There are in all walks of life myths, old wives tales and beliefs. Health and fitness is no exception, so in the next series of blogs, I, the personal trainer and your expert, will look at some of the most common myths in fitness. Questions like “is running bad for my knees?”, “Will yoga give me a perfect figure?” and “exercising on an empty stomach, will it make me thinner?” will all be answered.

1-Sit ups will get rid of a flabby tummy. 

False. You can do 1000 sit ups a day and if you are stil eating more energy than you are putting out then you will keep your fat tummy. This myth is closely connected to the “spot toning” theory that says you can exercise a particular area and lose fat in that area alone. This is not the case. Altgough you can tone your arms, for instance, and they may begin to look slightly better, the muscle tone is only beginning to show despite the layer of fat on top that will remain. The body takes fat when needed from all over, all at once, and contrary to belief will do so fairly evenly. Some things seem to get thinner before others during weight loss, but this is simply because some areas are less fatty than others, the areas that are fattest will take longer to appear toned, and areas thet were not holding much fat will be revealed sooner. If you want to have a flat tummy then you need to burn fat. The best way of doing this is to eat slightly less energy then you expend. One of the best ways of doing this is to increase the metabolic rate by building muscle tone. The bigger the muscle group the more effect it will have on this rate, so clients need to do “big bang” exercises. Crunches and sit ups only work the abdominals, a small muscle group, so their effect will be limited. Lunges, squats, push ups and bent over rows however work lots of things at once and toning this way will make you burn fat thus gaining a flat tummy. Out tutor at Premier Global Windsor (the guy who traines personal trainers) would frown (a lot) on crunches given to clients in a programe. They only work a small area and take up time in which you could be doing more efective things. We get lots of personal trainer clients coming to us from all parts of  Berkshire, Windsor and Maidenhed who have been doing lots of gym work and not really getting there. Many times this is because they are not doing the right things in the gym and are doing too many CRUNCHES!! For a simple and effective routing have a look at the video piece I did with the Maidenhead Advertiser on the knowledge  page, and do it 3 times a week!

Being fit and healthy is a 2 sided approach. You can run 50 miles a day but if you are taking onboard more calories than you are expending then it must be stored as fat. So as well as exercise you must undercut your daily calorific needs a bit and then you will slowly and surely get smaller and fitter, revealing the toned you underneath. So exercise AND eat well, avoiding processed foods wherever possible and keeping it as naturalas possible. For more detailed nutritional information have a look at out nutrition fact sheet on the knowledge page, where you will find lots of nutritional tips used by personal trainers to get certain results.

Tip 5- Take care with alcohol. Different foods (liquids included) have different calorific values, that is to say 1 gram of something might have a lot more calories in it than 1 gram ofsomething else. 1 gram of carbohydrate has 4 calories in it. Protein has the same amount and fat has a whopping 9 calories per gram. Alcohol (like those glasses of wine you have in the evening) has 7 calories in it per gram, nearly as much as fat! This explains why a glass of wine has so many calories in it, around 120 per glass, and even more for beer at 200+ per glass. So if you are having 2 pints of beer a night, this adds up to 2800 calories a week, which equals 1.5 days worth of calories on top of what you are having in a week; this equates roughly to a weight gain of 2llb a week. For wine the equation is similar, 2 glasses a night will be the equivalent of putting on 1llb a week in fat. And this is if you are eating well and the right amounts in the first place!!

So try to cut down. Habits are easy to break-you are in the habit of driving on the left, but when you go to the continent you adjust to driving on the right almost instantly. So try to drink a sugar free squash or water instead, and save wine for a special occasion. We are always advising clients to try to use the 80-20 ratio. So be good for 80% of the time, and then let go for 20% of the time. Within reason. If you must drink then try to go for a clear spirit with a low calorie mixer like soda , slimline tonic and diet coke. If you can do this, AND exercise in a constructive way 4 or 4 times a week then you will have a great chance of reaching the target of a slimmer and trimmer you.

Tip 4-Work Hard. If you are strolling along, chatting with a friend,pootling around in the pool, going along gently on your bicycle, then, although these activities are good for you, they are not enough to make you fitter or thinner. When exercising you MUST be working at a level that challenges your body, and only by working at this level will you take your body into overload and cause it to change and adapt. That is to say, GET BETTER!!

