As I am in Chicago’s Midway airport, I see a lot of people who should be my personal training clients. I also saw a guy who is a high level pro bodybuilder. So everyone has to travel right? But what I wanted to say, was if you want some good exercise, just fly standby on a busy day. I have probably walked 10 miles today in this freakin airport. It’s my own fault, but I look at it like this. Every time I don’t make a flight, they move you to the gate of the next flight. As I am writing this, I have had to move gates four times already. And none of them have been consecutively close to another one. This is a lot of walking. Add the fact that I have taken my laptop, TRX, and a couple big bottles of water along with me, and this is a slight workout! Although I REALLY want to start doing pushups and bench jumps off these uncomfortable chairs, I will take this walking thing as my fitness for the day. So next time you get annoyed with the standby stuff, just realize that as long as you are up and moving, you are basically working out!
Archive for the ‘Las Vegas Personal Trainer’ Category
Fitness in The Airport
Sunday, July 11th, 2010
Fitness Goal- 3% Decrease in Bodyfat.
Friday, July 2nd, 2010My fitness goal fort the month of June was to lose three percent bodyfat and go from 6.64% to 3.64%. I had twenty-seven days to do this, since I started on June Third. My diet was a little intense, but I did slip up a few times. Some people I know like to keep junk food in my fridge. I would say my nutrition, I complied with about 90% of the time. The workouts consisted of a lit of interval training, as well as a lot of circuit training with bodyweight and dumbells as resistance. The end result- in 27 days, I lost 12 pounds and 2.2% of my bodyfat. Although I didn’t quite reach my goal, I gel had I tightened up the nutrition aspect of it just a tiny bit, I would be sitting at 3% right now. Just goes to show you, no matter what shape you are in, there is always room for improvement.
99 Problems, but Fitness Ain’t One! HIT ME!
Sunday, June 27th, 2010A couple of days ago on facebook, I asked a question. That question was this: “Do you work out? If not tell me why.” I got loads of responses on this topic. Now, most people who follow me, work out in some sort of capacity. Some people are looking for motivation to work out, and some people are workout studs and studettes. Yeah, I just made that word up. But I also said following the question, that I am curious to hear the reasons, and I think I can come up with solutions to their problems. Oh yeah, by the way, big thanks to Jay-Z for making that song so I could use it as a title for my blog. I can’t remember if “fitness” was the thing he said wasn’t one of his problems. Might have been something else. Anyway. I am going to suggest a few things to a few of the responses I received on facebook.
One of the first responses was probably one of the most misunderstood and difficult reasons for working out. A guy has been battling cancer, and hasn’t found a trainer who won’t ease him into the workouts. Although it’s a scary thing to come by, it’s going to be tough at first. He’s just got to keep looking for someone who can help him the way he wants to be helped. Working out can be VERY beneficial to people inflicted with cancer. There are countless stories about people beating cancer, by following great exercise programs, and a healthy diet. Obviously it isn’t going to be easy, but if you get with the right support group, exercise SHOULD be a part of your rehab.
Another big one was basically a complaint of no time. To me, i don’t want to offend anyone, but I don’t buy the “no time” excuse. If you have time to have fun, watch tv, go out at night, go to restaurants, concerts, WATCH athletic events, you are telling me you have time right there. You have kids, take them on bike rides if they are old enough. A dog, take your furry kid on a walk or jog. I know a guy who gets home from work around 7 or 8 pm, just in time to spend a few hours with his kids. He always uses it doing something interactive. It’s great for him, AND his children.
What if your little boy or girl is a baby? I think that’s almost easier. Unless you have severe attachment issues, you WILL NOT be holding that kid 24 hours a day. My brother has a baby. That baby has this thing called a cradle. He also has this thing called a swing. And a stroller. Point is. While that baby is in the cradle, what is stopping you from doing 5 pushups every few minutes? Or jumping jacks? Or take it up a notch and do mountain climbers. YOU. You are the only thing stopping you. Your energy put into exercise, will give you energy outside of exercise. You won’t feel exhausted all the time. Trust me!
There were also some “reasons” I would like to call, LAZINESS. A few people flat out admitted that. Well, here is my advice. Find a reason you shouldn’t be lazy. Whether you want to look good for the summer, or your health, or getting a boyfriend or girlfriend. Find a reason to work out. Barring injury, nothing bad can come out of it. As for the person who doesn’t like to get hot and sweaty, she lives in Las Vegas. It’s hot and sweaty here without working out. Might as well get some benefit out of being hot and sweaty.
