Super-sets for Fat Loss

Now the warm weather is on its way it's time to shed the last of the winter fat. This year I packed on a lot of new muscle but my fat% went from 11% to 14% in the process.During the winter I'd been lifting heavy with lots of rest inbetween sets.

In order to strip the extra fat and retain the muscle I've switched to super-setting exercises and keeping rest between pairs of sets to 60 seconds. I've been pairing opposing muscles for chest & back exercises whilst perfroming 2-3 exercises for the same muscle with no rest for arms, shoulders and legs.

With this protocol, and the right diet, definition starts to imprive very quickly. This is due largely to the increase in growth hormone, which is related to the lactic acid build up from reduced rest. The weights are still high enough to retain muscle (10-15 reps mostly). Heart rate is elevated throughout the workouts, thus ensuring more calories are burned and a significant excess post exercise oxygen consumption (EPOC), which keeps you burning fat for some time after the workout (estimates of how long vary from 3-38 hours depending on the intensity of the exercise).

A sample wokout might be:

A1) Bench Press 2x 10-15 reps (no rest)
A2) Cable Row 2x 10-15 reps (60 seconds rest)

B1) Lat Pulldown 2 x 10-15 reps (no rest)
B2) Clean & Press 2x 10-15 reps (60 seconds rest)

C1) Alternating Lunge 2x 10 reps (no rest)
C2) Dead Lift 2 x 10 reps (60-90 seconds rest)

D1) Leg Extension 2 x 10-15 reps (no rest)
D2) Squat 2 x 10-15 reps (60 seconds rest)

E1) Rope triceps pressdown 2 x 10-15 reps (no rest)
E2) Dumbbell Biceps Curl 2x 10-15 reps (60 seconds rest)

For abdominals I generally use giant sets (i.e. ball crunch, side bend, reverse crunch, cable crunch, plank with no rest in between).

New Book Released

My new book "Foundations for a Better Physique" has now been released and is available either as a paperback or download from www.lulu.com

The book cuts through all the confusing information about training with weights to give you the best method, in my opinion, of training your whole body whilst preserving structural balance.

The book describes the six core exercises in great detail and tells you how to periodise your training for optimal results.

Invaluable information on motivation, rest, recuperation, training variables, and diet is also included along with record sheets for diet, training and physical measurements.


Paperback costs £6.25 and download £1.50

12 Week Body Transformation Challenge

Six clients have now started the 12 Week Body Transformation Challenge - all want to lose body fat and build or retain some muscle.


The recording of diet has been made as simple as possible - it involves selecting one of three choices per meal (6 a day including snacks), entering the letter and the time eaten. So far compliance is perfect.


Three people are training with me in the FISH studio but the others have elected to train by themselves following programmes I have written. They all have copies of the diet plan and record sheets and unlimited email support.


Whilst it is naturally ideal to do the challenge with a trainer, not everyone can spare the cost; but its amazing what can be achieved with a good plan, access to support, clear goals, and (most of all) dogged consistency.


Good luck to everyone. 2nd November is not too far away. 12 weeks out of your whole life is nothing, so you might as well succeed.

If you have any queuries please don't hesitate to contact me on derekprior@yahoo.co.uk

To view FISH Personal Training services and products please visit http://www.derekprior.com/

If you would like to participate in the challenge either with a trainer or by yourself send me an email.

Derek

12 Week Body Transformation Challenge

Due to popular demand I am once more offering the 12 Week Challenge for those of you who are serious about making extreme changes to your physique. During the 12 weeks you will work consistently towards your goal. Generally clients want to shed body fat whilst retaining muscle. I usually advise people to aim for between 12 & 24 lbs of actual fat loss depending on their starting fat percentage.

This is a perfect opportunity for those of you looking to get really lean or for those, with more to lose, to make a bug shift in your weight loss goals.

