Thanks for everyone who came along on Saturday, I had a blast and I am sure you all did to!

Here is a few photos from the day.

Hopefully we can do it agin in a month or two…

Team Fitta Bodies

If a healthy lifetyle is what you’re looking for then I highly recommend joining Troy and his Fittabodies training sessions. A diet full of air and bubbles is encouraged if you’re after weight loss (such as popcorn, champagne and beer), but if you do insist on eating then Troy doesn’t mind as long as you push yourself to your limits and have a little puke at the end of training.
I thoroughly enjoy dragging myself out of my warm bed and into the fresh and sometimes wet mornings and training under a blanket of stars. And if I happen to miss a morning, I can’t wait to see what email awaits me at work, complimenting me on what a great sleep in I achieved that day! 

Thanks Kelly, see you in the morning.

Reaching your goals of better health or weight loss is so easy to do. It is not rocket science, it is purely doing the right things over and over again.

We need to to stop searching for that quick fix to reach your goal, because it will never happen! The only way you can truly reach your goals is to sew, cultivate and harvest. These days all we want to do is harvest.

What do I mean by that?

Sew: Undertake an exercise and healthy eating plan.

Cultivate: Train daily and eat healthy most of the time for an extended period of time, day in day out until you reach your goals, for as long as it takes. Be patient and diligent.

Harvest: Enjoy your new found health and fitness.

Like I said, this is not rocket science but I feel like it must be because the majority of people just don’t get it. I get so excited when somebody does get it, and you know what happens when I meet somebody like that? They reach their goals. They harvest!

Far too often I meet those in search of the quantum leap and you know what happens to them? They don’t reach their goals and they don’t harvest. They just go off in search of the next quantum leap promise. Unfortunately they will do this for the rest of their life unless they come to the realisation of the error of their ways and begin to consistently repeat the correct actions that willl eventually lead them to successfully reaching their goals. You will know this person when you see them, they always have something new they want to tell you about which doesn’t conform to eating a balanced healthy diet and doesn’t involve regular normal exercise.

Everyday you are faced with decisions. From the moment you wake up to the moment you fall asleep, you are faced with decision after decision and your action at the time of that decision will help to shape your future.

The funny thing is that we don’t really acknowledge how important those decisions are. Think about this:

Do you instantly become unfit if you miss your exercise session today? No. But the fact is, you will repeat that action throughout the course of a year. Does that make you stay unfit and not progress? Yes

Do you instantly become fit if you turn up to your exercise session today? No. But if you repeat that action throughout the course of the year, will you become fit? Absolutely!

Not rocket science…

Do you have a heart attack everytime you eat a Big Mac, Fries and Coke? No, but I’m sure if you did, you wouldn’t eat another one any time soon. Does repeating that action throughout the course of the year lead you closer to a heart attack? Most definitely. The actions we make today help to shape our future.

Do you instantly become healthier when you eat a nice plate of meat and veggies and skip dessert? No, but if you make that choice today, you are probably going to make a similar choice tomorrow and the day after. Does that make you healthier? Absolutely!

Making the right choices over and over and over is the only way to reach your goals.

Eat well and exercise regularly

Most people acknowledge sugar is bad for you but few really understand how bad it actually is.

One thing you need to know is that you cannot eat sugar without causing a rise in insulin.

Here is a list of problems that have been associated with consuming sugar and the rise in insulin associated with it. I will not go into too much detail as I would be writing for days, but here is a summary:

* Sugar blocks the amount of vitamin C absorbed into our white blood cells. Vitamin C is essential to a healthy immune system.

* Sugar is devoid of any vitamins and minerals so it enters our bodies and robs essential vitamins and minerals from our muscles, bones, brains and other tissues.

*1 molecule of Sugar requires 56 molecules of magnesium to be metabolised which will lead to a magnesium defficiency. Magnesium defficiency is related to high blood pressure, heart attacks, strokes and neurological problems.

* Consuming sugar will cause a sudden and dramatic release of insulin into the body. Over time this constant elevation of insulin levels will lead to insulin resistance or Type II diabetes.

* Insulin helps to store magnesium. If you become insulin resistant, your ability to store magnesium will be compromised leading to the magnesium defficiency and it’s related health problems listed above. Mainly high blood pressure.

* Insulin resistance is a factor in osteoporosis. Insulin helps control growth hormone, testosterone and progesterone. If these hormones are reduced, bone building is reduced and osteoporosis is a concern.

* Insulin resistance causes elevated levels of triglycerides. This is a major factor in heart disease and stroke. Most people think fat is the problem, but if we think about it, we all know this isn’t the case. Here’s a simple test; Do you or someone close to you have high cholesterol? Do you or they eat a high fat diet or high carbohydrate/sugar diet? The proof of the pudding lies in the eating. Literally! In the 80’s there was a push to cut down on our fat intake in order to reduce heart attacks. This fat replaced with an increase in sugar for flavour in our foods. This has led us to an increase in heart attackes, cardiovascular disease, obesity and metabolic syndrome. 

