20 Minute Rower HIIT Workout - Cardio When You're Short on Time

In all the articles we’ve written on the AdMac Fitness blog, I don’t think we’ve given much attention to the humble rower. There’s no reason why - it just hasn’t featured much, that's all.

Today, that changes.

The rower is a fantastic piece of cardio kit. It’s a full-body cardio workout, it’s versatile, there are plenty of different workout styles that it can accommodate, and it suits a wide variety of people. The lack of impact is great for many people who can’t run, or for those who suffer if they put too much impact through their joints.

In this article I’m going to share a 20 minute rowing workout that will raise your heart rate through the roof, burn a lot of calories and transform your cardio fitness. It’s designed to be an all-out effort in a condensed time window. If you do it properly, it’ll be one of the toughest 20 minute workouts you’ll ever do!

A lot of people are put off by the rower because they just don’t ‘get it’. They go all-out in the first couple of minutes, then they’re exhausted and have to cut their workout short.

That’s like starting your run by sprinting flat out to the end of the road and then having to walk the rest of the way!

The prevent that from happening again, take a look at this technique video from Concept2…

A 20 Minute HIIT Rower Workout

Now you know the correct technique, it’s time to get set up. The workout is an easy pattern…

Gentle warm up for 1 minute.

After you’ve warmed up, set your rowing machine computer for 100m intervals with 20 seconds rest.

• Row FULL SPEED for 100m

• Rest for 20 seconds

• Repeat for 20 rounds

This workout looks simple on paper, but if you do it properly it’s absolutely brutal. Seriously, it’s one of the toughest workouts you can do in 20 minutes. It’s super efficient, because it’s training your upper and lower body in one go.

There’s also no risk of injury here either, because you’re not enduring any impact at all. It’s a way to max out your effort, without causing yourself any damage.

Each 100m interval will take between 18 and 30 seconds depending on your fitness level. Expect them to take longer as you progress though the workout, thanks to fatigue. You should try to make each one as fast as possible, because the whole point is to gain the maximum fitness benefit you can in the short workout period.

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

20 Minute Battle Rope Workout - Your Quick HIIT Blast!

One of the most frequently used excuses for missing workouts is “I don’t have the time”. At AdMac Fitness, we understand that. Lives are busier and we aren’t all blessed with 25 spare hours per week to exercise in.

But here’s the thing… Some exercise is better than no exercise.

So with that in mind, here’s the first part of an unofficial series on fast workouts. The kind of thing you can do if you only have a spare 20 minutes or so. They’ll generally focus around a single item of equipment, supplemented with exercises that will help pad out a whole workout.

The idea is that they will help you to stay active in some form, or at least get some benefit from exercise when you otherwise would have made the excuse not to.

This article is going to focus on Battle Ropes - a simple item of equipment that is often overlooked. However, when used properly, Battle ropes are awesome. A Battle rope is a superb workout tool that lends itself well to a HIIT blast.

The 20 Minute Battle Rope Workout

This workout is designed to be fast and intense. The kind of thing you can do without an excuse, because the whole thing can be finished within 20 minutes. It’s a full-body workout and you’re expected to be working almost non-stop throughout it.

Repeat each exercise in a 15 seconds on, 15 seconds off pattern for three minutes.

At the end of the two minutes on an exercise, give yourself 30 seconds to recover/set up the next exercise, then away you go.

Exercise #1 - Battle Rope Slams

This is a classic battle rope exercise. It’s designed to be upper-body specific, and it engages the arms and torso. The core is heavily engaged too. Go hard for 15 seconds, rest for 15 seconds and repeat the pattern for three minutes.

Exercise #2 - Battle Rope Burpees

A classic conditioning exercise, burpees work the entire body in a single movement. They don’t always get a lot of love, but they’re appropriate here. Again, go hard for 15 seconds, rest for 15 seconds and repeat the pattern for three minutes.

Exercise #3 - Alternating Reverse Lunge with Waves

This is a good way to get a single leg element into the workout as well. You have to keep yourself coordinated, but it’s an approach that works as long as you can keep your lunges in time! Go hard for 15 seconds, rest for 15 seconds and repeat the pattern for three minutes.

Exercise #4 - Squat Jump with Double Slam

If the lunges are a way to get the legs warm, this is an exercise that will push them hard! I’ll be honest - it takes no prisoners! The whole body is pushed hard here. Go hard for 15 seconds, rest for 15 seconds and repeat the pattern for three minutes.

Exercise #5 - Battle Ropes Russian Twists

We needed to add an abdominal exercise in, and this is one that fits the bill. It combines ab training with rotational movement, so is a double winner here. Go hard for 15 seconds, rest for 15 seconds and repeat the pattern for three minutes.

What to expect from a 20 minute battle rope workout

If you follow this workout to the letter, with the intense 15 seconds on, 15 seconds off for 3 minutes pattern, you’ll be surprised at how tough it is. The thing is, it needs to be tough, because it’s only short.

That’s the trade off.

What we want you to understand though is that you can still have a great workout in a short period of time. It might not be optimal but it’s definitely worth it! You can get rid of the ‘I haven’t got time’ excuse if you follow this kind of training. It’s a way to get a workout in even when you thought you couldn’t.

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

Muscle Building - Helping You Age Better and Healthie

There are a lot of aspects of health and fitness that are important, but the single most important thing you can do for your health is build muscle.

There has been a lot of debate over the years about how to improve quality of life, longevity, disease resistance, insulin sensitivity and the like. The evidence repeatedly points to the same thing. The most important aspect of your health and wellbeing is building and maintaining a healthy amount of muscle mass.

At this point it’s important to say that I’m talking strictly from a general health point of view, and not a pure sporting one. If you want to run marathons, there’s little need for a lot of muscle!

The need to build and maintain muscle mass increases as we age. The research shows that there’s an alarming rate of muscle mass loss past thirty years of age…

‘Muscle mass decreases approximately 3–8% per decade after the age of 30 and this rate of decline is even higher after the age of 60’.

Thankfully, this can be arrested and even reversed when you apply strength training principles and adequate protein into your diet. Research into the benefits of strength training in older adults by Churchward-Venne in 2015 provided an interesting conclusion…

‘We conclude that there are no nonresponders to the benefits of resistance-type exercise training on lean body mass, fiber size, strength, or function in the older population. Consequently, resistance-type exercise should be promoted without restriction to support healthy aging in the older population.’

The research showed that the longer the strength training went on, the greater the impact on the muscle mass and health of the participant. We can reliably say then that long term strength training is a worthwhile endeavour regardless of the age of the participant.

Importantly, the need to build and maintain muscle mass isn’t just an opinion either. It’s heavily-supported in the research. We know that research from 2009 focussing on muscle mass in care home residents concluded that…

‘The present study suggests that among community-dwelling old–old subjects muscle mass may be positively related to functional performance and survival.’

The evidence that muscle mass is important for longevity is huge. We don’t just want a long life span, we want a long health span. Your ability to enjoy old age is largely determined by your health and fitness level. Maintaining muscle mass is key to this process.

Building and Maintaining Muscle Mass in Older Age

In this section we’re going to outline the broad principles of building and maintaining muscle mass in older age. We’re going to look at the exercises you should be doing, the frequency and the repetitions. This is a very basic programme, but one that will serve you well.

It’s 5 exercises long and will take less than 40 minutes. Repeat it 3-4 times per week. Supplement this daily walking or gentle cycling and you’ll great!

Make sure your diet contains 3-4 good sources of protein per day, such as lean meat, fish, eggs, dairy, nuts, pulses or a protein shake.

Perform 4 sets of 10 on each exercise.

Exercise 1: Squats

Exercise 2: Dumbbell Shoulder Press

Exercise 3: Trap Bar Deadlifts

Exercise 4: Dumbbell Bench Press

Exercise 5: Chest Supported Row

This is a very basic programme - you can add more to it as you see fit. It’s also important to make sure that you perform these exercises safely and effectively, which is where a personal trainer is so valuable.

At AdMac Fitness we have a personal training studio in Bow, and a personal training studio in South Woodford. We have a range of personal trainers with different specialities and approaches, so we can ensure we match you with the perfect personal trainer for you.

We don’t try to baffle you with useless information. Our approach is clear and simple, built over years of successful fitness instruction. We’ve worked with a huge range of personal training clients, so we can help you too!

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

Autophagy - Your Secret Health Weapon

What is autophagy?

As the power of fasting is becoming better known, the additional benefits of the approach are coming to the fore. Arguably the most powerful one is autophagy - your body’s natural repair system that goes into overdrive during a fast.

The research around autophagy is powerful, leading many people to believe it might be one of the most important health behaviours we have.

Autophagy is a process by which cells recycle their own internal components, such as proteins and organelles, to maintain normal cellular function and survival during times of stress or nutrient deprivation. It is a stress response, but what that enhances our physical condition.

During autophagy, the cell forms a double membrane structure called an autophagosome, which engulfs the targeted materials and fuses with lysosomes for degradation and recycling. Autophagy is key for cellular homeostasis and has been linked to various health benefits, such as increasing lifespan and reducing the risk for diseases like cancer, neurodegeneration, and aging-related disorders.