The programme consists of:

Goal setting

Weight and body fat monitoring

3 Personal Training sessions per week (weights)

Optional outdoor group training twice per week (running, hill walking, bootcamp)

12 week diet plan with detailed record sheets (vegetarian option available)

Unlimited email support

Advice on supplements and supplement ordering service

Option for additional Personal Training sessions for only £10 each
Optional photos (before, after, and monthly)

The entire 12 Week Body Transformation programme costs only £50 per week (payable at the beginning of each week)

SPECIAL OFFER: If you pay for the entire 12 week programme in advance it will cost you only £450 (a saving of £150!)

*prices are for the FISH Studio. If you wish to train at another location please contact me for a quotation.

Payments can be made by cheque, cash, or Paypal.

Contact: http://www.derekprior.com/ or derekprior@yahoo.co.uk

Telephone: 07735433467

International clients please see ONLINE TRAINING on http://www.derekprior.com/

Consistency

Whenever you see someone with a lean, defined physique you can be sure they have trained, and even more importantly dieted, with consistency. Rather than hitting the gym hard for a few weeks, or following a rigid diet which leaves you hungry and ready to binge at the drop of a hat, it's more productive, in the long-term, to keep progressing with small steps.

Many beginners to weight training make the mistake of increasing the weight too much. For years body builders have been saying that if you can't feel the muscle working then the weight is too heavy. Outside of power-lifting/strength/athletic performance circles this is absolutely right.

To build muscle you need to keep the target muscle under tension; you also need to focus on the function of the muscle and not on the lifting of the weight (which is a tool for increasing tension). Ego is often the curse of weight lifters. What's the point of benching 100kg if you are only starining your tendons and rotator cuff muscles?

A useful aid to making continual progress is to use small increments, micro weights (such as Plate Mates). These allow you to increase the load by as little as 1/4 of a kilo. This is most helpful for busting plateau's with smaller muscle groups.

Diet is the same. Make small adjustments that are easy to follow rather than depriving yourself so much that you can't sustain it.

Generally, increase protein (but not to the ridiculous levels recommended by some body builders, unless your goal is to keep growing huger), reduce carbs (but not as low as Atkins) and increase monunsaturated and polyunsaturated fats. Ensure you take sufficient amounts of Essential Fatty Acids (omega 3 & 6; I would recommend Udo's Choice oils, flaxseeds and oily fish). A multi vitamin/mineral supplement is good insurance too. Make sure you have enough B6 in particular to metabolise all that protein.

I find it helpful to create food record sheets that list the 3 or 4 options for each meal as A, B, C etc. You then simply record the letter and the time of the meal. Too much choice may be detrimental; keep things simple.

If, like me, you like to socialise then you could have one cheat meal per week where you eat what you like for an hour. This is an opportunity to go to a favourite restaurant and have a glass of wine or two. Any more than that and you can't get really good results (although you might just be able to maintain).

To get the best results, you have to be consistent. It generally takes 12-16 weeks for a figure competitor to get into peak shape, and they often start off in good shape anyway. Make your eating and training parts of your routine, not chores to be gotten out of the way. When they become as easy and unconscious as breathing you will be on the way to serious transformation.

For help and advice or to book training and nutritional plans please visit http://www.derekprior.com/

Vegetarian Training Diet

Statstically, vegetarians have a higher body fat percentage than meat eaters. They either tend to be corpulent or "skinny fat". I was vegetarian for 25 years but spent the last year eating chicken and fish to see if it made any difference. It certainly made muscle gain and fat loss easier but I concluded it wa snot essential. I'm back to my veggie ways, and happy with it.

The big problem with vegetarian diets is that they tend to compensate for protein with increased amounts of carbohydrate. If you eat too many starchy carbs (most nutritionists recommend 60% of calories come from carbs!) they will be stored as fat. They also increase the incidence of type II diabetes, mood swings, energy fluctuations etc.

Rather than loading up on pasta, bread and rice, vegetarians are better off increasing their intake of essential fats (omega 3 and 6) and finding high quality proteins.

