It's not only the most wonderful time of the year, but the busiest.  Finding time for all of your family and friends, shopping, parties, and travel plans is a juggling act in itself. Much less finding the time and effort to keep your fitness goals on target. Unfortuntely, for many, that is easier said then done.
So how do you stay focused and maintain the integrity of all your progress?  Here is what you need to keep in mind:

1. Find Your Balance 

• Time management will be your biggest hurdle. Even the best of intentions are challenged this time of year. Things just pop up out of no where. So, each day you will need to evaluate, prioritize, and adjust to accomplish your objectives for that day.
• Squeezing in those workouts is usually the biggest challenge. Remember its all about quality not quantity. So, keep those workouts at 20-30 minutes with highly efficient verticle workouts that include combo type exercises. You can refer to my post on creating effecient workouts by clicking HERE. As far as cardio, there are more accessible resources in walking, running, jumping rope, bike riding, etc.
• There is certainly no shortage of food, holiday "spirits", and over indulgence. Know your limits and hold yourself accountable. 

2. Keep It Simple

• When it comes to cardio, you can do 10, 20, or 30 minutes at a time which makes it a much easier fit into those busy schedules.
• If you haven't already, check out the Fooducate App to track your food choices with ease. Click HERE to review my post on Fooducate.

If you have made a lot of progress to date, you don't want to lose that momentum.  So stay focused, be consistent, and hold yourself accountable.

Until next time, enjoy your workouts

We have all been there and done that.  We know it's time to get in better shape or start eating better and it makes the perfect New Year's resolution. Unfortuntely, and for many New Year's fitness goals are easier said than done. In fact, fitness resolutions are the most popular with an estimated failure rate of 42.4%.  Fitness is not a race or a quick fix, but rather a life style that should direct your goals, activities and motivation on a consistent basis towards healthier living.

 Let's take a look at why the failure rate is so high:

1. Unrealistic expectations
2. No plan or accountability - "No plan is successful without regular checkups"
3. Feel out of place and intimitaed by others at the gym
4. Commute or excessability to the gym
5. Lack of guidance and don't know what to do at the gym
6. Time Availability
7. Expenses
8. Lack of motivation - No support system

My new Remote Coaching and Nutritional Guidance program is designed to minimize these roadblocks and let you focus on established goals and accomplishing a more fit and healthier lifestyle. Here's how it works:

You will be provided with a training app that will initiate our communication.  This app is unique to you and is password protected.  This app includes:

• Assessment categories BMI, Body Measurements, Weight, Height, etc., which provides us with a starting point to establish realistic goals and check points that will be updated quarterly
• The ability to insert pre and post photographs for visual tracking and progress updates
• Weekly plans that will provide the pre-designed workout sessions and activities 
• Generates a complete diary of all of your workouts that also allow you to add informative photos and comments
• A private messaging system within the app (text) to ensure we keep the channels of communication open to help you with and questions or needs

To take a quick tour of this app click here

Key Points:

1. All of your workout sessions will be designed based on the quipment that you have available to you.  This may be equipment available through a gym membership, equipment you plan on purchasing, or just stuff you may have around the house.  I always suggest starting slow with stuff you can use at home. As you can see from the photo below, you can create a complete gym/workout atmosphere for $60.00 and get results. Importantly, it's convenient and maximizes your time investment.  For you travelers or road warriors, the resistance bands and jump rope will be your best tools.
2. There is an instructional video with every designed exercise included in your daily plans.
3. Each Sunday your weekly plan will be posted in you app for your review and any needed preparation.
4. We will develop checkpoints at 90 day intervals and will make any necessary adjustments to ensure you stay on track with established goals.
5. In addition to your training program, as a certified Nutritional Specialist, I can provide the needed support and direction that will coincide with your goals.
6. Each weekly plan includes 2 lifting/resistance/toning sessions and two cardio workouts designed around your schedule and time requirements.  Your financial investment is $30.00 per weekly plan through either PayPal or Venmo.

