Poll Results - What's the most important quality of a PT?

Work is finally taking a slightly slower pace these days (maybe its because of the CNY holidays) and I am finally done traveling for work (and leisure as well). So I finally get sometime time to post something. Sometimes having a weekend with no big travel plans can be nice.

Anyway, enough chit chat, it’s time once again to review our poll results and see what everyone thinks and share why they chose the answers they chose. The question asked this time was: If you had to choose only 1 quality, what is the most important quality that a Personal Trainer should have? To be honest, all the 4 answers I gave were important but of course I wanted you to choose which was most important to you. Let’s just have a quick review of why each one was important and the votes that it received.

Certification
Well your personal trainer should know the basic science of fitness and what he is teaching you. You don’t want someone who doesn’t know anything about fitness teaching you. I honestly felt that this answer would get a much higher score but surprisingly, only 6 people voted for this. This goes to show that though certification is important, its not everything. Being a good personal trainer is more than just being a good student who can pass certification exams. You need to be passionate about it. I knew of one personal trainer in California Fitness who scored the highest in the certification course, but then I saw numerous clients shouting at him and sharing their dissatisfaction with him. So I guess I understand why this answer got such a low vote.

Looks Fit
This is extremely important to me and my vote landed here. As a personal trainer, you need to look the part. Do you really want to take fitness advice from someone who is fatter than you? Learn how to cook from an anorexic? In short, don’t sell Nokia hand phones to other people when you yourself prefer an i-Phone and use that instead of a Nokia Phone. To me, if my personal trainer looks fit, I am assured he has some basic knowledge on fitness even if he doesn’t have the paper to show it. Plus, I feel a whole lot more confident knowing that my personal trainer has personal experience on how to get there. Being fit needs a lot of self motivation, so I am sure he will be able to motivate me, the same way he motivates himself. Only 8 people out of 51 voted here and I was 1 of them.

Able to motivate me
This was of course the big winner of the whole poll by a huge margin. 70% of people felt that this was the most important thing to have. If you have a certification, look fit, but don’t know how to motivate people, the first 2 criteria are just wasted. It’s like having a Ferrari but not enough money to put petrol in the tank. What’s the point of having a Ferrari then? No wonder so many people chose this. End of the day, people want to be motivated to push themselves to the limit.

Good listener
OK, I know I kind of skewed the results by putting up a post about Personal Trainers who are hired only because their clients want someone to talk to. But in actual fact, being a good listener is important as well. By this, I don’t mean about him listening to your complaints in life or why your favorite TV Show got cancelled. What I was referring to was listening to what your fitness goals are and what motivates you as a person. A lot of personal trainers try to impose their own fitness goals onto clients without stopping to ask what their clients want. This is why being a good listener is also important to being a personal trainer. When your client shares his emotions, you need to listen to and connect with them. This way you can truly motivate them because you understand them better. So yes, listening is important as well. Only 1 person voted for this answer. Does the person who voted here want to share why you chose this?

So there you have it, what it takes to be a good personal trainer. For personal trainers who read this blog, I hope you are taking notes. :-) Anyway, what was your vote and what was your reasoning behind it. Do share and as usual, look forward to hearing your comments.

Biggest Loser Asia - Part 2

Due to popular demand from last weeks post, here is Kasey’s second post on the Biggest Loser Asia. Take it away Kasey….


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The Biggest Loser Asia is probably the best reflection of everything that's wrong with the fitness industry at large. WHY Fitness First would have their name attached is... well, just another part wrong with the fitness industry at large.

At first I was so astonished by the trainers Dave and Kristy's complete and total ABSENCE of any education whatsoever, but now I think I'm beginning to understand it. Given the premise of the show, which is to tear people down with no regard to their well being and completely screw them over under the pretense of 'getting in shape', you'd simply need trainers who really DONT know fitness, and will wear their ignorance like a badge of pride, as they smile and make complete fools of themselves.

Just to make sure, I decided to do a little research and find out what their qualifications were. I started at the Biggest Loser's website, where you can find a profile on all the contestants and even on the host, and yet you cant find anything on the trainers themselves. Almost like they're deliberately keeping the trainers info off the site.

I found 2 profiles for Kristy - one here:

http://weightlosswithshamala.com/the-biggest-loser-asia/the-biggest-loser-asia-trainer-profile-kristy-curtis

and the other here:

http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=175048847717

So after viewing these, turns out I was right. She doesn't have any qualifications... at all. No degrees, no certs, nothing. This is probably why she gets snippy that her opponents team is drinking liters of water because she doesn't understand drinking water doesn't cause you to lose fat. Maybe understanding a few of the mechanisms behind fat loss, such as epinephrine, its effects on beta-2 receptorcites, the release of triglycerides from adipose tissue, the use of fatty acids in the aerobic pathway of energetics, etc might help.

