Bodyweight Exercises

How we eat is a huge problem. And the 100’s of “fad” diets that come out every year, masquerading as “scientific studies” and “proven techniques” just add to the noise of confusion.

I have been doing weightlifting, yoga, karate, or bodyweight exercises for almost 30 years and I never - NOT once - followed the chapter of recipes in any book. Why? Because it takes too damn long!


When I was opening a new office in one state, but still managing all my work in the old office, and commuting between the 2 - the only way to eat was fast food places. I picked the healthiest alternatives (Hardee’s BBQ grilled chicken has only 4 gms fat, I seem to recall). But the point is that you can’t prepare walnut-and-tofu-with-lean-chicken-salad at Gate 17 of Midway Airport!


So what’s the solution?

Actually, the answer is many-fold:
  Ø      find a diet solution that focuses on overall nutrition, not just specific recipes;
 
        Ø      find a diet solution that is flexible and compatible with your life;
 
  Ø      find a diet solution that allows you to “fall off the wagon” with respect to what you eat;
  Ø      find a diet solution that fits in with your chosen exercise routine.

Do you need to become a nutritionist? No. Heck, I can brush my teeth, but I’m not a dentist. You do need to understand fundamentals of eating (too many fats are bad, but some fats are good, especially for infants) and then YOU can decide what to eat.

So check out The FITNESS Portal for products that fit everything we’ve talked about.

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What is the main reason Americans - and you and me - are gaining weight
and getting out of shape?  I'm sure there are 1,001 studies on this,
but I think the main reason is simply lack of time. Well, really it's
lack of ability to fit fitness into the rest of your life.
For most people, this wasn't a problem when you were in high school or
college. Again, yeah, I've seen the surveys that say kids are getting
fatter. But that still ties back to my answer: because 20 years ago,
kids could fit fitness into their lives.
There's a paradox here, though. (Ha! Bet you never thought you'd see
the word "paradox" on a blog about fitness, did ya?). The
athletes of today are so much better at such young ages. I am in AWE of
LeBron James's skills and abilities. It is beyond my comprehension that
someone could be that good, that young.
Want another paradox? (Twice! I'm on a roll!). Athletes are also
perfoming at a high level much older. Randy Couture is a mixed-martial arts
(MMA) champion in his mid-40's. Most top level MMA fighters are well
into their 30's in what looks like a sport that should be dominated by 20
year olds.
So what's the take away from all this?  The average person (and I
include myself - full-time professional job, wife, 2 grade school kids) is
not LeBron James, and never was. But we did have a brief period of
athleticism (for me, it was 4 years of karate training). How do we get that
back?
By finding fitness programs that are flexible enough to adapt to your
current life. You want fitness to be a priority. You NEED fitness to be
a priority. So overcome the obstacle by using fitness programs that fit
in among all the other priorities of your life. That's what all these
blog posts are about.
So check out The FITNESS Portal for products that fit everything we've
talked about. Check out the FREE Bonus with every purchase. 
Get our FREE eBook "Physical Fitness In 30 SECONDS A Day"
And keep giving us feedback, either on the blog or on the Comment box.

Back in the day, I lifted weights A lot. Like almost everyday

after work and 1 or 2 days on the weekend. I lifted for

strength, so I wasn’t particulary big. But I was way stronger

than I looked.

I bench pressed 325 3x with a body weight of 154. I did, at

each workout, about 15 sets of squats, working my way up from

225. See, I would do 1 set of squats in between other bodypart

exercises. So 3 sets shoulders - 1 set squats - 3 sets lats -

1 set squats. You get the idea.

Why do I tell you this? How does this relate to the title of

this post? Let me tell you about the time I tried to work out

with a hangover.

See, this is back when I drank. I don’t drink now, but it has

nothing to do with being anti-alcohol or anything. It’s just

that I didn’t drink anything while I was dating my wife. I

was in law school and she was finishing up her music degree,

and she never went to bars. So I never went to bars. Well,

eventually someone offered me a beer, and I thought to myself

“why start again when I’ve just gone over 12 months without

drinking?” So I didn’t. And I haven’t.