How do I create autophagy?

Autophagy is a natural cellular process that occurs in the body and can be induced through fasting or exercise.

The preferred approach is through short-mid length fasts. Logically this approach stimulates autophagy and doesn’t create waste products and tissue damage that the body has to repair first. It also removes and possibility of reactions to food.

You can also stimulate the process with some very gentle exercise. Something like walking is ideal - it doesn't change you hormonally and is easy to recover from. It stimulates physical changes in the body and burns calories without demanding much of you.

Finally, it’s a very simple and binary approach. You don’t have to make any decisions about what you should eat to stimulate autophagy… you just don’t eat anything at all!

How long into a fast does autophagy start?

Autophagy typically begins after 12-16 hours of fasting, depending on factors such as age, sex, and overall health. It can increase significantly after 24-48 hours of fasting, and may continue for several days or even weeks depending on the duration of the fast.

Anecdotally, the best feelings from autophagy kick in beyond the 48 hour marks. At this point body tends to have cleared many inflammatory markers and the tissue renewal is working well.

What evidence is there in support of autophagy?

There is a growing body of scientific evidence that supports the importance of autophagy in maintaining cellular homeostasis and preventing various diseases, including cancer, neurodegenerative disorders, and age-related conditions.

Here’s some of the main benefits of autophagy…

1. Cellular stress response: Autophagy is activated in response to various forms of stress, such as nutrient deprivation, DNA damage, oxidative stress, and infection. Autophagy helps to remove damaged proteins and organelles, prevent cell death, and maintain cellular function.

   It’s effectively your body spring-cleaning itself. Breaking cells apart, re-using the useful bits and clearing out the junk!

2. Regulation of metabolism: Autophagy plays a crucial role in regulating cellular metabolism by recycling damaged mitochondria and other organelles to produce energy and nutrients. Dysregulation of autophagy has been linked to metabolic disorders such as obesity and type 2 diabetes.

   This is your body’s way of recycling itself and making the most of the good bits, essentially!

3. Aging: Autophagy has been implicated in the aging process, as levels of autophagy decline with age. Some studies have suggested that boosting autophagy may help to prolong lifespan and prevent age-related diseases.

   This is particularly powerful and is repeated across the research base. It’s more than likely a by product of the first two benefits…

4. Cancer: Autophagy can have both pro- and anti-tumor effects, depending on the context. In some cases, autophagy can promote cancer cell survival by providing nutrients and preventing cell death. In other cases, autophagy may act as a tumor suppressor by removing damaged proteins and organelles, and promoting cell death.

   There’s a strong suggestion in the research that autophagy can both help to prevent cancer, and be a big ally in cancer treatment. This could be huge, given cancer rates.

5. Neurodegeneration: Dysregulation of autophagy has been implicated in the development of various neurodegenerative disorders, including Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, and Huntington's disease. Autophagy dysfunction may contribute to the accumulation of toxic protein aggregates and neuronal cell death.

   What the research shows us is when autophagy is disrupted, it can speed the onset of neurodegeneration. By stimulating it properly, we can help to maintain brain health.

Overall, the evidence suggests that autophagy plays a critical role in a wide range of cellular processes. It’s a physiological process, but one that most people will never be aware of because it requires a fast in order to get the most out of.

If you’re in good health, and you’re looking for a little extra boost then why not give a 48-72 hour fast a try? It’ll really help your body, and the evidence base in support of the approach is rock solid. You can’t medicate your way to many of these benefits. The power of autophagy is accessible to anyone if they simply fast.

A water fast is the best way to go. That way your body isn’t dealing with coffee etc. It can just get to work quickly on its spring clean!

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

Fitness for Running... Preventing Running Injuries With Effective Strength Training

Now the weather is improving, the days are getting longer and the temptation to get outside is increasing, you might be tempted to get outside and start running again. As personal trainers, we’re all for this - the cardio you do outside leaves more time for us to focus on technical work in the gym!

But… We have to give you some advice, because if you don’t approach it correctly, running can be a one-way ticket to injury. There’s a bit of a saying in fitness…

‘You should get fit to run, not run to get fit’

That’s not to say running is bad - far from it. Just running if you’re not physically prepared for it can be a big problem for people. In this blog post, we’re going to give you advice on how to prevent running injuries with an effective strength training approach.

It’ll prepare your body for running, and will help you stay injury free as you get outside and rack up the miles!

Frequency of running injuries

When studied, researchers found 20.1% of recreational runners will suffer a running related injury. Further research suggests around 7.7 injuries per 1000 hours spent running.

These injuries were generally found in the connective tissues of the ankles and knees, so we have to look at protective measures for these areas. It means we have to focus on exercises that build stability and offer a level of protection under fatigue.

We know that strength training can be very helpful when it comes to mitigating the landing forces in the knees. This increased stability through training has an impact through the rest of the body as well, because limbs work in chains, with the joints forming those links. If you prevent impact in one of them, you help them all.

Reducing running injury through core strength

The core is integral when it comes to strength, health and fitness. Almost all exercises, movements and performances have a heavy core involvement, so we need to make sure it’s strong in several planes and directions.

The problem is core training is often done really poorly, with no real thought or process behind it. Here’s what Bliven and Anderson, the authors behind this piece on core stability training had to say about making core training effective…

‘A multifaceted approach is recommended utilizing tests for muscle recruitment, endurance, neuromuscular control, and fundamental functional movement patterns. Core stability should be trained in a progressive fashion, beginning with local muscle recruitment, moving to core stabilization in a variety of postures, and then transitioning into total body dynamic movements.’

You could summarise this by saying keep your movements progressive and varied. Crunches alone just won’t cut it!

Strength training exercises to prevent running injuries…

These are exercises that will help you to prepare your body for running. You’re not looking to build outright strength and size here, so focus on hitting good form and reps for time. I’d suggest 30-60 second long sets of each…

Dumbbell Step Ups (30 seconds per leg)

Side plank clamshell (30 seconds per side)

Calf raises (30 seconds)

Kettlebell swings (30 seconds)

Front squats (45 seconds)

Swiss ball roll outs (30 seconds)

Perform these exercises in a circuit 2-3 times per week, and build up your running mileage gradually, adding around 1/4 of a mile per week in your running distance length. Start with an amount you can comfortably do, then build up. This slow approach might make you think it’s taking too long, but you’d rather that than get injured!

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

Improving your Squats - Helping You to Maximise Range of Movement on Leg Day!

For the most part, time under tension isn’t a problem with a lot of exercises. There’s one exercise and body part where it really does become an issue though… SQUATS!

The amount of people who seem to struggle with hitting great squat depth is huge. As personal trainers, we see it all the time. Sometimes it’s an inability to achieve proper squat depth because of poor flexibility. Other times it’s a lack of confidence that you’ll be able to get back up. In a few isolated cases, it’s just because people aren’t aware of how deep you should be going on a proper squat.

With that in mind, we’re going to run through a few ways you can improve your squats. In a couple of cases, we’ll add in exercises that you wouldn’t always consider. There’ll also be some advice on improving your range of movement without making drastic, complex changes.

These suggestions are all tried and tested ways to increase range of movement on leg day…

Step ups

The first tip is to switch out the exercise for a different one! I know that sounds completely counter-intuitive, but go with me here.

A change is as good as a rest. When it comes to squats, sometimes a pattern interrupt is the best thing you can do. By changing the movement for a similar one, sometimes you can improve the original. Step ups are a perfect example of this.

If you’re struggling to hit parallel with your squats, setting up a step where the height of the step forces you to drive through a full range of movement is a superb alternative. It’s also a great way to isolate both legs, preventing over-use or domination of one leg over the other.

If you look at the image below, see how the thigh is parallel to the floor at the start of the movement. This forces a long range of motion and increases the time under tension for the leg muscles…

Use Heel Wedges

If you don’t want to invest in weightlifting shoes, you can always gain some of the benefits of them by using a heel wedge.

By elevating your heels when you squat, you do a few things that help squat depth…

• Prevent tight calf muscles from limiting your range of movement

• Allows you to maintain an upright torso throughout the squat

• Open up the hips, helping to lower squat depth

A heel wedge is a simple intervention - you place it under your heels when performing squats. As opposed to weightlifting shoes (which are still excellent, by the way), they are temporary so you use them whilst you’re squatting, then can put them away again and carry on with your workout.

The practical difference between a heel wedge and a weightlifting shoe is that the weightlifting shoe isn’t designed for anything other than squats, clean and jerks and snatches, so they’re awful for anything involving running, jumping etc. If your workout contained any of these movements, you’d have to change your shoes if you wanted to do them effectively.

Perform Split Squats

A split squat is a great way to isolate a single leg. Not only that, the elevated rear leg helps you to get a full range of movement with the squat too.

I particularly like the elevated rear leg for people who have tight hip flexors, because it really helps you to stretch them as you lift. If you take a look at the video below, you’ll see how deep the front leg should be squatting. It’s easier to break parallel with this exercise, because you’ll be lifting lighter weights and you have the support of your back leg.