Nope, forget all that, DURRRRRR UR GAIZ ARE DRINKING WATER THAT’S CHEATING DURRRRRR!!!!

Gosh, I cant figure out why my clients have all plateaued! Oh wait I have an idea! WORK HARDER!!! Oh what your knee snapped again? Well that cant be my fault (cuz I'm the trainer and all) - KEEP WORKING!(snaps a whip) "whhhPSSH!" HARDER YOU GOOD FOR NOTHING FATTY! As your trainer and someone in whom you've trusted your health and well being to, I will NOT be showing you any of the compassion or encouragement that one would routinely expect from a health and fitness professional!

Anyway, lets take a look at Kristy's profile, shall we? (Yes I'm picking on Kristy but that's only because Dave is not such a douche).

From the first link I provided earlier:

Although a little bit more low profile
◘ Yeah being on national television is SO low profile. I mean its practically a mandatory step in the witness protection program - go on nation wide TV and tell everyone who you are! You probably mean her fitness background is low profile but that’s only because its embarrassingly absent of any of the qualifications you'd expect from a fitness trainer.

Kristy Curtis is no less accomplished than her counterpart Dave Nuku.

◘ A woman with noodly arms who probably couldn't do the exercises she demands from her clients with no education at all in the field she's supposedly an expert in? I'm guessing Dave wasn't training professional athletes.

She is one of Australia’s leading health and wellness expert

◘ HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OH man!!! Seriously a f*cking kangaroo could do better!

who runs her own personal training business

◘ Running a business is an entirely separate issue. I don’t know what Kristy's business qualifications are, but if she can recognize market trends, understand supply and demand, anticipate changes in consumer behavior, manage a sales team, and keep comprehensive records of business transactions, then she might be great at running her own business! In fact as long as you've got the start up capital needed, you could skip the need to understand anything at all about fitness by hiring others to handle that for you. In other words: running a business is not a fitness qualification. Nice try though!

and is a Group Fitness Manager in an international fitness chain where she teaches classes all over Sydney.

◘ Only serves to reinforce my point. Maybe she's a good manager and can handle loads of paperwork, but this isn't a fitness qualification either. Its painfully obvious from watching the show that concepts such as fat loss are just wayyyyyy over her head.

Kristy has lived in London where she worked in the corporate fitness industry and her passion for fitness has taken her all over the world in spreading her message.

◘ Wow, what a fantastic way to keep a low profile!

Of Chinese-Australian descent, Kristy faced body image issues as a teenager,

◘ Really? Cuz, I mean, it’s so rare that teenagers have body image issues.

a struggle that she conquered

◘ Yea most people grow out of it.

and went on to become a National Aerobic Champion.

◘ Now this sounds impressive at first, but after considerable research, I couldn't find any aerobic competition Kristy had entered in which she won the championship title. That’s sort of a mandatory step in being able to call yourself a "National Aerobic Champion", with capitalized letters no less, with any degree of honesty. What’s even more conspicuous is that the year, date, and location are missing. Not even the name of the event where she supposedly won this title, or the name of the organization that hosted it.

I mean this is a truly impressive title! You don’t just go leaving it in the dark like that! Its possible she simply forgot to give any details when they asked for her profile, but its unlikely someone so accomplished in business would make an error like that. Not unless you were deliberately keeping details off your profile... much like keeping the trainer's profiles off the The Biggest Loser website.

I could be completely wrong on this, so to be sure, I tried sending an email to The Biggest Loser Asia website, requesting more information. This part of the site doesn't seem to be working, so its off to the site forums next! We'll keep you updated in the comments section.

Also just had a look at Dave's profile (seen here; http://weightlosswithshamala.com/the-biggest-loser-asia/the-biggest-loser-asia-trainer-profile-dave-nuku ).

I wont go into my usual routine on this one, but he does seem slightly better. Although again, I think they might have been looking for people who *weren't* qualified and who would just provide more drama. I mean really, even on the website's forum under "Experts", where its written

"The host and the trainers are there to help the contestants lose weight."

There aren't even any replies! Not from experts or the trainers from the show! Did they just completely forget about putting this here?

Look forward to hearing your comments guys.

Biggest Loser Asia

OK, this week since i am absolutely swamped with work and traveling for work, Kasey Brown decided to volunteer a post on my blog as a guest writer. So take it away Kasey....

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Hi everyone! Kasey here. Rajan's letting me sort of guest-write on his blog this week, so I thought I'd talk about the Biggest Loser Asia, which I just recently started watching. Mostly out of disbelief.

