Exercise Alone is not Enough

OK, so you’re exercising and working as hard as you can but are you holding yourself back in other areas?


What did you eat today, or yesterday – or any day for that matter? No amount of hard work can make up for a bad diet. You may lose weight by using up your body’s fuel reserves and/or water but it doesn't mean you’ll be healthy.

Many people look fit on the outside but are unhealthy on the inside due to what they feed their bodies. We should be exercising to ourselves keep fit, strong, supple and active; and we should be eating to fuel our bodies. It’s as simple as that; give your body what it needs to perform the way you want it to. There’s an old adage that losing weight is all about calories in verses calories out and on a very basic level that sounds like sense. But that is an old outdated theory and in reality calories can be very different depending where they come from; some calories, (green leafy greens, whole grains, grass fed meat) give you good useful energy while others, (refined sugars and processed food) drain you with first a spike and then a crash in your blood sugar levels. Some quick tips;

  • Don’t confuse good fat with so called ‘low fat’. Our bodies need good fat to survive, and consuming good fat, (avocados, nuts, fatty fish) actually helps you burn more body fat, whereas ‘low fat’ often means full of chemicals or sugar.
  • People talk about ‘carbo loading’, (eating foods high in carbohydrates for the purpose of exercise) but unless you’re a serious athlete any excess carbs will be stored by the body as fat!
  • Don’t over eat but also don’t under eat; your body will think there’s a famine and will start to store more body fat at the expense of your energy.

Keep it all in perspective; eat a good balanced diet and work hard to achieve your desired results. Think healthy – be healthy – healthy is the new sexy!

This post first appeared on the Results 4 Life Fitness Blog on March 18, 2013.

4 comments :

  1. Great tips! The fat one gets everyone confused it seems. Hope you had a great time in NY! I can't wait to see a recap post of the conference :) (If you weren't planning one, consider that my formal request!)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Anna, it's true - so many people are obsessed with 'low fat' foods and end up doing themselves far more harm!
      Watch this space for posts on the weekend...:-)

      Delete
  2. Admireable, how you reduce scientific results in three simple sentences, that everybody can understand easily.
    See you,
    Mike

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Michael, that was exactly my plan :-)

      Delete

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...