fitness – Fittie Over 40

How to choose and work with a personal trainer

Thought about hiring a personal trainer but are unsure where to start? This post is for you. A lot of people talk themselves out of working with a coach, worried that they are not fit enough (a bit like tidying up your house before the cleaner arrives!), or are afraid of the gym or of being shouted at: blame bad memories of school sports in my case. The reality is really the same as making any investment. You need to decide what you want, do some research into what is available in your price range and start asking for recommendations.

Getting the right ‘fit’

Far from a personal training session being a clinically-delivered set of instructions with someone watching you sweat, your hour should be spent with someone whose company you enjoy. If you don’t have rapport with your coach and they don’t try to establish a connection with you, look elsewhere. If you enjoy being shouted at, then that’s your call and plenty of trainers will do that for you!

Ultimately, a good trainer should be a valuable source of support and someone who is invested in helping you to achieve your goals. They should not value your transformation photos (absolutely not compulsory, by the way) as a marker of how good they are at their job, but meet you where you are and establish the right pace of progress for you.

Look at their website and get a feel for their approach. If you are looking to get fit post-natal or are trying to get healthy after a bout of illness, then look for a trainer with experience in these areas. Find a trainer with life experience, empathy and a roster of similar clients. For example, I don’t do body transformations, although I can recommended good trainers who do. I have found my niche working with people who hated exercise in the past, are very overweight and need an empathetic, more moderate approach based on more than just numbers and data, as well as clients with complex health needs, older clients (in fitness parlance, the over 50s, even though I’m 46 myself!) and so on. If you want me to get you in bikini shape by crash dieting and running you into the ground, I’ll pass on you as a client. Beware of a trainer who claims they can offer you everything: go to someone who specialises in what you need and with whom you can connect.

Trial sessions

Many trainers offer a trial session, but please don’t expect this to be free of charge. We all work by the hour, so you may be asked to pay a small fee to cover the venue hire or, in my case, the chat to discuss your goals and to see if we suit each other is free but you will start being charged once we enter the gym and I am paying to use the space.

Working with your trainer

Getting the best from personal training requires commitment on both sides.

A few basics:

– be on time and make sure you have eaten appropriately to fuel your session and get the most out of it. A small carbohydrate snack a couple of hours beforehand will do it if you are between main meals. My pet hate is underfuelled clients who are too tired to work out effectively. Similarly, turn up hungover at your own risk. If you know you are training, you owe it to yourself to turn up in a fit state to get the most for your £40 or so per hour. Your trainer probably won’t be sympathetic!

– pay your bills on time. Hourly-paid freelancers need to maintain cash flow so please don’t make us wait until the last minute to pay for your sessions. Expect to pay in advance and to lose your payment if you cancel shortly before a session; make sure you know your trainer’s terms and conditions. We need to pay our bills, too.

–if we are helping you with your nutrition, be honest about what you eat and drink. It’s obvious to us that if you are not losing weight, in 99% of cases you are eating more than you think or are reporting. Help us to help you. We are not allowed to give you meal plans (only state registered dietitians can do this legally) so please don’t ask for one, but we can give you guidelines. Remember that our job is to keep you accountable so don’t be offended when we challenge you or call you out for not sticking to what you promised to do.

– remember that we are not on 24 hour duty. If you need to ask a question, send an email rather than texting or calling. I’ve had clients calling on weekends and texting even after I’ve gone to bed. Please respect our boundaries. Many trainers offer support outside of sessions by email, but don’t expect immediate replies or responses outside of normal office hours.

– your trainer should discuss what you want to achieve and how often you can train before they agree to take you on. From then on, your sessions should be tailored to move you towards those goals and not be generic ‘cookie cutter’ training that could apply to anyone. A good trainer should be able to adapt around injury, pregnancy and change a session at the last minute if you are not performing and need something different. That said, it’s our responsibility to help you get fitter and healthier, and we work on a principle called ‘progressive overload’ so be prepared to work harder as time goes on and feel challenged. You will be expected to complete a health questionnaire (PAR-Q) and sign some kind of informed consent or waiver so that all parties are aware of any risks involved.

– finally, and this may seem strange but it is an issue, please don’t flirt with your trainer. Our work with you can be intimate as we take an interest in our clients and train you in very close physical proximity, but it will make things uncomfortable if you: comment on our bodies; flirt with us; buy us inappropriate gifts – all things that have happened to myself and my colleagues. Most of us have partners and we observe careful boundaries when working with you to avoid accusations of harassment. Make me feel uncomfortable and you won’t be my client for long.

But it’s so expensive

Yes, I understand that personal training is a luxury and not a necessity in most people’s budgets. The Bristol average for an hour of PT is about £40. If you gave up your daily takeaway cappuccino, that would cover two PT sessions per month. You have to weigh up what is important to you and think about where you can best invest your money. I am on a budget myself but still have my own coach to motivate me and keep me in great shape for working with my own clients. Hiring a trainer could be the crucial difference between succeeding or failing again with your fitness goals. Take advantage of block bookings to save money, or have a 1:1 then use your trainer’s online programme, if they offer one. It’s often much cheaper, requires more motivation on your part but should still be tailored to your needs. Mine is just £50 per month.

And there you have it. Those are my top tips for finding the right trainer for you and making your relationship with them work. You can find me at www.brainboxcoaching.co.uk if you think I’m the best trainer for you. Get in touch and we can discuss!

Why yoga isn’t ‘stretching’

This one has been percolating away in my mind for a while and it’s a response to two issues:

– doctors and fitness professionals recommending yoga as a cure-all for flexibility and rehab issues

– yoga being perceived as a purely physical discipline, as a workout, or as a stretching protocol.