First I need to lay down a few scientific reasons behind why the show is completely retarded. I mean most of us know how retarded the show is, but we'll get specific. The entire premise of the show is ridiculous. The contestants are judged based on how much weight they've lost, NOT on how much fat they've lost. Does anyone here know how much weight you will lose if you fast for a week? Depends on activity level and metabolism of course, but whatever amount you lose, around 70% of that weight will be muscle, not fat.

The body has plenty of stored fats and carbs in the adipose (fat)tissue, but it does not store protein OR amino acids there. 1 protein is made of 20 amino acids. Each of those amino acids has an important job in the body. L-Arginine and L-Tryptophan help regulate hormones, while L-lysine assist in calcium absorption, bone formation, and fights viruses. L-Glutamine has a dozen different functions, as do the branch chain amino acids, Leucine, Isoleucine, and Valine. Out of those 20 aminos, 8 are ESSENTIAL (meaning you'll eventually die if you dont get them)

So where does the body store the aminos and proteins? In the muscles of course. And the body is more than willing to start tearing up its muscle reserves to provide itself with the vital tools (amino acids)it needs to continue living. Thats generally why fasting is a BAD idea, and eating 5 to 6 times a day is a GOOD idea. By getting protein in every one of those 5 meals, your body has no reason to tear down its own amino acid reserves (muscle). Since muscles are the primary providers of metabolic rate, losing muscle means fat loss becomes more and more difficult as time goes on.

This is also why the best way to beat a fat loss plateau is to start deliberately gaining weight. By eating more than you need and lifting heavy weights, you rebuild some of that lost muscle, which then helps you start losing fat again.

The creators of the show, and the trainers (hell even the contestants and most of the audience) are seemingly oblivious to any of this. As a result, the contestants work themselves to a dangerously unhealthy state, are extremely malnourished, and lose tons of muscle mass.

The real irony being that the show is supposedly related to the health and fitness industry, yet the contestants are the most unhealthy people I've ever seen. Underneath the layers of lose skin is probably a person with all the nutritional fortification of a holocaust survivor.

Call me crazy, but I always thought this is NOT what fitness is supposed to be. A lot of the people on the show have probably never consistently exercised or dieted before in their lives. Their first exposure to what diet and exercise should be like come from completely unqualified / uncertified trainers (more on that in my next post) who force them to do work they hate, while injured, and placing them on a

diet that are completely unrealistic.

I mean even in the United States Marine Core the training is brutal, but at least its productive. Physical training is given in measured amounts and they make sure you eat enough so you can see the results of your training. The point of yelling and screaming at you is to force you to develop coping mechanisms you'll need to survive in actual combat. The Biggest Loser Asia has you doing endless amounts of work that do nothing but place you in a catabolic (muscle wasting)state and the yelling / demanding is entirely pointless.

Contestants believe drinking loads of water before a weigh in is going to help, and no one corrects them on this because no one else knows any better either. The deficient diet and overtraining is probably why the contestants have so many various injuries, and yet the trainers still demand they train despite all the pain and injuries the trainers themselves cause without any considerable readjustments. Really, if your client's knee is hurt, how hard could it be to let them do bench presses instead of push ups, especially if the push ups are hurting the knee?

If someone has been weight training intensely, and he weighs in with a 0 kg weight loss, most likely he hasn't "plateaued" at all. He probably gained 2 kg of muscle while losing 2 kg of fat. This is actually the ideal situation - you want as much fat as possible offset by the replacement of muscle mass, and since a pound of muscle is smaller in size than a pound of fat, the contestants will definitely be getting smaller while keeping the same weight. So the ones who haven't lost any weight are actually getting healthier - and are chastised for doing so. Its like being healthy is actually a BAD thing!

There is so much wrong with this show, and I could go on... in fact I will go on next week (or whenever Rajan lets me post again)! Let us hear your feedback. Would you like to see more posts like this from me, or if you'd like to stick with Original Rajan Recipe?

If you found this post interesting and would like to know more about the exact how and why of fat loss and nutrition, ask us about Nutrition Science Level 1 course currently being offered from Kasey Brown Fitness.

This post was made possible by Fitness Malaysia, the letter H, and viewers like you!

Should I workout when I am ill?

Just the other day I was telling someone how I have not gotten a flu in over 3 years now. With everyone around me having the sniffles, I thought wow, I must be in great shape. despite hanging out with people who had bad flus, i still did not get sick. But as luck would have it, I finally did fall ill and dealing with flu as I write this.

Anyway, the purpose of this posting is not to bitch about being sick, but rather to answer a simple question that many out there ask me. Should I work out when I am ill?

