I have a stubborn Achilles injury, I say stubborn because since I ruptured it in May its hampered my lifestyle somewhat. I'm back exercising finally and its just brought home to me the importance of knowing and listening to your own body. Sure its my job to cue you on posture and technique, but its your job to know when to work harder and when enough is enough. Training is about getting fitter, and any trainer worth their fee should know that while training you aren't getting fitter. The improvement comes when we recover in the cocoon of our own home. 

I've lost count of the times I've heard trainers saying they do a split program 5-6 days a week. This proves 2 things, firstly they're blissfully unaware of anything but muscle groups. They think that as long as its bi's and tri's (biceps and triceps, not bisexual and trisexual) on Monday, and legs on Tuesday, that its fine because the arms get a rest. Its leaving out the Autonomic Nervous System, (which should be fatigued if you've been doing big bang exercises that challenge the neuro-muscular connection), and the energy systems amongst other things. Secondly it proves they know jack about programming. Anyone who trains properly would need the recovery day.

I've had clients that have got into actual arguments with class instructors who have tried to force them past a level they're comfortable with. One doing yoga-letes was told, despite having an injury, “Your knee is supposed to be off the ground.” Luckily my client understands her own limits and knows what she's working towards, so she wasn't bullied into it despite being told, “There’s no slacking in here.”

When I worked at Virgin I frequently got new clients who had felt trainers “pushing them.”  Its that 80's image that a trainer is there to push you past your limits, when in actual fact they are supposed to coach you through a prescribed series of specific exercises and lifestyle changes to help you reach your goal.

Bullying is rife in gyms and members seemingly love the passive-aggressive comments from ego driven trainers that are simply disgusted that you can't bench the same weight as them...shame on you. 

It takes a lot for someone to step back and say "I'm not as fit as I once was." To admit that they need to build up slowly. Ego effects us all, however its the ego of those that coach and train us that needs checking in my opinion.

As many of you know I started my career as a Personal Trainer in a gym. I'd had a long career already conditioning athletes to perform better, but my passion is health and athletes are rarely interested in health. To me weight-loss or weight normalisation falls  under the banner of health. Your weight is generally a reflection of your health. Don't read into that statement that I'm claiming people with a few extra pounds can't be healthy, in fact numerous studies prove the opposite. Health is what your body desires and no matter what you do to it, health will always by what it strives for. Cut yourself and your body will attempt to repair itself. Over exercise and the body will repair the muscle damage and make it stronger for next time. Drink too much and the body will work to detox you. I see many many occasions where the body is working to maintain its health, from people with skin issues (the body yet again de-toxing itself) through to todays topic of exercise.
Exercise brings with it a compensation factor. After a hard trip to the gym, a class or a long run we become hungry and need to eat. Various arguments exist about if the exercise makes you hungry, or because you want a reward (or both). I've seen plenty of women going for cake and coffee after aerobics, maybe its the reward factor or more likely its the need to replace the energy they've just used up. So, the body compensates for this energy expenditure by "making you" replace the energy to protect itself. I've spoke a lot the past few weeks (and as far back as 2002) about the effects of semi-starvation and this just backs up the fact that "we" need energy to survive. The more we try and burn away fat stores, the more the body will increase appetite to protect its reservoir of energy.Eric Ravussin, chair in diabetes and metabolism at Louisiana State University and a prominent exercise researcher agrees stating, "In general, for weight loss, exercise is pretty useless."Researchers from Columbia University in The journal Obesity Research (2001), found that a pound of muscle burns approximately six calories a day at rest compared to two calories for a pound of fat. So by converting (which is the mythical offer in most gyms), 10 lb. of fat into muscle, you would in theory only get an extra 40 calories allowance per day!!! Yeah, now your a real calorie burning muscle machine.Despite spending our hard earned cash on personal trainers, fat or boot camps, aerobics, zumba, marathons, blah blah blah, we aren't any thinner (remember I tried all this **** in 1999-2001. After an hours class we crave sugary calories like nothing on earth. Sure some use willpower or break down muscle tissue to help them cope, but for most a sports drink or a banana replaces all the energy burned in about 30 seconds. Now, I'm not saying thats a bad thing, remember the body is trying to stay healthy and you've just been personal drained so its fighting back to maintain its balance.
Willpower can help a few people avoid the post exercise calorie cravings but our physiology isn't designed to do that. We are after all designed to replenish our energy reserves after a bout of activity, so most people crumble (note the food based apple crumble link, even thinking about exercise is making my brain consider food). Steven Gortmaker, the head of Harvard's Prevention Research Center on Nutrition and Physical Activity, states that "The most powerful determinant of your dietary intake is your energy expenditure, If you're more physically active, you're going to get hungry and eat more." He suspiciously points the finger at McDonald's restaurants, asking "Why would they build those?", referring to the playgrounds they all seem to have nowadays. He points out that, "I know it sounds kind of like conspiracy theory, but you have to think, if a kid plays five minutes and burns 50 calories, he might then go inside and consume 500 calories or even 1,000."
The International Journal of Obesity published a paper by Gortmaker and Kendrin Sonneville which found that "there is a widespread assumption that increasing activity will result in a net reduction in any energy gap", (energy gap = the difference between the number of calories you use and the number you consume). Gortmaker and Sonneville found during 18-months observing 538 students that when kids start to exercise, they end up eating an average of 100 calories more than they had just burned.
To other way our bodies can compensate for this outburst of activity is by making us less active post exercise. As mentioned earlier, the body wants to stay in balance and preserve itself...health is of upmost priority. We hear all the time that our leisure physical activity has decreased since the 80's, funny how that right around the time exercise gripped the nation. Walking, getting out in nature taking a stress free stroll all sound great but as a nation we seem obsessed with being abused by a personal trainer at the gym.