Let’s get started by reminding ourselves of what yoga really is as a practice.

(Me in mermaid pose. Yoga, or just a good old stretch?)

What is ‘yoga’?

Yoga in its modern form has become entrenched in the popular psyche as a pretzel-making form of stretching and contortion, maybe with some chanting thrown in for good measure.

It’s actually better understood as a belief system or philosophy composed of Eight Limbs (drawn from Patanjali’s Sutras, a classic and much argued over yoga text), that include codes of personal conduct and rules for behaviours towards others, meditation, withdrawal of the senses, and the physical practice, or asana, which is intended to prepare the body and mind for the demands of seated meditation and is only one of those eight components.

You can practise yoga without performing a single physical pose if you meditate regularly, develop spiritual discipline and are mindful and compassionate in your dealings with others and yourself. I suspect this isn’t what the average GP has in mind when they recommend a patient with low back pain to ‘try yoga’.

Why is the misunderstanding of yoga problematic?

I’m not a massive yoga purist and accept that many hybrid and gimmicky forms of physical yoga practices exist that bear little relation to what I think of as yoga. It may well lead people to explore yoga in more depth later on, which is great and, if it doesn’t, c’est la vie. However, not understanding what yoga is can be potentially a problem.

Turning up to a group yoga class could be a surprise in several ways. Depending on the class, you may find you don’t move much at all but will be expected to sit, chant, breathe and meditate. At the other end of the spectrum, you may find yourself well out of your depth and at risk of injury in a class too advanced for your needs: there is a world of difference between a slow, supported yin session and the rigours of the Ashtanga primary series.

Yoga teachers are not, by definition, experts in stretching

Please don’t labour under the illusion that a yoga teacher automatically knows what stretching is. Every training course is different and some place a much greater emphasis on spiritual teachings than physical practice. Yoga teachers are taught to teach yoga: alignment, basic biomechanics, joint actions, contraindications and modifications for injuries or pregnancy. They are not mobility and stretching specialists.

I have co-taught a yoga anatomy workshop to teachers who did not know what I meant by basic terms such as flexion and extension in the spine, and have clients in my own classes who have been physically and painfully pushed into poses by other teachers of which their body was not capable. Do not assume training in advanced anatomy and physiology in a yoga teacher.

Do your research before booking

If someone with low back pain or tight hamstrings is recommended to try yoga by their doctor or PT, they need to do some research. I would argue that they should really book a 1:1 with an experienced yoga teacher who knows about biomechanics, the science of stretching (stretch reflexes, positional isometrics, myofascial release) and have a session tailored to their needs.

It may actually be preferable that they see a physiotherapist or a personal trainer with a specialism in mobility work and movement assessment. Do your homework and choose someone who is least likely to cause further injury, not an over enthusiastic teacher who thinks yoga can cure all ills. Yoga teaching, compared with personal training and physiotherapy, is a frighteningly unregulated industry, so do your homework and check your teacher’s training background and insurance. They should not be offended by you asking.

Doctors and fitpros, please take the time to learn the difference between yoga styles, as well as the difference between the very broad church that is yoga and the purely physical training involved in Pilates, for example, which might be a much better option for a client with poor core stability. Have specific teachers to whom you can refer clients or patients, whose credentials you can trust, rather than making a blanket recommendation to ‘try yoga’. They may come back to you in worse condition than you found them.

Why yoga shouldn’t be your only form of fitness

I’ve been in love with yoga since 1987 when I picked up a copy of Teach Yourself Yoga from the Uxbridge branch of WH Smith aged only 16, and starting contorting myself on my bedroom floor while being grossed out by the dhauti cleansing practices involving swallowing lengths of cotton.

Yoga has certainly increased dramatically in popularity in the UK and US since the 80s and I ended up training to be a yoga teacher myself at the age of 42, after deciding to focus on a kinder and more compassionate form of movement after years of bruising martial arts. Guiding my clients through group and individual practices and seeing them grow in confidence remains one of the most enjoyable and rewarding aspects of my work.

Is yoga really about fitness?

The older I get, the more I view my practice as a form of mental relaxation and focus and less of a physical discipline. Yes, I use it to stretch and maintain the body of which I demand a great deal each day, as well to devise ideas for teaching my classes, but I mainly see it as a quiet place to go and switch off, rather than as a way to bust some bendy moves.

Like most people, I came to it initially for the physicality and to achieve some of the more impressive poses, but it has become a much more spiritual practice for me over time, which is what many yogis will argue what yoga is in essence: something driven by mental discipline and not by physical accomplishment. It does grate on me personally to see yoga advertised as giving you a tight tush or as a form of calorie-burning exercise. That’s definitely not in Patanjali’s Sutras as a benefit of regular practice and there many ways to lift your butt without calling it ‘yoga’.

The way in which you choose to practise is up to you, of course but, if you use yoga as your primary form of fitness or just to improve flexibility, this post invites you to rethink your approach.

There are three aspects of complete fitness

To have a fit body means having a healthy heart and good cardiovascular capacity, muscular strength and power, and flexibility. Most people neglect one or two of these in the pursuit of their favourite sport. For example, runners will often underestimate the benefits of strength training for their stability, while those who focus on lifting can neglect their cardio. The majority of my clients confess to forgetting to add stretching to their weekly programmes to develop or maintain flexibility.

To be fair, how you train needs to be appropriate to your goals, so we need to work out programmes proportionate to those. A runner will always need to focus primarily on running with shorter weight training and stretching sessions, and a lifter isn’t training to race. However, they will benefit from doing metabolic sessions occasionally by not resting between sets and getting their heart rate up.

