Tag: DIET

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Comprehensive Weight Loss Plan Tips

Maintaining a healthy weight can be tough, especially during this time of buffets and giant-portion-sized meals. A lot of people, who have tried and failed with their weight loss plans, don’t believe diets work for them. They are probably right in a sense. Traditional diets don’t work in the long term. There’s a need to have a weight loss plan that incorporates a diet plan as well as a good exercise routine. It is one way to avoid the common dieting drawbacks and get a more lasting weight loss success

In order to control your weight, you just need to do some balancing in your life. If you consume a lot of calories than you burn, then, you will gain weight. If you eat fewer calories than, the amount you burn then you reduce weight

Around 3,500 calories is equivalent to a pound of fat. A comprehensive weight loss plan calls for a low-calorie, low-fat diet. Decreasing the consumption of calories by 500 from the daily diet will allow a person to lose one pound per week. It looks simple on paper but hard to implement in the daily lives.

Most people make the mistake of going into extreme diets that will leave them starving and cranky. They also make unhealthy lifestyle choices that go against their dieting efforts. The good news is that there’s a better way to lose weight without having to feel miserable. A comprehensive weight loss plan will allow you to make the right choices each day and develop new eating habits. A healthy lifestyle will let you win the battle of the bulge.

There is no single solution that will work for everyone. A weight loss plan must be made specifically for the person. It involves a lifestyle change and not just a short term, crash diet. You must be committed to make permanent changes in food choices and lifestyle in order to keep the weight from coming back.

When trying to lose weight, it is best to lose a pound or two a week to maintain a healthy weight loss. When the weight loss is too fast, the mind and body will suffer. The person will be sluggish, sick and drained the whole day. Fast weight loss involves losing muscles and water instead of fat.

 

Diet Plan

For a low-calorie, low-fat diet plan, you don’t need to starve yourself. You can fill yourself up as long as you choose the right foods. The secret to a healthy weight loss program is fibre. High fibre foods take a longer time to digest that makes them more filling. Some examples of high fibre foods include fruits, vegetables, beans, and whole grains.

A comprehensive weight loss plan involves enjoying lots of vegetables and fruits. They are generally safer to eat as many as you like. There’s no need to count calories or measure the portions. They have high fibre and water content that will make it hard for you to overeat. You’ll be full before you go over your required calorie count.

Vegetables should be eaten steamed or raw. They should not be breaded or fried. You can dress them with spices and herbs for flavour. You can add cheese and nuts to salads. You should use low-fat salad dressings, such as vinaigrette made of olive oil. From breakfast, pour less cereal to make room for strawberries, sliced bananas, or blueberries.

Workout Routine

A comprehensive weight loss plan should also incorporate a simple workout routine. Exercise is one of the important elements of the diet plan. It not only burns calories but also improve the body’s resting metabolism. Studies suggested that three ten-minute exercises a day are as good as one thirty minute workout session.

You don’t need to go to the gym in order to go your workouts. Some of the best fat burning exercises that should be part of your routine include burpees, jumping lunges, jack-knife crunches, push ups, side planks with leg raises, jumping jacks and lateral jumps to name a few.

The workout routine of the weight loss plan must engage multiple muscle groups at the same time. This is vital especially if you don’t have a lot of spare time for exercise each day. High-intensity interval training workouts are seen to be effective in losing weight.

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Tips to Remember for Effective Strength Training

Summer is now over but this does not mean you should stop trying to achieve the beach body you have always dreamed of. In this case, it is now time to hit the gym and start building muscle through power training, lifting weights and other workout programs. Do not be a lazy person who just stays on the bed whole day, munching on junk foods and watching TV. Instead, make wiser use of your time and be engaged routines to get the chiselled body everyone will be surely envious about.

Getting the Most Out of your Strength Training Program

According to sports nutrition experts, any kind of fitness training will not prove to be an easy feat, especially for anyone who has not been engaged in a stringent workout routine in the past. For starters, it may be tempting to quit easily, but this will do you no good. This will result into the inability of being able to reach your goal within the desired time.

Some people have the misconception that losing weight and toning their body will require them to not eat anything at all. In reality, however, this is one thing you should never do as this can result into the lack of energy to function in your daily life.  Of course, you will need food to act as muscle fuel and to allow you to carry on with your day-to-day activities. You should avoid the inclusion of refined sugar, processed foods, and alcohol in your diet. Instead, concentration should be on healthy fats, complex carbohydrates, and lean protein.

It is also important to learn when you should rest. Even if you are running short out of time, exercising all day without rest will do you more harm than good. You might end up passing out. Therefore, it is important to take a break from working out when needed, especially when your body can no longer handle its physical demands.

