Meet my best teacher

August 9, 2011 Laurence No comments

I have researched exercise physiology and sport science; I have studied the work of many experts in fitness and sports and I have trained in many physical disciplines under many different coaches, sensei and trainers.

Every time I have learnt something new, but never have I learnt the wealth of things like I am at the present moment with my new teacher

Many are my teacher’s qualities: the ease of movement, the boundless energy, the perfection in the squat, the freedom of spirit intertwined with a great curiosity and a phenomenal wish to learn.

But I believe her greatest skill is the ability to show me through her very own journey of discovery, what we, as humans, were, and indeed still are meant to do with our bodies.

My teacher is 13 months old Isabella, and I’m am very lucky to be her dad.

 

 

 

 

It is wonderful, as a parent to see your child learn to move, first crawling then standing, then walking. Even more so for someone like me who has made of movement and exercise a career and a way of life.

What has most struck me is to see how instinct kicks in at a certain age in a child telling it to stand. And there will be many failed attempts, but ultimately in time the skill is learnt and the child is ready now to attempt its first steps.

No one told Bella to stand…she just knew that was what Nature intended her to do.

Now she can toddle and her greatest wish is to be free to move, to walk to pick things up and carry them around.

I find it partly amusing and partly sad that we are the only creatures on the planet designed to stand and locomote permanently on our hind limbs yet we spend most of our time sat down.

I find it unbelievable that we were built to endure physical tasks and hardships, to be agile, flexible and powerful, yet in the present day this description encompasses only a chosen few of our species, whilst the vast majority is content with being weak, permanently in some kind of physical discomfort and finds it hard to run for the bus.

What a pity I say.

It is so obvious to me, watching my daughter, that to move and to be physical is instinctive to us. It makes us happy.

At some point though we just give it up.

Told to sit still in chairs at school we struggle for some time then just become tamer and begin our journey towards negating hundreds of thousands of years of evolution.

If nature wanted us to sit most of our lives it would have given us some kind of inbuilt pillow in our backisides I say…

Isn’t it about time you got back in touch with evolution, with your inner child, and got moving?

It’s fun when once you begin…:-)

Laurence

http://bodyclocq.com

http://nottinghamfitnessbootcamp.co.uk

 

Exercise , , , , ,

Ladies, there’s no excuse…..period!

August 3, 2011 Laurence No comments

Hi!I thought of sharing this interesting article my wife Mealnie wrote for our female clients some time ago, there are insights in here only a woman has! I

 hope you find it useful :-) , please leave a comment!

 

As we all know there are certain times of the month when you just feel ‘urgh’………..everything feels that bit tighter, your temper is that bit shorter and all you want is CHOCOLATE…… CHOCOLATE…….. CHOCOLATE!!!

 

But did you know that in actual fact training on the week before and the week of your period can actually help you lose fat?  Don’t believe me?  Then let me explain.

 

Period Week (day 1 – 5)

Ever wondered why something that may have felt reasonably easy the week before suddenly feels so much harder?!  Unfortunately our fluctuating hormones can make that 8kg kettlebell suddenly feel like a 12kg!!  However much you may not feel like it, exercising when you are on your period can help ease your symptoms and actually make you feel better.  At this time of the month your serotonin levels drop (serotonin is the happy hormone!) and your progesterone levels rise, which is why most of us feel grumpier, but exercising increases your serotonin levels, so exercising will make you feel happier!!

 

I know most of us never look forward to this week, but, the week before and the week of your period your body will burn fat far more efficiently.  Which means that if we work hard we will burn more fat than at any other time of the month.  However, our bodies know this, and this is why we suddenly start craving those carbs and chocolate!!  So although it might take a bit more discipline keeping to the Revitalise principles these two weeks will mean that your results will happen even quicker!

 

Optimal Hormones (day 6 – 20)

Everyone breath’s a sigh of relief as our hormones settle down and we are back to our usual kick-ass self at the gym!!  Those 8kg feel like 8kg again and in fact we feel so good we skip those 8kgs and go straight for the 12kgs and we are ready to work hard.  During these days our bodies are ready to work to the best of their ability – you want to push harder, higher, longer and faster!!  If you want to feel those improvements in your training now is the time to do it.