Which aspects of fitness can yoga support?

Yoga will help to develop and maintain flexibility and, depending on the style being practised and level of effort applied, can absolutely improve strength through all those vinyasas, chaturangas and warrior poses. However, where yoga can’t help if you are trying to build complete fitness is with cardio. Yoga practices have been measured and shown not to push the heart rate into the zones which increase cardiovascular capacity. You may feel a little out of breath during all those jump backs and transitions, but it’s nothing compared to the cardio workout you would get from running even at a conversational pace for the same amount of time. To gain any additional cardiovascular fitness through yoga means you would have to been relatively unfit to start with.

While yoga can increase flexibility and strength, it will not give you cardiovascular fitness, which contributes to your overall health in important ways, including decreasing the risk of coronary heart disease and stroke, as well as the risk of developing type 2 diabetes. So get running, on your bike, into the pool or find any other kind of activity you enjoy to really get your heart rate up. Yoga, I’m afraid, isn’t enough on its own.

Does yoga burn calories?

If you’re looking to burn calories, choose a different form of movement. Yoga burns surprisingly few calories even during a fairly vigorous practice and, even if you’re sweating your way through hot yoga, any immediate weight lost is water, which will be regained throughout the day as you eat and drink.

As a fitness professional with a lean muscle mass of 38% and weighing about 56.5 kg, I still only burn about one calorie per minute practising yoga, and just a little more in a very dynamic practice. That’s about 35-40 calories during a moderate 30 minute session and 50-60 for a tougher practice of the same duration. A 35-40 minute run sees me burning around 350 calories by contrast.

That’s not to say that yoga is not a worthwhile form of physical activity but you need to be realistic about what you can achieve.

What does yoga actually do for you?

There are however many excellent reasons to practise yoga!

– increased range of motion and flexibility. Practised regularly, yoga can help to undo some of the damage done if you have a sedentary job and to complement and balance out repetitive movement patterns in sport. It will not, however, permanently lengthen your muscles. They will retract to their original size and shape post-practice but, over time, you will be training your nervous system to relax your muscles more readily. Note that most athletes require a degree of tension through the muscles for propulsive and explosive power. For example, super-flexible hamstrings are not a runner’s friend. Keep everything in balance.

– increased core stability and overall strength. Working with your body weight and challenging your balance can strengthen the muscles around the lumbo-pelvic hip complex, abdominals and spine. You also get some upper body work if you regularly practise chaturanga. However, you need to complement all the pushing work in yoga with pulling movements, so get on the rowing machine, perform bent over rows or use a TRX system for pull ups.

– greater focus and mental well-being. Yoga’s attention to the breath and its meditation practices, as well as broader mindfulness-based work, are being recognised as beneficial for mental health, in terms of helping to manage anxiety and pain. Learning to control the breath and relax is also hugely beneficial to many sports when training at lactate threshold or when working anaerobically. It has helped me enormously since I started learning to swim in February and with the cardiovascular demands of boxing.

Next steps

If you decide to attend yoga classes to increase your flexibility, then be prepared to learn to meditate and do breath work, too. It all comes as part of a more spiritual practice. If that doesn’t appeal, then you don’t have to practise yoga at all to improve your range of movement. Pilates could also work for you and there has been a recent increase in the number of mobility classes available in gyms.

You can look on YouTube for videos helping with stretching and mobility, as well as lots of free yoga content. I would also highly recommend a 1:1 with a qualified teacher to look at some of the basic postures to bs sure that you don’t reinforce any movement imbalances and actually create a problem.

Yoga is often touted as a miracle cure for a wide range of movement problems as well as mental and physical ailments. But like any discipline, it has its limits and should be seen as appropriate in some scenarios and maybe even irrelevant in others. What it can’t be is a complete movement and fitness system. It never evolved to be such a thing, no matter what modernmarketing may tell you, but its benefits can be significant and potentially life-enhancing, if you are willing to embrace it as more than some fancy moves.

www.brainboxcoaching.co.uk

Why you need a balanced exercise plan

I’m doing some corporate talks about getting started with fitness next month and one of the most important elements to consider when beginning a new training regime is finding balance across your activities. Most of us tend to just focus on one primary form of training and forget to build ourselves up in other areas, so it’s important to look at what your body needs beyond what you enjoy doing most.

(With my client Linda in the studio at Sweaty Betty Bristol.)

The three pillars of fitness are: cardiovascular health, muscular strength, and flexibility and balance. Without addressing all three areas, you are potentially setting yourself up for mechanical imbalances that could lead to weaknesses that will impede your progress long term and maybe even cause injury.

For example, if you are a keen runner you may be very focused on putting in the miles, especially if you are training for a distance race. However, lack of overall muscle strength and specifically a lack of stability through the trunk can create an uneven distribution of force through your joints every time your foot strikes the ground. If you are running off road, you may be less able to deal with uneven terrain and correct your balance to avoid falls.

Runners often avoid strength training because they fear getting too heavy, but there’s no need to worry. Even some simple bodyweight exercises can help build stability without creating bulk. Developing strength and stiffness through the core (the area between your diaphragm and pelvis, including your back muscles) will add stability while running, especially through the lumbar spine and help avoid lower back pain, while strengthening the leg muscles builds greater stability through the hips, knees and ankles. These are all joints ripe for potential damage when you are performing a repetitive movement with a heavy load. You need strong joints and muscles working through the appropriate range of movement to decelerate with care and distribute the force meeting you upwards from the ground with every foot strike.