Yet, they still push the low fat theory for reducing heart disease etc. In what other place would you ever find a theory that causes the exact opposite of what it is meant to yet we still listen to it and believe it and die by it?

* Insulin resistance plays a major role in depression, fatigue and moodiness.

* Sugar is bad for your gut flora. It encourages the growth of parasites, worms, fungus and candida.

* Insulin plays a large part in cancer. I’m not going too deep into this one, but I have done my research and so should you for such an important issue. All of us know somebody who had been affected by cancer, but there are ways to help reduce your risk and killing your sugar consumption is the best place to start. Kill the sugar or let it kill you.

* Sugar makes you fat.

The American Diabetic Association lists sugar in the top 3 causes of degenerative disease.

I think we all need to take the idea of quitting sugar seriously.

I think we need a sugarholics anonymous!

What if everytime you ate a chocolate bar you had a heart attack. Woud you eat a chocolate bar again?

What if everytime you drank a cocktail you immediately got a serious illness die to your weakened immune system. Would you have 5 cocktails next Saturday night?

What if everytime you ate a bag of potato chips you suffered a stroke. Would you pick them as a snack again.

What if everytime you drank a bottle of fruit juice or soft drink you went into a state of depression? Would you choose it over water next time?

Sugar is killing us slowly. So slowly we don’t even notice it. Until it’s too late or as most people will say, just bad luck….

ABSOLUTELY!

There are so may reasons not to eat sugar that I am going to break this down into 2 entries. This first one will talk about weight loss. The next one about how sugar is responsible for a whole range of health problems. To view this article, enter here.

Firstly, let me ask you this question:

Are you overweight or at the very least, can’t shift the muffin tops?

Now let me ask you:

Do you eat a high fat diet?

or

Do you eat a high carbohydrate diet?

I personally don’t know anyone who eats a high fat diet. It is so hard these days with half the supermarket filled with low fat everything.

I personally do know lots of people who eat high sugar diets and this is why people are fat! If eating a low fat diet made you lose weight, then why so many fat people? Am I wrong? Think about your own diet.

When we eat/drink sugar or a food that turns into sugar, that sugar is delivered into our blood stream. This results in high blood sugar levels. Your body does not like high blood sugar levels, so it releases insulin from the pancreas. The insulin pulls the sugar out of the blood stream and delivers it to your muscles and liver and anything left over is stored as fat. There’s one more critical factor here. When there is insulin circulating in your system, your fat cells are immobilized. So when you eat sugar, you can bet that you won’t be burning any fat for up to 6 hours.

How does that sound? Eat sugar and don’t burn any fat for hours. Does that sound like something you want happening in your body?

I think it is funny when somebody tells me they love eating sweets and that it isn’t a big deal. They feel that so long as they are not eating loads of fat then they are fine. What a mistake. That sugar is converted to fat very quickly!

I do however understand that sugar is highly addictive and so should you.

Here are a few questions to determine whether you might be addicted to sugar:

Do you use sweets as a reward?

Do you eat sweets when you feel down or stressed?

Do you eat sweets even when you’re not hungry?

Have you said you are going to give up sweets but find yourself eating them a few days later?

Do you make jokes about how you just love eating sweets and don’t have an interest in cutting back?

Do you take a small bite of something sweet and then can’t resist eating the whole thing?

Do you ever binge on sweets?

What do you think, are you possibly addicted to the sweet stuff?

There are a whole range of problems that sugar can cause in the body and I will go through that soon, but for now, I only have one very, very important thing to say to all of you;

STOP EATING SUGAR OR FOODS THAT TURN INTO SUGAR AND START LOSING WEIGHT NOW!

What do I mean by foods that turn into sugar?

I am basically referring to the glycemic index. The glycemic index refers to how quickly a food turns into sugar in your body. The higher the ranking, the quicker it turns into sugar. Eating low glycemic foods are the best. Bear in mind that only carbohydrates are on the glycemic index because they are what turn into sugar. By carbohydrates, I am referring to anything from chocolate cake to carrots, weetbix to grapes, lollipops to strawberries. They all have different rankings and turn into sugar at different rates. You might be surprised at some of the findings. I recommend buying a glycemic book with charts or find a good webpage with charts on it to help you make wise choices.

Here is a little tip; When eating carbohydrates, try eating some fat and protein with them. This will slow the affect on the blood sugar levels as the body has to process everything together and isn’t just converting the carbs to sugar. Combining the fat and protein with the sugar dulls out the affect to some degree.

For example, combine your fruit with nuts, choose whole fruit over fruit juice, have protein on whole grain sandwiches.

Lastly, I just want to say again STOP EATING SUGAR OR FOODS THAT TURN INTO SUGAR AND START LOSING WEIGHT NOW!

If you think I may be wrong then I encourage you to stop eating sugar or foods that turn into sugar for 30 days and see what happens. What have you got to lose other than your gut?

To view my article on how sugar could be making you sick, enter here.