An essential fat blend (such as Udo's Choice oil or capsules) is perhaps the easiest way to meet your EFA requirements. It's also a good idea to stock up on flaxseeds and almondss (although nuts and seeds generally are a good investment). Obviously portion size is important as nuts are calorie dense.

Protein should come from eggs and whey protein chiefly (isolate rather than concentrate. Ion exchanged is the best source). You can also use prepared egg-white mixes or egg protein powders.

Quorn and soya products are also a useful form of protein. For carb-load days you can combine beans and rice to make complete proteins too.

Below is a sample (strict) fat loss, muscle building diet for vegetarians:


Breakfast: ½ cup berries, 1.5x scoops of whey, 1 tea spn Udo’s Choice, 15 almonds, water

Mid AM snack: 1 x whey, 1tspn Udo’s or 5 almonds

Lunch: 2 x wholemeal Nimble bread, or 1 slice of bread, or half a cup of wholegrain rice, or 1 sweet potatot
a) 250 cals veg protein (qourn or soya)
b) cottage cheese or
c) 2 eggs

5 almonds or 1 dessert spn seeds

Mid PM snack: 1 x whey, 1 tspn Udo’s/ 5 almonds

Dinner:
A) 250 cals veggie protein, B) cottage cheese, C) 2 eggs
salad/veg, 1 dspn of Udo’s

Evening snack: 1 x Casein
5 almonds or 1 tspn Udo’s


You should supplement with a good multi vitamin/mineral.

(Post workout: A) 2 x Pro Recover, 5g Creatine
Or B) 2 rice cakes, jam, 1x whey)

Every third day have a carb-load meal (an extra sweet potato, half cup of rice, slice of wholemeal bread and maybe add a banana to breakfast).

Consistency is the key - with both training and diet. Don't do anything excessive...just keep following th eplan, week in, week out, and the results will come.

If you are socialising, one meal per week could be a cheat meal....eat anything you like for an hour (but don't go crazy and gorge yourself!) This could be an opportunity to go to an Italian restaurant or whatever you fancy (just order anything from the main course and sterr clear of the bread and desserts).

Keep alcohol to an absolute minimum (save it for your cheat meal ideally).

E Book

The training E Book is nearing completion. Most of the text has been written and the photos will be taken in a few weeks. This is an incentive to enter another peak phase of dieting once this two week holiday is over.

I've elected to reduce carbs a bit more and increase essential fats, which are vital for encouraging the body to burn fat as energy.

I'm training with low volume and heavy weights at the moment. Generally I do a warm up set of ten reps, the weight stays the same each workout for this. I then perfrom one set of 6-8 reps making sure to increase the reps or weight each workout.

Exercises are predominantly big compound moves, although I am using giant sets on shoulders at the moment.

My body fat % is now below 12% and should dip below 10% in the next month or so.

Many of my clients are now upping the weights and reducing the reps - training is always cyclical. A number are working on increasing their deadlifts so that they can at least lift their own body weight. Two clients are close to lifting twice their own weight. At this rate we may need to arrange a competition.

For all Personal Training services visit www.derekprior.com

Spring

Spring is upon us and, as is the tradition at this time of year, most of my clients are moving towards peak condition for the summer.

My own training has altered from the heavy liftin gof the winter. I am training4-5 times per week using relatively high repetitions (generally 8-15, sometimes more), short rest intervals, and a variety of grips, angles, combinations of exercises whilst keeping in the big moves like dead lifts and squats.

I've reverted to a parallel grip for incline dumbbell press in order to rest the shoulder joints a little and I've dramatically reduced biceps work, having made some good gains during the winter.

My goal is to shed another 5 lbs of fat by Easter. Abdominal definition is already starting to come through due to adjustments to my diet:

Currently I'm eating 6 times a day with moderate amounts of low GI carbs, good fats, and fairly high protein. I've also added some cardio in the form of boxing just to speed up the fat loss.