Here's what one of my clients has to say about this new program:

"The workouts have been easy to follow, yet challenge me as well. I always feel sore the next day which makes me happy because I know my body is being challenged and the workouts are building muscle. I recommend working with Rand. He is very encouraging and quick to respond to any questions I have had...I also love the flexibility-I have two young children and am able to complete the workouts on my schedule." -- Testimonial from Remote Training client Katy Hirschel (For the full testimonial, as well as others, click here.)

There is no doubt, the Remote Coaching and Nutritional Coaching program will get you off to the right start, and continue to support your efforts towards a healthier lifestyle.

• Perfect for any schedule whether you are a stay at home mom, commuter, or road warrior
• Provides the needed information to establish a realistic goal
• Establishes accountability with designed checkpoints/benchmarks that allows us to make any neccessary changes or adjustments to stay on track.
• Maximizes your available resources and time avaialble
• Provides targeted guidance for all designed workouts and nutritional needs
• Provides a support system that will continue to peak your motivation

If you are ready to get started on your remote training journey or would like more information, just click here and complete the remote client survey. Also, if you have any friends or family members that you feel would benefit from this program, please feel free to share this post.

Until next time. Enjoy your workouts.

Whether it's your vacation or work, keeping up with your exercise goals while traveling can be a big challenge.  Keeping that balance while you are at home is hard enough as it is.  When you are on the road, your time and resources are often limited and working out is usually not at the top of your list. Your schedule is hectic, you're exhausted, and you want to relax. I get it.

I get it because I spent a large portion of my forty years in the corporate world on the road so, I know it can be done.  You CAN stay in shape while traveling. It's all about knowing the limitation of your resources, finding your balance, planning ahead, and being prepared.  You will actually have more energy while spending time with your family on vacation or those longer work hours as a road warrior.

If finding time to exercise is a challenge when you are at home, it will become even more difficult when you are on the road. So, whether it's work related or vacation, plan short sessions. Focus on the quality and each workout will have an impact.

Most hotel "gyms" are outdated and usually inadequate at best. Think about what you can accomplish in your hotel room or outside. Here are a few suggestions that should address most situations:

1. You can do bodyweight exercises such as push-ups, planks, squats, and jumping jacks.
2. Go to YouTube on your smart phone or tablet and try yoga or Pilates.  You can always find a session that meets your scheduling needs.
3. Pack a resistance band and your room is now your personal gym. I actually used to pack a jump rope as well. It makes for great cardio either in your hotel room or outside. Don't worry, the ceilings are always high enough.
4. You can go outside for a walk and use the stairs instead of the elevator.
5. If you enjoy running, make room for tennis shoes when you pack.
6. If most of your travel is work related and you frequent the same locations.  Look for local gyms close to your hotels. They usually have good travel programs or membership incentives for travelers.  At one time, I actually had three memberships that cost just $30.00 a month.  

Working out while traveling is about maintaining your fitness. So address those limited resources as an opportunity to be creative, find your balance, keep it simple, and make it fun.

Until next time, enjoy your workouts (wherever you may be).

When you think about it, without flexibility, balance, and coordination you really can't do much of anything. We all know this, but how do we address this need in our daily lives and fitness efforts to ensure long term results?

We all incorporate some sort of stretching in our daily lives. Sometimes it's to get moving in the morning, after sitting for long periods of time, or preparing ourselves for an athletic or fitness activity.  However, we need to incorporate activities within our fitness efforts that encourages ongoing muscle elasticity, giving our muscles and joints a greater range of motion. This elasticity and increased range of motion can help you prevent injuries, back pain, and balance problems.

In discussion with my clients and friends, their initial reaction is that we already do that. We stretch, do squats, and incorporate the stability ball in our work routines. That's a great start. You have to be careful, however, not to be too routine in your efforts. That type of redundancy will start to dilute your results and really doesn't focus or encourage the full range of motion of all joints and muscles. The key phrase being "all joints and muscles".