When lifting as part of your training, your focus should be on the form and not with weight. Therefore, it is essential to maintain proper posture, which will be beneficial avoiding injury. Especially if you are just beginning, start with no weight or light weight before you progress with the heavier ones. Do not try to lift more than what you can. If you experience an injury, immediately apply first aid treatment for quick recovery. Have it checked by a professional if the problem gets worse and take the necessary medications.

At the end of the day, fat burning and muscle toning will be an easier goal with you if you will have it complemented with the use of effective dietary supplements meant to help boost your strength and improve your physique. Be careful with your choice to be assured of their highest level of effectiveness.

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Simple changes in diet to help with fitness

 

Adding certain foods to your diet will almost always result in an additional boost to fitness goals. Below there are just a few foods that serve this purpose. Some of them have been called “Super Fruits” for good reason. Some of the healthiest and most effective super fruits are gelatinous fibers such as Chia seeds and Aloe Vera and Chlorophyll containing plants such as parsley and coriander.

A good way to help with diet is juicing fresh fruit every morning and adding one or more of the following ingredients to the mix. Try to have different colour fruits to get the most out of them.

Chia seeds are a concentrated food containing healthy omega-3 fatty acids, carbohydrates, protein, fiber, antioxidants, and calcium. Chia seeds are an unprocessed, whole-grain food that can be absorbed by the body as seeds (unlike flaxseeds). One ounce (about 2 tablespoons) contains 139 calories, 4 grams of protein, 9 grams fat, 12 grams carbohydrates and 11 grams of fiber, plus vitamins and minerals.

Aloe Vera can be in a gel or latex form. We recommend drinking Aloe Vera juice which is the ultimate healthy habit, as it aids in weight loss, digestion, immune function, and even easing general discomfort.

Adding parsley or coriander to a fresh fruit drink will give additional benefits of Chlorophyll which is a green pigment found in plants. Chlorophyll is used for constipation, detoxification and wound healing.

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Keeping Fit with Football

Have you been getting absorbed by the talent on display in the World Cup in Rio? Have you considered playing football yourself?

If you are struggling with your summer diet or your fitness regime has slipped recently, football could be your route back to optimum health. In fact, now is the best time to be thinking about getting involved in the beautiful game as many clubs will be preparing for pre-season training in July and August. Even if you have no aspirations about securing a place in the team, training itself provides a structured way to gain strength and burn calories.

Whether you do join a club or decide to hone your fitness at the local park first, it is important to warm up beforehand. There’s nothing worse for your fitness aspirations than picking up an injury and being unable to work out at all. There are various warm up routines you could follow, but a mixture of running and static and dynamic stretches should be included, making sure every area of your body, from neck to toes, are involved.

Football involves a lot of running, at various paces, which is great for slimming. Regularly running for 90 minutes (the length of a football match), with periods of sprinting, combined with nutritional calorie control is a great way to achieve lasting health. It is particularly suited to those of us who are motivated by attaining a goal at the end of our training – literally! Indoor football can be especially effective and is usually more loosely organised than a standard football team. The ball doesn’t really go out of play in an indoor match which means an hour or more of non-stop running, great for burning up those calories. Finally, football is also a great way to improve your flexibility, agility, balance and co-ordination as you improve your skills with the ball.

As always, the best summer diet, in terms of health and calorie control, is one that involves regular, cardio-vascular exercise, some weight-bearing activity and a healthy, balanced food intake. Although diet supplements should never be used as a replacement for food, you may also find it useful to consider some diet supplements as part of your summer diet plan.

To get in touch with a local football team, search online and contact your local league’s secretary. Blow the whistle on your failed fitness drives and kick off your summer diet anew!

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Lose weight in time for the summer holidays

With summer just round the corner the pressure is well and truly on to look in great shape for the beach. A healthy diet doesn’t have to be starving or depriving yourself from delicious foods. It is all about making the right choices at the right times.

Below you will find a selection of fat burning super food ingredients and tips to help lose the extra pounds with minimal effort.

Calcium – Growing evidence suggests that a calcium rich diet allows us to burn more calories and help the body get rid of fat. Calcium binds with bile acids and increases the amount of fat we excrete through the bowel – so instead of storing it we lose it. Foods rich in calcium include cheese, milk, broccoli, rhubarb and salmon. Full fat milk and cheese should be avoided, low fat alternatives should be consumed instead.

Omega 3 – Found in the likes of oily fish, kidney beans, chickpeas, garden peas, avocado and walnuts, studies suggest Omega 3 fatty acids are one of the great secrets to permanent fat loss. They help maintain healthy blood sugar levels, inhibit the storage of calories as fat, encourage glucose to be stored in muscle cells instead of fat cells and increase thermogenesis – the production of heat by cells within the body causing fat to be used as fuel and calories burned.

