Split Squat

Advanced Push Up

Hurdles

 Body Row

Measuring your resting heart rate (or pulse) when you’re at rest is a good way to assess your cardiovascular fitness because the stronger your heart is, the fewer times a minute it has to pump to send blood around your body.

Do this test first thing in the morning so that the results won’t be affected by physical activities or stress and avoid taking stimulants such as caffeine or nicotine before doing it.

Take your pulse at your wrist for 15 seconds, using your finger. Now multiply the number of heartbeats you counted by four to get your heart rate in beats per minute (bpm).

If you’re running regularly, you can expect your resting heart rate to drop by one or two beats per minute every one to two weeks. If you’ve trained well, after six months you could be looking at a drop of between 10bpm and 15bpm. However, your heart will only drop a maximum of 20 beats.

Test 1: Resting Heart Rate

Measurements

By measuring different parts of your body, you’ll be able to keep track of how you’re firming up and the way your body is changing as the fat melts away. Your waist measurement can be a very valuable way to assess your health risks as where you carry your extra weight can have a big impact on your health.

People who carry most of their weight around their hips and thighs are healthier and live longer than those who carry their weight around their stomach. It’s thought that this is because having a lot of fat around your major organs negatively affects the way they function.

Use the tape measure to take the measurements (in either inches or centimetres) of the following parts of your body and fill them in on the chart. For you to chart your progress accurately, it’s vital to take readings from the same place on each body part each time.

• Chest: place the tape measure around your chest so that it runs across  your nipples.
• Waist: Place the tape measure around your waist so that it runs straight across your tummy button.
• Hips: Place the tape measure around your hips at the widest point.
• Thigh: Place the tape measure around your leg at the highest part of your thigh, where it meets your groin.
• Upper arm: Place the tape measure around your upper arm so it touches the highest part of your armpit.

A waist circumference of over 80cm (31 ½ in) in women and over 94cm (37in) in men indicates excess abdominal fat, which is a greater health risk than fat stored around your hips and thighs. The other four measurements will help you track your weight-loss progress – and provide a constant source of motivation.

Test 2: Measurements 

This formula intuitively sounds correct but is woefully incomplete. For the majority of people this approach fails over and over again. If it could work long-term it would have done so long ago. Underfeeding the body can slow metabolism as can over-exercising. Punishment gets you absolutely nowhere. True nourishment and joyous movement of the body will take you where you want to go.

 Myth #2: The reason you eat too much is lack of willpower.

Fortunately, the experts are off the mark on this one too. Your willpower is better than you could have ever imagined. We overeat not because we’re weaklings but because we’re physiologically driven to do so when our meals are deficient in relaxation, time, pleasure, awareness, and high-quality food.

Myth #3: As long as you eat the right foods in the right amounts, you’ll ensure good health and lose weight.

This principle seems scientifically sound but it’s caused way more damage than good. We can eat the healthiest food in the universe and in the perfect amount, but if we consume it in a state of anxious rushing, the physiologic stress-response will cause a dramatic rise in nutrient excretion and a deep decline in calorie burning capacity. What you eat is only half the equation of good nutrition. How you eat is the other half.

Myth #4: The experts are your ultimate source of reliable and scientifically accurate nutrition information.

If only this were true. We experts certainly have our lofty place, but we love to disagree with one another and we constantly change our minds. In actual fact, the most definitive nutrition expertise is literally found inside you. It’s called the enteric nervous system or ENS – the brain in the belly. This is your most faithful and accurate day-to-day dietary guide.

Warm up jog/ cycle for 10 minutes

Squat jumps – find a park bench, bottom of the slide, anything that requires a bit of a jump to get onto (make sure it’s stable!) and then perform 20 jumps, landing in a deep squat on the ground and a perfectly balanced squat on the object.

Push ups – place your hands just wider than shoulder width apart on the bottom of the same object and perform 20 push ups in solid form. Try and go as fast as you can without sacrificing good form to keep the intensity high.

Swing jackknife – put your feet on the chair of a swing and walk your body out into a push up position. Your body should then be parallel to the ground and draw your feet (and swing) towards you and then back into start position. Your body should form a pike position as you draw in and then flat, plank position as you return to the start. Perform 20 fast reps in good form.

Chin ups – find the monkey bars and perform 20 chin ups making sure you lift your chest to the bar and don’t hunch your shoulders round at the top. If you can’t do a chin up, perform a ‘negative’ where you jump up and really slowly lower yourself down. This is the important phase of the exercise.

Hamstring curl – then it’s back over to the swing, lying on your back on the ground this time with your feet up on the swing seat. Raise your body into a plank  – your body should be held up in the air by pushing your feet down on the swing seat, keeping your legs straight and supported by your shoulders and head which are still in contact with the floor. Another 20 reps.

Go for a sprint around the playground  and then get stuck into the second set of the above 5 exercises. Do 3 sets in total or 4-5 if you’re used to training in high volumes.

Call for further instruction of the exercises and I’ll send a picture to help demonstrate…Enjoy!

So get yourself down to Performance Foods (opposite Hove Library on Church Road) where you can get it with a 20% discount in celebration of their recent opening.

If you live too far away you can order it online at www.performancefoodsbrighton.com

“according to scientists, pomegranates have about three times the antioxidant levels of red wine and green tea, which are both renowned for their health benefits”

Antioxidants are the naturally occuring substances in plants that protect the body from harmful free radicals. Produced by the body when cells use oxygen, free radicals can cause heart disease as well as premature ageing.

So, it’s in our best interest to get as many antioxidants into our bodies as possible especially after training to mop up all the damage.

But, before you crack open that bottle of red wine quoting me as a lame excuse for getting pissed – here’s a list of my top antioxidant foods (and red wine’s not one of ‘em!):

Berries
Broccoli
Pomegrante
Tomatoes
Red grapes
Garlic
Spinach
Green tea

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The results of this test will give you an idea about how balanced your health is at the moment. You will probably be a mix of each of the dosha but it is likely that one will dominate. Each of the dosha have some advantages and some disadvantages. Ayurveda helps you to understand your body’s needs according to your dosha so you can make positive changes in your life to help you feel balanced.

Ayurveda is an ancient system of healing still used throughout India and is becoming increasing popular in the Western world. It has many important lessons that we can learn and apply to our lifestyle. I’ll help you decode it all and tell you how you can use this to make changes to your diet and lifestyle.