So, what do we do or what is the alternative? Workout fads that address flexibility, balance, and coordination come and go, but virtually no other exercise programs are as enduring as Yoga and Pilates. They each have a lot of similarities. Choosing one or the other is really a personal preference.  Let's take a look:

• Yoga: It's been around for more than 500 years and does more than burn calories and tone muscles. It's a total mind-body workout that combines strengthening and stretching poses with deep breathing and meditation or relaxation. While it may seem mellow compared to most training programs, yoga's health benefits keep pace and often surpass what many people would call traditional forms of exercise.

• Pilates: Uses controlled movements, primarily focused on your core to build body strength, flexibility, and endurance. It's a body conditioning routine that won't result in bulky muscles.  Instead, the movements serve to lengthen your muscles as they strengthen them. It emphasizes proper postural alignment, core strength, and muscle balance.

I can't think of a better way to ensure a consistent effort toward establishing a greater range of motion, improved balance, endurance, and coordination. Importantly, it provides the needed variety to avoid redundancy and creates the real potential for better results. I engage in both Yoga and Pilates at least once a week and encourage my clients and friends to do the same.

Keep it simple. It's not hard to find the right avenue to enjoy either Yoga or Pilates with really no additional investment or interrupting your current schedule.  If you are a gym member, most gyms provide a variety of Yoga and Pilates classes.  If you want to do this at home, there are plenty of Yoga and Pilates routines on YouTube, as well as free apps for your phone or tablet. As in any new exercise or fitness endeavor, start slow and progress at your own pace.  You will enjoy the results for a lifetime.

Until next time, enjoy your workouts.

Sources: Google for Yoga and Pilates Definitions 

Photo: Google

For years we have been programmed to measure our fitness efforts in weight lost or gained.  There is, however, so much more to managing a healthy lifestyle than the weight scale. In fact, when you take a closer look, the weight scale can give you a false sense of security and is more of a deterrent than anything else.

Don't get me wrong, managing your weight to fit established medical standards is the foundation to building a healthier lifestyle.  However, it's how you get there, how you stay there, and making needed adjustments to stay on track that will determine the longevity of your success. If the weight scale is your only measurement to manage your plan, you are setting yourself up for failure. Let's take a closer look.

How You Get There: There are some essential components that need to be in place to build the right foundation that ensures a healthy and sustained journey.

• A nutritional plan that includes the right sources of energy or macronutrients (proteins, carbohydrates, and fats), the Micronutrients (vitamins and minerals), and ample hydration that supports the healthiest avenue to any needed weight loss or gain.
• A comprehensive fitness plan that outlines the needed activities that will enhance your nutritinal plan and support the longevity of your efforts.  

How You Stay There: Your plan should include time dated benchmarks that will determine your progress outside any targeted weight loss.  These benchmarks should indicate:

• muscle mass gain
• inches lost, gained, or moved 
• how your clothes fit (sizes up or down)
• how you feel physically and mentally
• do you like the way you look?
• do your endurance levels satisfy your fitness efforts?

These are all measurements that are pivitol to the longevity of your health and fitness plan that cannot be determined by the weight scale.

Making Needed Adjustments: Making sure your progress is in line with your set benchmarks is pivotal to making needed adjustments in a timely fashion. Some examples:

• If your nutrients are in line with your fitness efforts, you should be losing targeted inches and either dropping a size or fitting into your cloths better while maintaining you current weight. 
• If you are using the right supplements and hydrating appropriately, your skin should feel better and you should feel better physically and mentally.

Keep in mind, your health and fitness plan is always a work in process and is vunerable to any changes if they are not addressed in a timely fashion. So, once you make any needed adjustments, you will need to align and adjust your benchmarks accordingly.

A great example of how you get there, how you stay there, and when you make needed adjustments is illustrated in the photo below of my good friend, Nickie Summers, founder of "It's All You Fitness." As you can see in the time dated photos, Nickie has made substantial changes in her body composition while maintaining a weight of 130 lbs. You will also note that this transformation began in 2010 and is a work in progress as we speak. Her results are consistent with building the right plan and understanding her progress.  She will tell you that her adjustments are consistent with how she feels mentally and physically, how she looks, how her clothes fit, and her level of endurance during workouts. Not the weight scale.