Researchers from Peninsula Medical School studied 206 kids, ages 7 to 11, at three schools in and around Plymouth. The first school was private academy where they got around 9.2 hours per week of rigorous physical education. Kids at the two other schools, one in a village and the other an urban school got just 2.4 hours and 1.7 hours of PE a week. The kids wore ActiGraphs, which measure the amount of physical movement and the intensity. The kids at the private school had significantly more physical activity at school, but overall they didn't move more. Alissa Frémeaux from the study commented;

"Once they get home, if they are very active in school, they are probably staying still a bit more because they've already expended so much energy," and that "The others are more likely to grab a bike and run around after school."

What and how you eat (remember my blogs about the dangers of not eating) is far more significant in weight loss than how hard you try punish your body.  I know you'll claim that you feel good after exercise, and I'll cover that in another post soon. Why not save your cash, avoid the beasting by your PT who makes your throw kettlebells around, skip the post exercise treats and avoid crashing on the sofa, and exchange it for, eating real food and going for a walk.

My clients, former clients and friends are highly educated. When I've trained them in the past I haven't just dumped a load of ridiculous exercises on them (while I count the reps and chew gum - hello former co workers). Nor have I just given them a diet based upon a generic glycemic index or any a recommendation to avoid fat while eating carbs (the most bizarre recommendation I've ever seen).

I gave (and still do) my clients a solid foundation in why they need to do certain things. This includes teaching them to listen to their bodies response to exercise or food. I trained Mark a few times way back in 2004, we lived on the same street and while we didn't train for that long Mark still knows his stuff. I'd happily let him train any of the PT's I used to work with as he'd do a great job (probably wouldn't enjoy the wages though).

Mark sent me a message earlier today saying that he saw a poster in his work gym.

Work Gym Member of the Month - Brian

with the following quote "Brian's shift patterns are far from favorable, yet he still manages to make it to the gym after a long night shift! Well done Brian, keep up the good work."

Mark spotted the fact that training after a night shift isn't something to be proud of or aim for, lack of energy, altered sleep patterns, hormonal disturbances etc etc all add up to it not being the ideal foundation for a gym work. The guilt advertising may or may not have its desired effect and shame others into "showing up."

In my personal opinion Brian would be far better searching for jobs away from night shift or shift work in his quest for health, wellness or a six pack. However, well done Brian, you've just showed Mark the exact reason why he trains rather than drains himself. Well done to Mark as well for not getting hooked into the guilt marketing these gyms use.