Stretching also needs to be part of an athlete’s training repertoire. My client Linda has been a runner for many years but coming to my HIIT classes and performing different movements like squats and lunges has shown very clearly how muscle imbalances have been created over time. Her left piriformis (under the gluteals) became overactive, tight and sore. An overactive muscle can cause painful spasms as well as little ‘knots’ or trigger points that need releasing through a static stretching programme & some myofascial tissue release using a foam roller or massage. Partner stretching with me has given Linda a great deal of relief.

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(Linda performing banded squats above to help strengthen her gluteals and correct the knee valgus you can see below on her right side.)

Linda’s focus on running also created a weakness in her gluteus medius on the right side, leading to weak abductors (the muscles that move the leg laterally away from the midline) and her right knee developed a tendency to knock in (valgus) while squatting. The quadriceps often take over when we run and weaker gluteal muscles can be a common problem as a result. A programme of activating and strengthening these underactive muscles now sees Linda performing squats with much improved alignment, strength and range of motion. She has been a clear example of how strength training helps to even out muscle imbalances, while stretching to relax overactive muscles has taken her out of pain and enabled her to perform a range of exercises safely and with better form.

So, if you want to train in a balanced way and avoid imbalances that can lead to injury, think about your week. Plan in the exercise you prioritise, maybe three runs. Then add a short stretching routine after each run, and two strength training sessions of 20-30 minutes. A programme of bodyweight exercise can be performed at home and doesn’t need the gym.

(Linda is 55 but can now perform some advanced bodyweight exercises and has developed a strong core which will help her running form.)

Now, if you’re a yoga bunny and think that your practice is giving you everything you need, then think again. As both a yoga teacher and fitness instructor, I can tell you that while you may have great strength and flexibility, even the most vigorous yoga practice will not increase your heart rate to the level it needs to achieve to really improve cardiovascular fitness. One or two HIIT sessions a week, or spin classes – whatever you can do – will help build all round health.

Because I’m seeing increasing numbers of clients with imbalances and injuries, I started studying a few months ago for a specialisation in corrective exercise with the National Academy of Sports Medicine (NASM). What I have learned so far has already enabled me to help personal training clients like Linda and has also started to change the way I teach yoga, looking at different ways in which to modify poses to suit people’s anatomy rather than getting them to conform to traditional alignment that may not be possible due to physical limitations. I’m incredibly grateful that I decided to study this programme and work more effectively and safely with my clients.

While my current clients are already benefiting from my increased knowledge base, I will be offering individual corrective exercise 1:1s when I qualify as a specialist service. In the meantime, please exercise safely and try to balance out your range of movement and activity.

http://www.brainboxcoaching.co.uk

Yoga for my (real) life

I spent yesterday at the OM Yoga Show in London, a massive festival and trade event, and I usually make the trip each year to network, touch base with my yoga contacts and stock up on new clothes and products to try. It also offers a vast programme of free classes, so it’s a great opportunity to practise with new teachers. I took a great workshop with Katy Appleton a few years back and got a fabulous hug from Tara Stiles, too!

My visit usually prompts reflection on my own practice as well as on my teaching, which are two quite different things. Teaching group yoga sessions is one of the most enjoyable parts of my work. Creating a space for people to feel safe, relax and feel confident in their practice is the essence of my teaching. My home practice is probably not as much as you think. My sessions can be quite short and often focus on meditation and breath work, rather than on gut busting vinyasas or trying to nail a fancy new pose.

And that’s where my approach to yoga has changed so dramatically since my first visit to the Yoga Show more than five years ago. I went back then as someone with a long standing home practice, not a keen class goer, and not only felt like a bit of a fraud but was a bit too impressed by all the green juice-drinking contortionists. Now I go as a teacher and a well trained fitness professional with a nose for bullshit and a lack of tolerance for a lot of the nonsense that comes with the yoga world. I have met some horribly aggressive people there as well as stalls peddling totally useless products ‘guaranteed’ to change your life. The yoga industry, like any community, contains a cross-section of humanity, with all the good and the bad and the greed that entails.

(My own teacher, Sally Parkes, leading a session at this year’s OM Yoga Show London.)

These days, my focus on yoga is very different from that first visit. I used to want to be ‘good at yoga’, whatever that means, whereas now I prioritise it as self-care, which means gentler practices and a lot more regular meditation. My priority for teaching is now based much more on the wealth of anatomical knowledge I have acquired in the last three years and is focused completely on client safety. The idea of correcting and adjusting people to fit the preconceived idea of a perfect pose (if such a thing can exist) leaves me cold. I am far more interested in clients working with what their bodies allow them to do and ditching a pose completely if it doesn’t work for their anatomy. Again, meditation is a key part of my teaching, as is reflecting on how we live yoga outside the studio. You can be all sweetness and light on your funky Lifeform mat, but if you’re rude to staff on the way out then you ain’t no yogi, no matter how many turmeric lattes you drink.

If you want to expand your practice, think about living your yoga, going deeper into your practice and not just throwing shapes, as fun as that is!

Great books to read include:

Donna Farhi – Bringing Yoga to Life

Judith Hanson Laseter – Living Your Yoga

Deborah Adele – The Yamas and Niyamas

Richard Rosen – Yoga FAQ

Sally Kempton – Meditation for the Love of It

If you would like to practise with me, you can find my current Bristol teaching schedule here. You’ll be well looked after in a friendly group with lots of laughter and plenty of personal attention for a safe practice. Beginners are always very welcome.