So you need to be pushing reasonably hard, and getting breathless and sweaty. A good test is your breathing. At 60% of you maximum heart rate, you will be forced to breathe through your mouth, and talking will be possible but not a pleasure. If you can’t talk at all then you are going a bit fast, so slow down a tip. You also need to be doing this for 20 minutes, 3 times a week. If you really can’t motivate yourself then we can always get you a personal trainer to bully (sorry, encourage) you into doing it the correct way!

OK, so I know I keep going on about it, but if you are trying to get fitter in the new year and be slim, then you MUST do some resistance or strength training. Not only will this make you functionally stronger and less likely to suffer from injuries (including bad backs!) but your new lean muscle mass (from all the resistance training of course) will push your metabolic rate up and mean that you will burn more energy all the time. This is really effective if you are also eating well and undercutting calories a little. For more on the resistance training see our fact sheets on the knowledge page. Tune in tomorrow for more insider personal trainer information..

Tip 2-Be patient. Think about how long it took you to get fat and unfit. It’s likely that this was a very gradual process that slowly built up over the course of months if not years. It would seem therefore a bit optimistic or possibly even naive to expect to be able to reverse a biological event in a few weeks or days that took much longer to happen in the first place. Any good personal trainer could make you lose 4 lbs in an hour or two. I could ban all water intake, run you hard, do a vicious circuit, put you in a sauna and then wrap you in clingfilm (well, not the last one). Any quick weight loss will be from loss of water and will inevitably go back on over the course of the next few hours or days as you rehydrate. Any good personal trainer or weight loss specialist will also tell you that the safe upper limit for weight loss it 2-2.5lbs a week; any more than this and you are either losing water or losing lean muscle mass or both, and will put the weight back on after the diet, as well as having depressed your metabolic rate, making weight gain even more likely (see the knowledge fact sheets).

So the key is to take your time and look at weight loss as a silver lining of getting fitter and healthier, and don’t believe the media, you can NOT lose 10lbs in ten days and keep it off.

Ok so it’s the supposed worst day of the year with divorce rates at their highest than any other day of the year. So it’s likely that you are not loving the idea of actually following through with that resolution to lose two stones and look like a god (dess). Over the next ten days I will be going through some insider personal trainer tips to get you going, get you there and keep you there. The most important thing to remember is that t is eminently possible for you to get that buff figure, lots of our personal trainer clients have done it (have a look at the testimonials on the Success Stories page). So you can do it too. Don’t let past failures put you off, it wasn’t you, it was just that you were going about it the wrong way. Here’s the right one.

TIP 1: Set the Target. At first ou might be thinking of running the marathon, but this will seem like a daunting task, one that you might never achieve. So it’s really important that the goals you set are achievable and sensible. A good way of doing thins is to divide your goals up into short, medium and long term ones. Start with the short term ones first, while keeping the other two in the back of your mind. So if you want to do the marathon, and lose 2 stone, start with a 10k run, do the correct resistance training (a personal trainer will help here) and correct running and you will get through. Then move on to the next goal, and so on. Weight wise, look at losing 5 lbs first, hit that target and you will get there in the end. So don’t be unrealistic. Sure if you are already doing 10k runs, then dive in to marathon training, but if you’ve been watching Grey’s and eating bug macs then just being able to go for 1 mile might be a good first target.

There are lots of online resources, including us, so if you are really serious and need a personal trainer in London, Windsor, Maidenhead or Bracknell then we can help.

From BBC online news:

Scientists have unlocked the entire genetic code of two of the most common cancers – skin and lung – a move they say could revolutionise cancer care. Not only will the cancer maps pave the way for blood tests to spot tumours far earlier, they will also yield new drug targets, say the Wellcome Trust team. Scientists around the globe are now working to catalogue all the genes that go wrong in many types of human cancer. The UK is looking at breast cancer, Japan at liver and India at mouth. China is studying stomach cancer, and the US is looking at cancers of the brain, ovary and pancreas.

 The International Cancer Genome Consortium scientists from the 10 countries involved say it will take them at least five years and many hundreds of thousands of dollars to complete this mammoth task. But once they have done this, patients will reap the benefits.Professor Michael Stratton, who is the UK lead, said: “These catalogues are going to change the way we think about individual cancers.