Its 6 years since I left Virgin Active (VA) and I can still incur the wrath of those that still work there (sorry Cat). I haven't got a problem with Virgin, I think they run a fantastic business model and when it comes to getting people active and having fun they do a fair job at that. My post was more aimed at the whole industry or industries aimed around health. From gyms, equipment manufacturers all the way through to the NHS and pharmaceutical empires. They all drive home a bad message when it comes to health and wellness.
I'll attempt to uncover a few of the myths perpetuated the fitness/health industries over the next few posts. 

Myth Number 1, Cardiovascular Health is improved by Exercise 

The 1984 book, The Exercise Myth, by Henry A. Solomon, M.D. a cardiologist, member of faculty at Cornell University Medical College and physician at New York Hospital. (he's now retired).

The truth about exercise and cardiovascular health is far from the picture painted by government guidelines which tells us to increase our activity to prevent disease. The Sugar Bureau, yep you heard me right, recommend "Getting, and keeping, physically active is the single most important thing for preventing CHD. In fact, being inactive doubles a person's chances of developing CHD. The current recommendation is that everyone should aim to accumulate 30 minutes or more of physical activity over the course of most days of the week. However, a recent study has reported that it doesn't matter whether the exercise is broken-up into three lots of 10 minutes a day or one continuous session of 30 minutes for it to improve cardiovascular health. In addition, research shows us, that the exercise does not need to be strenuous to confer a benefit to the cardiovascular system. Gentle ‘aerobic’ exercise such as walking, cycling, swimming and dancing, can be effective in reducing the risk of CHD."
http://www.sugar-bureau.co.uk/coranary-heart-disease.aspx

We are taught that exercise prevents coronary heart disease (CHD), but the evidence just isn't there. CHD develops despite people engaging in exercise and sadly those who exercise still die of heart disease.

Highly recommended source - The Exercise Myth, Henry Solomon, M.D., Harcourt Brace Jovanovich Publishers, New York, NY, 1984 (out of print but you can get it via my healthchek.info store on the last page). 

Do we ever see wild animals (ones that eat a proper carnivore diet, not our pets that get fed carbs) engaging is sustained periods of cardiovascular activity to maintain perfect weight and perfect health? They use specific energy bursts to hunt and ensure their survival, either grazing and only running when they need to escape the hunter. Or in the case of the hunter, running to catch dinner. Running (and cardio in general) causes a stress response in the body, its fight or flight at work and has little to do with improving health. Theirs been a local 10k race recently and all I've seen on facebook and twitter is ill health and injury since people competed in it.

Why would you get conned into believing you need to jump on a treadmill or take part in aerobics/body-pump or other generic classes? When I started working at my first gym I'd not actually been a real gym user before and was the picture of health. I felt vital, healthy and fully energized. This changed quite dramatically by the time I'd began teaching (I hadn't studied too much back then) 3 spin classes a week. I ended up fatigued and unhealthy despite following all the recommended guidelines for both diet and exercise. 

We're also recommended to make carbohydrates the basis of our diet, despite physiology textbooks clearly stating carbohydrates create a massive insulin (fat-storing) response. Carbohydrates are needed in our diet but should always be consumed with adequate fat and protein for ones metabolic type (MT). The modern world is suffering an epidemic of disease, diabetes, CHD, and a whole host of other diseases because of excessive carbohydrate consumption are on the rise. The sugar bureau I mentioned earlier exists to protect their business interests and they invest a serious amount of cash in ensuring that they can prove they aren't to blame. No body is saying carbohydrates are bad, its just to proportions that people recommend that cause such ill health.

The Textbook of Medical Physiology (also available in my Healthchek Store) describes that "it takes 40 days of running an hour a day to lose just one pound of bodyfat." Its no wonder that running completely fails as a weight loss tool. Exercise has the effect of making the heart larger and more powerful as it pumps more blood per beat. As the heart beats slower the process of oxygen transfer isn't improved, so theirs no benefit there. The size of the artery is increased which can delay (longer fill time) clogging but still doesn't prevent it CHD, it just delays the inevitable. Mitochondria, (the powerhouses of the cell act like a digestive system that takes in nutrients, breaks them down, and create energy for the cell) are increased but but this doesn’t increase oxygen transfer so still no benefit. Marathon runners frequently die of heart attacks despite seemingly doing exactly what is suggested. Exercise does not prevent heart disease or increase life-span.

