My Top 5 tips to looking great in that 'little black dress'

It's the party season and it's that time of year when ladies dust down their 'little black dresses' and attend those festive parties. However shock horror, you may not feel that confident as you've gained a few pounds since last year and you haven't stepped foot into a gym or dance studio for some time. But don't despair, there's still time to look great in that 'little black dress'. 1). Do squats-This exercise is the king of butt exercises, as it works all the muscles of the butt, making it more toned and uplifted. Not only that it hits the muscles in the legs too, so you can get toned legs at the same time doing just one exercise! Try doing 2 sets of 15-20 reps with or without weights and build up to 5 sets, with a 30 seconds rest in between. 2). Dead lifts-use either a bar-bell or dumbells, this works the lower back, glutes and hamstrings. Ensure you have a slight bend in your knees and slowly and with control bend at the hips, lengthening the spine and keeping the weights close to your body and go down as far as you can, breathing in. Breath out and keep your stomach muscles tight as you slowly return to a standing position. Do 2 sets of 15-20 reps and build up to 3 -5 sets. 3.) Plank-this Pilates exercise works the core muscles, helping to strengthen and tone the stomach muscles. Lay prone on the floor and lift yourself off the floor having your forearms supporting you and on the balls of your feet. Ensure you draw your belly button towards your spine, keep your stomach tight and remember to breath. Ensure your shoulders, hips, knees and ankles are in alignment. To make it easier rest one or both knees on the floor. Do 3 sets of 10 - 20 seconds. Progression will be increase the time spent in plank. 4). Push ups- If squats is the King of the lower body then this is the King of the upper body. This exercise hits the chest but also helps tone the shoulders and triceps. Who doesn't want toned and honed shoulders and arms when wearing that strapless dress. There are various levels the easier one is on your knees with your hips forward and in line with your shoulders. Hands are one and a half shoulder widths apart and hands are inline with the chest. Harder version is the same position but off your knees. The shoulders, hips, knees and ankles should be inline. Bend your arms until they are at a 90 degree angle, with elbows in line with shoulders and sticking out to the sides, then with control push yourself back up, ensuring you don't lock out your elbows and keeping your body in alignment. Aim to do 2 sets of 6-10 reps and progress to 15-20 reps of 3 sets as you get stronger. 5). Stand up straighter- posture is really important and if you ensure that your ears, shoulders, hips, knees are in alignment than you will instantly look slimmer and the bonus is that if your posture is good, there's less strain on your lower spine, therefore less chance of getting back pain. Try doing a mini circuit incorporating these exercises. Do them in this order:- Squats, Push ups, Dead lifts and planks. Do all exercises back to back and rest for 30 seconds before doing again. Do 3-4 circuits in total. Doing the exercises in a continuous pattern will help keep the heart rate up and burn body fat as it becomes an aerobic exercise. Try adding a sprint on the spot for 30 seconds as well to get your heart rate up even more and burn some extra body fat.

Activity Levels in Mums and their Children 'directly linked'.

Recent research conducted from Cambridge and Southampton universities have discovered that the more active a mother is, the more physically active her child is. The study examined 500 mums and their 4 year old children. They wore heart-rate monitors to measure their activity levels over a 7 day period. The research also discovered that many of these mothers' exercise levels fell way below the recommended levels and factors such as if they had a job and whether the child had any siblings, influenced the mother's activity levels. The researchers concluded that parents have an important role to play in developing healthy exercise habits early on in life and the more activity a mother did, the more active her child would be and it was likely that activity in one of the pair influenced activity in the other. The study also discovered that for every minute of moderate-to-vigorous activity a mother engaged in, her child was more likely to engage in 10% more of the same level of activity and for every hour that a mother was sedentary than their children would be sedentary for nearly 11 minutes.

How much exercise will you have to do to burn off that Big Mac?