The spilt squat is one of the best leg exercises around, and some high profile coaches even look to use these instead of traditional barbell back squats, for all of the reasons mentioned in this section. If you don’t use them, give them a try and see how you get on…

Spanish Squats

Most often used as a rehab exercise, Spanish squats are an excellent way to fully engage the quad muscles as you work through a squat pattern.

If you aren’t familiar with Spanish squats, here’s what they look like…

The band behind the knee offers structural support as you squat. This allows you to get to a greater depth, because you have something to support your legs. More importantly, it offers this support without making the exercise ‘easier’ - it’s still a seriously tough exercise to complete.

The benefits of the Spanish squat aren’t just potential squat depth, they also help knee health, range of movement quality and squat technique.

You can make the Spanish squat harder by using a kettlebell or dumbbells to add weight to them.

Improve Your Flexibility

The final and arguably one of the most effective ways to improve your squat (and therefore range of movement) is by improving your flexibility.

A lot of the limitations in technique (across many exercises by the way, not just squats) is through a lack of flexibility and mobility in their muscles and joints. This is addressed by working the muscles through a full range of movement during exercises, but also engaging in a thorough stretching and mobility approach.

One of the more effective ways to engage in a mobility practice is through yoga.

The reality is most people won’t spend an hour or so per week on their flexibility, so if they attend a class where the focus is on flexibility and mobility, they’re more likely to engage. This in turn will provide the benefits you’re looking for. This won’t be a quick fix, so it’ll involve at least one class per week for 2-3 months in order to see any benefit.

If you are particularly stiff, a hot yoga practice can be helpful, because the additional blood flow will help to increase elasticity of the tissues. If you don’t fancy getting sweaty, a Yin Yoga practice will be helpful - it’s a much slower type of yoga, with classes lasting upwards of 90 minutes. In Yin Yoga you stay in poses for several minutes at a time, really stretching the muscles out.

You can still get the benefits of stretching by doing a general stretch and foam rolling practice at home (or in the gym), but you’ll have to commit to it.

Something like this done daily will be really helpful…

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

Practical Ways to Increase Your Time Under Tension on Exercises

One of the most important things to consider when resistance training is the time under tension.

The longer your muscles are working against resistance, the more strength and size they’ll develop. It’s something that has been well studied, and is generally accepted in the research. It makes sense as well, logically. The more work your muscles do, the more benefit they’ll gain.

It isn’t just a case of performing more sets and reps of an exercise though, because that’s a limited variable. Where do you draw the line? 10 sets? 20 sets? 50 sets?!

In this article we’re going to look at practical ways to increase your time under tension on exercises.

There are a few ways to increase the time under tension…

• You can slow down the rep speed, so you take much longer to perform a rep. Think 5 seconds to lift a weight, and 5 seconds to lower it. This is SUPER tough! These are sometimes referred to as negative reps, especially when the lowering section is elongated.

• Another one is to perform a paused rep, where you hit a position of high contraction and hold it. This was an approach that gained some traction and popularity in the 80’s, but didn’t last. It’s really boring, that’s why!

• There’s a high rep set, where you perform. lot of reps of an exercise. More reps = more time under tension. The problem with this approach is its slow-twitch training heavy, so won’t build massive strength.

• In my opinion the best one is to increase the range of motion of an exercise, so you are working against resistance for a long period of time. This improves flexibility and mobility as well as pure work time.

When you use one or a combination of these approaches, you can improve your time under tension significantly. This will translate into improved results in the same amount of time, making your workouts more efficient.

Increasing time under tension improves technique

When we train to increase time under tension, we have to really focus on the movements we’re executing. This means that the technique improvement is dramatic - especially with exercises such as curls, push ups, pull ups etc. You are slowing down the movement and working through a full range. That eliminates the chances of cheating through reps.

When you do this, you also reduce the chance of injury. A lot of soft tissue injuries in the gym are a result of poor form and rushed reps. The reality is that although muscle tissue is relatively elastic, connective tissues such as tendons and ligaments are much less so.

Rushed reps can result in the tearing or straining of these connective tissues, because they’re forced to deal with much greater ballistic forces than they’d normally have to. This is especially true if you’re exercising the cold, where tissues are stiffer, less flexible and more liable to damage, so outdoor training such as winter bootcamps should be performed with additional care.

Increasing time under tension can damage egos though!

Before I leave you, I want to issue you with a warning…

When you change the way you train, increasing your time under tension, your ego is going to be destroyed. I mean, properly kicked in the stomach.

You’ll have to reduce the amount of weight you lift by anywhere between 10 and 50% depending on the approach you take! When you slow down your reps, work through a full range of motion, increase the amount of reps you perform or pause your reps, you’ll have to change the weight you lift. It’s simply not possible to do these properly and keep your weights as high as they were.

You’ve been warned!

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

5 Important Exercises Using Resistance Bands

Resistance bands are great. They’re not just useless bits of elastic that you do a few warm up exercises with - they’re a legitimate training tool that can completely change the effectiveness of an exercise. Used properly, a resistance band can provide varying degrees of resistance to a variety of exercise. It can also help improve technique.

Finally, it can be used to gain a therapeutic benefit from an exercise, helping it to cure an injury.

So before you overlook a resistance band as something you get from the physio, or only use in a warm up, take a look at these 3 important exercises using resistance bands. I guarantee you that if you add them into your training, you’ll be fitter, stronger and less prone to injury.

And that’s a promise.

Resistance Band Exercise #1 - Lateral band walks

This is a class ‘oh my god I can’t believe how hard this is’ exercise. It’s a great way to strengthen the glutes, the hips and make the quads engage. When these muscles are strong, you help to eradicate problems such as IT band issues, runners knee and hip problems. You also improve your knee stability for exercises such as squats and lunges.

You can use lateral band walks as a primer before squats, a warm up exercise or even an exercise on their own. I like to use them as all three, depending on the context. Simply use a thicker, stronger resistance band when using it as a ‘proper’ exercise.

Here’s how they’re done…

Resistance Band Exercise #2 - Side plank clamshell

If you want to see your core training taken upon several notches, you need to get some side plank clamshells into your workout. They hit several points… They’re a side plank, so you have a lateral core and oblique engagement. When you add the resistance band, you make it a hip and glute exercise as well. This makes it a really effective prehab/rehab exercise.

The side plank clamshell isn’t just great for core and hip training - it’s also a really effective way of strengthening the lower back. This is helpful when you’re doing deadlifts, kettlebell swings, the olympic lifts or even heavy lifting at work.

Here’s how they’re done…

Resistance Band Exercise #3 - Standing abdominal crunches

As a rule, I’m not a fan of crunches for most people. It’s not that they’re inherently dangerous, they’re just more risky than they need to be for most. The reality is a lot of us don’t have especially good lower back health and strength, so creating a lot of spinal flexion doesn’t help. If you’ve had disc issues especially, they’re not a great idea.

Where you can perform spinal flexion in a safe, healthy position is when you’ve got a thick resistance band to work against. You can be on your feet with your torso straight. This helps to limit spinal flexion, but the thick resistance band adds an additional challenge.

Here’s how they’re done…

Resistance Band Exercise #4 - Spanish squats

The Spanish squat is a phenomenal exercise, and I don’t even mean that as a joke. It’s one of the best out there. It’s a really simply exercise, but it isolates the quads better than almost any other squat. Not only that, it helps to rehab knees really well, so if you’ve struggled with your knees, Spanish squats maybe the way to go. You can make them more difficult by adding extra weight.

In the Spanish squats, you can control depth really easily, and the thick resistance band stops the knees travelling over the toes (which is the essence of the Spanish squat - that’s how they isolate the quads so well). You only need a strong resistance band and a solid anchor point.

Here’s how they’re done…

Resistance Band Exercise #5 - Shoulder pull aparts

Shoulders are up there with lower backs as one of the most vulnerable body parts when it comes to injury. A big part of the problem comes from the fact that modern life see’s us in a forward-leaning, internally-rotated position in the shoulder. This leads to a tight chest, weak upper back and rounded shoulders. Over time, this becomes painful and can restrict strength and movement.

One of the ways to combat this is with exercises for the upper back and rear deltoids (back of the shoulders). By strengthening these areas, you correct your shoulder alignment, strengthen the important muscles in the neck and back and ease the issues you were suffering. All you need is a good resistance band.

Here’s how they’re done…

When you add these exercises into your workout, not only will you be a stronger, fitter person, you’ll also be a healthier and more injury-resistant one. These exercises will elevate your workout significantly, and help you to get more out of your training.

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

5 Push Up Variations to add to your Workout

Believe it or not, the push up is one of the most effective exercises there is. Whilst we may think of it as a boring bodyweight exercise, it’s actually so much more.

The push up is a way to improve chest, shoulder and tricep strength. It involves core stability, shoulder blade stability and a large range of motion at the shoulder and elbow. You can increase the difficulty by increasing weight, changing the hand position and the body position.