More people than every in history are engaged in exercise, gym memberships are at an all time high and we now eat lower fat than at anytime in our history, yet CHD, Obesity, diabetes and Cancer are more abundant than ever before. Why when your doing everything right, is disease on the increase? Our ever increasing consumption of processed carbohydrates is the driving force behind disease. Sadly the government continues to push high carbohydrate consumption down our throats, whilst telling us we're lazy and  that we need to exercise more. The problem is, exercise can't answer the problems caused by incorrect human nutrition.

Dr. Kenneth Cooper, the founder of aerobic training has finally admitted that he was wrong. He started all the unsubstantiated theories of ‘aerobic’ training, however 25 years later further research has shown that there is "no correlation between ‘aerobic’ endurance performance and health, longevity, or protection against heart disease." He also admits that "aerobic" training does carry with it a great risk of injury, and that "gross overuse activities such as running may be so damaging to the body as to be considered carcinogenic."

Sadly his story is continuing to be told around the world and most people, including the exercise teachers and instructors you PAY for advice, are blissfully unaware of the reversal, and still insist that you continue to “keep burning the calories” and get into your “target heart rate zone.” 

As discussed in a previous post, an ideal heart rate would be 85 beats/per minute (bpm). Peat states that unhealthy individuals tended to have rates under 70 bpm. 85 bpm x 60 minutes) = 5,100 beats per hour = 122,400 beats per day and they want us to get the heart beating more?? It just doesn't make sense but then what does in the medical/fitness world.

Numerous studies debunk the very notions sold to us but in April 2004, a Harvard University study showed that during a 12 week study those on a low carbohydrate diet that ate 25,000 more total calories than those on a high-carbohydrate diet and didn't gain any weight, whereas the carbohydrates eaters gained weight despite eating fewer calories. During my very first nutrition/exercise courses (thank you YMCA for making it look so daft that I questioned it straight away and went elsewhere for my education) I was taught that calories consumed minus calories burned = the key to maintaining weight. The fitness/health world had no thought to different foods, so 2000 calories of sweets (candy) in their eyes was the same as 2000 calories of chicken.

For those who aren't aware, we don't eat calories. They are just a term to describe a measurement. We eat food (or some of us do). Calories are a unit of heat equal to the amount of heat required to raise the temperature of one kilogram of water by one degree at one atmosphere pressure (complicated isn't it?, sadly it has little to do with human function).

This is thermodynamics which sadly has little to do with the human body. The food we consume is converted in to substances and structures that we need to utilize and sadly we don't function via heat production like they teach us via the calorie method. Adolph Fick proved in 1893 that our living cells are not heat engines and in the words of Nobel Prize-winner, Hans Krebs, “Fick made it clear in 1893 that living cells cannot be heat engines…” Herman Taller, M.D, author of Calories Don’t Count also states that, “One could assert with absolute certainty that the calorie theory has no scientific basis whatsoever”

This brings us back to my most quoted quote, its a favorite that I often use when people bring out daft research to argue a point. “It does not matter how smart you are, who made the guess, or what his name is – if it disagrees with real-life results, it is wrong. That is all there is to It.” – Richard Feynman, Nobel Prize-winning physicist.

I've consulted with over weight vegan's consuming as little as 600 calories a day, women who have followed low fat to the letter yet remain overweight, a man who spent 25 years following the British Heart Foundation guidlines and avoided red meat and butter, yet still had multiple heart bypass operations, aerobics instructors and PT's who are shattered and struggling to control their weight despite putting in the hours at the gym, and athletes who have put on weight and suffered poor performance despite completing huge amounts of cardiovascular exercise.

The theory that our hearts gets stronger and more efficient is weird. Does a car get better by punishing it at high speed day after day? Or does it respond well to the correct fuel, oil and correct usage? We don't come with a manual (we should and I can write you one if you want) so we rely on what we're told. Sadly industry clouds the facts and we don't get an accurate picture of what is honestly needed to be healthy.

A 1981 study “Distance Runners as Models of Optimal Health”, was performed on 50 competitive runners and found that blood pressure increased, rather than decreased. Dr. Elrick, from the Foundation for Optimal Health 
and Longevity commented “... that daily vigorous exercise does not protect people from hypertension (high blood pressure).”
Elrick, H., “Distance Runners as Models of Optimal Health,” Physician and Sportsmedicine 9,no. 1 (Jan.1981): 64-68.