Well for starters, you should see your doctor when ever you are ill. Ask your doctor if its OK for you to work out. Now most doctors will tell you its better to stay at home and just rest, so this is where your own judgement comes into play. Doctors are not wrong when they tell you to skip the workout, and they have your best intentions in mind... which is to recover as fast as possible. But if you are a fitness addicts like me, I usually nod my head and then decide later if I should rest at home or work out.

For me, I usually decide based on how ill I am am. If all you have is a little blocked nose and nothing more, I usually hit the gym anyway. I usually go a little lighter on weights and at a lower intensity for cardio. I never push a full blown workout when I am ill. How light or how intense you should push all depends on how ill you are, and with years of work out experience under my belt, I am a pretty good judge on how hard I can push at the gym. So you know your body best, and will know how far to push it. now i am not saying you should go against your doctor's advice and workout when you are ill. i am saying that you need to judge for yourself if you are up to it or not.

If I feel pretty ill and have a fever, headache, sore throat etc, then I stay away from the gym all together. Trust me, even if you did go to the gym, you would not be giving your best, so its better to rest and stay at home. When I am that ill, the only thing on my mind is to rest and recover...not pumping iron at the gym. So rest, recover and once you are better you can go crazy at the gym again.

Some people tell me that working out when you are ill actually makes you feel better. So rather than resting at home, you should workout more. Well the feel good factor is usually due to endorphins released into your bloodstream after a workout. whenever you workout or do vigorous activity, your body releases feel good hormones called endorphins. It has little effect on actually helping you combat the illness itself. For the fastest recovery results, resting at home will be your best bet. You will still recover even if you worked out, but your recovery time might be slightly longer. So this again, is where your judgement comes into play. If you are not sure on what to do, its best to stick with your doctor's advice.

So in summary, follow these simple steps when deciding whether to workout or not when you are ill
1) Speak to your doctor first. You can even ask him if its OK to do a light workout and he/she will tell you yes or no. If your doctor is the kindd that works out, he / she may even tell you how hard you can workout.
2) You know your body best. So decide on how well you are feeling before going to the gym. If you feel like crap, stay at home. IF you just feel a little whoozy, then yeah, go ahead.
3) If you do decide to work out, ensure it is a lighter one (maybe about 70% to 80% of your usual intensity)

So I hope this helps to answer the question on whether or not you should workout when you are ill. With lots of people having the sniffles these days, I hope this posting will help you. As usual, look forward to hearing your comments

The F.U. Model

I was conducting a teambuilding training a couple of weeks back and one of the things I use for my training is what I call the F.U. Model. Now I know many of you are thinking of F*** You, and jumping about in astonishment…but actually, the F and the U stands for Fed Up and not anything else. Now most people (including our parents) will teach you that being fed up is a negative emotion and should be avoided. Even if you feel fed up with something, you should plough through and work hard, because that’s how they all did it.

Well contrary to the popular belief above, I actually feel that being fed up is a useful feeling as long as you know how to act on it. The problem arises when people feel fed up, don’t do anything about it and then become depressed. For me, feeling Fed Up is your brain telling you that it needs something to change and you should listen to the signals that your brain is telling you.

Now the F.U. Model is divided into 3 simple steps as stated below:-
1) What is it that you are fed up about
2) Why are you feeling fed up?
3) What is the action plan you can take to overcome this

So the simplest example I can use, which I think everyone can relate to is being fed up with your current job. So the answers to the questions will be something like below:-
1) I am fed up with my job
2) I am fed up because of the pay package, the way my boss treats me, the long hours, too much politics…
3) Start applying for a new job by sending out resumes, looking in the news paper, JobStreet etc

So now, with that being said, the same model can be easily applied for fitness as well. Now assuming you are fed up with being overweight, below is what your F.U. Model will look like
1) I am fed up with being fat.
2) I am fed up because people always make fun of me, I have limited options for clothes, I am unhealthy
3) Join a gym, Start working out, eat less, avoid oily fried foods etc.

Now when we talk about being fed up, it has to be where you are really unhappy and truly fed up with the situation. Then using this model helps you focus your attention and energy in the right direction. If its just a matter of an inconvenience or a nuisance, than chances are this model will not be that effective, as you can still live with it and overall, you are still generally happy with the way you look. Yes, you could look better, but at the same time, things now aren’t that bad. The level of frustration you feel will determine your level of commitment, which ultimately translates to how successful you are in changing.

So what happens when you are fed up with working out? Well let’s look at it using the F.U. Model
1) I am fed up with my training / Diet
2) Because I am not seeing results
3) Change my training, change my diet, do some research to find out why I am not seeing results. (Law of Variability)

Whatever it is you are trying to achieve in life, if your decision to do so is very strong, you will definitely reach success. In fact, about 60% to 70% of how successful you are will depend on how strong your decision is. If it’s not that strong, don’t worry about it too much. It means you are relatively happy with the way things are. And as long as you are happy with things, then nothing else matters does it.
So try it out and see. Not just for fitness, but for anything else as well. As usual, look forward to hearing your comments.