It’s my belief that a push up, or a variation of the push up has a place in almost every personal training program that exists.

To increase the effectiveness of the exercise, here’s a list of 5 push up variations to add to your workout…

Decline push ups

The decline push up is the quickest way to increase the difficulty of the push up. You make the exercise harder by taking your feet higher than your upper body. This means you end up lifting a greater percentage of your body weight. The higher the feet, the harder you make the exercise.

You can raise your feet any way that provides you with stability. That can be via plates, a bar, ply box etc. You can adjust the height to make it more or less challenging, depending on your fitness and strength levels.

Here’s how they’re done…

Push ups on parallettes

I really like this exercise, because it’s a way to increase the stretch at the chest and shoulders. This is because the parallettes allow your chest to drop lower than your hands, which opens the chest. This increase in the range of movement at the joint increases the time under tension as well, making it a much tougher exercise than the standard push up.

The higher the paralletetes, the harder the exercise can be. You can perform the exercise with a range of different handle heights though, which allows you to increase the difficulty of the exercise somewhat.

Here’s how they’re done…

Ball push ups

You may already be familiar with the diamond push up, or the tricep push up. Well this belongs within the same group (if such a thing exists?!), but it’s much, much tougher. You’ve got three different factors at play here…

1. You’re dealing with a close hand position, which is tougher than a wider one

2. You’re on a ball, which is unstable

3. You’re working at an incline, which challenges the muscles more

This trio makes the exercise so much harder than you’d expect, so give them a go and see how you get on. I like to use a slam ball or a med ball because they’re both grippy and unstable. Here’s how they’re done…

Push up to row

This is a great way of combining a push up with a row. It means you’ve got the increased range of movement from the dumbbells, the added shoulder and back training from the row and the added core and shoulder stability element of being off balance during the row.

When you do these properly, you’ll really feel the benefit throughout your entire upper body. It’s why they’re an exercise that makes for a more efficient upper body training session.

Here’s how they’re done…

Atomic Push Ups

At AdMac Fitness, we’re big fans of the TRX suspension trainer. It’s a great way to add an element of instability to any exercise. There are a few different variations of push ups you can do on the TRX, but one of the best (and toughest) is the ‘Atomic Push Up’.

It’s a combination of a decline push up and a pike, which makes for a really tough exercise. If you can hit 30 or more of these in a row you’re a pretty legit trainer!

Here’s how they’re done…

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

Fish Oil - Beneficial or a Waste of Time?

One of the most commonly-suggested supplements around are fish oils. They’ve been a popular recommendation ever since research suggested they were effective against cognitive decline, heart disease and arthritis.

What does the research say about fish oils though? Are omega 3’s a good thing to take, or are they a waste of time? Let’s take a look…

What is fish oil?

Fish oil is derived from oily fish such as mackerel, herring, salmon etc. It’s similar to (but not the same as) cod liver oil, which is derived directly from cod liver. The reason for taking them both is largely the same though. This means although they’re not the same product, they have similar benefits to health.

The main purpose for taking fish oil is to increase the amount of omega 3 fatty acids you’re ingesting. The reason you need to take in omega 3 fatty acids are because your body doesn’t have the ability to make them itself.

You can get omega 3 fatty acids from non-animal sources as well. Vegans for example could consume flaxseed oil, nuts of vegetable oils for the same benefits.

What does fish oil help with?

The purported benefits of fish oils are numerous. They include helping with heart function, brain function, joint health, reducing inflammation, helping control cholesterol, boosting mood and several others.

Not all of the benefits of fish oil are strongly backed by the research, so we’re going to take a look at the success rate of the supplementation. By the end of the article, we’ll have more of an idea whether or not fish oil is beneficial or a waste of time.

Does fish oil benefit cardiovascular health?

There appears to be credible research that suggests yes, there’s a credible link between fish oil intake and heart health. These benefits are repeated over several studies, so they are worth giving serious consideration to. We can see there’s benefits in people with higher risk of cardiovascular disease, so if it runs in your family, I’d consider it an important supplement.

Research published in 2001 concluded… Dietary supplementation with n-3 PUFA (polyunsaturated fatty acids) led to a clinically important and statistically significant benefit.

A later review (from 2012) titled Fish Oil Supplementation & Coronary Artery Disease: Does It Help? concluded… PUFAs have cardiovascular benefits with a possible reduction in the incidence of all cause cardiac mortality in CAD.

Based on this research, there’s a definite case for consuming fish oils regularly.

Does fish oil benefit brain health?

The general belief for many years was that fish was ‘brain food’ and vital for our brain health. It was also linked to preventing cognitive decline, and credited with helping to improve mood and mental health.

More recently, research has cast some doubt on these claims. A review study from 2015 titled ‘Long-chain omega-3 fatty acids and the brain: a review of the independent and shared effects of EPA, DPA and DHA’ concluded that… ‘Overall, a greater understanding of the individual roles of EPA, DPA and DHA in brain health, protection and repair is needed in order to make appropriate dietary recommendations and targeted therapeutic interventions.’

The suggestion was that although there might be links between low levels of omega 3 fatty acids and poor cognitive health, nobody is sure how strong they are. They might be coincidental.

The mental health benefits of fish oil supplements are inconclusive as well.

Does fish oil help to control inflammation?

This is where things get interesting. There appears to be good quality evidence supporting the role of fish oil and a reduction of inflammation. These benefits are reported across a wide range of health conditions, suggesting there are benefits in ways we hadn’t previously considered.

A review published in 2004 titled Omega-3 fatty acids and inflammation concluded…

Clinically important anti-inflammatory effects in man are further suggested by trials demonstrating benefits of n-3 fatty acids in rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis, asthma, and inflammatory bowel disorders. Given the evidence relating progression of atherosclerosis to chronic inflammation, the n-3 fatty acids may play an important role via modulation of the inflammatory processes.

This research shows the benefits of fish oil will extend across many different aspects of health where inflammation plays a role.

Fish oil - what’s the verdict?

Based on the available evidence, there’s still enough reasons to take fish oil regularly - especially if you’re training frequently or suffer from cardiovascular disease. There’s also a case for taking it if you come from a family where cardiovascular disease is prevalent.

Whilst it appears fish oil isn’t the wonder substance many people thought it would be, it’s still a very useful supplement to take and one that we’d recommend.

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

Are Protein Shakes Worth Taking?

Of all the supplements in the world, after multivitamins the most popular and commonly used is a protein shake. Look at gyms the world over and you’ll see people mixing their post-workout shake, shaking bottles and glugging it down.

But is it actually doing anything, or are these people just wasting their money?

In this article we’re going to look into protein shakes, taking an overarching view to see if they’re actually worth it. We’re going to look at the science of protein requirements, find out if there’s an optimal time for taking these shakes, and more fundamentally… should we bother with them at all?!

Protein - what’s the score?

Let’s start by explaining what protein is and it’s important to us.

Protein is one of the three main macro nutrients. The others being carbohydrate and fats. It’s most prevalent in animal sources such as meat, fish, eggs, offal, milk, cheese etc.

It’s also present in vegetable and legume sources such as nuts, beans, pulses, tofu. The animal sources are a ‘complete’ protein (they contain a complete amino acid profile), whereas the vegetable proteins don’t contain a complete amino acid profile. That means you have to combine different types of vegetables to consume the complete protein.

Protein is responsible for the repair and regeneration of tissues. It’s why people who exercise a lot need more of it, because they’re breaking down their muscles with exercise, which then rebuild themselves bigger and stronger.

Protein also acts as a secondary energy source when carbs (stored as glycogen in the body) run low.

Finally, a high protein diet is very helpful when it comes to weight loss, because high protein foods are usually very filling, and protein only contains 4 calories per gram.

What are our protein requirements?

We need to look at the science here, because much of the nutritional information that makes the mainstream comes from supplement companies, who have an agenda to sell you more protein powders!

Instead of looking at what the supplement companies suggest you should be consuming, let’s look at what the nutritionists and scientists are saying. Research published in 2016 by Wu made the following protein intake observations…

Recommended Dietary Allowance of protein for a healthy adult with minimal physical activity is currently 0.8 g protein per kg body weight (BW) per day. To meet the functional needs such as promoting skeletal-muscle protein accretion and physical strength, dietary intake of 1.0, 1.3, and 1.6 g protein per kg BW per day is recommended for individuals with minimal, moderate, and intense physical activity, respectively. Long-term consumption of protein at 2 g per kg BW per day is safe for healthy adults, and the tolerable upper limit is 3.5 g per kg BW per day for well-adapted subjects.

So these suggestions show that the recommended protein intake varies depending on your goals, activity levels and protein intake history. If you are training hard and are looking to build a lot of muscle, you can hit 2g per lb of bodyweight.

If you are generally active, stick to around the 1-1.5g per lb of bodyweight mark.

How much protein exists in popular foods?

Not all protein is created equally, so when a food label says ‘30g protein’ on the back, it doesn’t mean you’re going to get all of that 30g. It depends on the quality of the protein, the way it has been cooked, the source etc.