Exercise is also targeted as being good at reducing cholesterol despite research such as that by Dr. Elrick concluding that exercise “does not guarantee low total cholesterol or high HDL (the so called “good” cholesterol) cholesterol values....” 

In 2004, a major pharmaceutical company spent hundreds of millions of dollars in an attempt to show that their drug, increased HDL and therefore decreased risk of CHD. It didn't. 

Londeree, B.R. et al., “Effects of Increases in Training upon Blood Lipids 
and Glucose Related Variables,” Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise


Keys, A., “Alpha-lipoprotein (HDL) Cholesterol in the Serum and the 
Risk of Cornoary Heart Disease and Death,” Lancet 2 (1980): 603-606. 

Money makes the world go round, and if industry wants results to favor products then they can buy the research that they need. I've consulted with many clients on cholesterol medication, that are engaged in cardiovascular fitness programs, that are avoiding meat, butter (real foods) in favor of manmade oils and low fat products (I saw a new advert last night with Vernon Kay advertising Flora Cusine which disgusted me) and they are still suffering ill health? Are they just the unlucky ones? 

As I've said time and time again, nutrition is the key to health. What we shovel into our mouths dictates the health we receive. We all have the power to control our health and to hit the pharmaceutical companies where it hurts? If we learn to listen to our own bodies and return to the foods that got us this far (we managed to evolve this far without flora cuisine and whole-meal bread) then we have a chance to regain the ability to maintain our health rather than rely on being medicated.

Before I get into actually canceling memberships, let me state that I love training in gyms, and I honestly do think people do need to commit to at least a year. Remember, results aren’t going to magically appear in the first month.

I meet a lot of people who’ve joined gyms and instantly regret it, I even joined one myself last month (they made me join in order to work there), however, I managed to get it cancelled and free myself from the shackles of the direct debit agreement. I know its down to us as individuals to check the terms and conditions but having worked at a Globogym in the past I’ve seen the underhand tricks sales staff (if you saw the targets they get you wouldn't blame them, imagine having the threat of a missed target over your head each month), often use to push through that sale. From brushing over the T&C’s, to actually signing a membership form for someone who joined via the phone (they wanted to include it in the end of month figures but all hell let loose when the member found out about the fraudulent signature).

I’ve blogged in the past about how most of you can easily train from home. Gym’s have a place, but for most it’s just a costly fad that they can do without. Train alongside me and you won’t be using the treadmills and recumbent cycles so surely you’re wiser investing a few month membership fees in getting your OWN mini gym at home.

Some people state that they need to be a member to help motivate them into actually exercising. Frequently I hear from people who tell me they avoid exercising because they hate the stresses involved, such as the time it takes to get there, (exercising at home you’d be done already), not being able to use the machinery that you want, (unless you sell memberships to your home gym this shouldn’t be a problem), uninterested staff, (I’ve spoke before about the poor pay that they get so let them off on this one please).

So, how can you get out of a contract and set yourself up at home?

1.  Read your contract. Contracts are essentially credit agreements, so before you even sign the contract in the first place, make sure your read its T&Cs.

Having said that, there are certain T&C’s and extenuating circumstances in which you can cancel. Gyms are also legally obligated to show you your contract upon request, so if you don’t have a copy, feel free to ask for one.

2. Complain. If within the contract period, the gym fails to provide a satisfactory quality service, you might be able to cancel without penalty and void your contract by showing that it’s illegal and that you were misled when you joined. The last gym I left allowed unqualified staff to induct members and train them (he didn’t pay them so he allowed them to earn cash this way), which is the perfect reason to get out of the deal.  One I’ve used with my clients is that if your trainer (moi) has been made to leave, complain and state that you’re not happy training with anyone else. If the service you require at the gym is no longer there it’s a pretty good reason to get out of that contract.

3. Relocate. If you are moving, and the distance to the gym is impossible, most gyms will let you cancel. You could also ask your boss to write a note on headed paper saying you are being transferred. But you can probably get pretty creative with this… 

4. Health If you have an injury that prevents you from physically using the gym, get a doctors note explaining this. For a woman, that might mean pregnancy. I’ve frequently written reports based upon clients specific needs which have allowed clients to cancel memberships.