Fitness SPRINTervals-Las Vegas Workout
Sunday, June 6th, 2010Las Vegas is hot. No doubt about it. I finished my workout today, on the track at a nearby high school, and I could not stop sweating. That heat was just right for this personal trainer though. I did a few backwards runs, and some 100 meter sprints, and you wouldn’t believe what you can accomplish on a fat burning level with sprints. When I want to lose fat, this is what I incorporate. I’m not going to say your situation allows you to go to the nearest high school track and do sprints. For all I know, you could live in Alaska, where it’s too cold, or you just don’t want to deal with the 100 degree heat here. maybe you don’t have access to a track because where you live, all high schools are behind security bars, I just don’t know. Anyway. You can still do these sprint intervals wherever it is you may be. If you have a bike, or a treadmill, or nothing at all, you can still do this kind of exercise. What this is, is basically an all out effort for a short period of time. Let’s say you have no exercise equipment at all. What you can do, is do as many jumping jacks as you can in 30 seconds. Now these, aren’t regular jumping jacks. These are quick, intense, pushing in, pulling out jumping jacks. you should average more than one per second. This could be your exercise for 15 minutes. Spend 30 seconds doing the j.j’s, then 1:30 resting. Do another 30, and continue the trend for all 15 minutes. Trust me, if you do this right, you’ll be tired. So, to finish this up, you can do interval sprints anywhere. But to make it effective, it’s the effort you put out on the sprints that are going to make all the difference.
The June Fitness Challenge-What’s Your Workout?
Wednesday, June 2nd, 2010Hello United States. Your friendly personal trainer, back with another blog post. This month, I want to join in the fitness quest. Now, I stay relatively lean all year round. This has to do with my workout, nutrition, and way of life mostly. I understand that everyone has certain roadblocks and different circumstances when it comes to reaching fitness goals, but we all have goals. So what is your goal. Let’s take this month, and have a little challenge between ALL of us. Myself included. Now, what I am proposing, doesn’t have to be this “Ooh I’m so fat and I am gonna turn myself into this mean muscle machine in 30 days!” type of thing. What if your goal is to just START working out, or to work out for 3 days a week. Maybe your goal is to lose 5 pounds this month. Whatever it is, LET’S DO IT. There is no better time to plan for it, the time is now. For myself, I want to join in this effort, and be together with everyone. I don’t have a ton of bodyfat to lose, but I am going to make my goal, just as difficult as the next persons. Right now, I am at 6.64% bodyfat. This next month, I will try to get down to 3% bodyfat. I want to be part of this too. So what I would like you all to do, is tell me what your goal is, and what you plan to do to get there. I am going to be writing a daily journal of some of the different things i adjust, to reach my goal. What will you do? Send me an email, stating your goals, maybe a beginning picture, some stats, and your plan. At the end of the month, I want another email, with new pictures, new results and a better you! As always, if you have questions about your own workout, let me know. Now, you can hire a personal trainer, you can do this on your own, or you can do a little of both. We want results people. We are trying to change our lives, so again I say, LET’S DO THIS! My email is tony@tonycress.com We have from now until June 30th. I will choose a few winners, and tell their stories. We’ll also deliver some prizes to the best transformers. But not Transformers 2. That movie was way worse. Anyway, I’m listening.
Infomercial Fitness- Are WE Next?
Friday, May 14th, 2010I have never done P90X. I have definitely watched the videos. I have also never done that Insanity one. But I have also watched those fitness dvd’s. I have opinions on both, but don’t care to go into those. They are definitely both hardcore, amazing workouts, but can everyone do them? I don’t think so. This got me thinking. I need to make a fitness dvd program, that is geared towards not only the people who are elite athletes and who want to get ripped, but also the guy next door, who wants to just live longer, and have a more enjoyable life. What do you guys think? I’d love to have some feedback on this, as I am going to go ahead and follow through with this project I think needs to be done. Any questions, tips, recommendations, or donations are greatly appreciated. You can email me at tony@tonycress.com. Thank you guys for your time. This is going to be one heck of an experience.
The Fitness Game- Don’t Cheat
Saturday, May 8th, 2010So, we have you finally workin’ on your fitness. You have decided to make a change. You start eating right, working out, and paying attention to your physical well being. Awesome! Congratulations! I promise you this is a decision you won’t regret. I want to talk to you specifically about the working out part today. I see a lot of things go on, while I am with my personal training clients, or with my fitness campers, or in the gym in general. These things are both good and bad. Yes, you are on the right track, getting in your workout, spending time in the gym or in group exercise classes. But the thing I see in adults, when they take on these things, is that they lose that drive from competition. I will take my fitness camp for an example. Now, the people in fitness camp work hard, there is NO doubt about that. But what I see, when we partner up, or we do team races, is that some people “cheat”, or slack off. Let’s say you are doing partner leg throws. Now, your partner doesn’t want to make you mad, so they only throw your legs at a moderate level. If this were me, I’d beg for a little more effort. Either they are afraid when it’s their turn, you are going to throw their legs with too much force, or they don’t want to hurt you. I think both are cop out excuses. You are there for a reason. To get a benefit out of this workout. By doing this, you are cheating both yourself, and your partner. Aren’t you there to put forth a maximum effort, and to get results from this whole fitness thing? If you just go through the motions, what reward will you get? A garbage one. If you try your hardest every workout, those gains are going to come that much quicker, and you will be even MORE thrilled that you decided to take this journey! The same can be said in the gym. If you push yourself, get a few more reps in with the weights, go another mile on that treadmill, you will REAP the rewards and benefits. Your body is an amazing machine, and you need to realize just what potential it holds. Don’t go for “good enough”. Go for “amazing”!
