A Good Diet is for Life Not Just for Christmas

At The Wolf Studio we often notice that our clients have two phases of training and diet. Clients will train and diet in order to get fit for their summer holiday, and at this time of year clients are often trying to loose weight to look good for the office party season.

While it is a great idea to get into the gym and start looking at your diet to get fit and healthy, whether it is to look good on the beach or to look good in that little black party dress, it is important to remember not to throw away all of your hard earned gains. Particularly at this time of year our clients are literally working their butts off to look good, it seems a shame for them to binge during the holiday period and get unfit and overweight.

A much better and more healthy approach is to look after your diet throughout the year and to exercise regularly. By doing this then you can maintain a higher level of fitness and the need for high intensity training and more severe dietary change is lessened. At times of the year when you want to add more training into your schedule, to look good on the beach or at the Christmas party, then these changes can be added much more easily as you will be working from a higher base of fitness and vitality.

What we often see is that clients will achieve their goals of looking and feeling better for their holiday or party season and then will stop training. They will go on holiday or overindulge at Christmas and will feel guilty about not training and will feel bad about getting back to training. Guilt is a major factor in many peoples training, it is a motivational factor but it is also a major obstacle. Just imagine that you have spent a couple of months working hard to achieve that weight loss or get those bulging muscles, you overindulge over the holiday period and the thought of getting back in the gym come January is just too much. A much more sensible approach is to accept that you are going to have a good time on your holiday or at Christmas, life is for living after all, but once the Christmas period is over then you are going to go back to eating sensibly and exercising regularly.

Exercise and diet are habitual, both good and bad diet and exercise. The problem at this time of year is that once you start indulging at Christmas parties, a few extra drinks or whatever then this becomes the norm. We have clients for whom Christmas parties start in mid November and end at the end of January. Obviously it is not possible to over indulge for this period of time and maintain health without some discipline.

Here are some tips to help you through this time of year;

• Keep exercising. Too many people just stop training over the Christmas period. Even if it is just one training session per week it will make a difference and will make going back in January easier.
• Prioritize your parties! Don’t over indulge at every party or Christmas lunch that you attend. Pick which parties are important for you and let yourself have a good time. At other events limit your alcohol intake, or don’t have a desert. Don’t blow all of your training at events or with people whom you don’t really like!
• Watch the alcohol. There are loads of hidden calories in alcohol and alcohol is really easily broken down to fat. Limit the amount that you are going to drink. Even better to take the car and stay tee total, especially at events that you are not too bothered about.
• Quality not quantity. If you are going to indulge, which you should at this time of year, treat yourself with high quality food and drink rather than masses of cheap crap. You will find that good quality food will taste better and will last longer, especially if you have been denying yourself over the build up to Christmas.
• When it’s over it’s over. Set a date when you are going to start exercising again and when the partying ends. If you know that you are going to be good from a specific date then you will be more disciplined.
• Tell everyone about your New Years resolutions. It you shout your intentions from the mountains so that everyone knows what you are going to give up or even better achieve in the New Year then you are much more likely to actually do it. Write your New Years resolutions down and stick it where you can see it, it really does work

Enjoy this Christmas and New Year and we hope to see you all in 2011.

Alan

Alan’s Top 10 Tips for Enjoying the Holiday Season

1. Enjoy your Holiday party season but remember that once the party has finished the diet and exercise regime must restart. The Holiday Season is long, you just keep exercising between Thanksgiving and New Year!

2. Don’t get involved with New Years resolutions. Make lifestyle changes when you are ready for them rather than just because it is the turn of the year.

3. When you go out drinking, and no I’m not condoning it, try alternating between soft and alcoholic drinks. This will hopefully reduce the amount that you drink and will increase your hydration level.

4. Do not under any circumstance go for the ‘diet’ option. Most of these sugar free or diet foods and drinks will contain aspartame or similar and should be considered poison. Yes that means that if you are going to have a cola mixer in your drink you are better to go for the full sugar option rather than the diet option.

5. To reduce the chances of the kids going hyper supply them with some healthy snacks such as carrots and fruit rather than chocolate. Your aim is to stabilise your kids blood sugar levels, introduce them to healthy food and it also means the times when they do have chocolate they will appreciate it more.

6. Treat your food like we treat exercise, it is quality not quantity that counts. If you are going to have food or drink that you know is naughty then buy high quality, high cost naughty food. This will mean that you will appreciate the food and drink more, you will savour the flavours more and the chances are that you will consume less.

7. If you are going out for your celebration meal and you know that you are a protein type, have a high protein snack before you go out. If you have a Thanksgiving or Christmas meal the chances are that it will be high in carbohydrate rather then high protein so have a suitable snack first. Also remember that you must include your desert in your carb/protein balance, so if you are going to have a desert you may not want to eat your veggies with your turkey!

8. Chew your food, it sounds basic but trust me this makes a big difference. By chewing your food until it is liquid you will take much longer to eat and this will much improve your digestion. Increasing the time it takes to eat will allow your stomach to actually register that you have eaten, this reduces the chances of overeating.

9. Remember that we are open throughout the holiday period so if you fancy a training session on Christmas day or hurt your back while playing with the kids give us a call.

10. Finally, reduce your stress levels by buying your loved ones a voucher for massage or personal training from The Wolf Studio (come on you didn’t think I’d miss an opportunity to plug the business!).

Alan