Everything we eat consists of a certain amount of calories and each item of food contains different amounts. Depending on what type of food it is and how it is cooked decides how many calories each one contains. Our bodies need a certain amount of calories a day, on average men need 2,500 and women 2,000. If you exercise a lot you may find you need to consume more then this, however if you consume too much then what the body needs, then these extra calories will be converted into fat and stored. A lot of junk food 'restaurants' are now showing customers how many calories are in each of their foods, so customers can make an informed choice and hopefully start to think that these types of foods should be eaten sparingly instead of being a main part of the staple diet. Here I present a selection of some of our nation's favourite foods, how many calories they contain and also more importantly how much time needed to exercise to burn such meals off. Full English breakfast (698 calories) - you will need to walk the dog for 3 hrs 41 mins or swim for 2 hrs, 2 mins to convert these calories to energy. Fancy that bacon sandwich? Or McDonald's egg Mcmuffin that will be 280 and 290 calories respectively and you will need to swim for the best part of an hour to burn it all off! Fancy having a Gregg's steak bake for lunch? That's another 420 added to your daily calorie intake and you will have to do nearly 2 hours of gardening or 2 hrs, 13 mins, walking the dog. A pepperoni pizza will be 970 calories, that's the best part of half the total daily amount of calories for a woman! You're need to do 5 hrs , 7 mins of walking that dog or nearly 3 hrs of swimming to avoid it adding to those hips. Fancy a pint, than that will be 200 for a bitter and 158 for a shot of Jaegerbomb, have a few of those ....and you can do the math on how much exercise you will have to do to avoid storing these empty calories as fat....a hell of a lot! Of course all that drinking will make you hungry again and you will need to get yourself a take-away. That KFC box will set you back a whopping 1080, that includes the diet coke and you will have to do just over 3 hrs of swimming or 5 hrs , 40 mins walking that dog again. The classic Donner Kebab that will be 642 and will need 1 hr, 52 mins of swimming to burn off. Oh and that Big Mac, that contains 492 calories and that's before you add the milkshake(490) and large fries (510), that's a gut busting 1,492 calories! To burn that lot off you'll need to walk for 6 hours or cover 9.5 miles! These types of food are ok in moderation and can be part of a well balanced diet but as you can see if these foods are consumed too often than those calories will soon add up and get out of control and the only direction they will be heading for will be on you as fat! Food for thought?

Seven Life Habits To Help You Live Longer

Back in April 2012, Lester Breslow, died at the age of 97. He was a distinguished public health doctor who in 1965 published the results of a study of 6,928 adults in California. It showed that the length of life was dependent on seven life habits. The fewer an adult followed the shorter their life expectancy was. The seven life habits were: Moderate consumption of alcohol, no smoking, regular exercise, 7 - 8 hours of sleep per night, maintenance of a normal body weight (BMI 18-24) by eating moderately and regularly and regular consumption of breakfast. This is a good check list to look at and decide if the lifestyle you are following needs improving if you want to stand the best chance of living longer and maintaining a good quality of life in your older years. How many do you follow?

Stressed Parents = Fat Kids

According to recent research by Dr Elizabeth Prout-Parks, a physician nutrition specialist at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, found a connection between parent-perceived stress and more frequent fast food consumption by the family. She and her fellow authors have speculated that stressed parents may be buying more junk food to save time or reducing the demands of meal preparation. They also pointed out that children of stressed parents may result in less supervision, who may than go on to make unhealthy food and activity choices. The World Health Organization (WHO) regards childhood obesity as one of the most serious global public health challenges for the 21st century. According to the latest available figures 2012/13, 19% of 10-11 year olds, were obese and 14.4% were overweight. Reception (4-5 year olds), 9.3% were obese and 13% were found to be overweight. This means almost a third of 10-11 year olds and over a fifth of 4-5 year olds were obese or overweight. In order for parents to avoid this trap and your children becoming a statistic, than planning ahead is essential. Fast food can be expensive and is high in saturated fats, salt and sugar and often low in protein, vitamins and minerals. Why don't you cook more food when you have the time and freeze the extra. In that way when you're rushed you only have to take the food out of the freezer and reheat it. This food would be much more nutritious and healthy. Foods such as cous cous, pasta, rice, stir-fries, vegetables, pulses and fruit are both quick and nutritious and can be a staple of your family's diet.

The XXX Factors for Building Muscle (Part 3)

