Insider Training brings fitness seminar to Quad Cities

Insider Training, Inc. is a metabolic profiling company and a leader in the Twin Cities with helping people better understand and maintain their metabolism. They are bringing their Fitness Independence Boot Camp to the Quad Cities on July 1-3, 2011. This high energy, entertaining fitness seminar will be held at the Holiday Inn Rock Island, 226 17th Street in Rock Island, Ill.

Insider Training's Fitness Independence Boot Camp seminar is complete with education, fitness assessments, and live group exercise training sessions. Exercise training with hip-hop, soul, jazz, classic rock, and gospel music. Group Fitness Classes include: 40+ Groove, Hip-Hop Generation, Singles Groove, Stretch to Live, Gospel Goodness, Boomer Fitness, and Youth Sports Conditioning.

In addition, there are education sessions, music, dancing and exercise—plus learning to improve your health and fitness with the latest research in the fitness industry. The featured presenter is Chris Dixon, M.Ed., AARP featured speaker at the 2010 Essence Music Festival, ACE, ACSM Certified Personal Trainer and NSCA Certified Strength & Conditioning Specialist.

The fitness seminar kicks off on Friday afternoon with a free community health fair and seminar then Friday evening join them for a networking/social hour. Saturday morning begins with fitness education and group exercise training sessions. Return Sunday morning for more fitness education and group exercise training sessions. Sunday concludes with give-aways and raffles for seminar attendees.

Register for the event at www.insidertrainingfitness.com and receive an Insider Training Metabolic Profile ($115 value) to help you better understand your metabolism. Early registration by June 16 is $20.00 with per session bundle of 3 classes is $45.00. After June 16, registration is $25.00. Spectators are welcome for $7.00 per session or a weekend pass for $20.00. Email qcbootcamp@insidertrainingfitness.com with questions.

How to Boost Natural Fat Loss

As a trainer, I find that many clients are willing to put in the fitness and exercise component while struggling with the nutrition component of their health program. If you experience the same thing, this article is for you.

It is important to realize that nutrition plays a bigger role in fat and weight loss than exercise and physical training. There are many ways to boost metabolism and working with a personal trainer will help you to incorporate as many strategies as possible into your daily routine.

The following are a few techniques to boost your fat loss efforts:

Engage in aerobic exercise for 30-60 minutes MOST days of the week and an additional 15-30 minutes in the afternoon/evening. My peers in the fitness industry may suggest less time per week but I find that the body is designed to be active daily and maintaining a strong workout schedule boosts the metabolism. Always remember that you can break your workouts into shorter sessions to meet your schedule and personal obligations.

When exercising, use interval training and weight training sessions at least three times a week. Both techniques push the body to use carbohydrate and fat stores in the body. Weight training also builds lean muscle mass which increases your metabolism.

If you are performing weight training and cardiovascular exercise in the same day, weight train first because it will burn carbohydrates for the first 30 minutes so that the calories you burn during cardiovascular exercise will come from fat.

Always look for ways to be active throughout the day. Walking up the stairs instead of using elevators and walking as much as possible throughout the day will add up to meet your fitness goals.

Exercise in the morning when you can because it will help to control your appetite all day long and decrease food cravings.

Do not hold your breath and breathe deeply during exercise because your body needs oxygen to effectively burn fat and boost your metabolism.

Once you have the fitness component in place, you should take a look at your dietary habits to boost your metabolism.

First of all, drink water, water, and more water. Drinking cold water throughout the day actually encourages your body to get rid of excess water, increases your body’s core temperature which stimulates your metabolism and promotes cleansing of the body.

Always eat breakfast and eat 5-6 smaller meals a day (every 3 hours).

Eat the majority of your calories earlier in the day when your body is active and able to burn more calories than during sleep.

Avoid empty-calorie foods and beverages like sodas or alcohol which dehydrate your body, slow your metabolism, do not satisfy your hunger, and add to the calories you have to burn later.

Whether you want to boost your metabolism to increase fat burn or boost overall energy, make sure you consult a professional like myself and gradually incorporate the tips I am sharing with you to reach your goals. Don’t forget to avoid stress and sleep well (7-8 hours) to improve your results.

A Word About Goals

When it comes to physical preparation, most athletes don’t know where to start or what direction to take. They go through the motions of training, but they’re unfocused and rarely leave their comfort zones. If they want to get to the next level, however, their activities must be much more focused and intense.

I’ve found that setting goals for my athletes has really given them the direction they needed. If you have goals in mind, like playing your sport in college or professionally, you tend to organize your life so you can meet them. Here are six keys to meeting your expectations.

1 Write your goals down. Until you put them on paper, they’re just ideas, and everybody has ideas. Once you write them down, you can start taking the necessary steps to reach them.

2 Put them where you can see them. Write your goals on posted-notes and stick them on the bathroom mirror. Look at your goals every day when you wake up and before you go to bed.

3 Set long- and short-term goals. While tracking your progress from week to week, you should never lose sight of why you are working so hard in the first place.

