resting heart rate quicker cause 1) since his heart is fitter, it did not need to go very high during that 3 mins step test anyway and 2) the work load is considered light and easy for his body so no need for the heart to keep pumping on high for so long so it slows down and return to resting quicker. So Eric, as you deligently work on your cardio, your heart will eventually get stronger and hence, your resting and recovery rate will improve. Genetic, age, gender.... etc... do contribute in how fit you are but though you can't change those factor, you still can improve on your current condition.
Although it's good to belong to a gym so you have convinient access to exercise facilities, it doesn't mean that you can't exercise and stay fit without it. However, it does take you some extra effort and initiative to get yourself to go do some exercise if you can't go to the gym. What you can do in situations like this is to team up with some buddies. Get yourselve involved in some group sports like futsal or basketball. Whatever sports you like. Be apart of a team that meet up regularly to play. Chances are, if you have people to do your activities with and have fun at the same time, you'll adhere better.
Another thing is, you'll have to schedule your workout in your diary. You can't say that you'll workout when or if you have time. Make time for it. Maybe you can write a note that you'll wake up half hour earlier each day, take out a jump robe and jump 100x, do 50 push ups, 30 step ups, 50 crunches, stretch for 5 minutes. Write that down, stick it somewhere visible (eg: the bathroom mirror, at the side of computer monitor, next to tv), set your alarm clock to ring on a default time, 30 mins earlier than usual daily.
Do surround yourself with people who are enthusiatic about their exercise and get some inspiration from them. If you consistently hear people talking about eating right and exercise, chances are, you'll get influence as well. You can also stick the result of your "not-so-impresive" fitness age report on your office desk to constantly remind you of how much work you need to do on yourself. Write out some specific goals eg: I want to lose 2kgs a month, increase my push up by 2 a week and be able to reach my toes with legs straight by Christmas. Make it a mini project for yourself and tackle it one step at a time within your self given timeframe.
At the end of the day, it comes down to how much you want it and how much you're willing to sacrifice to achieve your fitness goals. I'm sure if you've set out a goal and make that as the purpose of your hard work, you're more likely to succeed. If you have very vague goals or don't understand the reasons behind what you're doing, your work will not worth up to anything much. No one likes to work hard aimlessly. So, set your aim/ target/ goal and constantly remind yourself of it. Subconciously, you'll start removing your butt off the chair and take actions that would bring you your desired results.
Amy Loh (Personal Trainer Hot & Ripped)
Sunday, November 11, 2007
Good advice from trainer
Good job in taking more regular and smaller portions of meals throughout the day. That way, you'll keep your body's metabolic rate higher and more consistent. For those of you who are not familiar with how the body's metabolic rate works, here's the story:
Your body metabolic rate is basically, to cut the whole long scientific story short, the rate at which your body converts fuel/ food into energy. Different people have different Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR), the minimum energy expended to keep the body alive and it is determined by several factors like:
- Amount of body surface. (the bigger you are, the more energy you need to stay alive)
- Gender (males generally has higher BMR than females)
- Body temperature (if you’re having fever, your BMR increases)
- Thyroid Hormone Level
- Age (BMR slows down as you age)
- Nutritional state
- Pregnancy
- Caffeine and Tobacco usage
For those who believe or think that starving yourselves or skipping meals will make you lose more weight, you’ve been misinformed. Let me explain to you what I mean.
Our body has the capability to conserve energy and store fuel. If you’re eating at irregular intervals with an extreme varying amount (sometimes not enough, sometimes too much), the body gets the message that food is coming by rather infrequently so It needs to store up cause God-knows-when the next batch of new fuel is coming by and the body still need it’s fuel source to stay alive. So what happen? Your BMR slows down, meaning your body burns food slowly and stores more so that it can stretch out and survive longer without food. What happens when your BMR is on slow motion and suddenly after 8 hours of no food, you go for your nasi kandar/ lemak/ briyani?? Your body will get a shock of “food overload” and will have a hard time dealing with it. Most of what little energy your body is expending from your slow mo BMR would be dedicated towards digesting that big meal. Since your body is not very efficient in converting food into fuel, most will be stored and very little will get burned up to produce energy. Remember, your body still thinks that you’re living in When the next meal is coming so, better store store store. So, if you’ve been wondering why you feel sluggish and tired after a big lunch meal especially if you’ve not had breakfast or had not eaten for many hours, now you know!!! If you’ve been having difficulties loosing weight though you eat rather little, now you understand why!!