You are also invited to join myself and Jenna Freeman at Foundations Cafe, Baldwin Street, Bristol at 10am on Sunday 26th November for our first yoga brunch: one hour of a relaxing flow plus protein oats or waffles and coffee for just £15. Places are limited and booking is essential so email me at info@brainboxcoaching.co.uk to pay for your place with YOGABRUNCH in the subject box.

Looking forward to seeing you soon!

What I’m thinking as a trainer while I’m working with your body

My own personal trainer is a lean, mean, muscled machine, as is my boxing coach. Both are very fit and experienced competitive fighters who can look pretty intimidating. Was I nervous when I started training with them? Absolutely! I know how it feels to be on the receiving end of being trained, worrying about knowing nothing about lifting weights or throwing punches and feeling distinctly underpowered in the cardio department while they both run rings around me during padwork drills.

There’s always someone fitter, stronger and more knowledgeable out there than you, and that’s why I have my own coaches to keep me challenged and progressing and accountable; it’s why most people sign up for personal training and I also feel that every trainer should have their own coach to push them on. We all need someone else to motivate us. But we start where we start, and it’s the responsibility of a good trainer to meet the client where they are and not pass judgement. I know that when I train with my coaches, I’ll be getting valuable feedback on my skills and not on the size of my thighs.

(Training my client Helen at Powersports.)

I think worrying about being judged as weak/fat/clumsy can put people off signing up with a PT, and that’s a real shame. A good trainer isn’t the same as a shouty military instructor who motivates through humiliation (unless you like that sort of thing, in which case be my guest and find someone who isn’t me). A skilled personal trainer is an empathetic listener, an excellent coach and flexible according to the needs of their client. If someone arrives fighting off the flu, then the tough HIIT session I planned is going to be dropped in favour of light training and a stretch-based session. Working 1:1 on fitness is about far more than writing someone a programme full of sets and reps. You can be someone’s agony aunt in times of trouble, you will be asked for a lot of advice on areas well outside of health and nutrition, so be prepared to go way beyond what you think is required if you are thinking of becoming a personal trainer!

(Working with Ella and her arthritis at Sweaty Betty Bristol – training isn’t just for the athletic elite.)

My client base is predominantly female (I have three male 1:1 clients and a handful more in my yoga and HIIT classes) and I have been very conscious about how I speak in my work about women’s bodies. There’s enough shaming going on across social media; I want everyone who comes through my door to know they are not judged. Just being in a class for the more anxious members of my client base is a big achievement, as is training in front of other people in a shared space. For many people who have not exercised for some time, are injured, experiencing personal problems, are pregnant or carrying a lot of weight, training is a matter of getting through it, and I commend my clients for their efforts. People’s lives and their motivations are often far more complicated than we can appreciate.

We talk about form and technique in my classes and 1:1s, not about being skinny. My clients literally applaud each other’s efforts and we have fostered a reputation for being one of the most friendly and welcoming groups around, of which I am very proud. I know when someone new arrives, my fitness tribe will make them feel comfortable and motivate them through the class, whatever their size, whoever they are and whatever they can do.

(With Pearl and Shirlee, left, and Meg, right, at my group classes. We’re a friendly bunch!)

And when I am watching my clients working out, what goes through my mind? To be honest, it’s very technical. I’ve been trained through my studies to look at the body in terms of balance, form and alignment so I’m absolutely focused on how you are performing a movement and nothing else. I’m looking for the best, safest form you can achieve, and then working out ways to modify something you may be struggling with or progressing an exercise if you are looking strong. I will notice your mood and your energy and how that is affecting your training, and I might ask you some questions to see how I can help if you seem a bit off. I’m looking at your static posture as well as your dynamic movement patterns to see if something needs correcting, not because it makes me feel clever but because incorrect information is being fed to your brain and central nervous system when something is out of alignment. That’s a potential injury waiting to happen and it won’t get you closer to your goals.

I pay my clients compliments on their form and give praise where it’s due. I’m honest if I think you need to work differently or you could try harder on your nutrition, because that’s my job and I would be doing you a disservice as a coach and maybe even compromise your safety if I don’t speak up or call bulls**t where necessary. Telling someone they are not ready to perform a certain exercise or why they not losing weight isn’t fun, but I will always explain what you need to do to get there over time and with practice.

Am I thinking you look fat/thin/too muscly/too anything? Nope. I really am a dispassionate observer trying to help you achieve what you told me you want to do. If I pay you a compliment, it’s because you’re working hard to get closer to where you want to be, and you deserve it. I feel that my yoga teacher training and practice makes me a more compassionate trainer, but I also feel that is an essential quality for any decent trainer working with clients putting their mental and physical wellbeing in their hands. It’s a matter of basic respect and helping someone feel better about themselves. If you’re not willing to be motivational and take joy in your client’s gains, no matter how small, then it’s not the job for you.

If you’d like to read more about how I think trainers should responsibly coach their clients, then have a look at this article I wrote for the Personal Trainer Development Centre.

If you are interested in working with me 1:1 or coming to my group classes, then visit my website – link below. We also have a fitness half day event coming up on October 14th where you can get a taste of several areas of my work: HIIT, yoga and coaching.

I’m always happy to see a new face looking for a warm welcome!

www.brainboxcoaching.co.uk

www.befitbristolfit.com My episodes show me in group training and with 1:1 clients.