F.I.S.H. & Fat Loss

Strange times have been afoot at FISH of late. Derek has been absent a lot due to increasing his involvement with the Eating Disorders project for the Trust. This has left Melody doing the brunt of the training. A number of regular clients dropped out over the past month due to other commitments and things looked grim for a while. However, Derek and Melody registered for Body for Life and decided to use the extra time to focus on their own goals. Almost immediately old clients started coming back and new ones appeared! Personal Training is often like that - it tends to run in cycles (and seasons).

There are now five of us doing Body for Life and the results are already good (Derek has lost nearly 3% body fat, most of it in the last two weeks). We've also been keeping "body blogs" on bodybuilding.com and have had a lot of support from other mmbers there.

Mark Jobbins continues to build up his own client base and is proving very successful. He's becoming a bit of a regular feature at the studio.

Good luck to Melody, Jo, Caz, Sheree (and the BN23 clan) with Body for Life etc. Hopefully we'll post some update pictures here over the next couple of months.

Body For Life at FISH

Our special summer promotion this year is to take you through the Body for Life programme (as per the Bill Phillips book and challenge).

For only £50 per week you will receive 3 one hour Personal Training sessions that will follow the Body for Life programme. You will also receive guidance with the nutritional side of the programme.

Ideally, the programme lasts 12 weeks but you are free to decide how long you wish to follow the programme. The aim is to reduce body fat and increase muscle tone for that lean, summer body look.

We will also be offering a special on the German Body Composition programme of Charles Poliquin. For £60 per week you will receive 4 Personal Training sessions modelled on the German Body Comp program, which is designed to maximise fat loss whilt building lean muscle tissue. You will also receive a nutritional programme to complement the training.

Once again, 12 weeks is desirable for optimal results but you will achieve a great deal even with a few weeks.

To take advantage of these offers, and to give yourself the chance to actually achieve the results you want, email fishfitness@tiscali.co.uk or telephone 07871760054. You can also text or email your phone number and we will call you back.

For more on Body for Life visit: http://www.bfl-uk.com/

Fat Loss

Melody continues to reduce her bodyfat and has been consistent with this for a few months now. She's also started training with Del and is making significant progress. This week she has increased incline flyes to 10kg and is starting to achieve full squats.

Eddie has lost 9lbs of fat in four weeks and has replaced much of this with muscle. He has trained consistently three times a week with Del and has modified his eating habits as advised. Congratulations on this incredible achievement.

Facing the FAcTs

At the age of nine I was looking really chunky, I was picked on at school and felt ashamed of myself and hated school because of it.
So began the cycle of starvation for days followed by cramming in as much high sugar high fat food as I could.
By the time I was 11 I weighed 11 stone and was a size 14. School summer dresses were a problem as back then when overweight children were not so common, they only made these dresses up to a size 12. I remember the embarrassment I felt when the ever so skinny shop assistant. looked at me disapprovingly as she told my mum the news.
I sweltered in the summer in that thick winter uniform.

At 12 years old I was taken to the dietitian by my worried parents, I was now 12 stone, and put on what seemed a starvation diet if Ryvita and salad, at least that’s all I can remember about it. I now had everyone on my case, treating me, or so it felt, like I was a greedy lazy little naughty fat girl, who needed to be told off all the time and treated with no respect until I showed signs of losing weight.
And so, I became obsessed with food, I took to creeping down stairs into the fridge and cupboards and stealing and scoffing whole packets of ham, cheese, chocolate biscuits and anything tasty I could find. Only then for my parents to discover the stolen food and tell me off in front of everyone and anyone and humiliate me beyond belief, making me out to be so greedy stealing everyone else’s food. Well what did they expect when I was being starved all day and made to feel awful and ashamed of letting people see me eat?
It got so bad that I would take £1 out of my mums purse and sneak to the sweet shop and buy as much chocolate as I could and then hide it under my bed. I had stashes of food hidden everywhere!