So, wanna make your body into an efficient fuel burning machine??? Do what Ridzuan is doing. Eat regular small meals. When you do that consistently, your body will start getting the message that food is coming by very frequently so there is no need to store unnecessarily. “Why keep?” it says. Better burn it up cause new batch of fresh food will be coming by soon. So with that, you will have more energy cause your body is converting food into energy more efficiently. With small meal portion, your body also need not dedicate so much energy to your stomach to do digestion so hence, you still have adequate energy to stay alert and active. A good interval between meals would be around 3 to 4 hours. Don’t stuff yourself full. Just eat till you’re not hungry anymore will do. Maybe around 70% of your stomach capacity. Hungry later?? Eat again…!!! However, do be smart in your food choices as well. I’m not trying to give you green light to eat magnum ice cream every 3 to 4 hours. Choose foods that are light and comfortably digestible. Before you put something in your mouth, think of whether that food is nutritionally beneficially or not, what’s it is going to do to your body, worth the calories or not… etc!!! Well, at least give a try in giving some thought. I know it’s not easy!! Hehehe…At the end of the day, you must still make sure that you don’t eat more than what your daily activity requires.
(Want a longer story on that topic? Ask me some specific questions and I’ll elaborate more in next mail)
Regarding your question about mid section flab, well, here’s what I have to say. What you have around your mid section are accumulated access fat. Here’s are the layers that you have around your body from out to in.
1) Skin
2) Some water retention (you can’t have none else you’ll looked like sun dried tomatoes)
3) Fat
4) Muscles
5) Bone
Each of these elements CANNOT turn into the other. You can have more or less of item 2, 3 and 4 but can’t interchange them. All those crunches will work on your item number 4. Muscles!! It is possible for someone to have big strong abs muscles but still maintain a thick layer of fat on top of it, blocking the appearance of the 6 pack abs.
You’re probably asking in your head now, so, how to reduce item no. 3 and increase item no. 4?? Fat on the mid section is no different from fat on other region. The thing is, different people have the tendency to accumulate fat at different places. So, if the mid section is your fat bank, it will be one of the last places you’ll loose your fat too. There is no way you can spot reduce your fat. The body will shed off the fat as it’s programmed to in your gene when your caloric expenditure is more than your caloric intake. Keep up your exercise and manage your food consumption and soon fat will be shed but you might have to exercise some patience before you can see the reduction on your mid section. Your face and upper body might shrink first.
As for doing crunches to boost up your abs muscle, bear in mind that muscles needs rest in order to develop and grow. Don’t go banging on it everyday. Doing crunches are only one of the available exercises for abs. There are many more exercises that you can do for your abs with varying degree of intensity and difficulties. I will teach you guys more during our training sessions. However, working on your six pack abs muscles for vain and cosmetic reasons only will not give you much functional benefit in your daily activity. Work on the deep core and lower back muscles with exercises like plank/ bridge and the back exercises that we’ve been doing. Those are the exercises that can increase your daily functional performance. Anyway, no matter how much you work on your mid section muscles but if you still don’t bring down your fat level, you’ll most probably end up looking the same though you would had gained more strength in that region.
One of the possible reasons why you feel that your body and muscles fatigue quickly could be due low energy level from poor nutrition and inadequate rest and sleep. When you’re in the gym pushing weights, make sure that you don’t overwork yourself. Maybe your body is trying to tell you that it’s not ready to take the load. You might benefit from an extended slow pace warm up time before you start running or pushing on the weights. I think you’ve mentioned that your exercise in the gym has not been very frequent and structured as well. Your body might need more time to adapt to your exercise but if you’re not following any program or schedule and you “hentam” on whatever and however you feel like, your body has no chance to get adapted and hence, every little thing that you do might be taken as too much for your body. Start all over again. Go slow, easy, keep the weights light and go higher reps, keep to one or two exercise per muscle group and try to achieve a more complete and total workout instead of just working your upper body. Remember, your legs have muscles too!!!!! Anyway, if you still experience symptoms of dizziness and early fatigue, please do consult your doctor. Since you have a company doctor, there is no lost or harm if you do go for a check anyway even if there might be nothing wrong with you…. Just to make sure!!
Ok guys, I think I’ve written a bit much for this mail. I hope none of you fell asleep reading it. Sorry if it takes too much of your time to read it. I hope you all learned something from this mail. It would be my best interest to share as much as I possibly can throughout this period that I’m working with you all.
