September 8, 2010
Rock City Fitness is my personal training company. Rock City Fitness reflects me, my philosophy and all my years of experience. I want my customers to know what I bring to the table. I want them to know what is behind the Rock City Fitness name. Now I would like to speak more directly about training approach is. Not just explain my educational background or my desire for excellence. I want to explain what goes into training programs and workouts. I want to lay out the Rock City Fitness systems, tools and style of training. So, ladies and gentleman, here it is!
My approach to training breaks down into three main categories: Energy, Progression and Attitude. First, here is a general overview. Energy involves the manipulation of calories in vs. calories out. Progression is the principle of systematically changing exercise variables so that the workout program is progressively more difficult. Attitude is the subjective, yet crucial component that brings everything together. Nothing great will happen without the correct mind set. Ok, next I would like to present the first of these three categories.
This seems like a simple concept at first… eat less than what you burn, right? (Or conversely, if weight gain is the goal, then eat more than what you burn.) Well, first of all, on paper this is a classic “simple, but not easy” process. But, as you will see, when we really dive into it, there is much more to it.
“Calories in” is the component of nutrition. The three main factors with nutrition are total calories, timing and content. Let’s look at each of these more closely.
This is the basic mathematical component. Weight loss requires a caloric deficit. This means that you must eat fewer calories than what your body requires to meet your metabolism and activity requirements. This is determined by first calculating what your resting metabolic rate is then adding calories burned from activities of daily living and those burned from exercise. Once you have this number, then you must set your calorie intake at 500-1000 calories less. You will be able to lose 1-2 pounds of body fat a week with this plan.
Here is an example: Metabolism = 1600 calories/day. Activities of Daily Living = 500 calories/day. Exercise = 400 calories/day. Total energy expenditure equals 2500 calories a day. You must set your calorie intake at no more than 2000 calories if you want to lose at least one pound per week. One critical factor to keep in mind is you can’t eat less than what your metabolism is. So, in this example, the largest deficit you can achieve is 900 calories.
Your metabolism is the minimum amount of calories your body requires to maintain itself at rest. If you eat less than this, then you are sending a starvation signal to your body. A starvation signal causes your body to store fat and consume muscle for energy. This is the exact opposite result you want to have happen. That is why very low calorie, restrictive diets are not a good long term solution to weight loss. You will lose weight, but it is not the weight you want to lose. As your body consumes muscle, your metabolism will slow down. This will make weight gain easier and faster when you go back to normal eating. You will be entering into a never ending cycle of battling your weight.
Not only do you have to determine what the correct amount of calories to consume is, but you need to know how to spread the calories throughout the day. Our body is a machine that requires fuel and nutrition all day long. I recommend that you eat 3 meals and have 2-3 snacks each day. You should eat breakfast within 45 minutes of waking up and then eat every 2-3 hours thereafter. Depending on your total calorie requirements for the day, your breakfast, lunch and dinner should be 300-500 calories and your snacks should be 100-200 calories. These are typical numbers for weight or body fat loss. The calories would be much higher for weight or muscle gain.
Nutrition timing for exercise is extremely important too. You should eat before you exercise to provide fuel and nutrients for proper intensity. 1-2 hours for a meal or 30-60 minutes for a quick snack. Then you need to eat within 45 minutes after the workout to recover and get the most out of your workout. Exercise is the signal to cause your body to change, but nutrition provides the raw materials or building blocks so that your body can change.
Total calorie intake is essential, but it has to be combined with proper timing. Spreading the calories throughout the day allows your body to receive the energy and nutrition it needs without being forced to store the energy as body fat. Too many calories at one time will cause your body to store the extra calories as fat in your fat cells. So, even if you eat the right amount of calories, you may still have a hard time losing weight if you only eat once or twice a day.
One last thing to consider is how your day is spent and what your energy requirements are. People often ask if they can have a snack after dinner. Well, the answer to that depends on how many total calories you need and how you will be spending the time after dinner. If you eat dinner at 6:00 PM and then want a snack at 8:00 PM but you will be spending the time watching TV the rest of the night, I would discourage the snack unless it is something very high in nutrients and low in calories. But if you are planning yard work or golfing with friends, then go ahead and have that snack.
What I mean by content is the composition of your food and meals in terms of macronutrients and micronutrients. Macronutrients are carbohydrates, protein and fat. Micronutrients are vitamins and minerals. Macronutrients have a calorie value but micronutrients do not. Even though vitamins and minerals do not provide actual fuel to burn they are vital to our body functions and metabolism.
