Swimming for weight loss

Hello everyone, today I want to talk about swimming:

Swimming is one of my favourite activities so I practice it three time per week but, if you are not accustomed to swimming, the first few days your body will adapt and one of the adaptations is to create more muscle mass to make this exercise more effective. This will make don't note the fats burned because you will be increasing your weigh with the muscle mass.

Normally when you do an aerobic activity such as swimming the percentage of fat burned is greater when you take a few minutes in the activity, this means you should swim at least 15 minutes with a medium intensity.
A mistake in wanting to lose weight by swimming is swimming at a high intensity, it makes the majority used energy are carbohydrates instead of fats.

Don't worrt if firsts days  you can't swim more than 5 minutes. Be patient, wait some minute to recover some energy, and continue some more minutes swimming.

Over the days you will be getting more fit and be able to take any more time swimming, so it is also important to take it slow and go in progression.

The weakness feeling.

That weakness feeling happened to me some months ago.

After workout, or even when you wake up in the morning you don't want to do anything, you feel shaky.
For my experience I can tell you: eat better (sometimes I should say "more") and don't exceed with workout.

After some weeks of workout you think you can do more and more, and yes, you can do more but after some days you will feel as shit. Then is when lot of people leaves the gym and starts again a more sedentary life. In that moment starts the rebound effect (will talk about it), and all your previous efforts were for nothing.

When you have that feeling the best you can do is still going to the gym, change the workout if needed to another one more soft, and eat some more/better, because one of the most popular thoughts is "eat less, training hard,  get thin faster", and that's not true.

Monitoring your heart rate.

Hey readers, it's monday again and time to return to our workout.

Today I'm gonna tell you about the heart rate and why we should monitor it.

All you know that when running, biking or doing anyother aerobic exercise our pulse is accelerating more or less. Inside this accelerations we should find a range wich we will be burning calories in an ideal way.

This range it's easy to calculate if we have a control of our heart rate, that because I recommend using a heart rate monitor.
The basic formula for calculating the minimum heart rate of this range is:
- (220 - age) x 0,6 = To the minimum pulse you should have when doing any aerobic exercise.

And the formula for calculating the maximum heart rate of this range is:
- (220 - age) x 0,85 = To the maximum pulse you should have when doing any aerobic exercise.

Doing exercises between this range will help you burning calories in an optimum way and having a better cardiovascular performance.

If your heart rate is less than the minimum calculated, you are too lazy and must do some more for burning fats. And if your heart rate is more than the maximum calculated, slow down, you are running out of oxygen and you are doing anaerobic exercise.

Also remember, the minimum  time recommended is 20 minutes of exercises, but best results are when doing it about 30 or 40 minutes.

So it's time to monitor your heart rate! Are you doing it?

Sunday morning... Running!

Hey there, a quick update before I go.

Today we are going to run, a little late but at least we are doing something as every Sunday.

When I say "we" I mean me and two friends from the gym and muay thai classes.

So now we are leaving to the mountain for some running with some inclination /declination for being a little bit harder.

Tomorrow I will blog about heart beating and the importance of it for weight losing.

Leaving now, enjoy your Sunday!

Weekend relax

Well, it's Saturday and today I'm going to do nothing!

After all this week I need some rest, and because tomorrow for sure I will go biking or running I'm going to relax today.

It's my only relaxing day on the week after a Monday-Friday workout, so I'm not going to have a long talk today, sorry guys.

Tomorrow I will update to share my Sunday morning activity if good weather here.

Hope you all enjoy this weekend as I will do, and I want to see your weekend plans in comments!

How to: Squats.

Good morning sportsmen. Let me talk you today about squats.

The squat is a simple exercise that can tone up your buttocks and thighs, and it has a simple technique:

To perform squats you must be standing right, you should start with your chest forward and your head facing forward. Separate your feet to the distance of your shoulders and extend your arms forward for balance.

Go down like you were sitting on a chair. Keep your head facing forward and let your body go forward only slightly, keeping your back arched while you descend. Also keep your thighs parallel to the floor and your knees go beyond your ankles. Our weight must be on our heels.
Now go up, remember our wight  should be always on our heels, so it will be a lot harder but effective.

Finally, as I always said, try to do this exercise properly first, then increase your reps. and if you're doing it right you will see results in some weeks.