Amy Loh (Personal Trainer - Hot & Ripped)
Your body metabolic rate is basically, to cut the whole long scientific story short, the rate at which your body converts fuel/ food into energy. Different people have different Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR), the minimum energy expended to keep the body alive and it is determined by several factors like:
- Amount of body surface. (the bigger you are, the more energy you need to stay alive)
- Gender (males generally has higher BMR than females)
- Body temperature (if you’re having fever, your BMR increases)
- Thyroid Hormone Level
- Age (BMR slows down as you age)
- Nutritional state
- Pregnancy
- Caffeine and Tobacco usage
For those who believe or think that starving yourselves or skipping meals will make you lose more weight, you’ve been misinformed. Let me explain to you what I mean.
Our body has the capability to conserve energy and store fuel. If you’re eating at irregular intervals with an extreme varying amount (sometimes not enough, sometimes too much), the body gets the message that food is coming by rather infrequently so It needs to store up cause God-knows-when the next batch of new fuel is coming by and the body still need it’s fuel source to stay alive. So what happen? Your BMR slows down, meaning your body burns food slowly and stores more so that it can stretch out and survive longer without food. What happens when your BMR is on slow motion and suddenly after 8 hours of no food, you go for your nasi kandar/ lemak/ briyani?? Your body will get a shock of “food overload” and will have a hard time dealing with it. Most of what little energy your body is expending from your slow mo BMR would be dedicated towards digesting that big meal. Since your body is not very efficient in converting food into fuel, most will be stored and very little will get burned up to produce energy. Remember, your body still thinks that you’re living in When the next meal is coming so, better store store store. So, if you’ve been wondering why you feel sluggish and tired after a big lunch meal especially if you’ve not had breakfast or had not eaten for many hours, now you know!!! If you’ve been having difficulties loosing weight though you eat rather little, now you understand why!!
So, wanna make your body into an efficient fuel burning machine??? Do what Ridzuan is doing. Eat regular small meals. When you do that consistently, your body will start getting the message that food is coming by very frequently so there is no need to store unnecessarily. “Why keep?” it says. Better burn it up cause new batch of fresh food will be coming by soon. So with that, you will have more energy cause your body is converting food into energy more efficiently. With small meal portion, your body also need not dedicate so much energy to your stomach to do digestion so hence, you still have adequate energy to stay alert and active. A good interval between meals would be around 3 to 4 hours. Don’t stuff yourself full. Just eat till you’re not hungry anymore will do. Maybe around 70% of your stomach capacity. Hungry later?? Eat again…!!! However, do be smart in your food choices as well. I’m not trying to give you green light to eat magnum ice cream every 3 to 4 hours. Choose foods that are light and comfortably digestible. Before you put something in your mouth, think of whether that food is nutritionally beneficially or not, what’s it is going to do to your body, worth the calories or not… etc!!! Well, at least give a try in giving some thought. I know it’s not easy!! Hehehe…At the end of the day, you must still make sure that you don’t eat more than what your daily activity requires.
(Want a longer story on that topic? Ask me some specific questions and I’ll elaborate more in next mail)
Regarding your question about mid section flab, well, here’s what I have to say. What you have around your mid section are accumulated access fat. Here’s are the layers that you have around your body from out to in.
1) Skin
2) Some water retention (you can’t have none else you’ll looked like sun dried tomatoes)
3) Fat
4) Muscles
5) Bone
Each of these elements CANNOT turn into the other. You can have more or less of item 2, 3 and 4 but can’t interchange them. All those crunches will work on your item number 4. Muscles!! It is possible for someone to have big strong abs muscles but still maintain a thick layer of fat on top of it, blocking the appearance of the 6 pack abs.
You’re probably asking in your head now, so, how to reduce item no. 3 and increase item no. 4?? Fat on the mid section is no different from fat on other region. The thing is, different people have the tendency to accumulate fat at different places. So, if the mid section is your fat bank, it will be one of the last places you’ll loose your fat too. There is no way you can spot reduce your fat. The body will shed off the fat as it’s programmed to in your gene when your caloric expenditure is more than your caloric intake. Keep up your exercise and manage your food consumption and soon fat will be shed but you might have to exercise some patience before you can see the reduction on your mid section. Your face and upper body might shrink first.
