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| All this and more under expert tuition at Elite |
Over the next few months Evan Burgess is putting Elite Health & Fitness's plans and diet into action. Follow the results...
Elite Health & Fitness are helping me discover a way of going beyond
my personal boundaries to achieve greater fitness and health. My personal goals
have been taken and a plan has been set up to achieve them. All I have to do is
turn up and work hard. The system presented is faultless so long as it can be
properly followed. That means if I’m not seeing results, I have to look to
myself for explanations.
Assessment
The first step with any good health and fitness plan is an assessment. Weight, height, and my ability to perform simple exercises were tested. These were the plank, press ups, air squats and burpees (bench assisted). This was a revealing exercise and helped me establish where I am as opposed to where I want to be. The physical assessment doesn't lie, and being tested again in a few months time should reveal exactly how much change has occurred.
The first physical assessment found I could “plank”, or stay still on my elbows and feet in a near press up position, for 1 minute 21 seconds. This wasn’t bad, but not good either. A professional cricket player for example, could be expected to do it for about 3 minutes with no problem. The strict form press-ups weren’t so good, with a low score of 10 before my form dipped. Air squats were slightly better with 40, but my assisted burpees didn’t benefit much from the assistance, with only 13 managed before I fell apart. Looking back the short distance now, I can see my diet wasn’t supportive in the last few weeks running up to this assessment, which leads us to the next point.
Elite's 21 Day Kick Start Diet
Nutrition comes before exercise in importance. To put it into perspective, imagine being told to run 13 miles after a steak dinner, or after a pear salad. Which one would be easier? Personally, I know running or any vigorous exercise would be best on a light stomach. If anyone wants to put this to the test, feel free to get in touch! Elite's 21 Day Programme promises greater energy and serious fat loss results. It would mean quite a change in my eating. Before the assessment, I had been indulging in the bad stuff quite frequently, red wine, ice cream, copious amounts of coffee... not things that help the heart circulate efficiently, or muscles to rebuild with vigour. Everyone starts a fitness plan with different abilities and special requirements. Elite are flexible and sensitive enough to work with people of all dispositions. Personally, I’m a vegetarian which led to a slight re-working of the nutritional guidance due to the nature of protein.
It was made clear from the outset that being a vegetarian, there is a danger to eat too many carbs and not enough quality protein. I had to find a way to answer this, and smoothies are an excellent resource for adding protein to a diet. These aren’t ones with syrup in them and whip cream on top, and in my opinion, they taste better. With a large bag of soya protein, a newly acquired batch of BCAA powder and ground linseed, I was good to go with any variety of fruit or vegetable based mixer. In general it can be better not to mix carbs and fats, with protein being the staple with any other food group. Thus an avocado smoothie wouldn’t be mixed with an orange, and a pear smoothie wouldn’t have added fat.
The nutrition advice wasn’t just generalised. I was given Elite's 21 Day Kickstart manual. It is a nutrition plan that is easy to follow. It simplifies things as I don’t have to worry anymore about drinking alcohol, caffeine or fizzy drinks, and my stomach had been liberated of digesting ice cream, cheese and chocolate. Perhaps this sounds hard, but the key is focusing on what you can have, rather than what you can't. The most positive thing about this plan is that it makes you realise the abundance of food that isn’t processed or contains sugar. Reframing food can also help in the psychological game of beating cravings. Berries can be seen as natures’ sweets, and BCAA powder could be classified as something more naughty than it is, as it has a slight sherbet flavour. I don’t smoke, so from now on I try to imagine food I shouldn’t eat with a no smoking sign over it, which helps make me as likely to buy the item as cigarettes.
Beating Cravings and Peer Pressure
Elite offer a supportive network for healthy eating, with their members able to discuss recipe ideas and give advice of how to adjust to the change. Arguably, the hardest thing to avoid is peer pressure at social events, people you like talking you into bad habits. To strengthen the plan, Elite have created a positive group of people aiming for the same thing helps buffer against Grandma being offended because you won’t eat her Shepherd’s Pie, or your friend Dave buying you a double Jaeger Bomb to test your resolve.