Recovery: an essential aspect of a balanced training programme

So I fully expect this post to be met with howls of laughter from my friends and clients. Only last year I was commissioned to write an article on the importance of holidays to people’s health, only for everyone to pitch in along the lines of ‘you never take time off, you big hypocrite’… Anyway, I’m starting to draft this on the eve of a full seven days off work, I’ll have you know, so I feel perfectly justified in pointing out the added value of rest and recovery as part of your training schedule. Ahem…

As much as some of my clients find getting off the sofa and into my classes a tough call, others I find hard to dissuade from exercising every day, and sometimes more than once. I’m not a fan of the ‘yoga every damn day’ thing. Everyone’s body needs at least one rest day a week, and that includes from playing pretzel. Make it a meditation practice instead, and just give yourself a break. There’s a mental stress involved in making yourself achieve every day without respite, not to mention putting your hard earned physical gains at risk by overtraining.

(Don’t. Really. Everyone needs a day off, even yogis.)

Fundamentally, we make improvements to our bodies by putting it under controlled stress when we train. This encourages growth of lean muscle tissue as well as gains in strength, power and endurance. Cardiovascular fitness will also be improved, depending on the nature of your training; it is possible to get cardio into weight training with the use of explosive movements and short rest periods, but you need to slow down and lift heavy to build muscle.

Putting our bodies under this stress means we need to give it time to recover, which can be a day spent relaxing away from the gym as well as planning our training to avoid exerting the same muscle group or energy system on consecutive days. For example, you wouldn’t gain anything from two leg days in a row as your muscles would be too tired to perform well on the second day, and we also don’t recommend HIIT more than two to three times a week either, as it is so intense when performed correctly. Programme to get the most out of your body. Here is my typical week:

Monday: yoga and weight training

Tuesday: boxing-style gym session with skipping, bag work, kettle bells and body weight exercise

Wednesday: maybe yoga and a walk, sometimes a 5km run

Thursday: boxing lesson and yoga if time allows

Friday: weight training

Saturday: no training

Sunday 5km run and yoga.

For me, this is a good mix of cardio, weight training, stretching and the boxing conditioning that I love. I also teach eight hours of group yoga and fitness classes, 16 hours of 1:1 personal training and walk up to 100km a week, so I get a lot of incidental exercise in addition to what I schedule specifically for my body.

I sleep well, feel tired when I should and, until I wrecked my right tensor fascia latae while dancing (not training!) I’d also not experienced any physical problems, so I feel okay with this balance. What I need to do more of is be ready to take a ‘deload’ week more regularly, where I decrease the intensity of training and let my body recover (roughly every six to eight weeks), as well doing more foam rolling and get regular massages. This would definitely improve my overall physical maintainance. I have a happy home life, excellent friends and a yoga and meditation practice for my mental well being. I also love what I do for a living, obviously, so I feel pretty balanced.

(Me, this week, on holiday: no sports kit and a big chocolate milkshake! Bliss…)

If you are experiencing the following, you may be overtraining and are due for a deload:

– experience regular niggling injuries

– never seem to recover completely from training

– are always tired but get poor quality sleep

– feel guilty if you take a rest day or feel that you need to ‘earn’ your food. Neither of these are healthy approaches to fitness.

To maintain balance:

– always take at least one day a week off from training. Active recovery is fine, such as walking, but skip the tough vinyasa yoga class for something more relaxing.

– vary your training and avoid the same activity or working the same muscle groups on consecutive days.

– prioritise sleep. If you are very active, you may well need an extra hour nightly and certainly not less than seven.

– eat well to fuel your recovery, including quality sources of protein and plenty of vitamin-rich vegetables. Don’t e restrictive.

– ease off the ‘I must’ attitude. A day off won’t hurt if you are genuinely needing a rest, have to work overtime or life gets in the way Frankly, if Tom Hardy asked me out for dinner, I wouldn’t give the gym a second thought before running into those tattooed arms. I digress…

Ultimately, unless you are a pro athlete being paid to look and perform in a specific way or are a serious competitor, remember to take time out and be kind to yourself. You don’t need to push so hard. Even those athletes have an off season. Training regularly still puts you in a very small percentage of the population that performs vigorous exercise routinely. Be proud of that fact in a week in which we learned that most adults over 40 aren’t getting as much as 10 minutes of brisk walking a MONTH!!

Be proud of your prowess, but also know when to stop.

www.brainboxcoaching.co.uk

www.befitbristolfit.com

Healthy eating: the new ‘normal’

Eating a healthy diet seems to have become increasingly complicated of late. If you’re not counting macros, activating your nuts and chucking raw cacao/baobab/unicorn dust into your meals then you’re obviously not doing it right. And the big question? Do you eat ‘clean’? Because if you don’t, you’re a bad person and processed foods are the Devil.

Ok, so I’m exaggerating. A bit. But given the recent slew of cookery books and blogs from a host of healthy eating gurus in their 20s (and many without any kind of legitimate nutrition qualification) you could be forgiven for thinking that your storecupboard has an inferiority complex if it isn’t stocked with maca powder, raw cacao and coconut blossom syrup. No one I know eats like that. I don’t ask my clients to eat this way. I do not eat this way to be healthy. It is completely unnecessary and beyond the weekly food budget of most people.

We seem to have ended up very far away from eating ‘normal’ food, just enough for our energy needs and optimal nutritional value, and not too much of it, to paraphrase food anthropologist Michael Pollan. We also have so many labels attached to different ways of eating: Paleo, ketogenic, ‘if it fits your macros’ and of course ‘clean eating’, a phrase from which many early embracers are now distancing themselves as it has become increasingly associated with forms of disordered eating.