Have a good breakfast.

A common mistake of people interested in losing weight is don't having a breakfast.

They think this way they'll reduce the number of calories in their body, but that's not true.

When you don't have a breakfast, you don't  provide the body with the enough energy to start the day with strength. Also in a few hours you will be hungry, and guess what? next time you eat, you will eat a lot more because of this hunger, so that calories you where thinking to avoid, will be in your body and who knows if there would be more...

So, I want to say you today, have a great breakfast. You can eat cereals, fruit, yogurts, juices, milk, toasted integral bread... all these are good for that first meal of the day.

Now the question is, are you having a good breakfast?

Muscle Recovery

Hey ya

Today I just wanna say: relax!

After an intense workout, muscles need recovery and the best way for it is relaxing.
Be sure you sleep 8+ hours at night and try to relax about 1 hour at day.

Fibers repairing process happens when our body is relaxed and it is good for muscle to expand.

Remember that one easy-to-do part for getting fit is having a good rest after workout!

How to: Correct push ups

Push ups are a perfect exercises to tone your chest and back.
It's a good exercise that uses your own weight as resistance, but if it's not done properly you may hurt yourself or have shoulder, back or wrists injuries.
Here are some tips to do a correct push up:
- You must have your chest straight.
- Feet should be slightly separated to facilitate stability.
- Hands must be in vertical with your shoulders, to ensure we are focusing on the pectoral muscle.
- Semi flexed arms, hyper extension would make muscle rest and it's not good for elbows.
Now, down to the ground touching it but don't lean on it. If you down just a little, muscle doesn't work totally, and if you down more than normal, you may hurt your shoulders.

It doesn't matter how many push ups can you do. First, start doing it right, then you can increase the number of reps.
So, do you do proper push ups?

Is sugar good?

People consider sugar a source of empty calories because it provides calories but any nutrients. Those calories don't have any nutritional value.

Sugar has about 15 calories per teaspoon, so having three teaspoon of sugar is the same as eating a fruit, but fruits has many important nutrients.

It's too easy to accumulate calories and get some weight with food rich in sugar, also we can have health problems (overweight, gum disease, tooth decay) with excessive sugar.

Now you know, best way to have sugar is from food that has it naturally like fruits.

Do you like sugar?

My Sunday morning.

Hey, I wanted to write this yesterday but I wasn't at home for all day (that's the reason I couldn't answer you questions, sorry) so I'm writting this today after this happened.
So, many people spend they're Sunday morning sleeping, with hangover, or just resting.
After all the weekly workout, and after a no drinking Saturday (if you want something you must do some sacrifices, but you won't miss it.), I decided to wake up early and do some exercise.
Seen the weather, all clear. It seemed that we're going to have a good day, cold, but good at least.
So I took my mountain bike, went next to the river and followed it till the beach. There are about 25km/15.5mi, that's about 1 hour with great rate. It took me about 3 hours go to the beach and return, but I was enjoying the ride so I was slower than normal.

Now I'm going to have a shower, rest all remaining day, and tomorrow I'll start again the workout till next weekend.
That was my sunday morning, how is yours?

Some weight gain tips

Finally weekend! This two days there is no more workout. Well, at least for today, tomorrow surely I'll go biking or something.
Today, I'm gonna give some tips for those people who asked about wight gain. I'm not going to extend it a lot because I don't have many time and I will talk more about this.

So, first thing is that you must eat a lot more than other people. You must know that you have a high metabolism, this means your body is always burning calories, and you want to gain more weight, so you need more calories than you're burning. About 3500 calories at day should be fine, but be sure that those are good calories. It means that eat some fresh fruit, vegetables, lean meat and so.
Remember doing about 6 small meals per day and not the usual 3 big meals.

Have an specific hypertrophyc training at gym, be sure you workout every muscle with quality exercises. Ask your instructor for a weight gaining routine (I'll blog one anyway) that you can do at least 3 days per week working all muscles.

Also sleep and have a nice rest are very important for repairing tissues and build muscle.
Sleep all you need and avoid stress that is not helpfull for anyone.Be patient and stay disciplined, and you will reach your goals.

Hope this can help anyone!

Let's talk about stretching

Hey there, as I said let's talk about stretching.