The first step with any good health and fitness plan is an assessment. Weight, height, and my ability to perform simple exercises were tested. These were the plank, press ups, air squats and burpees (bench assisted). This was a revealing exercise and helped me establish where I am as opposed to where I want to be. The physical assessment doesn't lie, and being tested again in a few months time should reveal exactly how much change has occurred.
The first physical assessment found I could “plank”, or stay still on my elbows and feet in a near press up position, for 1 minute 21 seconds. This wasn’t bad, but not good either. A professional cricket player for example, could be expected to do it for about 3 minutes with no problem. The strict form press-ups weren’t so good, with a low score of 10 before my form dipped. Air squats were slightly better with 40, but my assisted burpees didn’t benefit much from the assistance, with only 13 managed before I fell apart. Looking back the short distance now, I can see my diet wasn’t supportive in the last few weeks running up to this assessment, which leads us to the next point.
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| Group Training is also available... |
Elite's 21 Day Kick Start Diet
Nutrition comes before exercise in importance. To put it into perspective, imagine being told to run 13 miles after a steak dinner, or after a pear salad. Which one would be easier? Personally, I know running or any vigorous exercise would be best on a light stomach. If anyone wants to put this to the test, feel free to get in touch! Elite's 21 Day Programme promises greater energy and serious fat loss results. It would mean quite a change in my eating. Before the assessment, I had been indulging in the bad stuff quite frequently, red wine, ice cream, copious amounts of coffee... not things that help the heart circulate efficiently, or muscles to rebuild with vigour. Everyone starts a fitness plan with different abilities and special requirements. Elite are flexible and sensitive enough to work with people of all dispositions. Personally, I’m a vegetarian which led to a slight re-working of the nutritional guidance due to the nature of protein.
It was made clear from the outset that being a vegetarian, there is a danger to eat too many carbs and not enough quality protein. I had to find a way to answer this, and smoothies are an excellent resource for adding protein to a diet. These aren’t ones with syrup in them and whip cream on top, and in my opinion, they taste better. With a large bag of soya protein, a newly acquired batch of BCAA powder and ground linseed, I was good to go with any variety of fruit or vegetable based mixer. In general it can be better not to mix carbs and fats, with protein being the staple with any other food group. Thus an avocado smoothie wouldn’t be mixed with an orange, and a pear smoothie wouldn’t have added fat.
The nutrition advice wasn’t just generalised. I was given Elite's 21 Day Kickstart manual. It is a nutrition plan that is easy to follow. It simplifies things as I don’t have to worry anymore about drinking alcohol, caffeine or fizzy drinks, and my stomach had been liberated of digesting ice cream, cheese and chocolate. Perhaps this sounds hard, but the key is focusing on what you can have, rather than what you can't. The most positive thing about this plan is that it makes you realise the abundance of food that isn’t processed or contains sugar. Reframing food can also help in the psychological game of beating cravings. Berries can be seen as natures’ sweets, and BCAA powder could be classified as something more naughty than it is, as it has a slight sherbet flavour. I don’t smoke, so from now on I try to imagine food I shouldn’t eat with a no smoking sign over it, which helps make me as likely to buy the item as cigarettes.
Beating Cravings and Peer Pressure
Elite offer a supportive network for healthy eating, with their members able to discuss recipe ideas and give advice of how to adjust to the change. Arguably, the hardest thing to avoid is peer pressure at social events, people you like talking you into bad habits. To strengthen the plan, Elite have created a positive group of people aiming for the same thing helps buffer against Grandma being offended because you won’t eat her Shepherd’s Pie, or your friend Dave buying you a double Jaeger Bomb to test your resolve.
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| Weight Training is an Important Tool in Fat Fighting |
At these points where your friends test you, it is important to remember what saying no is actually saying yes to. Saying no to stodgy hard to digest meals is saying yes to an un-bloated stomach and more energy. Saying no to alcohol is saying yes to flexibility the next morning and another ten reps before failure.
If you’re rolling your eyes, you’re exactly the person who would benefit most from a new frame of reference. It can be hard to re-imagine your internal world, so it is much easier when people who are a few stages ahead who can still remember the cravings and road blocks can give you a blue print for negating the pitfalls of bad habits.
Feel free to follow the regular updates of my personalised training plan.
CONTACT ELITE HERE
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