Your Fitness. What is it Worth?
Tuesday, May 4th, 2010There are plenty of fitness infomercials on tv right now. I can flip through the channels at any given time and see commercials for the newest craze. A weight you just “shake”. A program promising amazing results in 90 days. Another fitness program claiming you’d have to be “insane” to not do it. Obviously, a lot of these advertisements work, so it tells me one thing. People do care about their health. The fact that people are buying these products says they do want to put in some effort, even if these are the “quick fixes”. Once the product is purchased, who really knows how much use one will get out of it. But that brings up another question in my mind. How much is your fitness worth to you? I don’t know that you could put a monetary value on it, but let’s just look at it a couple different ways. Living in Las Vegas, the nightclub scene is tops. There are places that charge $22 for one drink! And guess what. People buy them. Now, normally, you don’t have just one drink, so let’s say you have three. With a tip, we can say that’s about $75 right? No big deal, you were out drinking. Now let’s turn this into fitness and exercise. One, you just spent some money on things that are taking you away from your fitness goals, and two, that money could have been spent on something taking you towards those very same goals. So now, is it not worth it to pay the extra few dollars to buy organic? Is three drinks really worth one personal training session? I’m going to end this here, but take a look at your goals, and figure out what is worth what to you.
Las Vegas Personal Training- Your Goals.
Tuesday, April 13th, 2010Las Vegas and the rest of the country, ask yourself this question. Are you where you want to be right now? It’s April, and the months are warming up. Is this where you expected your fitness level to be at, right now? Have you lost that bodyfat that you planned on doing in January? What have your workouts been like? Are you following your nutrition the way you had planned? Ok. That’s about 15 questions, not one. Who’s counting though? Anyway. If you are exactly where you planned to be, good job! It takes a lot of dedication and determination to reach the fitness and exercise goals some people come up with. You are prime examples of what you can do when you put the knowledge and desire to work for yourself. Keep doing what you are doing. For those of you, who still think you have some work to do, you still have time. You can decide, today, that you are going to start changing things. The way you eat. What your workout is like. Little things, like deciding to eat at least two solid vegetables today, is a huge start. Might not seem like much, but it sets the wheels in motion. Deciding to go to the gym today. That is another great start. Why keep waiting, when your results are waiting for you to go get them? Just wanted to give you guys some things to think about. Just spend five minutes, mapping out how you can get to those fitness goals you have, or any goals for that matter. Ask yourself why you haven’t reached them, and how you can change the things you do to get to them. Have a great day folks!
Las Vegas Personal Training- Eat For Your Workout
Saturday, April 10th, 2010Las Vegas, and well, all other areas for that matter, is a little clueless when it comes time to choose what to eat while you are getting your fitness on. Everyone knows they need protein, but how much is too much? When do you need to have it? Should I have whey, or soy, or other sources? (Don’t let your dirty minds get a hold of you here.). Well, the answer to those questions, is YES. Doesn’t seem like a good enough answer to you? That’s ok for this personal trainer. Let’s just look at it this way. We know protein helps build muscle. Without it, we wouldn’t have a six pack, or biceps or legs for that matter. So for the general public, getting a few servings a day of different lean sources would be beneficial. And why not get a variety of sources. Have some fish here, some chicken there, a protein shake up high, and you are on track to making some major body changes. But if you couple that protein, with some good carbohydrates, and some quality fat, yes, you heard me, fat, we are on our way to a sexy, muscular MACHINE. Your body will not work over time with just protein. You need a combo of fats, proteins and carbohydrates to get functioning properly. So, after your workout, have some sort of combo like, believe it or not, a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. It has protein in the peanut butter, great fats in the peanut butter as well, and some quick carbs in the bread and jelly. All of which you need right after the workout. So take that tip and run with it. Don’t over indulge on those sandwiches though. Limit yourself to a few a week. Keep up with the complex carbs from veggies, lean protein from chicken, fish, and eggs, and get your fats from sources like olive oil and nut butters. This has been a public service announcement from your friends at Tony Cress Personal Training:)