The Answers

Last week’s post was about personal training certification. I posted 3 simple questions for everyone to answer just to test your knowledge on Fitness and I thank those who actually took the trouble to answer the questions. So, now that you have patiently waited for one week, its time to reveal the answers to last weeks posting. Are you ready? The answers may shock you as to how much you did or didn’t know about fitness. So here we go.

1) How long should you rest between sets?
I got a few variations in the answers here and honestly, when I was first asked this question, I answered just like you guys. The sad part is, when you walk into a gym and ask their so called “Master Trainers”, how long you should rest between sets, you still get all kinds of answers from 2 minutes to 10 minutes. The sad part is, no one can give you a clear answer as to why 2 minutes or why 1 minute and what benefits can you gain and why. It’s all just opinion and not based on any scientific fact.

The truth is, resting time is very crucial depending on what the athlete wants to achieve. If you don’t have any specific goals (you just want to “get in shape”), then it probably doesn’t matter much. But for a more serious minded athlete, rest times depend on the fiber composition and training goals of the athlete. A red fiber (endurance) athlete will recover far more quickly than a white fiber (strength) athlete. Also, shorter rest times tend to trigger a greater release of human growth hormone (hGH), which is more closely associated with size increases (body building). Longer rest times tend to trigger a greater release of testosterone, which is more closely associated with strength increases (weight lifting / power lifting). So again, depending on what your client wants to achieve, it is important to know how long they should rest to get the maximum benefits. When attending the course, there is a table which shows you the differences between different rest times and the different results that you get, so you know what is best to prescribe to your client. Sorry, can’t share the table with you guys here as it is Copyright material.

2) Is being flexible beneficial to all athletes?
In general, the ability to move through a full range of motion can be important for sports and for every day life. However, a lack of flexibility can be just as important. Many do not realize that tightness can be beneficial, depending on your goals. For powerlifters, a certain level of tightness at the bottom of a squat can not only help resist the downward motion of the weight, but can also work as a kind of “spring” to help the athlete begin his ascent to the standing position. A sprinter may find that a little tightness in his hams and gluts can help slingshot his legs back once they’re in front of him. So flexibility is not necessarily beneficial to all athletes. Again, it depends on what the athlete needs. A lot of times, Personal Trainers try to impose their own ideals onto their clients.

3) Name 2 exercises you can do to train your lower abs?
OK, this one was actually a trick question. Sorry guys, but I had to make it hard, or else everyone would get it. The fact is, there is no way to train your lower abs. Your ab muscles is one long muscle which is attached at 2 points (refer to diagram below).


When muscles pull, the fibers between the 2 attached points contract and it is not possible for just part of the fibers to contract while the rest are relaxed. The best way to picture this is imagine having a string tied to a door knob. The string represents your muscle fiber and as you pull on the string (to pull the door closer to you) the entire rope gets tight, and it’s impossible to leave any part of it somehow “less tight” or “more tight” than other parts. For the same reason it is impossible to target just the lower part of your abs, just as it is impossible for you to target just the lower part of your biceps. So whether you are doing sit ups or leg raises, you are essentially using the entire ab muscles and not targeting anything specific. But the idea that leg raises specifically target your lower ab muscles is a myth. Now I am not saying you should stop doing it, but saying that you cannot target you lower abs by doing leg raises.

So there you have it, the answers to the questions. Any comments? Quite shocking isn’t it. Also, I hope this gives you a preview of how technical and scientific the Am-FIT certification course is. I know it is new in the market and people will be skeptical, but I hope this shows you the quality of what you are learning and how beneficial this kind of information will be to your client. Train your client with scientific knowledge and not opinions that someone taught you. Once the course is ready to be launched to the public, I will inform you guys. I am trying to negotiate a discount for those who frequently visit my blog and share their comments. Will let you know.

As usual, look forward to hearing your comments.

Personal Training Certifications

Let me be absolutely honest with all of you. I am not a big fan of fitness certification, and if I had to choose between a certified fitness instructor who looked fat or a fit looking fitness instructor with no certification, I would choose the fit looking guy without any papers. Reason being, I have just heard too many stories of certified personal trainers who are fat and out of shape, and their clients…. Don’t get any better after 2 years (I wrote about this a while ago. To read that posting, click here) For this reason, I truly believe that a personal trainer is only as good as what he himself has experienced… so if he is fat (he has experience), he will probably be great at telling you where to eat your favourite foods. If he is fit, he will be good at telling you how to be fit. Just getting a cert doesn’t mean much in my books if you look like the only weight you ever lifted repeatedly was your TV remote.

