Rant and Tip for July 12, 2011

I thought today I would talk about the clothes rack you have in your spare bedroom or basement, it was originally purchased as a piece of exercise equipment. Yeah you know what I mean. You purchased a treadmill, or elliptical runner machine. Maybe it was a bike or a rowing machine. You said to yourself this is it, I am going to use this new machine and for the first week you did. You made small strides and then either life happened or you just stopped or felt I will just do it later. Well it is later folks and it is time to go fold the clothes and dust off the machine and get moving. I am counting on you and we know that machine is feeling pretty embarrassed right now.

    You all know I am a big proponent of strength training with weights or even you own body weight. The home cardio machines are good and if you have them you should use them. Strength training will actually help you burn more calories when you are at rest though. As you build muscle you body works harder to maintain that muscle which in turn burns more calories and depending on our diet will burn off more body fat. At this point in my diet and strength training regimen I work pretty hard for an hour a day. All the time trying to get stronger and build more lean muscle mass. Of course as I do this I am eating more food that you can imagine and still maintaining a lean physique. I try not to get caught up in the scale unless I am preparing for a meet.

    Everyone is different. Some people like to run for several miles a day. Me I really do not like to run. I will do it as quick means to burn off a few extra calories when I take the week off before a meet. When I do I will only run about 3 miles at the most. While I know some people that will run 10 miles a day. The challenge I see in this is how do you keep the body fueled for these runs. Your body at some point will start to consume it’s own muscle protein to sustain itself for these long runs. If you are a runner who enjoys long runs, please be sure to find a way to add fuel as you run. There are several drinks you can have to help with this. Even Isopure has a liquid protein that is so pure you can see through the liquid. It looks like a Gatorade but packs enough protein to repair the muscles you are using.

Have a great workout!

Tip:
Dust off that exercise equipment and find someone to be responsible to and use the machine. Be sure to schedule your exercise time just the way you would an important meeting. You will be happy you did!