Now, I don’t prep clients for bikini competitions, so you’re not going to get me wading into the debate on how many grams of protein you need per kilo of body weight for ‘gains’. There are plenty of people out there who will do that for you. I just want to remind you of some very simple guidelines for eating a balanced diet for solid nutrition and offer a few tips for fat loss, if that is something you are working towards. I don’t want you to weigh your food or be the goon who turns up to someone’s wedding feast clutching their plastic box of chicken and greens. No, really. Just don’t. Food can be a joyous social celebration, so get stuck in occasionally. For the most part, here’s what to bear in mind.

– learn how to compose a plate. Start with vegetables, 2-3 kinds to take up half the space. Add a palm-sized portion of protein (meat, fish, two eggs, tofu, beans, lentil) and a dribble of healthy fat such as olive oil. You can also cook with a small knob of butter, eat a small piece of cheese or add a few nuts. Add starchy carbs like rice or other grains only after exercise to help refuel your muscles, if you tend to over eat them. Ultimately, though, if you are trying to lose weight, you just need to consume fewer calories than you expend, and carbs can still make up some of those calories. Just choose wisely.

– three meals a day? Five? It doesn’t matter as long as you don’t eat more than your body’s energy requirements. See my previous post for the link to the Precision Nutrition calculator

– you’ll get more nutrition out of your food if you cook it from scratch. Ready meals can be high in salt and low in nutrients. However, we’re all busy so do shortcut where you need to to. I use those packs of microwaveable rice (no, microwaves don’t kill you) and prepped meat or fish fillets with some kind of sauce. With a bag of mixed vegetables, it’s a quick and healthy dinner at the end of a long day. If you do have time, batch cook a big casserole or curry on a Sunday. Home made ready meals can’t be beaten when you’re home late and tired and only have to quickly reheat something tasty.

– Remember that the basics are healthy: eggs, chicken, fish, lentils, cheese, vegetables, fruit, nuts/seeds and dairy. You don’t have to do all the fancy stuff and add loads of supplements – there is no evidence that they work. You don’t need to cut out dairy or gluten unless you have a clinical reason to. If you care about the welfare of your dairy and meat, buy organic and free range if your budget allows, or eat less of it. There are plenty of plant-based sources of protein but you will need to combine them to get complete proteins; these only come from animal sources.

– if you’re worried about eating out, many restaurants post their menus online so you can have a look in advance and make the best choice based on what’s available.

– if you are starting to gain weight around your middle over 40, then you may need an honest look at what you’re eating and start creating more of a calorie deficit. Cutting back on alcohol is a good place to start if you have become a regular wine drinker of an evening. Getting more weight-bearing exercise will help maintain bone density and strength as you age, too. Get moving and avoid being sedentary as much as you can. All the incidental exercise adds up.

So, keep it simple and feel free to ignore the complex advice and ingredient lists. Poached eggs on a slice of good quality toast with some creamed spinach, or a piece of grilled fish with a green salad is far less fuss and just as good for you as some bonkers recipe full of sea buckthorn berries and baobab powder. And there’s always room for cake. Keep it real, people, and you won’t go far wrong.

www.brainboxcoaching.co.uk

www.befitbristolfit.com

Ageing, menopause and my man-sized appetite

My own trainer likes to joke that, for a small woman (5 feet 2 and 126 pounds), I have the appetite of a large man. This is ridiculously accurate. I love to eat. I love food. I am not and have never been one of those people who just ‘forgets to eat’. This is a totally alien concept to me. Not having a cigarette or coffee habit to fall back on, I eat. Food is my habit. I don’t do it for comfort or out of boredom. I like to make and enjoy eating really bloody good food, and I live in anticipation of each meal. That is all.

Having a large appetite wasn’t really a problem due to the sheer volume of physical activity I manage each week: I burn between 2,300-2,700 calories a day and walk over 100km a week. I can eat a decent 2,000 calories a day and still create a deficit for weight loss. And in case you’re thinking I’m fixated on calories and weight, tracking and measuring data is one of the most effective tools available for weight loss. High fat and protein diets where you blissfully ignore your calorie consumption and eat ‘intuitively’ can end in significant weight gain if you aren’t aware that 100g of almonds contains 576 calories – which could be one third of your total daily intake for a sedentary female, for example.

However, perimenopause kicked in and things have started to get more challenging. Hormonal changes mean that I am experiencing a frustrating paradox where I am even more hungry than usual but really need to be eating a less as my body develops a propensity to lay down extra fat around my belly. I feel ravenously hungry all the time and am having to think more carefully about what to eat, how much and when, so that I don’t go completely overboard.

What works in terms of nutrition and fat loss is very individual; a Paleo diet works for your friend because it works for your friend. You may find the low carb and no dairy approach too hellish to manage, especially with homicidal mood swings to cope with, so you need to think about the best carbs for you and when the best time is to eat them. Going dairy free is also not great when we need calcium for decreasing bone density as we age.

(Yes, that’s me. I developed my love for carbs early. I’m a pro.)

While there is no one size fits all way in which to make losing weight work for you, here are some of the strategies I use myself as well as with my clients, so try some out, tweak them, and then stick to what works:

– the only thing we know for sure that works for weight loss is creating an energy deficit consistently over time. This means consuming less energy than you use. While there is not a simple and direct correlation between calories in and calories out (people metabolise food at different rates and some people will store excess calories from some food groups more readily than others) you still need to know what’s going in. I recommend the energy calculator at Precision Nutrition to help you get a more accurate picture of how much you really need to eat based on your activity levels. You may be surprised by how easy it is to over eat for your needs and trimming a couple of hundred calories daily might make all the difference.

