Had a great trip down to LA last weekend…a bunch of us fitness experts, including Isabel, Vince, Joel, Roman, and Mike Geary were lucky enough to attend a Richard Branson charity event, raising money for Virgin Unite and then we all went to meet Bill Phillips, the author of Body for Life.

One more travel week to finish off the year…this time to see Holly Rigsby in KY, then to Boston to see old clients, and then off to NYC to hang out with John Romaniello and visit a NYC jets game. Should be a blast!

Click here to listen to the call…

Now let’s get into the TT Workout and tips…

Monday – Nov 22nd

Transformation Tip of the Week

“There are only two options regarding commitment–you’re either In, or you’re Out. There’s no such thing as 90% committed. It’s 100% or not at all.”
Bill Phillips

“If it’s in the house, I’ll eat it.”
Bill Phillips

I have the same problem.

If there are goodies in the house, we’re going to find them and eat them. And even though research suggests that if you put the goodies out of arm’s reach and hidden in containers in hard to reach places, then you’ll eat less of them…

We still know that we’d still track them down. And eat them. ALL.

So I keep the junk out of the house.

Workout Tips

To increase workout intensity…first, define intensity:

Strength intensity – Increase weight, decrease reps (decrease reps by 2 & increase weight by 5%)
Interval intensity – Increasing speed or incline
KB’s – Increasing size of KB
Jumps – Depth jumps

Intensity is not what most people think it is…using less recovery time actually reduces the intensity of the resistance you can use, even though it lengthens the time your heart rate is elevated.

But in my next tip later in the call, we’ll focus on that definition of intensity…

Tuesday
•    Get 30 minutes of fun activity – now grab a Green Tea and do this week’s research review.

Reference:
Obesity (Silver Spring). 2010 Sep 16. The Effect of Electronic Self-Monitoring on Weight Loss and Dietary Intake: A Randomized Behavioral Weight Loss Trial.

Researchers from the University of Pittsburgh studied 210 overweight adults (average BMI = 34). Subjects were put into one of three groups:

a)    Paper diary recording
b)    PDA with self-monitoring software
c)    PDA with self-monitoring software and daily feedback messages

91% of people finished. Impressive.

Everyone lost a significant amount of weight.

BUT…

More PDA + FB subjects achieved greater weight loss than the paper diary record group AND waist circumference dropped more in both PDA groups compared to paper diary.

Finally, the PDA groups consumed fewer calories.

Bottom line:
You might want to try electronic “apps” to help you monitor your diet. Could be better than traditional paper food journal diaries.

Wednesday Workout Tip

Intervals before resistance – I don’t use this a lot, but it does elevate the heart rate and makes the rest of the workout feel much harder. Record your performance to make sure you don’t have too much drop off in the weights you use. Alternatively, you can use the Adrenaline style sprints and incorporate sprints as the last exercise in a tri-set or circuit.

Trainer Thursday
•    Do 30 minutes of fun activity…

Alwyn Cosgrove alerted me to a study that might be of interest to you…

Reference:
Supervised exercise versus non-supervised exercise for reducing weight in obese adults.
J Sports Med Phys Fitness. 2009 Mar;49(1):85-90.

Two groups – Group one met a trainer twice a week for 4 months (as a group). Group two received basic advice to increase physical activity and access to a fully equipped gym (any exercise they did was unsupervised).

The group with supervision lost 13.4lbs vs. and only 3.7lbs in the advice only group.

Interesting side note -they made these improvements without ANY dietary advice given.

This is not a new finding, nor is it that surprising as a good coach or training partner/team can really help with your results.

But the fact that the group exercised together only served to improve those results further (as social support is one of the key variables in fat loss success) so its possible that the supervision and instruction alone was entirely responsible for the enhanced results – or the social support was part of it.

However, it’s clear that together it’s an unbeatable combination. And perhaps that’s one of the reasons why semi-private training seems to get better results than one-on-one training.

You’d also have to assume that there was more instruction in the supervised group as there was more contact with instructors.

Another study came out a few years ago showing that a participant would exercise 30% harder or more (can’t remember the exact number) with someone just watching them (i.e. not offering any instruction or encouragement).

You can imagine how that could translate into much greater results, when added with a good program, great coaching, great social support and great instruction.

If you are serious about changing your body – hire a coach, or get a great training partner or team to help you. If you’re serious about increasing your client’s results if you are a trainer or coach – consider running some small group or semi-private options.

Facebook Friday

Q: Hey just wondering what the best oblique exercise to do is to get great oblique abs like yourself?

Answer:
First, heavy lifting, muscle building, and low-body fat are the most important aspects. Next up are these 5 exercises:

=> 5 Best Abs Obliques Exercises

Q: Should I then try to get my body fat percentage down as low as possible then use your TT muscle building program and those 5 exercises?

Answer:
That depends on where you are now. What is your height, weight, age, and body fat%?

Guys like myself and John Romaniello don’t even do a lot of abs exercises.