Here’s a table outlining some protein quality rankings from protein research published in 2004…

You’re looking for two things…

The protein digestibility corrected amino acid score. This is a rounded measure of the quality of the protein. The score is capped at 1.00, so the closer to that figure, the more protein is used by the body.

The net protein utilisation score - this is how much of the administered protein is used by the body. The closer this figure is to 100, the better.

A combination of these will give you the best overall proteins.

If you can eat protein, why supplement with it?

There’s a couple of reasons why people will supplement with protein…

Convenience: It’s far easier to drink your protein straight after the workout than it would be to eat it. You don’t need to warm a protein shake like you would a meal. It can also be consumed much more easily when on the go. It’s easier to drink a protein shake whilst driving that it would be to eat protein in another form.

Protein type: The vast majority of protein sold is whey protein. You can see from the table above how good a protein it is - arguably the best of the lot. However, you’re very unlikely to eat whey, so the best way to consume it is via a supplement.

So, are protein shakes worth taking?

The million dollar question…

A short answer would be yes, absolutely. They’re convenient, they offer additional vitamins and minerals, plus research shows they help with performance, recovery and muscle synthesis. There’s zero doubt in the research whether or not they benefit you by now. The answer is a resounding yes, they do.

However…

You don’t need to take them. If you’re able to consume enough protein in your diet then there’s no absolute need for protein shakes. They’re just really beneficial and easy to consume. If you have the time to eat your protein in food form though, that’s every bit as good. Arguably cheaper too!

Let the AdMac Fitness Personal Trainers help you build muscle!

With personal training studios in South Woodford and Bow, let the best personal trainers in East London help you to build the body you’ve always wanted…

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

Can You Overtrain? Exploring Overtraining Syndrome...

In certain circles, the concept of overtraining has been in constant debate. The two schools of thought are pretty simple - they either say yes, you can over train and there’s a genuine condition as a result. The others argue that it doesn’t exist and that any ‘overtraining syndrome’ can be solved with some extra rest.

In this article we’re going to look at overtraining syndrome (OTS), exploring the research around the condition and seeing what the latest thinking on the subject is…

One of the problems with a condition such as overtraining syndrome is that it’s notoriously difficult to diagnose. The human body is a complex system, so how can we be sure that training is responsible for any perceived over-stress?

The reality is, we can’t. At a physiological level, all stress looks the same. The physical symptoms are the same whether the stress is emotional, financial. physical etc. According to work done by Chu et al on stress, published in 2022, the symptoms of stress essentially look like this…

• High heart rate

• Higher blood pressure

• Increased breathing rate

• Raised stress hormones

• Impaired sleep

• Compromised immunity

• Lower energy levels

When people reportedly suffer from overtraining syndrome, these symptoms are exactly what they’re describing. In fact, look how closely this description matches one from work done on OTS by Kreher and Schwartz in 2012…

OTS appears to be a maladapted response to excessive exercise without adequate rest, resulting in perturbations of multiple body systems (neurologic, endocrinologic, immunologic) coupled with mood changes. Many hypotheses of OTS pathogenesis are reviewed, and a clinical approach to athletes with possible OTS (including history, testing, and prevention) is presented.

The only conclusion we can draw here is that there’s a difficulty in diagnosing training as the problem, when the waters are muddied by the similarities of the symptoms between general stress and training stress.

So does that mean there’s no such thing as OTS? Is it just stress?

No, that’s not necessarily the case. It’s just difficult to diagnose in a complex system. But there are cases when we can make a case for overtraining syndrome being the problem…

Imagine a person who has all of the major wellness boxes ticked. They’re sleeping well, their nutrition is absolutely on point - they’re eating well and their supplementation is effective. They’re sleeping well, not drinking, smoking etc. They have low stress levels. Nothing has changed in their environment - home life great, no financial or work issues. There’s on exception though…

An uptick in training intensity, load and duration.

If that person begins to suffer the effects of overtraining syndrome after 10-12 weeks, then we have to start looking at their training schedule. If there’s nothing else that has changed, or nothing else that is an obvious factor in how they feel, we’ve got to start considering the possibility of overtraining.

We could take a break from training for 7-14 days and see what happens. If the symptoms begin to disappear, the smoking gun is with the training.

Avoiding overtraining - practical tips

We’ve already discussed that the body is a complex system, and all stress looks the same from a physiological point of view. What this means is that your body can’t really tell the difference between stresses. So, if you’re under high stress at work, you’re under stress at home etc, really consider whether or not you should be going super hard in the gym.

Next up, research suggests that a big part of overtraining syndrome is actually an inability to recover sufficiently quickly. So, if you are training particularly hard, you’ll need to up your recovery game at the same rate. That means better nutrition, better sleep, no alcohol etc. Give yourself a chance.

A healthy diet may not be enough. You might have to increase your intake of immune-boosting vitamins and minerals as you train hard. Think multi-vitamins and minerals, vitamin D and fish oil.

Have your exercise programmed for you. By working with a professional personal trainer, they’ll be able to programme an appropriate amount of training for you. The guys at AdMac Fitness are experts in body transformation and have worked with hundreds of clients over the years, using exercise as a tool to improve lives.

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

Getting Ahead Nutritionally - Making Dieting Easier

When people come to AdMac Fitness and they want to lose weight, one of the most important aspects we address with them is their diet.

When it comes to weight loss, there’s absolutely no way around the fact that we have to watch the calorie intake. In order to lose weight, we have to create a calorie deficit. Regardless of the approach we take, this is a non-negotiable for weight loss.

There’s two ways we create a calorie deficit…

1. We consume fewer calories than our body needs

2. We burn additional calories through exercise

Fundamentally, most people understand this. It’s nothing new or groundbreaking in of itself. Here’s the thing though, although dieting may be simple, it isn’t easy. Knowing how to do it is one thing, having the skills, the motivation, the principles and the behaviours in place to manage it are another.

In this article we’re going to share a few little tips to help you stay on track nutritionally. They’ll make your dieting life so much easier, helping you to lose weight like so many of our AdMac Fitness success stories…

So here’s a few simple, practical tips to help you get ahead nutritionally, making dieting and weight loss easier for you to stick to…

Use counter top digital weighing scales for portion control

One of the most common reasons diet fail for people is because they don’t have a good grip over portion control. If you’re going to be counting calories, you have to take the guesswork out of it in order to be accurate. This one cheap, simple introduction into your food prep life is huge. It takes just a few seconds to accurately weigh your food, allowing you to add the calories into your tracker.

I like MyFitnessPal as a calorie tracker and these are the weighing scales I use…

They cost me £13.99 from Amazon and have been an absolute godsend when I’ve been tracking calories. They’re really simple to use, they’re accurate and they take a few seconds to give you the information you need. Without them, tracking calories is so much more difficult.

Stock up on food containers

Taking your own food to places is a way of being in control of what you’re eating. If you’re relying on the options of a canteen, or you don’t know if you are going to have access to good food, you need to be prepared. The best way for that is to meal-prep in advance and take a tuppaware container with you.

Here’s an example of the kind of thing I take to places with me when I’m not sure what I’ll be able to eat when I’m out and about…

It means I know I’ll be able to eat something healthy, and I can control the amount of calories I’ll be consuming when I need to eat.

This approach keeps you consistent, stops you from relying on poor quality options and it means you’ll always have something to hand. If you have enough food containers, you can get ahead and prep a few meals for the week, so you save cooking time throughout days ahead.

Batch cook when possible

One of the best time hacks you can enjoy when it comes to food is batch cooking. This entails cooking a lot more than you need, then dividing it into equal portions of food to use at a later date. Not only does this make your life more convenient, it also allows you to do the calorie counting once, then you don’t need to keep doing it every time you have a meal!

Batch cooking saves so much time, which is important - when you’re in that ‘I can’t be bothered to cook, I’ll just get a takeaway’ mindset you can veer off track quite severely, so by having a healthy option already pre-cooked and all you need to do is heat it up, you can save yourself plenty of money and even more calories!

I tend to roast a lot of vegetables in one go and cook a lot of protein ahead of time. That way you can quickly cook your carbs and within a few minutes, you have a meal ready to go.

Invest in an air fryer

I know it feels as if everyone in the world is banging on about air fryers at the moment, but hear me out. They’re absolutely fantastic - they work quickly and efficiently. They save a bunch of calories and they’re really cheap to run.

This isn’t a case of style over substance at all - they can back up their claims. You can cook meat and vegetables with barely any additional fat, just seasoning. It makes them taste great, and you can cook a whole load of food in one go. Here’s a batch os chicken with salt and pepper seasoning I did. I can then mix this with vegetables, rice or noodles and I’ve got a dish cooked quickly, without any additional fat.

Keep all of the good stuff in your food, without adding much of there bad stuff!

Making dieting easier

There’s no point suggesting that dieting is easy. It’s really not, and no amount of pretending otherwise is going to change that.