This went on until I left home, at 15 I weighted nearly 16 stone and was now a size 18, while everyone else at school was enjoying P.E. classes I did anything I could to get out of it. I hated the drama of when the 2 most slim pretty popular people would be chosen by the teachers to pick out from the class who was to be on their team. They would choose all their friends first, then the fittest people, then at the end there would be just me and a couple of the geekiest most picked on individuals left. They would then laugh and take the mickey and would moan about which of the crap people they were going to get lumbered with on their precious teams. It makes my blood boil just to think back on those memories!
Needless to say though many of those pretty girls had their kindness repaid as many of them I have I seen in recent years have weight problems or are just plain ugly now!!
Sorry, but Ha bloody Ha!

So I left home at 16, and my weight stabilised for a while, I didn’t put any on for a couple of years. Then I made one big mistake. I started seeing a guy, I can’t now begin to imagine why I became so infatuated with him, but I did, and so when he told me he really liked me BUT would only really want to go out with me if I lost some weight, I agreed.
I went to a dodgy doctor and was given an appetite suppressant and stimulant called Duremine. This gave me endless energy and no need for food! I lost a stone and a half in 4 weeks, the compliments were flooding in and I felt fantastic. UNTIL ONE NIGHT I PASSED OUT.
My appetite had been so suppressed I was barely eating anything but the odd bit of salad or fruit, after 5 weeks of this my body couldn't’t take it, and walked home one night I blacked out and woke up vomiting. I was shaking so violently I was frightened.
I went to a real doctor and he told me “stop the Duremine.”
2 months later I had regained all of the weight lost and added on to it another 8 lbs.
Over the next year and a half after a cycle of yo -yo dieting I went to weight watchers only to discover I was now up to 17.10 stone.
I remember feeling quite shocked and upset at this figure.
My new boyfriend was supportive and really liked me just as I was which stopped me from considering any more nasty diet tablets!
Weight watchers I felt was quite good, I did manage to lose a slow steady stone through good eating and the support of the meetings.

Shortly after this period I met Derek, my now husband. We got together, and for a while I think we both lost weight due to the passionate nature of our relationship!!
Soon that familiar comfort and cosiness of being together set in and we loved going out to restaurants and pubs together or staying in and having fine food and wine and having friends round for parties all based around music and food. We planned to get married and we were both conscious of our bloated bellies and so we joined the David Lloyd club to try and get into shape!
Well, I remember ambling around doing a bit of this and a bit of that, sometimes working to hard, and other times not really doing anything.
At the time I had no idea about weight training and nutrition and so I did lose some weight but not much, and probably lost more muscle tissue than fat.

Fat Loss Through Weight Training

Many people think that to lose fat they need to go on a restricted calorie diet and perform hour upon hour of cardio. Calorie controlled diets are virtually certain to backfire: they generally result in a loss of lean muscle tissue which leads to a corresponding drop in metabolic rate. Eventually progress with the weight loss plateaus until there is another drop in calories and a further reduction in metabolic rate. From here there are generally two options: continue the progressive calorie restriction (ultimately leading to anorexia and cachexia, or severe muscle wasting) or return to normal eating and put on even more weight than you lost due to the reduction in metabolically active muscle.

Aerobic exercise may help to shed even more calories but it does not effect major changes to body composition and metabolic rate. Cardio is ideal for health (the 30 minutes per day of exercise equivalent to brisk walking recommended by the ACSM) or sports-specific training, but weight training is superior for lasting fat loss and changes to body composition.

Not only can muscular hypertrophy lead to a better physique and the burning of significantly more calories at rest, but there are even protocols for training with moderate weights (65-75% of 1 rep max) that will generate high levels of blood lactate with a corresponding high production of growth hormone (which burns fat whilst stimulatin glean tissue growth).

For maximum fat burning it is essential to produce high levels of lactic acid by extending sets and increasing time under tension (through relatively high reps, say 10-15). It is helpful to pair exercises using super or compound sets and to reduce rest intervals (generally to between 45 and 65 seconds; sometimes as low as 30 seconds). This "incomplete" recovery contributes to the elevated lactate levels and growth hormone response.