Astaxanthin – A carotenoid that gives salmon, prawns, langoustine, rainbow trout and lobster their pink colour has been shown to increase the usage of fat as an energy source and accelerate fat burning during exercise.

 

The rules:

  Eat only fruit until 11.30am – it’s easier to digest if eaten on its own. A poor digestive process will severely affect any weight loss efforts.

  Have a bowl of soup at lunchtime, and a plate of salad too.

  Avoid the starchy carbs allowed in the diet after 6pm unless you exercise in the evening (sweet potatoes, beans, lentils, couscous, brown rice, quinoa).

  Have plenty of vegetables or a big salad with every meal.

  Eat small meals often to keep fat burning going all day and avoid energy dips and cravings.

  Avoid white rice, bread and pasta as they give only short-lived energy, provide few nutrients and don’t fill you up for long.

  Get 30 minutes of physical activity every day, ideally on an empty stomach first thing in the morning when you burn fat more efficiently for as long as eight hours afterwards.

  Drink water every two to three hours – every chemical reaction in the body from extracting nutrients from food to encouraging fat burning needs water to get a result.

  Use one of our supplements to help with motivation and speed up results.

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Spring Diet Tips

Make dieting easier with helpful tips from our blog. WellBeing Pro…. Weight Loss and More

Spring is well and truly here. The sunshine seems to provide extra motivation to get in shape fro the summer. Here you will find a few tips to make the most out of the season and achieve the results you are after.

 

Turn off the TV and head outdoors. There simply are no excuses to be stuck indoors watching TV and eating junk food. Go for a walk or even better, a run. Don’t forget the water bottle. The warm weather will make it taste so much more refreshing.

 

Invest in a BBQ grill. Flame grilled food is not only healthier than fried, but it will also taste better without adding calorie rich sauces.  Barbecues are also great for socialising. Just remember to minimise or cut out completely the alcohol consumption.

 

Stick to seasonal fruit and vegetables. Visit local markets for fresh produce which is healthy and full of goodness. Research has shown that “fresh” fruit and veg from abroad loses most of its nutrients by the time it has reached the shelves. Local produce on the other hand will not have this issue and should also be cheaper.

 

Eat more lean meats and fish. Lean meats such as chicken and turkey are rich in protein and low in fat making them perfect for most diets. Fish is also rich in protein as well as Omega-3 fatty acids which lower your risk of heart disease mainly by lowering triglycerides and countering inflammation. Focus on oily fish such as mackerel, trout and salmon for the highest Omega-3 content.

 

Stay away from the kitchen after dinner. As the days get longer, temptation gets greater to have a snack after dinner. Try to avoid this by reading a book, going for a walk or socialising. Ideally no food should be consumed later than 2 hours before going to bed.

 

Drink plenty of water. With the weather getting warmer there is a greater risk of dehydration. Top up the fluid intake regularly during the day. We recommend having a glass of water immediately after waking up, before each meal, before and during a workout and before bed. This will boost the metabolism as well as keep you refreshed and help with detox.

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Power training or light exercise?

Find out which training method better suits what you are trying to achieve. Explore our blog….

It all depends on what you are trying to achieve. Power training is designed to increase muscle mass and generally individuals doing this will gain some weight in muscle, fat or a combination of both. Light exercise is mainly used to maintain weight as well as add muscle definition.

 

Important points when engaging in power training:

Eat well. Several high protein meals must be consumed throughout the day. It is also important to have a meal 2-3 hours before training to allow time for the food to be properly digested and energy needed to be released. A typical pre workout meal would consist of a high protein meat such as chicken or turkey and complex carbohydrates such as vegetables and potato.

Heavy weights and low reps. In order to build muscle in a reasonably short period of time, it is essential that heavy weight sets and short breaks are applied. Typically sets of 10-12 on maximum resistance coupled with breaks of 30-60 seconds.

Allow time to repair. Training sessions must be alternated between different muscle groups to allow time for muscles to repair. Power training will result in muscles being literally ripped and a couple of days are needed for the repair to take effect.  A good protein supplement coupled with creatine and BCAAs will help speed up the recovery process.

 

Light exercise points:

Persistence is key. Although generally low intensity, light exercise sessions typically last a lot longer than power training. In order for maximum results to be achieved, regular sessions of over 1 hour are needed.

Cardio is king. Cardio sessions up the heart rate and increase temperature thus burning more calories and fat. They are particularly effective for problem areas such as around the stomach and thighs.

Eat healthy. All the exercise in the world will not get you anywhere if you have a poor diet. Try eating more lean meats and vegetables and cut down on breads, pasta, sweets, ready meals and desserts.

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Health benefits of running

Running is not only a great way to get in shape but it will also strengthen many parts of the body as well as lifting the mood thus boosting happiness. Just 5 sessions of 30 minutes a week can make a huge difference. Below are just a few of the ways running can help you lead a healthier life.