However, with a few simple steps, a bit of help and a the discipline to follow these tips, you can make it easier. With the help of the expert personal trainers at AdMac Fitness, you can go the whole way, successfully losing weight in a safe and healthy manner. Our personal trainers in Bow, and our personal trainers in South Woodford are experts at helping guide clients through a weight loss journey.

We’ve successfully done it for years!

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

Easy to Store, Easy to Move Equipment For a Home Gym

The best place to do your strength and hypertrophy training is always the gym. If your gym is well set up, you’re likely to always have the biggest variety of training options, weights, bars, space etc there.

The thing is though, sometimes life gets in the way. Whilst we’d prefer to get in the gym, on occasion time or location might be against us, but that doesn’t mean we can’t or shouldn’t train, we might just have to box clever. It’s a case of use what you can, when you can, as well as you can!

In this article I’m going to share with you a few relatively inexpensive home exercise equipment options. They won’t be expensive, they’re lightweight and easy to store.

This means if you’re stuck for time, or you’re going on a trip (business or pleasure), you can have access to a few different workout options. These items aren’t going to be big and cumbersome - they’re the kind of things you can easily store at home, or chuck in the boot of the car if you’re heading somewhere and will want to train.

What kind of equipment would I need?

Let’s make a few basic assumptions…

Let’s assume you don’t have the space or the budget for a complete home gym set up. Let’s assume you live in a normal sized house or apartment, and the equipment you buy has to be easy to hide when not in use. Let’s assume you can’t put heavy barbells on the floor, or that you don’t have 10 feet of overhead space for training.

Let’s assume the budget is reasonable - less than £200 for everything.

Using those parameters, here’s what I’d be buying for my home training options. The equipment here will allow you to transport your ‘gym’ in the car, hide it in a spare room (or cupboard) and still provide you with a good few training options…

Push Up Parallettes

These are fantastic because they’re well made, they’re versatile and allow for lots of progression. You can use them as a pair of push up handles, you can progress them to levers and even use them as mini hurdles for plyometric exercises. These are the reasons I’d select them over standard push up handles.

Suspension Trainer

When it comes to outright home gym versatility, the suspension trainer is the king of the hill. As long as you buy one with a door anchor, there’s almost no movement or body part that you can’t perform with one of these. They’re excellent and really worth the investment.

Pull Up Bar

One of the more difficult movements to perform at home is a vertical pull, so one of these pull up bars is an excellent addition to a home exercise set up. The pull up bar here is able to protract the door frame, it supports a lot of weight, is easy to put up and take down. Finally, it’s also nice and cheap!

Kettlebell

A kettlebell is a great addition to any exercise set up. You could argue a kettlebell is a whole gym in of itself as well. You can swing it, pull it, squat it, press it, clean it, lunge it etc. There’s not a great deal of movement that you can’t perform with a kettlebell. It has edged out a barbell in this list because of storage, and dumbbells because you can get away with a single one, plus you can do everything with a kettlebell that you could do with a dumbbell, plus more.

Ab Roller

One of the best abdominal exercises is an anti-extension roll out. Not only does this force the abdominals to work hard to prevent the body from collapsing, but it also trains the abdominal muscles eccentrically, which is different from most ab exercises.

Mobile home gym options - why those items made the list

If you can’t make the gym, then don’t try to replicate it at home - you won’t be able to. Instead, try to do things differently. You can max out bodyweight work with these items - the suspension trainer is a whole body workout in one.

The kettlebell adds an element of resistance, plus it gives a huge amount of workout versatility. When you’re done, just hide it in a cupboard or behind a stair! It’s easy enough to do.

The pull up bar and parallettes can be combined for an excellent all body workout. One of my go-to lockdown workouts was this…

• 3 air squats

• 2 pull ups

• 1 push up

I repeated this 100 times, meaning I did a 600 rep workout and covered my whole body. It was super tough, super effective and didn’t take up any room at all.

Don’t over-complicate your home exercise options. You’re not going to improve on the gym, so don’t try to. Instead, do things a little differently. Use the instability of the suspension trainer to challenge your abs. Go high rep with your exercises. Mix things into interesting circuits.

It’s a stop gap. Don’t spend crazy money, just get the basics and when you can, get into the gym to get your higher weight workout done!

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

Weight Loss Isn't Linear! Don't Expect it to be!

Given the time of writing, there’ll be a lot of people reading this who are either dieting, have recently dieted or about to start trying to lose weight.

If you’ve got some recent experience of weight loss, you may have noticed the fluctuations on the scales. Some weeks you might have lost a lot of weight. Other weeks you might have stayed the same. On some weeks you may have even gained weight, even though you’ve stuck to your calorie and activity targets.

If you don’t know what’s going on, this can destroy your confidence in the process, or make you as what’s the point of it all?

I’ve got some news for you…

THIS IS TOTALLY NORMAL. YOUR SCALE WEIGHT WILL FLUCTUATE DURING WEIGHT LOSS. IT’S NOT A LINEAR PROCESS - DON’T EXPECT IT TO BE!

Your body is an incredibly complex machine, and at any one moment there are millions of physiological processes occurring simultaneously. These processes produce waste products, sometimes they consume a lot of energy, water, etc.

All of these things can have an impact on your weight, irrespective of calorie consumption.

There was a research study performed in 2020 titled ‘Weekly, seasonal and holiday body weight fluctuation patterns among individuals engaged in a European multi-centre behavioural weight loss maintenance intervention’ by Turrichi et al.

They found that even during a calorie-controlled study (meaning there’s no calorie-driven reason for weight gain), the participant’s weight fluctuated by 0.35 - 1.35%. For perspective, that means if somebody weighed 210lbs (15 stone), their weight would sometimes fluctuate between just over half a pound, and 3lbs - this is in people who are calorie controlled.

Body weight fluctuations under ‘normal’ conditions are even more severe. We have a great study that examined this. A 2017 study called ‘Composition of two‐week change in body weight under unrestricted free‐living conditions’ was carried out by Bhutan et al.

They found that a within-week bodyweight fluctuation of 2.2–4.4 pounds was normal.

Why does our bodyweight fluctuate?

There are a lot of reasons why bodyweight fluctuates… Food intake, fluid intake, medicines, supplements, hormonal changes, temperature etc. There’s more than just one.

Assuming everything else is ‘normal’ - no medication, no obvious hormonal changes, no medication etc, it’s likely to be water intake. Water is responsible for a lot of bodyweight change - water retention or loss can see your bodyweight change by up to 10lbs in a week, depending on the severity of the condition.

Here’s a few elements that can positively or negatively effect water retention…

• Dehydration: When a person does not drink enough water, their body stores water to prevent dehydration. Drink until your urine is clear - that’s the best hydration advice.

• Sodium intake: Too much salt can lead to water retention and weight gain. You need salt for muscle contraction, but not too much. If you exercise and sweat a lot, you do need to replace lost salts.

• Glycogen storage: The body turns carbohydrates from food into glycogen molecules. The body stores excess glycogen in the muscles, liver, and fat cells. Low carb intake reduces the glycogen stores, which sees dramatic weight loss from water removal.

• Exercise: When you’ve exercised, you’ll have sweated out a lot of water (if you’ve trained especially hard). This will need replacing, so don’t be surprised if in the short term you gain a couple of pounds.

These 4 reasons can occur irrespective of the amount of calories you’ve consumed. So, if you’ve had a great week, hitting you protein target, your calorie target and your activity target, but have still gained weight, don’t worry about it! There could be other reasons.

Does the weight come off?

Absolutely!

What we’re interested in is the trend of weight loss, not the micro fluctuations.

Say for example you start the month weighing 200lbs, but you end the month weighing 190, we’re happy.

Whether that weight loss occurs at a steady rate, or you lose weight in week 1, gain in week 2, gain in week 3 but lose a lot in week 4 - it doesn’t matter. As long as the long term trend is downwards, the day-to-day isn’t important.

Just keep hitting your calorie targets and activity targets, then the rest will look after itself.

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD

What are You Training for? How Personal Training helps you Achieve Your Fitness Goals

When many people first start training, they look at a magazine such as Men’s/Women’s Fitness for inspiration. They might look at instagram or YouTube, or perhaps they’ll ask a gym-going friend for advice. The problem with this approach is a simple one… There’s no guarantee that these approaches align with your goals!

All of the hard work in the world is great, but if it’s in the wrong direction it’s not going to help you. And that is the problem with taking the wrong advice, whether that’s from a magazine, an influencer, a TV show etc. All of your efforts should be taking you closer to a goal.

Imagine you have the goal of losing weight, but you’re following a program designed for powerlifters. You’ll get stronger, but you probably won’t shift an ounce on the scales!

It’s one of the (many) reasons that personal training is so effective. Your workouts and your wider actions are structured around your goals. You are guided by a professional trainer who doesn’t just listen to what you want to achieve, but actually designs a programme around helping you to achieve those goals.

At AdMac Fitness we have personal trainers in Bow, and personal trainers in South Woodford. Our team at experts in designing training programmes that help you to achieve your health and fitness goals. From the consultation to the program design, then into the implementation we’ve got your back.