Since I started Fitness Malaysia, I have been approached by numerous self acclaimed Fitness Gurus who all wanted to sell me their certification course. I always look at it with a suspecting eye and always found holes in the material and most are nothing more but marketing scams trying to milk money out of the booming fitness industry. Not too long ago, I met Kasey Akira, an ISSA certified fitness instructor from Alaska. As usual, he had a fitness instructing course he wanted to sell and so I went to meet him. I went with the same level of suspicion until he showed me his material – OK, pretty impressive. So I asked him some questions on fitness and exercise (which I usually do to test the validity of the program) and waited to see his answers. OK, so this guy really knows what he is talking about and could answer my questions. Impressive, but 1 last test. I asked him about results that I see in the gym but didn’t know the explanation as to why it happened (like why do you become stronger after taking a week off from the gym). So I asked him to explain. Guess what – he flipped to a page on his program and showed me a diagram and explained to me why it happens. It was a scientific explanation on how the muscles work and why you become stronger. Not just an opinion, but a scientific explanation. I was impressed. When I got home, I actually researched his answer and guess what… it checked out.

Being fully impressed, I called him again after that and we met a few more times and we are now working together to introduce his scientific fitness course to everyone in Malaysia. This course was designed by him, pulling together the wealth of knowledge that he has gathered through his studies and research over the past 10 years. We are tweaking the contents a little to meet the needs of Malaysians, but I truly believe, this is most superior fitness instructing course out there. So what is this course called? It’s called Am-FIT – American Fitness Instructing Touchstone. The course itself is broken up into 2 parts:-

1) Kinesiology and Biomechanics
2) Nutrition Science for Fitness

Once you complete both courses, there is a written exam and also a practical exam, where you will need to coach 1 individual while being monitored by the examiners. The coaching includes coming up with a work out routine and diet plan based on their needs and goals as well as coaching them through a full 1 hour personal training session. So you not only memorize a whole bunch of nonsense and then vomit it out on exam day, you actually have to perform it in a real life scenario. If you pass it, then, you will earn yourself a certificate. If you ask me, this is the kind of certificate that I would believe.

This course not only covers what gym rats should do, but extends beyond that. It teaches the whole science of training everyone:- from an old lady who just wants to shed a few pounds to professional body builders, weight lifters, power lifters, professional athletes (sprinters, high jumpers) to marathon runners. So when teaching you about how muscles work, the course covers the entire spectrum and not just body building and weight loss. In essence, completing this course, will make you competent enough to train professional athletes, if the need arose.

Since I am working closely with him on this course, I am currently attending the course as a normal participant. Why am I excited about the course? Well learning the exact science behind fitness and the reason for getting results we get are truly mind blowing. I no longer have to say “I don’t know why it happens, but trust me it does work”. Now I can truly explain to people why they get the results they get.

Just as a teaser and a preview on how good this course is, try answering the following questions. The real answers will be revealed in next weeks postings, but if you don’t mind, just post your answers as comments.

1) How long should you rest between sets?
2) Is being flexible beneficial to all athletes?
3) Name 2 exercises you can do to train your lower abs?

OK, I know I have been bragging about the course and how great it is, but I am just excited with everything that I am learning. But before I end this post, there are things that even Kasey does not know, and when he doesn’t, he always tells me he doesn’t know. He is honest about it. There are even parts of the course that say “Based on our current scientific understanding, we hold this to be true for the moment” Anyone who tells you they know everything about fitness is a liar. If you meet a trainer like that, run away as fast as you can.

Anyway, look forward to hearing your comments and of course, your answers to the question

Trip To Penang

Me and wifey took a trip to Penang for New Years Eve and it was a great trip… except the coming back which kinda sucked due to the heavy traffic on the roads. But still, we had a great time, and definitely worth another visit.

What did we do? Well what do most people do when they go to Penang? You eat and you eat. OK, I did not turn into a glutton overnight, but let’s just say I ate close to 50% more than my usual. Added with the fact that I skipped the gym whole of last week (this is my break / rest period to ensure I do not become a victim of overtraining), so now I feel like a chunk of flab. Can’t wait to whip myself back to shape again.

We stayed in Flamingo by the Beach (in Tg. Bunga), which all in all was a great hotel. For the price of RM 238 nett for new years eve, it really was above my expectations. Most hotels were charging way over RM 400 plus for new years eve, so for the price we paid and what we got, excellent deal if you ask me. We welcomed the new year at Ferringhi in a bar called The Wooden Pub… It’s called Wooden Pub because all the furniture in there, looks like it is made out of logs, not the processed wood you buy from your friendly neighbourhood hardware shop. There was a small crowd of people there, but it was just what me and the missus ordered.