As for doing crunches to boost up your abs muscle, bear in mind that muscles needs rest in order to develop and grow. Don’t go banging on it everyday. Doing crunches are only one of the available exercises for abs. There are many more exercises that you can do for your abs with varying degree of intensity and difficulties. I will teach you guys more during our training sessions. However, working on your six pack abs muscles for vain and cosmetic reasons only will not give you much functional benefit in your daily activity. Work on the deep core and lower back muscles with exercises like plank/ bridge and the back exercises that we’ve been doing. Those are the exercises that can increase your daily functional performance. Anyway, no matter how much you work on your mid section muscles but if you still don’t bring down your fat level, you’ll most probably end up looking the same though you would had gained more strength in that region.
One of the possible reasons why you feel that your body and muscles fatigue quickly could be due low energy level from poor nutrition and inadequate rest and sleep. When you’re in the gym pushing weights, make sure that you don’t overwork yourself. Maybe your body is trying to tell you that it’s not ready to take the load. You might benefit from an extended slow pace warm up time before you start running or pushing on the weights. I think you’ve mentioned that your exercise in the gym has not been very frequent and structured as well. Your body might need more time to adapt to your exercise but if you’re not following any program or schedule and you “hentam” on whatever and however you feel like, your body has no chance to get adapted and hence, every little thing that you do might be taken as too much for your body. Start all over again. Go slow, easy, keep the weights light and go higher reps, keep to one or two exercise per muscle group and try to achieve a more complete and total workout instead of just working your upper body. Remember, your legs have muscles too!!!!! Anyway, if you still experience symptoms of dizziness and early fatigue, please do consult your doctor. Since you have a company doctor, there is no lost or harm if you do go for a check anyway even if there might be nothing wrong with you…. Just to make sure!!
Ok guys, I think I’ve written a bit much for this mail. I hope none of you fell asleep reading it. Sorry if it takes too much of your time to read it. I hope you all learned something from this mail. It would be my best interest to share as much as I possibly can throughout this period that I’m working with you all.
Amy Loh (Personal Trainer - Hot & Ripped)
Wednesday, November 7, 2007
Friday Life Seminars
Friday Life Seminars
Beginning 16th Nov (Friday), we will be having a series of 4 sessions throughout the Get Fit! challenge program.
The programs are design to ensure you Get Fit! for Life! ....and of course help you reduce your Fitnessage.
Refer to the schedules below, mark your calendars and join us! Who knows? We might have "special" gifts for those who attends... :-)
Beginning 16th Nov (Friday), we will be having a series of 4 sessions throughout the Get Fit! challenge program.
The programs are design to ensure you Get Fit! for Life! ....and of course help you reduce your Fitnessage.
Refer to the schedules below, mark your calendars and join us! Who knows? We might have "special" gifts for those who attends... :-)
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Team Burn Baby Burn has changed to Perspire 11.5
Team Malaysia...
We've completed our 5th session. It's taking shape and we've beaten some records already.... ahem... among them are as follows:
Overall team flexibility has indexed averagely 110 - 120 vs pre training.... stretchhhhh....
Team FUN has indexed 200 vs pre-training, thanks a lot to wacky Ket Loong
We even have a video link now if you should know.... try this :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kr8Ox-xTR74
Also want to wish our youngest team member a happy birthday
Harry!!!! Happy 32nd Birthday!!
Cheers...
Welcome !!!
So, what has been happening since the start of the Fitness Challenge ! So far, only team Burn Baby Burn have been pretty active in "publishing" their activities..Have you checked out their latest video (Perspire 11.5)? It's simply amazing...
Come on folks... send in your latest news on what you and your team are doing to bring down your Fitness Age with the hope of winning the coveted Fitness Challenge Champions !! (Don't forget bout the Ipod waiting to be won)
So.. here's how you post - send a note to yours truly and I'll give you authorship to post articles for your team... of course, anyone can give comments (on the articles - to give moral support !!!)
The more you post, the more likely you'll win the award category of Most Participative Team !!
Oh yeah, feel free to post almost anything in this site (of course, it should be linked back to healthy living) - for example, a food review, an exercise method, or even asking folks to join you for a game of tennis!!!!
So start posting ....
Come on folks... send in your latest news on what you and your team are doing to bring down your Fitness Age with the hope of winning the coveted Fitness Challenge Champions !! (Don't forget bout the Ipod waiting to be won)
So.. here's how you post - send a note to yours truly and I'll give you authorship to post articles for your team... of course, anyone can give comments (on the articles - to give moral support !!!)
The more you post, the more likely you'll win the award category of Most Participative Team !!
Oh yeah, feel free to post almost anything in this site (of course, it should be linked back to healthy living) - for example, a food review, an exercise method, or even asking folks to join you for a game of tennis!!!!
So start posting ....