 

PMS Week (day 21 – 28)

This is the week where we start to feel – well basically crap!  You know the usual suspects…………bloating, headaches, cramps, tiredness and, of course, those cravings!  This is the week where you’ll probably find that you end up having “teddy bear” workouts as my husband calls them.  No grizzly bear workouts here!!  But this week, it’s better to just get something done, rather than nothing.  Remember that exercise increases our serotonin levels and this is the week that we’ll probably need it!  A word of caution for you here, there is a higher risk of injury due to joint laxity which is caused by the hormone relaxin.  Those of you who have had children may be familiar with this hormone.  However it is also increased when we are on our period, which means that for this week our joints become a little bit more elastic, and whilst some of you may want to take advantage of this by finally getting into the splits, I’d advise caution!!!    

Finally, as I’m sure you are aware; never weigh yourself when you are on your period.  Due to water retention you will probably find that out of nowhere you’ve suddenly gained between 2-5lbs (ARGH!!!).  A good way of keeping water retention to a minimum is to actually drink more water.  By increasing your water intake your kidneys will automatically increase the hormones that tell your body to release water.  Ok, so you might find yourself popping off to the loo a bit more than usual but at least those jeans won’t feel as tight!

Hopefully this article can help you understand why sometimes a workout can feel harder than it should and why keeping to clean eating even when those cravings hit can mean that those results will always keep on coming!

Melanie

http://www.nottinghamfitnessbootcamp.co.uk

http://www.bodyclocq.com

 

 

Nutrition and fatloss, Women's Fitness , , , , , ,

Free yourself from the modern day mess!

July 27, 2011 Laurence No comments

I am sure there were times in which things were much simpler; unfortunately in our era the simplest things seem to have become the hardest to understand and achieve.

 

 

 

 

 

 

When it comes to anything that includes fat loss, healthy eating and exercise an appalling amount of confusion is stopping people from getting the results they so long for. 

This ”Modern Day Mess”, as I have dubbed it has been created by the never-ending marketing campaigns from the food industry, and unfortunately, the fitness industry; the continuous stream of misleading information from the media, and from the dubious modern day role models: the so called “celebrities”.

That’s the problem.

I spend a lot of time with my personal training clients at BodyClocq and with the Nottingham Fitness Bootcamp members reversing the “brainwashing” that they’ve been put through simply by watching TV and reading magazines.

Too many people will make their nutrition and lifestyle choices based on what the latest fad diet is or because they fancy the “lose a jeans size challenge” or because in a magazine they read that this or that celeb lost 4 dress sizes in a week eating only celery, or because on the news they heard that beer and chocolate are actually good for you if you have them on the twelfth night of the year under a full moon…

This list could go on forever.

The fact is the marketing people are trying to sell you a product, the media are aiming to sell more copies/get a higher audience and the celebs…well they are just as confused as you are with the added pressure of HAVING to fit in that size 0 dress, so they end up making some very silly choices.

None of them have any interest whatsoever in your health and couldn’t care less if the constant, failing battle to lose weight is making you sad and unhappy.

To top it all up, the people that SHOULD be interested in your health and waistline are too busy arguing amongst themselves what is the best way to get people to lose weight, often forgetting that those same people are still there, waiting for an answer that makes sense and ultimately works.

In reality though, nobody is FORCING anyone to buy what they sell or to listen to poor or confused advice.

Truth is we are all solely responsible for our own health and of the way we look and feel. A poor choice is still a choice, hence taken in total freedom…

The first thing you need to do to be successful in shedding the flab and achieving better health you must choose to free yourself of the sneer of the Modern Day Mess.

Remember this simple mantra:  “the closer I stay to Nature, the healthier and leaner I will be”

Nature has all the answers, if we listen we can be free…

Laurence

http://nottinghamfitnessbootcamp.co.uk

http://bodyclocq.com

 

Mindset , , , , , , ,

A few things you might not know about fatloss

May 25, 2011 Laurence No comments

When it comes to nutrition many people still consider fat loss a simple matter of calories in-calories out.

Unfortunately it is no so simple. I have listed a few litle known factors  that greatly contribute in keeping people overweight.