Now, I just want to share some of my food experiences there and my opinions on them.

Char Kuey Teow at Lorong Selamat – This particular stall was recommended by a colleague of mine who is from Penang. Overall rating – Excellent. The prawns were fresh and huge and it just tasted perfect. It is not halal, but if you are a non-Muslim, you must try it out. Thumbs up from me.

Nasi Kandar Yasmeen – we were supposed to check out the famed Nasi kandar Line Clear, but alas, we went at 1pm on a Friday and the guys were off to pray, so we went to Nasi Kandar Yasmeen which was just next door. I am not a big fan of Nasi Kandar, and neither is my wife. The food was so so only and I dare say we can get far better Nasi Kandar in KL. Took a piece of fried chicken, and it was hard and rubbery – clear sign of over frying, or re-frying yesterdays stock. So thumbs down from me on this one.

Jemputree – Now this place promotes itself to be a restaurant on top a huge tree, but don’t get fooled. It’s not on a tree and just on the road. Yes, the ambience was nice with a lot of trees and greenery around, but the fact remains, its not on a tree. Foodwise, I thought they were horrid. Wife ordered a Chicken Sausage Pasta and honestly, it tasted like Ayamas sausages and the sauce was straight out of a tin. Real bad. Double thumbs down from me.

Roti Canai Jalan Argyll – For those who are not aware, this particular restaurant came from very humble beginnings. It started out from a shack next to a building and now they have a shop inside a building. This roti canai is so popular that it was even featured on Travel 360, Air Asia’s in-flight magazine. The main difference I can taste between this roti canai and everyone elses, it is a lot more compact (padat) and not so flaky. But the thing that makes it the best, is the curry. Fish and Dahl curry mixed and poured on top. Just heavenly. One disappointment I had, the Roti itself was a little small compared to the last time I ate it. So definitely thumbs up for this on.

We did eat in other shops, but I honestly feel they are not worth mentioning here. Also, we went prepared to check out the beach, but finally decided not too, coz the beach at Ferringhi is not that good. Water looked murky and barely any waves. Sorry, but after visiting the clear water beaches in Sabah and Tioman, this really falls short of my expectations. But the night life in Ferringhi was great. Just rows and rows of restaurants and bars. For some reason, there is a huge number of Middle Eastern restaurants there. Don’t ask me why.

Sorry, no tips on Fitness this week, just wanted to share my little holiday with everyone. Have any of you checked out any of the places I mentioned? Would love to hear your comments on the food and things to do in Penang.

Making A New Year's Resolution That Sticks

It’s that time of the year again, when festivities are in the air and everyone is out partying and having a feast. Nothing wrong with that, I have been a complete glutton over the past 2 weeks as well and this weekend, I will be in Penang – Food Paradise of Malaysia.

It is also the time when people start making new years resolutions which usually don’t last. Last year, before we welcomed 2009, I gave some tips on how to make a proper new years resolution to be fitter and healthier. I hope those who did follow those tips stuck with the program. For those who tried and failed, perhaps this posting will be of some use to you.

Why do so many people make a New Year’s Resolution and never stick with it? The reason is, people don’t have a concrete reason for doing it. A lot of times, people just make a resolution, because:-
a) it is year end and that’s what they’ve been doing for the past umpteen years. So why not do it again.
b) people make a resolution because they feel guilty from all the year end festivities, be it eating too much, drinking too much or smoking too much. So to comfort themselves with this total loss of control, they tell themselves – It’s OK, starting next year I will cut down or quit blah blah blah.

Though these are reasons, they are not powerful enough to make a lasting change. What you need is a real reason which is impactful and will move you.

For the moment, I am going to be referring to making resolutions on a being fit, losing weight and becoming healthier. But with some small tweaks to this, you can easily use this technique for other things.

So how do you find this reason? Simple. Answer the questions below truthfully and honestly. If you lie and write something which you think is the correct answer, you are only cheating yourself. Take some time to think about your answers, and your answers should be nice long ones. 2 to 3 sentences at least. Be very descriptive with your answers. It’s best to sit in a quiet place when doing this and set aside 20 to 30 minutes of undisturbed “me time” for this session.