If you don't wanna get injured while training, you must do some stretching before starting it.
But I don't mean when you just arrive to the gym you must do it. No that's not the way. Always stretch when muscles, joints and tendons are hot, that mean that you have to do some light cardiovascular exercises like biking, walking or running a little before stretching.

Best way for this is gradually stretching to a point of tension that we can hold on. You must note that there is a good stretch but you don't have any discomfort. That's the point you must keep about 20-30 seconds. Don't forget feel pain means that you are injuring yourself, causing micro-tears in your muscles and / or ligaments and possibly deriving a major injury.

It's also good do some stretch exercises when finish a set, i.e when you finish your chest reps, do some chest stretching.
That way you will enlarge muscle gainning some elasticity and muscle tone.


You can see a basic stretching routine at image, but I suggest you talk with the instructor and make an specific one according to your possibilities.


Let me know, do you always stretch before doing some sports, playing basketball, or football?

Many more posts to come soon!

Our best ally for weight loss

Hey, how are you?
I've talked about feeding but I've not said anything about one of the most important things if we want burn those fats.

Uhh... hmmm...
Sorry, that one was for another update about motivation.

What I want to talk about is water:

We must drink more water than normal if we're doing some sports. The minimum is 2 liters per day, but if we are burning more calories and sweating a lot more, our body will request for more water to avoid dehydration.
Remember we sweat to maintain a good body temperature, so when we stop doing exercises our body returns to its normal temperature but with a lot less water. That's the reason why we must drink water even we are training.

Don't forget drinking a little every time, and don't get your stomach full of it because you won't be able to continue your activities.

It's also known drinking water when you're hungry. If you must wait about a half or an hour for lunch or dinner instead of eating anything, wait for it, and drink some water, it will calm your hunger.

And you, how many water do you drink per day?

Facebook and Twitter!

I quick update just for telling you that I've created a Facebook and a Twitter account about my blog.
Like and Follow me for all news about my blog!

What we should eat for a healthy diet

Hi, today I'm gonna write a few words about feeding. Take a look at this pic:

 

I think everyone can see easily what it "good" and what is "bad". Really what can I say that no one knows?

Vegetables and fruits are the basis of a loss-weight diet. Note that vegetable are very low in fats and calories and full of vitamins and minerals your body will need. Also fruits will provide you with vitamins, fiber and natural sugar (don't worry about it, this is the good one!).

Just introducing more vegetables and fruits in our daily diet we will lose some weight with no exercises needed, just changing our feeding habits, because our body doesn't receive that kind of food usually (as it should be).

Instead eating some hamburger or fried chicken, why don't eating some pasta?

Cereals, rice, bread and pasta are the not-vegetable food we must eat the most, and are the main source of carbohydrates (I will talk about it) that your body will need.

About meat, chicken, turkey or beef are the bests selections we can do. These are low fat meat, but when we fry it we add a lot of fats and calories, so cook it on the grill.

Don't need to talk about candies, cakes and other stuff. You know you must leave it if you want a fit body but, we will use these food as gifts. If we have been training all week, we may have a "gift" at weekend and eat something sweet.

At the end all this is not like following a diet, is some kind of re-education in feeding habits, those habits that most of us should have from our childhood.

What do you think? What are your feeding habits?

My workout for weight loss (for beginners)

First, thank you all for your comments! Regarding this:
@rKaiser: I will write about gainning weight also, stay tuned.
@Mekor:Yes, that's the idea, every sport has his cardiovascular activities, and this means weight loss yes or yes ;).
Now, the workout:

First day at the gym

Hey, today it's the big day! today it's the first day we go to the gym! Nervous? (Think that I'm starting something that will become routine, so what's the reason being nervous?) Answer should be: "Holy ****, of course. That place is full of fit/strong men that are watching you as an stranger in their home, and hot girls that contrary to men make you feel like you don't exist."

Firsts days. Kicking out fast food!

Hi, I'm here as I promised to starting this feel-better-with-yourself project getting fit.
Firsts days we will be full of energy because of motivation of losing weight, but this motivation will be decreasing week by week till we can see substantial and visible changes on our body.

Welcome, are you ready?

Hello to all that people interested getting fit, and welcome to my new blog.

First of all, I'm going to introduce myself: I'm a man, 24 years old and 180cm tall.