I would like to thank Nickie for providing me the inspiration to write this article and hope you will find measuring your success outside the scale to be helpful in your continued journey to better health.

Until next time, enjoy your workouts.

Find Your Balance - Hydration for Health and Performance

How much water should you drink on a daily basis? It's a simple question with no easy answers.  Studies have produced varying recommendations over the years but, in truth, your water needs depend on many factor including your health, how active you are, and where you live.

Although no single formula fits everyone, knowing more about your body's need for fluids will help you estimate how much water to drink each day. First, let's take a look at the health benefits of water, and then the factors that influence water needs.

Health Benefits of Water
Water is your body's principle chemical component and makes up about 60% of your body weight. Every system in your body depends on water. For example, water flushes toxins out of vital
organs, carries nutrients to your cells, and provides a moist environment for ear, nose, and throat tissues.  Lack of water can lead to dehydration, a condition that occurs when you don't have enough water in your body to carry out normal functions.  Even mild dehydration can drain your energy and make you tired.

How much water do you need?
Every day you lose water through your breath, perspiration, urine, and bowel movements. For your body to function properly, you must replenish its water supply by consuming beverages and foods that contain water. Again, your water needs depend on many factors such as your age, exercise, the intensity of your exercise, environment, illness or health conditions, and pregnancy or breast feeding.

How do you stay safely hydrated?
Generally, if you drink enough fluid so that you rarely feel thirsty and your urine is colorless or light yellow, you're doing ok.  If you were to keep track, that would measure at least 6.3 cups (1.5 liters) , or more a day. Everyone has heard the advice that you should drink eight 8-ounce glasses of water a day, which is not to far off.  Although this thoery is not supported by hard evidence, it remains popular because it is easy to remember.  Keep in mind, the rule should actually be reframed to say "Drink eight 8-ounce glasses of fluid a day" because all fluids count toward the daily total.

Beyond the tap: Other Sources of Water
You don't need to rely only on what you drink to meet your fluid needs.  What you eat also provides a significant portion of your total.  On average, food provides about 20% of total water intake. For example, there are several fruits and vegetables that are 60% or more water by weight:

• Watermelon - 92%
• Spinach - 92%
• Grapefruit - 90%
• Broccoli - 89%
• Blueberries - 85%
• Avocado - 81%
• Potato - 75%
• Roasted Chicken - 64%

In addition, beverages such as milk and juice are composed mostly of water. Even caffeinated beverages like coffee, tea or soda can contribute, but should not be the major portion of your daily fluid intake. Water is still your best bet because it's calorie-free, inexpensive, and readily available.

As you can see, determining how much water you need is not really rocket science. It's an awareness to better maintain hydration levels that fit your needs and leads to a healthier lifestyle.

Until next time, enjoy your workouts (and stay hydrated)

Sources: Mayo Clinic Healthy Liniving
              National Academy of Sports Medicine

No matter where you are in life, healthy habits such as diet and exercise never lose their importance. But for those of us managing our health after the age of 50, fitness becomes an even more essential factor in daily life. It can reduce the impact of illness, enchance mobility and improve daily moods. In fact, a recent study published by JAMA Network suggested that regular, moderate to vigorous exercise can also significantly reduce early mortality.

So, how can you get started on fitness after the age of 50? Here are a few guidelines that I think will provide you with the needed direction to create the most positive experience:

Find Your Balance
Fitness is not a race or a quick fix, but rather a lifestyle. This lifestyle is like developing a plan on how you want to live a healthier life moving forward.

1. Incorporate functional fitness: Exercise is crucial to keeping our muscles and bones strong, preserving our balance, flexibility, coordination, and even enhancing the health of our brain.

2. Keep up the nutrients: After the age of 30, we begin to lose valuable muscle mass and flexibility. So, you need to ensure that your nutrition plan includes the right balance of adequate protein, carbohydrate, and essential fats.