1) Why do you want to make this change. (what is the driving force for this change)
2) What is your goal. (be specific, if it’s weight loss, have a specific number of Kgs you want to lose)
3) How would you feel once you achieve your this goal. (your emotions, the praises)
4) What is it that you truly want to do in life, but you can’t right now because you are overweight, unfit and not healthy
5) What would happen if you conitnue your unhealthy lifestyle (include how you would feel if you continued)

Once you answer these 5 questions in writing, keep it with you and make a point to read these answers at least once a week. If you must, read it every morning when you wake up. By answering these questions properly and honestly, you will discover a deep reason for wanting to make the change and hopefully make you decide on wanting to embrace this change. If you find it extremely difficult to find the answers and still don’t feel moved, it means that subconsciously you are not ready to make the change yet, hence why your mind is rejecting the idea and finding it difficult to come to an answer. In short, if you have truly made a decision to change, nothing will stop you, and if you are not ready to make the change, then you will be stopping yourself.

So go ahead, take some time and answer these questions, and you will surely succeed. As usual, look forward to hearing your comments and I would like to wish Happy New Year to everyone.

PS: Can you read what's written on the women's bottoms? :-)

Virtual Trainer - Part 1

As promised in my last posting, I will share with all of you, the meal plan and exercise plan for the Biggest Loser Allianz. This posting is called the Virtual Trainer, because all of you can read and follow the exercise routine and meal plan and lose weight easily. When it is time to change the exercise or increase the intensity, I will post it up here, so you will know when its time to make those changes. Also, if you have any questions, leave a comment and I will get back to you. So in short, its like having a Personal Trainer, but in a virtual setting and its absolutely free of charge. I hope everyone who reads this blog on a regulare basis will take the opprtunity to try this out.

So here is the plan.

Meal Plan
Once I received all the food diaries from the participants, I noticed a few common traits. Perhaps some of you may be doing the same, if you are, its time to break those habits.

Bad Habits
1) Sweet Drinks – On Average, these participants were consuming between 5 to 7 sweet drinks a day. I am not saying no sweet drinks at all, but sweet drinks are what I like to call empty calories. Does not fill you up, but high in calories and these are calories you can do without
2) Snacking – all the participants have similar traits. They constantly snack on unhealthy things between their meals. From Goreng pisang, to keropok to karipap. Again, these are unnecessary calories.
3) Unhealthy Choice of Food – One of the biggest problems I noticed is, that all the participants had poor choice of food. The normal breakfast is either nasi lemak, mee goreng or some kind of cheese bun.

Not wanting to make it too drastic, I decided to make 3 simple changes to their diet plan. So here is what they are doing now.
1) Breakfast has to be healthy. The choices they have are:-
a) cereal with low fat milk and a green apple. Cereal here refers to oat bran kind of cereal like Nestle Fitness. No Koko Crunch, Honey Stars and Fruit Loops as these are mainly sugar based.
b) 2 half boiled eggs and 2 slices of wholemeal toast
c) Wholemeal Sandwich – egg sandwich, chilli tuna sandwich (no Mayo) or ham sandwich
d) Thosai or Iddly

2) No Snacking in between. Keep your meals to Brakfast, Lunch and Dinner only. No Snacking in between be it a drink or food. This way, they truly appreciate their food now
3) Keeping sweet drinks to just 4 glasses a day. So now that these partcipants have a quota each day, they really got to consciously think about every drink that they have. May target is to reduce this to 2 drinks per day.

Exercise Routine
When coming up with the exercise routine, I had 2 main challenges. 1) the lack of equipment –so I had to get creative with what I had. 2) that these participants have never worked out before and you can’t push them too much or they will get injured.

With those 2 things in mind, here is the exercise routine I designed for them.

Chair Squats
10 reps, 3 sets with 1 minute rest between sets. The reason for going with chair squats instead of normal squats, because I am not sure if these participants can handle it. Its basically sitting down and getting up from the chair, but you are not allowed to use your hands to assist.

Wall Push Ups
10 reps, 3 sets with 1 minute rest between sets. Wall push ups are a great way to build up your push up strength. If you are not able to do push ups, you can start of with wall push ups first until you become stronger. To do this, stand about 2 feet away from the wall, put your arms straight and rest against the wall. As you get stronger, you will move your feet further and further away from the wall.


Box lift
10 reps, 3 sets with 1 minute rest between sets. I filled up a box with about 1kg of paper. Then I had them bendover, and lift it up above their heads. As they improve, I will keep increasing the weight.

Knee ups
10 reps each leg, 3 sets with 1 minute rest between sets. To finish up, I made them do a march on the spot. They needed to raise their knees as high as they could, put it down, and then raise the other knee.


This routine needs to be performed 4 times a week and for best results, they should finish up with a 20 minute walk. So do the routine above first, and then finish up with a 20 minute walk. But since this is their first time, I just got them to do this and skipped the walking bit. But this week, I am planning on doing this and adding in the walking bit. I hope all of you will give this workout routine and meal plan and a try and enjoy the results.

Before I sign off, Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to everyone and look forward to reading your comments.