Diet also has its part to play but not by excessively reducing calories. Generally the ratios of macronutrients need to be manipulated in favour of higher protein and lower carbohydrate (but not to the levels suggested by Atkins). Low GI complex carbs should be the principal form of carbohydrates. The level of carbohydrates decided upon will be dependant upon carb tolerance, energy levels, and activity. The only exception to the low GI rule should be the post workout (within 15 minutes) meal.

For more information on losing fat through weight training contact Derek at fishfitness@tiscali.co.uk

Are You Serious About Changing Your Body?

At F.I.S.H. we take great pride in our knowledge and experience of using weight training to change body composition. Whether your goal is to lose body fat or increase muscle mass we can help you with all aspects of training and nutrition. We always start with technique, ensuring that all exercises are safe and effective. We then make progressive demands on the tensile strength of muscle fibres and on the respective energy sustems to elicit the desired training effect. Through manipulation of training variables, nutrition and rest we can help you to make the most of growth hormone production to build lean muscle and eliminate body fat.

If you think you have the dedication to transform your body, and if you can commit to three or more training sessions per week then we would like to hear from you. To kick start the opening of the new studio we are looking for four people willing to undertake the body composition challenge and share their progress with visitors to our blog. The four people selected will receive a substantial discount on Personal Training sessions for the period of the challenge (12 weeks).

Please email fishfitness@tiscali.co.uk for further details.

Diets Don't Work

Whilst the diet industry would like you to believe that you can shed weight by purchasing their products, it is unlikely that you will achieve any long-term benefits from the majority of diets and weight loss products on the market. Sustainable weight loss is best achieved by creating a negative energy balance – that is burn more calories than you consume.

The problem with traditional diets is that they often advocate eating fewer calories than those needed by the body to sustain its basic functions. If you consume fewer calories than this Basal Metabolic Rate the body will enter starvation mode and cling on to fat stores in an attempt to preserve life. If blood sugar levels drop as a result if inadequate nutrition, particularly for those on low carbohydrate diets, such as the Atkins diet, the body will create its own glucose for energy by scavenging amino acids from lean muscle tissue. This self-cannibalisation results in less lean muscle which consequently reduces the metabolic rate. In effect this means fat gain will happen even easier in the future.

A reasonable approach to sustainable fat loss has a number of elements. Energy out has to be greater than energy in. Rather than reducing your calories to amounts lower than Basal Metabolic Rate, additional calories should be burnt through exercise (incidental exercise such as walking to work and taking the stairs, or using the cardiovascular equipment in a gym).

Metabolic rate can be raised by increasing lean muscle tissue through resistance training (each additional pound of lean muscle burns approximately fifty calories per day at rest). Weight training also burns between 240 and 400 calories for a typical session.

Nutritionally, a balanced diet comprised of approximately 55-60% carbohydrate, 30% fat and 10% protein is recommended for health. There will be some variations depending on desired outcomes and exercise programmes. Carbohydrates should be from wholegrain, wholemeal sources and of low-medium GI (glycaemic index). Avoid simple sugars as these will spike blood sugar levels causing insulin production which will store the sugars as fat.

A useful aid to ensuring you eat enough to lose weight is the keeping of a food diary in which you record times, amounts and types of food eaten. For optimal results a programme of exercise involving both cardiovascular and resistance training is recommended. The anatomical adaptations that take place through a progressive exercise programme increase the ability of the body to metabolise fat as fuel whilst raising the metabolic rate and burning additional calories.

Fat Loss Tips

Whilst it is a good idea to estimate your resting metabolic rate and then to make adjustments for activity and weight loss/gain goals it is possible to make good progress even if you don't go through with the calculations.