Our personal training studio in Bow has been established for years, and our personal training team consists of a variety of experts with different approaches. This is important too, because not all people have the same goal. Individual targets need an individual approach.

Most people would like to lose weight, but there are also lots of people who want the opposite - they want to build muscle and gain strength. Some people want to be able to run faster and further. We can’t train these people the exact same way, when they have opposing goals.

The point is, experienced personal trainers treat each client as an individual. There are not going to share generic programmes designed for the masses with you. Sure, there might be similarities between exercises and movement patterns, but overall your personal trainer will make sure it’s suitable for you and your goals. It’s their job to help you reach your targets in the safest and most effective way.

The reason we have so many fantastic transformations and goal achievements is because we train people the way need to be trained. Check out the examples below. These two clients had completely different goals, so their training had to follow a different path - by not following a generic programme, they achieved great results…

AdMac Fitness offers Personal training in Bow and Personal training in South Woodford

Across our personal training studio in Bow, and our personal training studio in South Woodford we can offer completely different experiences.

In our Bow HQ, we can work with anyone from individuals to small groups. We have a fully equipped private personal training studio, with access to outside space if we need the extra room. Operating from the Bow PT studio, we have built a reputation for delivering expert personal training, changing thousands of lives over the years.

Our new personal training studio is in South Woodford. We wanted to offer something new to London personal training here, so went in a different direction. I’ll explain…

Many of our clients live a frantic life. Long working hours, rushing for tubes, constantly on the end of a phone, incredibly busy and almost no time to think, let alone do anything for themselves. (It might sound familiar to you reading this actually!)

To combat this, we wanted to create the antidote. A sanctuary where for an hour of your day, you focus on you, and you alone. The AdMac Fitness South Woodford personal training studio is designed to be your place away from the busyness of the outside world. Your phone won’t distract you, your emails won’t be pinging and you can create your own training environment - your own music, make as much noise as you like!

It’s just you and your personal trainer in there…

If you want to change your body, your health and your life, AdMac Fitness is the place to go…

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels.

These aren’t flippant claims - we mean what we say. In a world as competitive as personal training, if you’re not very good you get found out quickly. We’ve stood the test of time - we’ve been in business for years, we survived the pandemic and we are going from strength to strength (literally and figuratively), helping the people of east London get fitter with our personal training approach.

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

The 30 Minute Workout - What are the Options?

One of the biggest misconceptions in fitness is that a short workout isn’t effective. In fact, let’s go bigger than that. It’s that unless you aren’t getting an hour or more in the gym, it’s not going to do anything.

As personal trainers, we find that absolutely laughable!

Sure, a personal training session at AdMac Fitness is an hour, but that’s because we’re doing this professionally, and people have the luxury of time when they come to see us. By booking a personal training session, they’ve allowed themselves the time to do things optimally.

But life isn’t always like that. We’re busy, and sometimes you don’t get an hour to train. So with that in mind, we’re going to look at different 30 minute workout options. We’ll put together workouts that will maximise the effectiveness of you workout time.

We’ll cover different fitness goals as well, so no goal is left ignored…

When general fitness is the goal…

Here you’ve got to optimise for ticking several boxes - you need a strength element and a cardio element. They way to combine these is with a weights-based high intensity interval training approach. You can get creative with the approach…

30 Seconds Work, 30 Seconds Rest x 5

1. Kettlebell Swings

2. Push Ups

3. Bent Over Kettlebell Rows

4. Kettlebell Push Press

5. Kettlebell Front Squats

6. Swiss Ball Plank

These 6 exercises, each performed for 5 minutes will give you a whole body workout in bang on 30 minutes. The intensity will be high enough to get your heart pumping and give you a great strength training workout.

Here’s another workout, this time with a barbell…

Perform 10 reps of each exercise, then rest for 2 minutes and repeat. Do as many rounds as you can in 30 minutes…

1. Deadlifts

2. Power cleans

3. Front squats

4. Push press

5. Bent over rows

6. Lunges

This will hit every muscle in the body, you can time cap it at 30 minutes and it’ll get the heart pumping fast! You’ll enjoy a lot of calorie burn in a short period of time.

When strength is the goal…

Here you’ve got to go a bit more route 1 - think simplicity, think heavy, think whole body. That’s the approach I’d be taking. Give this a go…

5 minute cardio warm up, in a way that uses the whole body. Think rower, cross trainer, air bike etc.

1. 5 x 5 Squats

2. 5 x 5 Bench press

3. 5 x 5 Deadlift

Go hard, go heavy, just be careful.

If you’re less of a powerlifter and more of an all-rounder, I’d be looking at something like this…

1. 3 x 6 Incline dumbbell bench press

2. 3 x 6 Chest supported dumbbell rows

3. 3 x 6 Dumbbell shoulder press

4. 3 x 6 (per side) Bulgarian split squats

In these two workouts you’ve hit your whole body and still have time to get yourself back to work! Perfect way to get strong in a short period of time.

When cardio is the goal…

Here you’ve got a lot more freedom. You can hit a good half hour run - that’s easy enough. If you’re after something a little more creative, here’s a few approaches…

Talke a cardio machine of your choice. I like a whole body machine such as a rower or air bike ideally.

• 30 seconds gentle pace

• 20 seconds fast pace

• 10 seconds flat-out pace

Done in that exact order, for 30 minutes in a row. The short time goals means the 30 minutes flies by really quickly.

Another one I like goes like this…

Set the treadmill at a running pace you can cope with relatively easily. Something that raises your heart rate, but you could maintain for a long time if needed.

Every 30 seconds, put the incline up by 0.5%. It’ll take you 15 minutes to reach 15% incline (if you can make it that far). Once you’ve reached your maximum (whatever incline that may be), take it to 0% and start again.

Your 30 minute workout options - final thoughts

I’ve just given you 6 different workout ideas, covering general fitness, strength training and cardio training. All of them are a really simple set up, easy to execute and are brilliantly effective.

Next time you think you there’s no point in hitting the gym because you’ll only have 30 minutes, give one of them a go and see how you feel. I can promise you that you’ll be glad you trained when you feel the effects of them! Short workouts can be great, you’ve just got to do them right.

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

How do we Optimise Training for Muscle Growth?

When it comes to muscle growth there’s a lot of myths that do the rounds. From the type of workout routines to follow, the amount of weight you need to lift, the reps you to need to hit, the days of the week you train.

The reality is, there’s not a one-size-fits all answer.

You can build muscle a whole load of different ways, using different exercises, different weights and different workouts. One thing remains important though - the amount of training you do. If you train too little, you’re absolutely not going to build any muscle at all.

If you train too much, you’re likely to overtrain and not be able to recover in time. That will also impact your muscle growth.

In today’s article we’re going to look at how to optimise training order to grow muscle. We’ll look at the research and try to establish an optimal approach to training for muscle growth. Any recommendations we make are going to be evidence-based and not opinion-based.

Maximising hypertrophy - what we know

When it comes to maximising hypertrophy (muscle growth), there’s a few things we know for sure. For a start, we know that we need to create a mechanical tension and metabolic stress.

In English, this means we have to get the muscles to work hard - this is mechanical tension element. When the muscles have worked sufficiently hard enough, it creates a metabolic stress. This is the chemical response by the muscles to dwindling energy levels. It sets into motion the physiological processes we need to build muscle.

Put simply - to create metabolic stress, you need to work hard by creating mechanical tension (lifting weights). Metabolic stress then forces the muscles to grow and adapt to these challenges, making them bigger and stronger.

The longer this process goes on for, the bigger the effects. That’s why you can’t just do a couple of workouts and turn into the hulk.

We also know that the mass of the weights lifted aren’t as important for muscle hypertrophy as first thought. It was once believed that in order to grow muscle we needed to lift weights that fatigued us in the 8-12 rep mark. Whilst research suggests that might be optimal for muscle growth, it’s not the only way.

Grgic performed a meta analysis on 2020 titled ‘The Effects of Low-Load Vs. High-Load Resistance Training on Muscle Fiber Hypertrophy’.

He concluded…

‘In this meta-analysis, there were no significant differences between low-load and high-load resistance training on hypertrophy of type I or type II muscle fibers.’

How much training do we need to do for muscle growth?

When this topic was studied by Schoenfeld et al in 2016, they concluded that there was a definite relationship between volume and muscle growth. Their research suggested…

‘Outcomes for weekly sets as a continuous variable showed a significant effect of volume on changes in muscle size. Each additional set was associated with an increase in effect size of 0.023 corresponding to an increase in the percentage gain by 0.37%.’

This means that you always benefit from more sets. Volume appears to trump weight, exercises, joint angles etc when it comes to hypertrophy. As long is the volume is appropriate to the load lifted (lighter weights need longer sets etc), it’s the most important variable of the muscle building game.

The caveat here though is that you’ve got to be able to recover from them. If you’re not recovered, you’re not able to give your all in the session.

If we go back to the rules we established at the start of the article - that mechanical tension and metabolic stress need to be present to build muscle - our ability to create mechanical tension and metabolic stress is severely impacted when we’re fatigued.