Okay, back to the story. Now please understand - I didn’t

really know I was hungover. I thought I was just extra tired

from a long night of super-hard dancing. So I hit my first

round of 3×10 bench presses, and then got under the bar for

a squat. And I pushed out 3, and on the 4th, I felt like the

little plug that holds all my energy in, got taken out and

all my energy drained out all over floor. I was done. Completely.

And I never forgot that day, for 2 reasons. First, because my

stomach felt like it had been turned inside-out and put back

in wrong. And second, because I had no backup workout routine.

I worked out 1 way, with 1 order of exercises. While that made

for great discipline, it sucks when it comes to adaptability.

A few years later, I broke my ankle. Actually snapped a tiny

little bone in thay area. So I couldn’t go to the gym. But I

had nothing else. No bodyweight exercises or pilates or yoga.

Nothing. But, my appetite didn’t decrease. And I actually put

back - in 3 weeks - ALL of the weight I lost the previous 6

months. Weight that I had lost without dieting - just by

exercising. Because my body was demanding lots of calories. And

I had no way to burn them off.

So an ideal fitness program has to be flexible, to adjust to

your energy level, and to your physical condition (hurt, tired,

distracted). I am not a “morning person” but morning is the

only time I have time to workout. So I have a routine that is

built around shotokan kata (because I can perform kata at any

level of interest, energy, or sleep deprivation) and a generous

smattering of bodyweight exercises. Because I have found that

this type of routine offers the most flexibility and

adaptability to things like energy level and time.

Hey! Check out The FITNESS Portal for 3 reasons:

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Ideal fitness program incorporates relaxationRelaxation techniques are too often overlooked as part of fitness.

This is probably because anything that doesn’t directly make your

muscles bigger, or make you run faster, or make you lose weight is

ignored by us in the West as being part of a fitness program.

Fitness is more than weight loss or muscle gain. Fitness is really

anything that improves the quality of your life. Relaxation

certainly qualifies as that (well, except for my friend Chip. His

favorite saying was, “I’ve tried relaxing, but I enjoy the feeling

of being tense all the time.”).

The benefits of relaxation are almost too numerous to mention.

Relaxation lowers your blood pressure, and helps to keep it at a

healthy level. Relaxation reduces stress, and allows you to handle

stress or other situations with calmness and detachment.

Any ideal fitness program incorporates relaxation into the body of

the program. The relaxation techniques will blend seamlessly with

the other elements of the fitness routine.

Relaxation is not some hippy yoga thing, but is used by all top

athletes. It should be used by all top business and professional

people, but - sadly - too often, people equate relaxation with

laziness.

The simplest form of relaxation is breathing. Deep breathing.

Rejuvenating breathing. Here’s how:

1. stand or sit so that your waist is not bent.

2. breathe in as deep as you can.

3. breathe out, so that all of the air is out of yuor lungs.

4. breathe in again, but this time, force your stomach to push out

and keep breathing in, even when your lungs are full. Count inside

your mind 1, 2, 3… while breathing in.

5. Hold the breath for the same count as you breathed in.

6. Exhale for the same count you held it for. Empty your lungs

completely.

7. Repeat.

This form of deep breathing relaxes your body in several subtle ways:

1. by counting while breathing, your focus is put on your lungs and

away from your problems and stresses.

2. by filling - actually filling - your lungs with air, you are

getting badly needed oxygen to your stressed and tense muscles.

3. by using your abdominal muscles to force the air in and out,

you are activating your chi to begin to work throughout your body.

There are many forms of relaxation. But the key is to use them

inside and with your exercise and fitness program, so that the

benefits are maximized and magnified.

Are you wondering what this “ideal” fitness program looks like? Well,

in a few more posts, I will reveal an ideal program.