– fill up on healthy sources of protein such as chicken, fish, eggs, tofu or pulses/beans. Protein is satiating for longer than other foods. If you start your day on toast, it’s no wonder you’re hungry soon after and crave more carbs. If I eat carbs for breakfast I will want to eat like a horse all day. Start me off with eggs and I’ll be happy for hours and manage my carb cravings.

– start by filling half of your plate with vegetables. They are filling and very nutritious for far fewer calories than bread or pasta. Veggies are a key source of dietary carbohydrates; I will poke you in the eye if you tell me you’re ‘carb-free’. You either don’t understand your food groups or you need to eat more greens before you drop dead.

– Speaking of which, please don’t ditch food groups. You need carbohydrates for energy, especially if you exercise, and carbs need to be present in the body for fat to be burned. Eat healthy, unrefined carb sources such as sweet or white potatoes, rice or oats for energy in the right portions. That’s a golf ball size portion of rice, not a plate of risotto, a small sweet potato or 50g or half a cup of oats. If you’re really struggling to lose weight, then limit your starchy carb portion to one meal a day, preferably post-exercise to restock your muscles with glycogen.

– don’t fear healthy fats like butter, olive oil, nuts or avocado, but be aware of their high calorie content. You may be making a ‘clean’, healthy smoothie but a tablespoon of trendy nut butter throw could will blow your calorie allowance for the day. However, flaxseeds are an excellent fat source and provide Omega 3 fatty acids which perimenopausal women can benefit from. Their anti inflammatory properties can relieve sore joints & dryness, as well as helping to balance mood and improve the triglyceride profile of post-menopausal women which can often be too high. Add a tablespoon of ground flaxseeds to porridge, Bircher pots or smoothies.

– if it’s in the house it gets eaten. Leave the trigger foods at the supermarket and avoid the psychological warfare of resisting them once they make it to your kitchen.

– be aware of any bad habits that can lead to self-sabotage and make a list of strategies to avoid them. If you tend to over eat in restaurants, check out the online menu and decide what to order in advance so that you make a better choice, for example.

– if you slip up, move on. Your next meal (not tomorrow) is your chance to start again.

Need help? My personal training clients are all offered nutrition advice as well as fitness, so visit my page if you live in Bristol and want to try it out. Not local? My Badass Body Online package is just £50 a month for a weekly tailored workout you can do at home and you get your nutrition support along the way.

Good luck!

www.brainboxcoaching.co.uk

www.befitbristolfit.com

The 40+ body in the fitness business

I am, apparently, recognisable by my shoulders. This is according to the film crew at Troy TV who drove up behind me on the way to a shoot and spotted me by this rather well developed part of my anatomy. People usually recognise me by my bum but, hey, things change…

As a personal trainer, I’ve realised that people comment on my body more than they used to. I wasn’t offended by the point about my shoulders: in fact, even my clients are becoming recognisable by their unique shoulder definition! However, in an age where body comparison and paranoia is rife thanks to social media – see my earlier post on this one – I feel even more under scrutiny being a fitness professional, especially being over 40. I guess people see the body of a trainer as a useful point of comparison for their own development, although I do occasionally get people asking how the ‘bodybuilding’ is going, with a bit of a smirk, or men telling me that having muscles is ‘unfeminine’. I thought we were beyond all of that, but apparently not.

It’s my job to be fit and have a body that looks that way; I have to be a good advertisement for my job. Instagram is full of photos of young trainers baring their six packs, vascular thighs and bulging biceps, but are they the appropriate criteria on which to judge how well they can train a client, and not just themselves? Can they adapt their training to suit someone with far less ambitious body goals? I don’t have a six pack but am in good shape for a 45 year old. However, part of me still remains a little pressured by the fitness industry norms to get leaner so that I ‘look like a trainer’.

With the right lighting and from a good angle, I can Insta with the best of them but I have to remind myself of two things when I start all the negative comparisons: one, I’m 45 not 25, and two, being a good personal trainer is more about being a good coach than having a great body (and who decides what a great body looks like?) and that coaching is what I do best.

Personal trainers and fitness models are not the same thing, although social media may convince you otherwise. My body helps to sell my business but what keeps my clients with me is my ability to build a strong working relationship with them. My goals are not your goals. Training myself is not an indicator that I can also train you.

My job is to help you identify your fitness targets and motivate you to achieve them with my skills and knowledge base. My formerly unhealthy past of being chronically ill and a bit chubby actually helps me work more effectively with my clients, as I know how hard it is to make a change. And being older? I’ve been around the block many times so when clients need to unload about their personal life (if you’re thinking about becoming a trainer, sharpen up your counselling skills because it’s not all about reps and sets) I’m sympathetic and pretty unshockable.

I’m already planning ahead for my future career as I have a limited time frame as to how long my body will be able to work at such physical intensity. I have an appointment with my physio this week to sort out a range of aches and pains. Switching to a more coaching-led practice is one way forward, as is specialising in working with an older age group. I’ve also just started a course that will qualify me as a specialist in corrective exercise, as I want to deepen my anatomical knowledge and I enjoy the challenge of working with clients with postural issues and injuries – that would be most of you!

For now, I’m working on myself to stay healthy and fit so that I can enjoy my job, and to make progress with my own strength goals. We have to look inside and focus on what we want to achieve for ourselves, not to fit other people’s conceptions of how our bodies should look. So for anyone who has been called unfeminine, too muscly, too skinny, too big or too much of anything – screw ’em. Do the best for you, right now, to get yourself one step closer to whatever you are trying to achieve: a pull up, a Parkrun, a walk around the block without getting out of breath. And, if you need a motivational trainer with a sympathetic ear who’s already been there, you know where to come…