Optimising training for muscle growth… Our Suggestions

Based on the lessons we’ve learned from the research, here’s a few points on how we can optimise training for muscle growth…

Always prioritise volume

The research is clear - when it comes to building muscle, volume matters more than weight. You can build muscle with any level of weight, as long as you are hitting the correct amount of volume. If you were shooting for muscle building, I’d be hitting 5 sets of 8-12 per body part in a workout.

All-body workouts

Following on from the last point, if you’re trying to build serious muscle, you can’t rely on hitting. body part once per week. Forget a body-part split, especially if you’re a beginner. Instead, hit whole-body workouts, or an upper-lower split.

Get plenty of protein

The metabolic stress puts the physiological processes of muscle building in place, but they need the raw materials to build muscle. If you don’t have enough protein in your diet, it’s going to be very difficult to add muscle. Hit at least 1g of protein per pound of body weight.

If you need help building muscle, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

Social Support and Fitness Goal Achievement - Why it Works

There’s an old quote that’s attributed to Jim Rohn that says ‘“You’re the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with.”

The subtext here is that we take our behaviours from the people around us. We bend our habits to the company we keep, essentially. We can even dig a little deeper on this when it comes to health and fitness, because the evidence is all around us.

Think of fitness and weight loss groups and you’ll see what I mean…

Weight Watchers and slimming world are communities, and they help people to lose weight not because of their dietary advice - you can find that anywhere. In fact, you can find better advice.

No. They work because of the community. It’s a group setting, and there’s an element of public ‘shame’ if you don’t achieve the goals you’ve set for yourself. You’re being publicly weighed every week, so it’s an external motivator that keeps you sticking to the diet.

Whether you agree with the concept or not, the evidence shows it works…

A study by Borek et al published in 2018 looked at ‘Group-Based Diet and Physical Activity Weight-Loss Interventions: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Randomised Controlled Trials’.

They concluded that… Diet and physical activity interventions delivered in groups are effective in promoting clinically meaningful weight loss at 12 months.

This is interesting because there’s a commonly-held belief that diets don’t work for the long term. However, a 12 month success story is impressive, especially in a world where a lot of people give up on their goals after a couple of weeks (or less) in most cases.

What does this have to do with me?

If you want to lose weight, improve your fitness, get healthier etc, you have to engage in a community where those behaviours are not only present, but they’re expected of you.

If you don’t have access to a community of like-minded people, you have to create it yourself. The quickest and most effective way to create that weight loss or fitness improvement community is to work with a personal trainer. Not only do you share the core elements of what makes group and community projects work (being weighed in front of someone, expected behaviours, an approach to follow), you also have it personalised to your needs and capabilities.

A personal trainer works with you to create a training program that will align with your goals.

If you don’t stick to the expected behaviours, there’s no hiding from the lack of results you’ll get. Your personal trainer will be assessing the results and the outcomes every few weeks, so you’ll be given constant feedback.

There’s also support, and that’s invaluable.

There’s an assumption that personal training is all stick and no carrot, so to speak. That your personal trainer will approach your weight loss by criticising wrong moves etc. That’s absolutely not there case.

Yes, your personal trainer has to hold you to account - that’s their job. But they’re also there to (in part at least) be a cheerleader. To encourage and motivate you to do things you didn’t think you could. To push yourself further and harder than you otherwise would yourself.

That’s the AdMac Fitness approach, and it’s part of the reason we have so many fantastic transformations across our personal training studios in Bow and South Woodford…

Personal Training in Bow and South Woodford

The AdMac Fitness personal trainers are experts in weight loss and fitness improvement. Across our years in business, we’ve worked with every kind of personal training client. From those who are terrified and need all the help we can give, to those who know what to do, they just need a kick up the backside to make it happen!

We can offer a private personal training studio in which to train as well.

Our Bow personal training studio is our longest-running personal training base. Here we offer personal training and group exercise to help you get in the best shape of your life. It’s not open to the public, only personal training clients of AdMac Fitness. It means you’ll never have to wait around for equipment!

If privacy is your thing, our personal training studio is South Woodford is perfect for you. It’s a single-person studio, so it’ll only be you and your personal trainer in there. You can create the personal training environment you want - control over your music, be as loud as you want to etc! It’s PURE privacy!

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.

Cold Exposure - What's the Score?

Recently you may have seen people getting into freezing cold water and posting it all over social media. You may have also seen Wim Hof on the BBC last year, getting a bunch of celebrities to endure cold showers, jump into icy lakes and swim under the water.

So what’s it all about? What’s going on?!

It’s the latest health and wellness craze. Over the years we’ve been through a bunch of them in the fitness industry. A few years ago it was the Atkins diet, then we had juicing. Next up it was Stoicism and now we’ve moved onto cold water exposure.

Like all kinds of things in fitness, there’s a bit of research that comes out, then a handful of influential people start to do it. The idea will spread, more people will start to do it, then the originals start to sell products on the back of it. It’s a rinse and repeat model that makes a handful of people a lot of money.

So is that what’s going on here? Let’s take a look…

Cold exposure and health - a quick history

The idea of using cold for therapeutic benefit is nothing new at all. We’ve been using cold on injuries for literally decades. The idea behind this cold use is to reduce inflammation in acute injuries. That’s why we see ice packs, freeze sprays etc in the physio bag.

We’re also aware of cold exposure following intense bouts of exercise. Images of athletes jumping into an ice bath after competition to speed up recovery are nothing new…

Interestingly, despite this being a common post-exercise practice, there’s surprisingly little rock-solid research to back up its use. It’s not to say it doesn’t do anything, it’s just that there’s probably more effective, more convenient and less uncomfortable ways to speed your recovery!

So if the research isn’t there for a post-exercise cold immersion, why do people still do it? What are the claimed benefits of cold exposure?

Why are people jumping in cold water?

The main benefits appear to centre around wellness. Here’s a snapshot of some of the overarching claims as to the efficacy of the practice…

There’s a psychological argument - that overcoming adversity has psychological benefits. It can help people to overcome fears, to face difficult situations, to push themselves physically and mentally, which has other benefits. Anecdotally, it appears to be a solid link. Lots of people self-report feeling psychologically better thanks to cold exposure.

The research here is limited, but interestingly it does show promise. A study involving cold showers shows that it can help people with depressive symptoms, but the researchers do say that the sample size was small, and the topic needs more investigation. It’s certainly showing promise though.

Fat loss is a benefit… This is an interesting one. Essentially humans have several types of fat. The most common one we know is ‘white fat’ - the stored energy that we associate with being overweight. There’s also a type of fat known as ‘brown fat’.

Brown fat burns chemical energy to create heat and help maintain body temperature. Researchers have previously shown that, in response to cold, white fat cells in both animals and humans take on characteristics of brown fat cells. This means cold exposure can actually help us to burn more fat, and the research appears to support this - as long as the cold exposure is long term and consistent. You can’t just do a single ice bath and then turn your body into a fat-burning furnace!

Circulatory benefits… There is some evidence that the contrast element of cold exposure and the subsequent return to normal body temperature helps with circulation. There’s lots of anecdotal research as well that supports this.

There are lots of people on social media reporting that cold exposure has helped to improve their circulation and in some cases, cure them of persistent Reynaud’s syndrome. Whether or not that can be applied to the masses is another matter, but it may be the case in future as more studies are done.

A warning…

If yo decide to give cold exposure a go, do so knowing there are risks you need to mitigate. Build top your tolerance over time. Don’t do anything stupid like jumping into icy lakes. Start with cold showers for 20 seconds and build up.

If you decide to carry on, buy an ice bath to use outside. A cheaper and just as effective way is to buy an extra wheelie bin from the council, fill it with cold water and use that!

Just be safe. Health first, pushing limits comes second.

Cold exposure - should you?!

Here’s what we know so far… there are lots of potential benefits to regular cold exposure. The research is in its infancy, but there is definite promise.

Whether or not all of the claims made by enthusiasts are going to prove true is a different matter.

That being said, there’s a lot of benefit in challenging yourself, expanding your capacity and your capabilities. If you’re doing it because you want to develop your mental toughness, or prove what you’re capable of, go for it.

If you are struggling with your mental health, there’s a solid case for using cold exposure. It appears to be excellent for this purpose.

If you are doing it for fat loss, for muscle recovery or for blood circulation, there are more effective and less uncomfortable ways of boosting those! The effects are there, but they’re not as powerful as other approaches we already have available to us!

If you want help with your health, AdMac Fitness is the place to go!

We help people using tried and tested fitness approaches. Our expert team of personal trainers, based in both Bow and South Woodford can help you get a grip of your health and fitness. With our guidance you can see your health and fitness reach new levels!

For more information on who we are, what we do and how we can help you achieve your health and fitness goals, contact us on… 07921465108 or email us at admacfitness@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!

Our locations are…

AdMac Fitness Bow: Arch 457 Robeson St, London E3 4JA

AdMac Fitness South Woodford: Unit 4 Marlborough Business Centre, 96 George Lane, South Woodford, London, E18 1AD.