I have seen fantastic transformations in my clients when we began adressing these areas

Toxicity: the enemy of health and fat-loss

I guess this topic could be resumed in the mantra “the further away you move from Nature, the closer you are to disease”.

You see, the world has evolved around us a lot quicker than we could possibly adapt to it, so we have to live in an environment that is not what we were meant by Nature to live in.

One of the reasons more and more people struggle with their weight is because of the toxicity they are exposed to on a daily basis which results in a constant state of disease.

What kind of disease? Feeling bloated, tired and lacking energy all the time, constantly catching colds and fatiguing at the mere thought of having to run to catch a bus… How many people do you know that fit the description? Are you one of them?

Well here is a fact: that’s not the way a human being is meant to feel, it’s just the way the human race is adapting to feel like, believing” that’s just the way it is”.

If your body is a toxic state your hormones will not be working properly, your thyroid will be out of sync, your immune system will be constantly strained and in jeopardy. All of this will contribute to a slower metabolism and as a consequence more body fat.

Also your system will be desperately trying to deal with the poisons in it, partly by excreting them and partly by storing them where they will do the least damage…yes you’ve guessed, in fat cells! If a high level of toxins is contained in them you will struggle to lose body fat as your body, in its natural wisdom, will not want to let go of the it as it would mean losing storage space for the toxic waste!

Where do those toxins come from? How do we avoid them?

Here is a list of the most common pollutants we are exposed to:

-Mercury amalgam fillings (silver tooth fillings). Mercury is a heavy metal, and highly poisonous to human organism, it should have no place in your mouth! 1 single mercury filling can contain as much mercury as 45 fluorescent tubes!!! Removal of silver filling is a must to re-gain health, although care in choosing a good dentist must be taken as there are procedures that need to be undertaken to make the removal safe.

-Tap water .Chlorine in tap water being the major culprit in messing up the thyroid gland by affecting the Iodine levels in the body. Scores more chemicals can be found in your tap water, this is a topic that I will talk about in a future article. The human body will absorb chemicals from water not only by ingesting it but also through the skin.

The solution is NOT to drink tap water! Bottled water is a better choice, although not the best as the quality of the water decreases the longer it stays in plastic bottles. An alkalising water filter such as the Biocera water jug are a good starting point and quite convenient, the absolute best solution, although initially expensive, would be to have a Micro-ioniser filter fitted in the plumbing system in order to have clean alkaline tap water to drink an wash in available all the time.

-Parabens contained in deodorants, shower/bath gels, shampoos, skin products and in some foods. Common parabens include methylparaben (E number E218), ethylparaben (E214), propylparaben (E216) and butylparaben. Less common parabens include isobutylparaben, isopropylparaben, benzylparaben and their sodium salts.

You can find products that do not contain them, but you will have to look out for them as hardly any of the high street retailers cater for this. Hopefully this will change soon as the big brand retailers notice an increased demand for these products.

-Non-stick cookware.The debates on this rage on, with manufacturers claiming the non-stick is safe and detractors claiming fumes from heating the non-stick items release dangerous chemicals and flakes coming off old pans end up in the food polluting it. If there is so much doubt about the topic I think it’s better to stay on the safe side and use stainless steel, cast iron or ceramic cookware.

-Air pollution. Not much we can do about this one, if not making sure to take some long walks in the countryside where the air is cleaner.

-Pesticides and fungicides routinely sprayed on non-organic foods. No, washing the fruit and veg will not get rid of them unfortunately. The only way of avoiding these dangerous chemicals is buying certified organic food. Some will argue this is more expensive, but really in the long term it will save money on health bills.

“To survive the 21st century you must learn to play the game”

As previously stated, we have changed our lifestyles and our surrounding environment much faster than we could naturally adapt to it, so we must learn to “play the game” to stay in good health and in good shape.

Without getting rid of toxicity many individuals have little hope of doing so despite their best efforts exercising. Many people struggling to lose weight are doing so because they are looking in the wrong direction. Don’t forget “the further away we move from nature, the closer we are to disease”!

To your health and fitness!

Laurence

http://nottinghamfitnessbootcamp.co.uk

http://bodyclocq.com

 

Nutrition and fatloss , , , , , ,