The first factor to consider is balance between the macronutrients. In most cases, the ideal diet consists of about 50% of the calories from carbohydrates, 20-30% from protein and 20-30% from fat. This can be achieved at meal time by having a palm-sized portion of meat, a fist-sized portion of starchy carbs (rice, pasta, potatoes, etc.) and a fist-sized portion of vegetables. Or you can divide your plate as follows: ¼ plate is meat, ¼ plate is carbs and ½ plate is vegetables. I discourage a low or no carb diet. Our body is designed to run off of carbs as a primary fuel source. The problem most people have with carbs is portion size and sugar content, not the carbs themselves. Once again, cutting carbs is not a good long term solution. Permanent results will be achieved through realistic lifestyle changes, not extreme changes that can’t be maintained.
The second factor with content is the role of micronutrients. The purpose of micronutrients ranges from building blocks for body structures such as bones to helping the body turn food into energy. Vitamin and mineral deficiencies cause major stress to the body and are risk factors for all types of chronic diseases. Most Americans, even when consuming a balanced diet, do not get all the nutrition they need from food alone, especially when exercising regularly. This is where supplements come in. Multivitamin and mineral supplements, energy bars and shakes each help attain the necessary amounts of micronutrients.
“Calories out” is comprised of the sum of metabolism, lifestyle (activities of daily living) and exercise. The goal of an exercise program is to impact and maximize the effect of the “calories out” variable.
Metabolism is the caloric sum total of the chemical process that occur in our body to maintain life. Four main variables impact metabolism: genetics, age, activity level and nutritional habits. Two factors are not controllable and two are. Fortunately, the controllable factors (and you know which ones they are), have the greatest impact on our metabolism. So, you could accurately say that you control your metabolism. You would be incorrect to ever say that you are the victim of your metabolism!
Having a more active lifestyle adds to how many calories you burn each day. Sitting in a car, at a desk or on the couch will place very little demand on your body. Your body will not consume very many calories and will have no reason to be in shape. Conversely, deliberately adding more activity to your lifestyle such as performing yard work, going for a family bike ride or taking the stairs instead of the elevator will increase energy expenditure and tell your body to be fit.
The way we chose to live our life will send one message or another. We can send messages that will lead to a sore low back, low bone density, poor posture, weak muscles, low lung capacity or we can do the opposite. Unfortunately, the society we live in makes it very tempting to be lazy and have low activity level. Our neighborhoods and suburban communities are set up for driving not walking, we can sign up for all kinds of services to take care of our yard and we have never ending entertainment and multimedia options with iPods, computers, video games and home theatres. The way you live your life is a choice that you have to take ownership of.
Exercise is different than lifestyle because it is a specific activity designed to produce a desired physical outcome. Exercise broadly consists of strength training, cardiovascular training and flexibility training. Exercise plans should consist of all three to be considered balanced, produce the best health outcomes and to have the maximum effectiveness. Each plays a vital role. While strength and cardiovascular training burns way more calories than flexibility training, we need this so that our body can move correctly and to prevent injuries. If we neglect stretching, then we risk not being able to exercise at all.
The roles of strength training and cardiovascular training are unique. Strength training does a couple things. It obviously burns calories. Compared to cardiovascular exercise, though, it does not burn as much fat or as many calories per minute exercising. However, what it does that cardiovascular training doesn’t is really increase how many calories you burn after the workout. Also, strength training builds muscle by increasing the size of the muscle cells. This results in two things. First, your metabolism will increase because muscle cells are metabolically active. More muscle = more calories burned. Second, larger muscle cells will hold more energy so when you eat you are less likely to store energy as body fat.
The primary role of cardiovascular training is to increase aerobic fitness and reduce the risk of chronic diseases. From a calorie burning standpoint cardiovascular training burns more calories per minute than strength training and more calories from fat. The reason you burn more calories is because you are constantly moving compared to the starting and stopping nature of strength training. More fat is burned because cardiovascular exercise utilizes more oxygen. Fat can only burn in the presence of oxygen. Another great outcome of cardiovascular training is changing the type of fuel our body tends to burn. A less fit individual burns a lot of sugar at rest. A fit individual burns a greater amount of fat at rest. By performing regular, challenging cardiovascular exercise you are training your body to prefer to use body fat as the source of fuel.
This sums up the Energy category of the Rock City Fitness training approach. Next up, I will discuss Progression.