In the past I have calculated my clients' nutritional needs down to the last gram of each macronutrient. I've then produced detailed meal plans that ensure a balanced array of nutrients, timed with military precision. I used to present the client with the plan confident that they would follow it to the letter and make the gains they wanted.

Bitter experience has taught me that there are very few "ordinary" trainees who are going to be consistent with such plans. Their lives are too varied; the dietary rules are too strict and it is only a matter of time before they break them. Usually these infringements of the rules incur a "oh, well, might as well give up" response and the goal gets ever more remote.

There are exceptions, of course, and these people make the best gains.

Others get into the idea of writing down what they eat - only they do this retrospectively and then beat themselves up for consuming too little or too much.

Recently I've elected for a basic ("ideal") meal plan with a number of alternatives for each meal and some general principles for those "can't be bothered" times.

Basically, there is a simple structure: eat six times a day at roughly three hourly intervals. At the simplest, divide your target calories (which you can determine by keeping a food diary for five days and seeing what you need to maintain, or you can do the calculations). If your goal is to lose fat, reduce this figure by about 15%.

Divide your calories by six and aim to eat roughly this amount at each of the six meal times.

For those who are busy, protein bars or drinks will provide convenient alternatives, along with hard fruit.

The diet should remain high in protein (1.6g per kilo of lean body weight is recommended for fat loss. There's no benefit from going above 2g per kilo). Carbohydrates should come from wholegrain sources wherever possible and should be low GI, and fats should be principally monounsaturated and polyunsaturated.

Once you decide on the sorts of foods you are going to eat, spend a bit of time calculating their macronutrient and caloric values by referring to the packet labels and using a calculator. It should then be possible to identify a variety of foods and snacks that could make up a meal slot.

You can work out the percentages of protein, fat and carbohydrate in accordance with your goals. For health the ratios are: protein 10%, carbohydrate 60%, fat 30%. For serious training, the retention of lean tissue and fat loss these percentages will need to be adjusted (for example 20, 55, 25). You may want to experiment with ratios or refer to a good nutrition book.

For simplicity, divide the values between the six meals (remember, there's little point consuming more than 25-30g of protein at one time - the excess will be excreted or stored as fat); and don't get hung up on carbohydrates: you need them! Your brain needs them, and your muscles needs them. Just make sure that they are from clean, fibrous sources and low GI, except within the fifteen minutes immediately after training when simple sugars help to speed recovery and optimise protein synthesis.

A sample basic structure might look like this:

7am Shreddies, skimmed/semi-skimmed milk; glass of orange juice

10am Protein bar; apple

1pm Tuna salad sandwich (wholemeal bread - preferably with seeds)

4pm Protein bar; pear

7pm Sweet Potato, Chicken breast/grilled fish/broccoli, carrots

10 pm Protein shake; handful of nuts

Post workout (within 15 minutes) 1-2 bananas; protein shake


That's about as basic as it gets. Once you have your structure in place you can add variety by substituting foods of similar nutritional value. Make sure there are enough good fats by adding cold pressed extra virgin olive oil to salads, eating a handful of nuts or seeds, and eating salmon once a week. The protein bars and shakes should be the low GI/low-moderate carbohydrate variety if your goal is to lose fat.

The more planning and calculating you do, the better the results, but as I said at the beginning, there are few people who can commit to that. Find out the sort of foods you should be eating; approximate their caloric value, and slot them into the six meals a day structure.

If you can't afford, or don't want, protein supplements, eat more fish, chicken /turkey breast, eggs, low fat yoghurts etc. You might also want to look at quinoa.

Once you know what you should be eating you can stock up on all the required foods and snacks and prepare food in advance for convenience/packed lunches.

One last thing: if you do "fall off your horse" and binge/eat too much when dining out, don't fret. Enjoy yourself and then resume your normal eating structure. Don't skip a meal or try to adjust for the additional calories. The basic meal plan should be the norm but there will (and must be) exceptions (unless you are a competitive figure/bodybuilding athlete or have a pathological relationship with food and body image).