Until then, you can go to The FITNESS Portal to check out some great

programs, and to sign up for our FREE eBook “Physical Fitness In 30

SECONDS A Day” and our randomly-sent-out newsletter.

 This is because stretching keeps you limber, adding to a youthful appearance. Also, stretching keeps your muscles from getting tight during an activity, which prevents injuries. Finally, stretching can help reduce stress (which should also be a key goal of your fitness routine) by keeping your body physically able to quickly repond to stressors and by reducing or eliminating fatigue.

Now, just to be clear, I want to explain the type of stretching I am talking about. I do not mean the 5 or 10 minutes of stretching done at the beginning of an exercise class to warm up, or at the end to cool down. This type of stretching is designed to do just enough to cover the next 20 or 30 minutes. The stretching this article is looking at is more permanent than that.

I also do not mean the little itty bitty stretching, or the worse irrelevant stretching, that so-called exercise gurus throw into their exercise programs. These stretches are not related to the exercises in the program, and can actually cause injury. This is because you are stretching muscles that were not used in the exercise, or were antagonistic to muscles used in the exercise, and so don’t focus on the right areas.

An ideal exercise program will include stretching that focuses on the muscles used throughout the program, to make sure those muscles are not hurt by exercising. But the stretching will also work all the muscles of your body, to keep balance after the exercise routine is finished.

This will also reduce fatigue and help you keep your energy at a constant level throughout the day, especially at those times of day you are naturally inclined to slow down or want to rest. This is different for each person. But stretching can reduce the ups and downs for everyone.

A fitness program that is properly designed will have stretching as a key and integral part. The stretching will be built into the routine, like a basement is built into a house. It won’t be an after-the-fact add-on, like throwing a deck on the back of an already-built house.

So how does an ideal fitness program do this?  Well, that’s probably coming up in another blog post.

In the meantime - as always - go to The FITNESS Portal to check out some great programs, and to sign up for our FREE eBook “Physical Fitness in 30-SECONDS A Day” and randomly-sent-out newsletter.

Until those posts are put up, go to The FITNESS Portal to check out some great programs, and to sign up for our FREE eBook and randomly-sent-out newsletter.

Tom Venuto, the best-selling author of “Burn The Fat!” was interviewed in the the hottest fitness teleseminar series of 2007, with more than 30,000 people registering for the live calls and audio playback.  He is offering this “Super Lean: Secrets of Achieving very low body fat” seminar as FREE BONUS if you get “Burn The Fat!” before  midnight February 13,  2008.  The seminar consists of  TWO MP3 audios - nearly two hours of listening - (which you can burn to CD’s, save in your IPOD or hear right on your computer). Not only that, the seminar has also been transcribed and edited into TWO 38 page PDF e-books. BUT - after that - the seminar will be sold separatel;y for $47, so get it NOW!

Check this out: Eat pizza and get six-pack abs! THAT’s my kind of diet!

QUESTION: “We’ve got a question here which is going to be useful for everybody, because probably everybody listening has their favorite foods that they don’t want to give up. For example, I love chocolate. A caller wanted to know, “Is it possible to get a flat stomach and six-pack abs and single-digit body fat while still enjoying your favorite foods like chocolate or pizza?” What’s your take on that, Tom?”

ANSWER: “Of course it’s possible. You just have to eat small enough portions of chocolate or pizza so you’re still in a calorie deficit. In fact, you could eat 100% pizza and 100% chocolate diet and still lose weight. Heck, if a guy can eat 100% Subway and lose weight, why not 100% pizza?

All you need is a calorie deficit. Of course, I DON’T recommend you eat a100% junk food diet because that’s going to have a negative impact on your health. I’m just trying to make the point that fat loss revolves around having that calorie deficit.

We have some diet book authors, some of them who even have bestsellers on the top of the charts right now, who are spreading the same myth that diet gurus have been spreading for decades; they’re saying calories don’t count. That’s total B.S.