“By identifying all the cancer genes we will be able to develop new drugs that target the specific mutated genes and work out which patients will benefit from these novel treatments.

“We can envisage a time when following the removal of a cancer cataloguing it will become routine.”It could even be possible to develop MoT-style blood tests for healthy adults that can check for tell-tale DNA patterns suggestive of cancer.

Russian roulette-The scientists found the DNA code for a skin cancer called melanoma contained more than 30,000 errors almost entirely caused by too much sun exposure.

The lung cancer DNA code had more than 23,000 errors largely triggered by cigarette smoke exposure. From this, the experts estimate a typical smoker acquires one new mutation for every 15 cigarettes they smoke. Although many of these mutations will be harmless, some will trigger cancer. Wellcome Trust researcher Dr Peter Campbell, who conducted this research, published in the journal Nature, said: “It’s like playing Russian roulette. Most of the time the mutations will land in innocent parts of the genome, but some will hit the right targets for cancer.” By quitting smoking, people could reduce their cancer risk back down to “normal” with time, he said. The suspicion is lung cells containing mutations are eventually replaced with new ones free of genetic errors. By studying the cancer catalogues in detail, the scientists say it should be possible to find exactly which lifestyle and environmental factors trigger different tumours.

So the key message here is that the healthier we are the less chance we have of getting a deadly cancer, even if we are genetically predisposed to it. Stopping smoking can seem like a very daunting task, but it CAN be easy, I know this because I’ve done it! Picture this, I am a personal trainer in Windsor and Maidenhead, and after every client, whether I’m running with them, doing circuits, or resistance training, I need a cigarette after each session. I have one first thing in the morning, in the shower, would you believe. But then I was recommended the”easy Way to Stop Smoking” by Allen Carr. This book changed my like, plus the life of my partner, her sister, and ger mother, who all stopped with little difficulty after reading this book or going to the lecture. So give it a go, you have everything to gain and nothing to lose!

Ok, so we all know that Christmas is now just around the corner, and that more than likely we will be going for it in the food and drink stakes. The average calorific horrific intake on Christmas day in Britain is 4000-5000 calories, or two days’ worth, so what we at Diets Don’t Work suggest is hiring on of our mean but supportive and charming personal trainers to pre-empt the onslaught. By embarking on a programme of resistance training and CV we can push your metabolic rate up higher so that you will be burning more calories (and more calories from fat too!) even while you are sitting watching the sound of music. Lean muscle needs more energy to maintain itself whether you are exercising or not and so burns more fuel, stopping you from getting too fat over the festive season. For more on this have a look at the energy systems fact sheet on out “The Knowledge” page on the website. 

Even a little trot out on Christmas morning will help to get you through the trauma of all those Brussels sprouts. So if you need advice or motivation we can help now and in the new decade with a personal trainer in the Maidenhead, Windsor and Bracknell areas. Good luck and be good-you can still have fun too!

As providers of life changing (wherever possible!!) personal training at home we endeavour to get clients outdoors wherever possible; it’s good for morale, good for the soul and also you burn more calories in the great outdoors when it’s cold! I take many of my personal personal trainer clients in Windsor (ans Eton) outside, and the area has some very very scenic runs and areas for resistance training.

The Great Park has to rank as one of the most stunning areas in Berkshire and the Thames Valley, there’s a great route from Windsor town centre up to the copper horse (the hill is longer than it looks!) and back. The view of the castle front is most impressive on the way back. There is also a fabulous run from Eton (look out for Judy and I zooming along) along the Thames path, over the bypass and then back along the river past the leisure centre and over Eton bridge for home. Windsor also has the benefit of having some of the only decent hills in the area for proper personal trainer torture (interval hill running).

Eton has the Brocas field, looking over the Castle on the hill, and Eton field where you can have personal training and admire the Eton boys in all their regalia as you throw the kettle bells.

So if you need to make a positive move and get yourself into shape, in the new year or sooner, then a personal trainer in Windsor or Eton will not only give you the best possible chance of success, but it will also give you the opportunity to see some fantastic scenery at the same time!! For a list of trainers available in the area have a look at our meet the trainers page.