What Gets You Out of Bed

In the business of fitness coaching PROGRESS is paramount to survival if you can’t definitively prove to clients that they are making progress by leaps and bounds, you’re dead.

Period.

And it can’t be skimpy progress like:

1lb per week
¼ inch here a ½ inch there
2% body fat in 12 weeks

Nope that won’t cut it

It needs to be

20lbs in 4 weeks
4% body fat in 6 weeks
4 inches off the waist in 4 weeks

And rightly so they are paying good money for those results and all things being equal a great exercise and nutrition program and an at least 90% compliance by the client; those type of results are completely achievable.

But what happens when, you’ve been exercising for 10, 20, even 30 years; then what?

When you have gotten to and kept ‘the perfect body’

When you have lifted the biggest weight possible

When you have trained for and competed in seemingly every obscure sport under the sun.

Then what?

What gets your butt out of bed, when your back is stiff, your ankles ache, and your body generally feels like someone has beaten it with a lead pipe.

Then what?

What happens when they quit complimenting you for ‘losing all that weight’, when you can’t get that ‘last 10’ stubborn pounds off; or your thighs or abs just won’t seem to ‘tone up’ not matter what you have tried.

Then what?

Let’s face it exercising for ‘health’ is plain boring no matter how you shake it.


Health is barely respectable enough to get most people to sniff their morning coffee; let alone get them to toil away day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year, in an effort to be, HEALTHIER.

It just doesn’t work, most will decide it’s not worth it and quit.

Your fitness program has to be something that ‘gets you out of bed’

Do you want to know what gets me out of bed?

I call it the 1-Rep Workout.

Nope it isn’t some miracle workout that is even shorter than the ‘8 minute Abs’, ’12 minute Arms’ or the 4 minute Total Body Workout (although there is a version of this that is very good).

Nope, none of that

It is simple really, after 16 yrs of consecutive training I still haven’t gotten the ‘perfect body’ although I am working on it and I still want to get a lot stronger; and I definitely still have a lot more sport to play.

Yet I have finely honed it down to what gets me ‘out of bed’ for my daily workouts, it is the chance of ‘1 good rep’

That’s all it takes for me to consider it a productive and successful workout.

This concept really hit me as I was working through what might be considered a mediocre training day last Friday.

Long story, short I was down to the last two reps of the workout, using the heaviest weight of the day for some barbell snatches and I was able to finish with 2 very good reps.

And that folks is what gets me out of bed to train no matter how bad I feel physically or mentally.

It is the chance for 1 good rep.

What is your ‘1 good rep’?

Enjoy



Troy M Anderson



Tempe Fitness Boot Camp

How Far Would You Walk for Desert

As you know I was just home a week or so ago and as most people do they tend to 'relax' their nutritional standards to some degree.

Well I was in one of my 'relaxed' modes as I was about to walk out to my parents freezer and get myself a serving of a frozen lemon desert that my mom makes, very tasty not great for the physique though.

I had to walk out of the house to the freezer in my dad's shop to get this desert.



Funny thing is even this short distance less than 20 yds round trip made me contemplate the value of going a getting that desert.

Of course I went anyway but I found it very interesting. That even that short distance was enough to make me pause and contemplate the value of getting that desert.

How does this apply to you and your results?

Simple, if you have 'deserts' in your home, i.e. cake, ice cream, cookies, etc.... make them difficult to get to. So you actually have to think about getting it; I would bet it will dramatically reduce you likelihood of going and getting it.

Especially if you are consciously working on fat loss goals:

Doing things like:


- putting ice cream in the freezer in your garage (actually you can probably put just about any
kind of sweet in the freezer)


- Not in the freezer how about a high shelf out of sight in the pantry


- Maybe in the back of the refrigerator again out of sight.

These are just a couple tactical places you can 'stash' things to keep yourself on the straight and narrow.

While ideally you shouldn't have this stuff in your home; there will be times that it is and this is one way to manage it without sabotaging yourself.

Enjoy



Troy M Anderson



Tempe Fitness Boot Camp

Laugh Out Loud Fitness

One my clients sent me a video link the other day showing author Jen Lancaster, and her quest to get in shape.

It's just so happens that my wife also reads this author’s books; as matter of fact she was reading one the other day; and was laughing so hard she was crying; and my wife isn't one to 'laugh out loud'.

The reason that this video and her books are so funny is because her trials and tribulations probably hit pretty close to home for many people.

In a sense she is ‘real’.

The main take home point is here that everyone struggles or has a bad day from time to time; it is those that stick with it the end up 'winning in the end'

Hopefully the video will at a minimum provide you some comic relief if you need it let; and to let you know that there are a lot of others out there working hard towards their fat loss goals.

Click Here to Watch the Funny Video





Enjoy!



Troy M Anderson



Tempe Fitness Boot Camp

How Jackalopes Are Stalling Your Results

For those of you who don't know what jackalope is bear with me and I will give you a link to go see, in a second.

First let me tell you what it is, a jackalope is a mythical creature that looks like a cross between a rabbit and a deer it was obviously conceived by some poor SOB who had a bit too much cabin fever one winter.

None the less this mythical creature is alive and well in many small little western tourist trap towns like Wall Drug, SD.

On my recent mini-working vacation I ran into jackalope and decided get my picture taken on it.

Just for sheer comic relief.

The only thing I could think of while sitting on that thing was,
‘man thousands of little bunnies must have given their lives to create this beast’.

Click Here to See a 'Real Live Jackalope'

What does a 'stupid' jackalope have to do with your fitness or fat loss success?

A lot more than you think, try as I might abolish all fitness myths they still exist.

I just ran into another the other day, let’s take a look and see if I can help you from being 'afflicted by jackalopes'

Myth #1 - 'I just want to maintain my results'

Response - No such thing you are either going forward or backward, this applies to any area of life not just fitness. Sure you may be able to maintain a 'particular body weight for a period'

This type of maintenance may well be the worst kind because it means that your 'regression' is unnoticeable on a daily or weekly basis and before you know it you’ll be left saying 'I don't know where this extra 20lbs came from'

Let me use another example that maintenance is a myth. If you park you vehicle in a parking lot and instead putting it park you leave it neutral what will happen?

It will generally slowly one direction or another.

In theory if we put the vehicle in neutral/maintenance it should stay put but it doesn't.



This doesn't mean that you are always going to be trying to achieve massive weight loss or fat loss goals; there are plenty of other relevant areas to work towards making progress with fat loss or fitness.

You Could Work on Simply Things:

• Getting More Sleep



• Doing Some Restorative Exercise



• Getting a Massage



• Eating More Vegetables



• Exercising an Extra day



• Doing some Strength Training
  
  What you can't do is jump on your jackalope and 'take a break' because the only direction that the jackalope will take you is back to where you started.
  
  Enjoy!

Troy M Anderson

Tempe Fitness Boot Camp