Calories in versus calories out is stating the first law of thermodynamics, but apparently we have a group of people who claim to have figured out a way to avoid the laws of physics.

There’s actually an explanation of why they say that though. What these guys are usually trying to do is to give you a list of eating rules which makes it almost impossible to overeat. You could say that they’re “tricking you” into eating less. I wouldn’t say that’s necessarily a bad thing. If the foods you choose spontaneously make you feel fuller on less calories, I might even argue that’s a good thing.

But they’re misrepresenting how it works because there’s a huge difference between saying “don’t count calories” and “calories don’t count” but they’re lumping them together as if they were the same thing.

Do you see the difference between those two statements? If anybody listening doesn’t see the difference, then make sure that you get the difference, because it’s huge.

Suppose I tell you that the only thing you can eat is lean proteins (like egg whites, chicken, fish and green salads and other vegetables), lean plus green and I’ll also let you take in some essential fats and oils, to make sure you get all the essential nutrients.

Then suppose I say, “Don’t count calories; you can eat as much as you want.” I bet you’re going to have a really hard time eating in a calorie surplus, because I’ve removed food groups that are dense in calories, like starches and grains and sugars.

But does that mean that calories don’t count? No. It means that instead of counting calories you were given a bunch of eating rules that usually curb caloric intake automatically

“Calories don’t count” is one of the worst myths out there because if people don’t understand the calories in versus calories out equation, they’re not going to be able to get past the plateaus that we just talked about and they’re going to start thinking there’s a cause and effect relationship between specific foods and gaining fat.

They’re going to figure, “Eating pizza equals getting fat.” It doesn’t. They’re going to think that eating chocolate equals getting fat. It doesn’t. It’s not a cause and effect relationship where “junk food” automatically turns into fat. Eating too many calories equals gaining fat.

Now if you take a pizza and you load that thing up with triple cheese and sausage and pepperoni and olives and just stack the calories in there, then you have a very calorie-dense food. Even though no food in itself makes you fat, calorie-dense foods, if you eat them frequently, are more likely to give you a calorie surplus.

Or some foods stimulate your appetite or don’t keep you full for long, so you end up eating more of other stuff later, and again, you’re likely to eat in a calorie surplus.

The bottom line? As far as your favorite foods go, my philosophy is that depriving yourself completely of your favorite foods is a great way to make yourself miserable and to be almost certain that you fall off your diet very quickly. My philosophy is allow yourself your favorite foods as long as you acknowledge that calories count and you obey the law of calorie balance.

This is one reason that I don’t prefer the full day off the diet or the free for all cheat day, because some people might interpret that loosely and they may almost feel obligated to see how much food they can eat and how much they can shove down their throats. They say, “Hey, it’s cheat day, so I have to cheat real good. I don’t want to miss out on this!”

They end up in a huge surplus and if they go so far over on the cheat day, when it all averages out over the week, they’re even and they haven’t lost any body fat.

Your best approach is to know your calorie target, or at least the ballpark, and inside that calorie target, give yourself a compliance rule.

One that works really well for me and for my clients is 90% compliance. I give you a list of clean foods like the ones that I mentioned before that include high nutrient density foods with all the essentials and I say, “Eat these 90% of the time. The other 10% of the time, eat whatever you want.”

If you look at it from this perspective, then you can see that there’s no such thing as forbidden foods. For most people, in the long run, any diet that gives you flexibility is going to work better than a diet that demands 100% “clean eating.” This is not only my personal belief, it’salso well supported in the clinical nutrition and behavioral psychology journals.

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“Burn The Fat!” emphasizes a program that does NOT use drugs or steroids - only the body’s NATURAL metabolism and food processing to lose weight more efficiently and at the same time, extracting more energy and nutrients. With the FREE “Super Lean Seminar” BONUS, your nutrition program to lose weight is complete from the first 10 pounds to the most stubborn last 10 pounds.

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