LOSE WEIGHT

Running will increase body temperature which causes hundreds of extra calories to be burned more effectively. Studies have shown that calories continue burning even after stopping. Covering big distances at a relatively fast pace will help shift fat from stubborn areas such as stomach and thighs making abs and glutes seem more defined.

IMPROVE OVERALL HEALTH

Running can have tremendous benefits on health. It can boost the immune system, lower the risk of blood clots, improve lung and heart performance, lower cholesterol, etc. Contrary to some inaccurate reports, running will actually strengthen joints and improve knee health. In addition to this, running increases bone mass helping avoid fractures and osteoporosis.

BE HAPPIER

Whenever you feel down, anxious or stressed out, put on some running shoes and you will notice that just after a few minutes you will feel better. This is also known as a “runner’s high” and is caused by the release of endorphins from running. It is known to create a feeling of euphoria and well being.

REDUCE THE RISK OF DISEASE

Several studies have shown that running can help prevent certain cancers and several diseases such as multiple sclerosis, cardiovascular disease, diabetes and high blood pressure. Running can also dramatically reduce the risk of having a stroke or a heart attack.

LIVE LONGER

As with other physical activities, running can add several years to one’s life. A recent study showed that individuals added an average of 3.5 years to their lives. Running can also improve brain function and helps defeat age-related mental decline.  It was also shown to prevent or slow down the progress of Alzheimer’s and dementia.

Posted on by — Leave a comment

The importance of water in daily diets

Explore our blog for useful advice on dieting, weight loss and training plans. Find out about the best food and drinks to go alongside our natural supplements…

Around 60% of the human body is made of water. Just a 1% decrease will cause mental and physical coordination to be impaired.  Sharp drops below this level, or dehydration, can have adverse effects on health such as dry mouth, dizziness, palpitations, confusion, sluggishness and even fainting.

Regular hydration will help detox by removing harmful toxins resulting in a healthy youthful appearance. Surprisingly, water will also help flush out any excess fluids in the body making it a perfect slimming aid.

Drinking water regularly during the day will help avoid any high calorie coffees or soft drinks.  Several studies have shown that drinking water before a meal will decrease the amount of food consumed resulting in fewer calories being consumed thus assisting weight loss.

Replace alcoholic drinks with water. Alcohol is a diuretic and caused dehydration, that’s why we always feel thirsty after a drink. When you take into account the massive calorie content of alcoholic beverages, it is easy to see why they should be kept to a bare minimum.

Cold water will speed up metabolism as well as start a natural thermogenesis.  This is caused by the body’s effort to maintain the temperature. Drinking cold water in the morning on an empty stomach will cause the body to burn fat to provide energy to stabilise the drop in temperature from the water.

For complete well being, water should be on top of every diet list whether you are trying to lose weight, detox, or just want to lead a healthy lifestyle.

Posted on by — Leave a comment

How Can Raspberry Ketones Help with Weight Loss?

The cutting edge of weight loss is an exciting place to be with obesity such a problem and people desperately looking for a slimming solution that doesn’t need drastic measures or a surgical procedure….

Safe weight loss is of paramount importance to a healthy society and there have been countless health and weight loss claims put forward by people providing evidence of diet success by taking food supplements.

If you are preparing your summer diet, you should avail yourself of all the information possible before making a purchase decision.

Raspberry ketones are phenolic compounds, a class of natural substances found in plants. They are part of what gives raspberries their delicious aroma and, as a result, are used in small amounts as flavourings (in such things as carbonated drinks, ice-cream and cosmetics) and perfumes.

The link with raspberry ketones and burning calories started about 15 years ago with strong evidence that these compounds had a powerful effect on lipolysis (fat metabolism).

In 2005, in Japan, experiments on mice on a high-fat diet found that those given raspberry ketones metabolised fat more quickly, reducing their fat levels. A later Korean study on fat in test-tubes provided more evidence that the phenolic compounds sped up fat metabolism. There have also been tests on rats and rabbits but still the well being industry waits for conclusive answers.

The most famous of all is a feature on the Dr. Oz show where raspberry ketones were shown to break down fat molecules thus assisting weight loss. Dr. Oz called raspberry ketone supplements a “miracle in a bottle”.

While most well being experts would probably agree that it is likely that raspberry ketone diet supplements would affect fat metabolism in humans, there is naturally a healthy caution about the correct dosage for safe weight loss. This is thought to be 500-600mg per day. Some fruit extracts containing raspberry ketones have a history of significant use within the EU, prompting the UK’s FSA to update its previous blanket advice on the ‘novel food’ classification of the compounds.

Healthy living is not always a clear cut issue, and we must always work together to balance the needs for calorie control and overall well being. Of course, any supplements should only ever be used as part of a healthy diet.