4 Make your goals measurable. I hear a lot of athletes say, “I need to be better overall.” How can you tell if you are better overall? For a baseball player, the proof might be improving your batting average by 100 points, increasing your RBI totals or making better plays in the field. These things are actually measurable.
5 Do what is necessary to achieve your goals. If you can’t find time in the day to develop your skills, such as batting practice or dribbling a basketball, wake up earlier. You’re competing against millions of athletes for that scholarship. Make the time.

6 Stay focused and keep your goals in mind with everything you do. If you lose concentration doing something simple, like jumping rope, you’re going to lose concentration in a game.

US Army Makes Changes to Physical Fitness Standards

The United States Army will make changes to their Physcial Fitness Standards.

A revolutionary new physical readiness test will shorten your run distance, eliminate sit-ups, change the way you measure push-ups and add three new events.

In addition, a new combat readiness test may replace one of the two PT tests soldiers do each year.

The changes — the first to the PT test since its inception in 1980 — stem from a nearly yearlong effort by Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling, deputy commanding general for initial military training, and Frank Palkoska, director of the Army Physical Fitness School. He and a team of 16 fitness and nutrition experts have built a new test centered on five events:

• 60-yard shuttle run

• 1-minute rower

• Standing long jump

• 1-minute push-up

• 1½-mile run

I will have tips on how to past the Army PRT in upcoming blog posts.

Variety Truly Is The Spice of Fitness

Different types of exercise can be very humbling for people because it exposes our weaknesses - and most people don't like being/looking bad at anything. The commitment to exercise is hard enough and now I'm asking you to do two minutes of Kettblebell swings, run the bleachers, do turkish get ups and push up planks. "That's too hard!" This is why most people never leave their aerobics class, get off the treadmill or attempt something other than their 15 minute walk. As a "challenging" based program MVP Kettlebell Boot Camp is designed to emphasize your weaknesses as well as your strengths. This is the sole reason why it works. Never before did you see Cardio and strength training in the same program because even trainers gravitate toward only one or two specialties.

Boredom, plateaus and injury are the enemy and the only way to combat them is through Variety. If you're struggling it's working. Swallow some humble pie and don’t give up.

10 Reasons to Exercise

Regular exercise gives you so many amazing benefits, but let's face it, some days you may get too busy, too stressed and simply too tired to fit exercise in your day.

Here's a list of my top 10 reasons to exercise. Pull out this list and read it when you're having one of those days.

1. To Prevent Disease
Exercise has been proven to reduce the risk of just about every single health problem known to man, from Stroke to Heart Disease to Cancer and Osteoporosis. Exercise is also a great defense against Type 2 Diabetes, which is one of the most widely growing diseases in the United States today.

2. To Look Great
Exercise firms your body, improves posture and even makes your skin glow. Looking your best is a wonderful result of regular exercise.

3. To Lose Weight and Keep It Off
Exercise burns fat and prevents future fat storage. If you want to have a thinner, healthier body, exercise is the answer.

4. To Have More Energy
Anyone who exercises regularly will tell you that they are more energetic, less easily upset and are more peaceful.

5. To Sleep Better
Exercise boosts energy levels, but also wears you out. It makes you feel more alive during the day and sleep like a baby at night.

6. To Age Slower
Exercise is one of the most effective ways to fight aging. When you age your body loses muscle and bone, the loss of both is drastically reduced with regular exercise. Exercise also helps reduce inflammation.

7. To Ease Depression
Exercise has been proven to reduce depression – sometimes even as effectively as prescription drugs. Just chalk this up as yet another amazing benefit to exercise.

8. To Stay Mentally Sharp
Not only is exercise smart for your heart and weight, but it can make you smarter and better at what you do. Exercise has been shown to improve memory and other cognitive functions, and seems to have a protective effect against Dementia. John J. Ratey, MD, an associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and author of A User's Guide to the Brain says "exercise is really for the brain, not the body. It affects mood, vitality, alertness, and feelings of well-being."

9. To Reduce Sick Days
People who exercise regularly are 50% less likely to call in sick to work. A regular exercise program reduces colds and upper respiratory infections.

10. To Boost Confidence
Being fit, feeling healthy and having energy are all building blocks to having great confidence. There is no better confidence booster than sticking with a regular exercise program.

Here's an Inexpensive Way to Improve Your Speed

Every athlete wants to get quicker and faster. The difference in being faster than your opponent can make a difference in a big game.

I'm going to show you a simple and inexpensive exercise that will improve your first step and at the same time will improve your speed and quickness.

The exercise that I'm talking about that will add speed and quickness to your tools is jumping rope.

The benefits of this simple but yet complex training technique ranks as also an ideal brain exercise, bone builder, and as one of the most efficient ways of improving cardiovascular fitness in as little as ten minutes.

According to research jump rope for a minimum of five minutes a day can improve your foot speed and when you build to ten minutes of nonstop jumping at 120 RPMs it can provide the same benefits as 30 minutes of jogging!

Simple grab a jump rope and do the following:

1. Start with the jump rope in each hand.
2. Jump off the ground and start swinging the jump rope under your feet.
3.Continue jumping up and down as you bring the jump rope under your feet.
4.Continue for the prescribed number of 500 jumps or for 5 minutes.