In the last of my series on the top 3 X factors that I believe are the most important in helping to build muscle, the final piece of the jigsaw is arguably the most vital but is often the most over looked. The final X factor is nutrition. It's no good doing varied and intense work outs, allowing time for each muscle to recover fully before challenging them again, if the fuel you are consuming to help build them is not enough and/or is the wrong type of food. The body in order to repair the muscles that have been damaged during work outs, need Protein to help rebuild them and increase their size. The main source of protein comes from animal and diary products, such as chicken, meat, fish, cheese, eggs, butter and milk. They can also be found in non-animal products such as pulses, tofu, textured value protein, seeds and nuts but you have to consume a lot more in order to gain the same amount that you would get from animal sources. A lot of people prefer to now use protein shakes as they can be more convenient and you can consume a lot more protein in one go, rather than struggling to consume the same amount from chicken and eggs. Herbalife has recently brought out a whole new range of products to help both professional and keen athletes and sports people. The 24 range includes a pumped up version of Herbalife's leading protein shake, which is the world's number one meal replacement product, the Formula 1 shake. This shake is called Formula 1 Sport and contains Whey protein rather than soya, as it is transported quicker into the muscles, as its the body's preferred source of protein. It also has a unique blend of carbohydrate-protein and fibre with essential vitamins and minerals that the body needs to repair itself fully. This comes in Vanilla Cream flavour and so lends itself well to adding other ingredients to it such as fruit or peanut butter to add further vitamins, fibre or protein. I would recommend consuming this after a work out, as this is when your body needs it the most. In addition to this you can have it as a snack between meals to help top up your protein needs. In the 24 range there is also the more advanced protein shake for those who are serious about packing on the muscle. Called Rebuild Strength, this is a high protein recovery shake that you consume after training. Packed with 25g of high quality whey protein and comes in a tasty chocolate flavour. Unlike a lot of other inferior protein shakes, there are no artificial colours, flavours or sweeteners in this product. Herbalife also believes in the policy of 'from seed to feed', meaning that unlike a lot of cheaper protein shakes that can have other companies involved during the development stages, Herbalife uses no outside companies and vigorously checks the product at each key stage of development in order to ensure that it contains the highest level of quality of ingredients and is fully in control of what goes into each product. Also professional sports people who can get tested for performance enhancing drugs can be reassured that every product from every batch produced in the 24 range are screened for prohibited substances by an independent 3rd party. Water is also important for our bodies, as we are made up of about 70% of water and is used to help transport nutrients to cells and get rid of waste products. In order to function at our best we need to consume at least 2.5 litres per day, even more if we are working out or in a hot environment.

The XXX Factors on building muscle (Part 2)

On my last blog I covered how important it was to up the intensity of your work out in order to stimulate the muscle enough to grow. If the muscle isn't placed under pressure, there's no reason for it to build more muscle fibres, to perform the task its asked to do, as it can already do it with the fibres it already has! In Part 2 I will be explaining the 2nd X Factor:- Rest & work out variation - how many times have you seen a really skinny guy in the gym throwing around weights and he seems to be in there all the time, 24-7 and he doesn't look any different from when he started a year ago! In fact he looks like he's putting on body fat rather than muscle! Why is this? What is going on? You would think if he is battering his body day in and day out he should be packing on lean, mean muscle and looking like a champion body builder and not a skinny weakling! It's the fact that muscle growth doesn't occur during your time in the gym but the magic happens once you leave that gym and start resting. When the body is resting and has been given adequate nutrition (more on this later)than the muscle fibres which have been ripped down during the work out can be mended and made bigger (hypertrophy). However if you're constantly working out in the gym, like that skinny guy, with the increasing swelling belly than all you're doing is ripping down the muscle and not allowing enough time for it to mend before ripping it down again. Over a period of time the muscle in fact becomes smaller and as the body only has enough energy stores for 1 to 1.5 hours per session, if you continue past this point your body will strip down the muscle to continue the work out (catabolism). This is something you don't want, as muscle mass burns more calories at rest compared with fat and this helps to keep your metabolism up and if your body starts to strip this away and leaves the fat, your body composition starts to change and your metabolism will slow down as fat% increases and muscle % decreases- not a good look! You must get plenty of sleep, at least 8 hours, as this is the time when the muscles start to rebuild and recover. This is also when testosterone and Human Growth Hormone (HGH)is produced, the hormones that help muscle growth. You must factor in rest days at least 1 day of total rest per week and split your fitness work outs in order to allow 48 hours rest of each muscle, before training them again. E.g on Monday do chest but don't do chest again until at least Wednesday, so do back or legs on Tuesday instead. Try to vary the work outs so you have heavy and lighter training days in order to help the body to recover and avoid over training. The other thing to avoid is continuing doing the same old fitness programme for months, maybe even years! The body adapts to exercise extremely quickly, so in order to continue packing on the muscle you must change your programme about every 6 weeks so you keep the body guessing and avoid plateauing. Also during each session mix up the order you do each exercise. If you always start with the bench press then start with chest flyes or pullovers instead, to keep the body guessing and make each session feel different, so each visit to the gym feels fresh for both mind and body. I leave the last word about keeping the body guessing to keep growing to arguably the most successful and influential body builder of all time, Mr Arnold Schwarzenegger, "Your muscles tend to become complacent and resist growth if you are constantly doing the same workout for them. But if you try all different types of training methods, exercises, weights, set-rep combinations and training tempos, you keep the muscles off balance. They sort of say to themselves, ‘Wow, there’s a new thing here. He just did 10 sets of 20 reps, and the next workout he’ll do 20 sets of five reps. I’ll never get used to this. I can never build up a resistance to the training, so I guess I’ll have to grow!’”