3. Get started and keep going: You need to commit to your plan and be consistent in everthing you do. Importantly, you need to hold yourself accountable. You will be pleasantly surprised how things start to fall in place and become a noticeably healthier way to live.

Keep It Simple:
Start slow and progress gradually. As mentioned earlier, this is a lifestyle.

1. Develop goals that allow you to monitor your progress and grow into your plan:
Include time dated benchmarks so you can make any necessary adjustments to stay on target.

2. Establish a Support System: Everyone one has those not-so-great days. So, encourage your children, spouse, or friends to help keep you accountable.

3. Reward yourself: There is nothing like a pat on the back to keep you motivated.  Find ways to reward yourself as you hit those benchmarks.

Some these changes and adjustments will be big changes, while others will need only minor adjustments.  Change is difficult for many, but realize that there is absolutely no downside to this journey especially when you consider the average life expectancy has reached a new record. It is not about how long we live, but rather the quality of those years that truely matters. There is no better time to start than now.

Until next time, enjoy your journey to a healthier lifestyle.

Source: JAMA Network

Recovery from training is becoming recognized as one of the most important aspects of physical activity and overall wellness.  While there are a myriad of recovery strategies and their varied levels of scientific support, it's important to remember that both scientific and anecdotal evidence point to the value of an appropriate recovery plan to encourage adaption, wellness, and performance.

Many recognize the need for recovery after exercise, but do we understand what it takes to fully recover and have we actually acheived that state? Though recovery is a critical phase of the exercise-adaption cycle, it is among the least understood and most under-researched components of training. Essentially, recovery is the process that includes rest, refueling, rehydration, regeneration (repair), resynthesis, reduction of inflammation and restoration that ultimately returns the body to homeostasis.  Homeostasis is a state of balance within the body that occurs when the variables in a system (e.g. pH, temperature) are regulated to keep internal conditions stable and relatively constant. However, physiological stress that is not followed by adequate recovery can, over time, compromise homeostasis and immune function.  This increases the probability of injury, illness, and the onset of nonfunctional overreaching and/or overtraining.

Considering these implications, it is important to develop a strategy that encourages adequate recovery and fits your individual needs. You may need to experiment to determine which one proves the most feasible.  The guideline that I provide my clients is that their recovery time should match the intensity of their workout program.  So, if they are "hitting it hard",  they need to devote equal time to "quitting it hard" to appropriately recover. This could be one day or two which ever works for you.  In fact, a light cardio day in between lifting can be just as benefical as resting.  Again, it needs to fit your needs.

As you can see, recovery is just as essential as exercise when it comes to finding the right balance and maximizing your fitness efforts for better health.

Until next time enjoy your workouts (and recovery),

Source: Exploring the Science of Recovery, Fabio Romana, MA, MS

Ever have those days where everything seems to get in your way? The days where everything seems to pile onto your already busy schedule and the time you've set aside for your workout gets buried.  If you're like most people, this probably happens more often than you'd like and finding that balance becomes a real challenge.  In fact, lack of time is the number one reason for not working out.

I would argue that, thanks to technology, we are also busier than ever before.  Finding a full hour to exercise is difficult for many.  However, it is important to recognize that there is nothing inherently "magical" about working out for an hour. It's the quality of the workout and the consistency of your program that matters, not the realitive duration.

The great news is that shorter workouts sprinkled throughout the day are extremely effective and will keep you in touch with your fitness goals. Just because a workout is short doesn't mean it is any less important to your overall health.  Here is one great example of a quick yet effective workout:

• Squats - 30 Seconds (Lower Body)
• Jumping Jacks or Jumping Rope - 30 Seconds (Cardio)
• Push Ups - 30 Seconds (Upper Body)
• Planks - 30 Seconds (Core)

This micro-workout keeps it simple. You can do one set or as many as your schedule permits. It requires absolutely no equipment, very little space, keeps you on track with your fitness goals, and helps you find that balance on the busiest of days.