In most cases, guys need to focus on building muscle if they want abs like Roman and myself, because even though I’m not that big, a lot of guys who come to me looking for abs are 10-15 pounds lighter than I am…so gain muscle!

Social Support Saturday!
•    30 minutes of fun activity…

The Branson event was interesting. It was his mother that stole the show. She’s feisty and hilarious, and is dedicated to helping young women in Morocco. I truly believe that a legacy and mission is critical to happiness and productivity. It will extend your life and keep you healthy.

Here’s a little quote I posted on my facebook page:

For the best life, find people you like to be around, choose a form of work you truly enjoy doing – rather than dreading – and have as much fun as possible while creating a lasting legacy.

And here are some business books that influenced me this year:

How to read faster in 10 days – Beale
Good to Great – Jim Collins
Mastering the Rockefeller Habits – Verne Harnish
Linchpin – Godin
Work the System – Sam Carpenter

Sunday – Plan, Shop & Prepare
•    30 minutes activity and plan, shop, & prepare
o    Some research that might help guys like me and Bill Phillips, from the book, “59 Seconds”

If food is out of sight and out of mind, you’ll eat less of it. To decrease intake, place food out of sight & in difficult to access areas.
(Wansink, B., et al. Int J Obes 3:871).

The Soup bowl study (Wansink, B., et al. Obes. Res. 13:93-, 2005).
We eat until we are finished. In this study, subjects ate from the “never ending soup bowl” (that was filled by a tube from under the table. Subjects ate for 20 minutes and consumed 75% more soup than usual because the bowl never got empty…AND they didn’t feel any more full!

Next week!

•    Training Tips – My Current Workout
•    Research Review – What you can accomplish with just 2 weeks of interval training
•    Personal Trainers – More wisdom from Alwyn
•    Nutrition – Eating for Life Extension
•    Books – 5 More Business Boosting Books

If you want to lose fat and gain lean, sculpted muscle at the same time, there is nothing better to get you motivated and committed than a 12-week Body Transformation Contest. But this week is the LAST CALL for you to enter the 9th TT Transformation Contest. The last day to begin is Saturday, September 18th.

Not only can you dramatically change your body, but you can also win $1000 just for losing belly fat. At least, you can when you join the Turbulence Training Transformation Contest.

And so here are the top 10 body transformation contest tips to help you maximize your results.

10. Clean out your pantry.

Listen, one of the best fat loss tips is simply, “If you don’t have it in the house, you won’t eat it!”

So get rid of as much junk food as you can – and avoid bringing more into the house. Simply cutting back on junk can help you lose fat fast.

9. Get social support.

Scientific research proves that you will lose more fat if you have social support, both in “real life” and on the internet. So hook up with friends who are going to help you reach your goal.

Online, I recommend getting started with Turbulence Training and using the Turbulence Training forum to connect with people like you who want to lose fat.

8. Use a food journal.

Write down what you eat. This is another research proven tip to help you lose fat faster. Write down everything you eat. It will help you eat better.

7. Take before photos.

Yes, it’s not a lot of fun to look at your before photos now, but when you are done your transformation, you’ll be glad you have the photos to compare. Plus, you’ll need those to win the TT Contest.

6. Fix your mindset.

No matter what you struggle with, you must switch your mindset to be a successful transformation. You must go from a person who “can’t resist cookies” to the type of person that “doesn’t eat cookies unless they are part of a planned reward meal”. That is how you win transformation contests!

5. You must be in the correct state of change.

The truth is that even the best transformation contest winners don’t lose 30 pounds of fat on their first try. They start, they stop. They begin, they give up. It happens. And it’s okay.

But when they get in the right state of change, that is when they finally breakthrough and transform! And that’s where you have to be.

4. Use a PROVEN, structured, short burst workout program.

Research shows that resistance training and interval training can help you gain muscle and lose fat at the same time. Plus, you can burn belly fat AND boost your post-exercise metabolism. You MUST use this type of workout for guaranteed results.

3. Stop doing slow boring cardio and switch to interval training.

Research shows that it takes up to 50 hours of cardio just to lose one pound of bodyweight.

Who has that kind of time? No one!

But other research studies show that interval training burns belly fat while slow cardio doesn’t. So skip the insanely boring cardio and start getting results with interval training (as you’ll find in the Turbulence Training workouts).

2. Plan, shop, and prepare your food.

Take an hour or two on the weekend to go to the grocery store and buy all the whole, natural foods you need for the week ahead. Go home and prepare as many lunches and snacks as possible so you have the right food to eat while at work. This is a proven strategy to help you lose fat and avoid temptation!

1. Get Turbulence Training. It’s the proven, step-by-step guide to transforming your body and your life.

If you’ve ever wanted to do this for yourself – if you deserve it – and I know you do, then NOW is the time to get started with the best fat burning workout in the world.

Click here to get started with Turbulence Training

Looking forward to your success story!

Your friend and coach,

Craig Ballantyne, CSCS, MS
Creator, TT Transformation Contests