Fit For Life: Tick-Tock

Saturday, November 09, 2013

Matt Espeut, GoLocalWorcester Health + Lifestyle Contributor

Time: It is something that is infinite, but nobody has enough if it, believes Matt Espeut.

It is something that is infinite, but nobody has enough if it.
It is something that can't be made.
It is something that can't be bought.
It has value, but it is priceless.
It can be spent, but you will never get a refund.

Although it is infinite, we as humans only have a limited amount of it, and nobody will ever know how much they will have.

The word of the week is time. My favorite cliché about time is: You only have a limited amount, so spend it wisely, because there are no refunds. So my question to you is: why do you keep wasting it in the gym?

Yes, I am a big advocate of working out and exercising, but if you are not getting the results you are trying to achieve, then you are wasting your time. I would much rather be hanging out with my nephew, sitting in a coffee shop, reading a book, or lying in the sun somewhere, than being in a gym, if I was accomplishing nothing. Many of you probably feel that as long as you get there, that's better than not going, but I am telling you that's the wrong attitude and approach, because if you are not exercising properly you are not only wasting your time, but setting yourself up for injury, which is worse than doing nothing at all. I see it every single day. 90% of the people in the gym are wasting their time and getting nowhere from a fitness perspective, or looking worse, from an aesthetic perspective. How can this be true you ask?

Well this is what I see:

People lumbering into the gym (usually with bad posture) grabbing a book or magazine and jumping on an elliptical machine or recumbent bicycle. Then they continue to practice poor form and posture by reading this book or magazine at a pace that would put you to sleep if you watch long enough. You cannot read if you are training intensely, and you cannot train intensely if you are reading. Why bother doing "cardio", if your heart rate isn't going to elevate and you aren't working up a sweat? Sure you may burn a few calories, but if you eliminate a piece of bread or a cookie from your food intake, you have accomplished the same deficit as lollygagging around for 45 minutes. Not only a waste of time, but by exercising with bad form/posture you are feeding dysfunction at an accelerated rate, which will pay you back with lots of visits to the orthopedist. My suggestion: take a spin/body pump or some other form of exercise class, grab a partner and go for a fast power walk, or play a game of basketball. Anything to up the intensity, elevate your heart rate or work up a sweat.
On the flip side, you see people killing themselves in the gym, sweating profusely, slinging heavy weights, but they ruin their efforts with a poor nutrition program.

There are two different ways you can sabotage making gains with poor eating:

1) You eat all the wrong foods. You finish beating your body down, shredding muscle fibers, and burning up all your muscle glycogen, only to refuel your body with some processed garbage from a drive-thru, or some packaged form of protein bar disguised as nutritious and healthy. Remember this! Your gains are determined by how much rest you get, and how well you nourish yourself AFTER the workout, not how hard you work during. So if this is your routine, remember you will get fit faster and waste less time if you pay attention to what you eat. As I continuously say, “you can't workout a bad diet.”

2) You don’t eat enough. I'm not sure which one of these two problems is worse. In order to perform at your peak levels in day-to-day life you need fuel, so when you work out you need even more. When you exercise and lack fuel you end up burning muscle mass, which changes your body composition or muscle-to-fat ratio in a unfavorable way. I always recommend keeping yourself fueled up and ready to perform at your highest level.

So – nobody has enough if it, you can’t make it, you can’t buy it, but you can spend it. It’s priceless, and there are no refunds. It’s your time to waste – or use wisely. Wasting it in the gym is time better spent laying in the grass or doing a thousand other things…investing time in the gym is a wise investment. One that will reap more time for you in the long run – healthy time – time to be fit and really live life to its fullest.

Matt Espeut has worked as a personal trainer for almost 20 years with clients ranging in age from 14 to 86. His focus is on overall health, strength, and functional conditioning. Holistic health and nutrition is the cornerstone of all his programs. Matt works in private and small group training available at your home or office location or at gym facilities. Matt offers his services to everyone wanting to be more fit and healthy, overweight young people, youth/collegiate athletes, and seniors. Matt has worked and continues to train at several facilities in the Providence area including Gold's Gym and CORE Studio, and he believes continued education is a must in his field. Email Matt: [email protected], check out his website at www.fitnessprofiles.net or on Facebook at Matt Espeut or on Twitter @MattEspeut.

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Fit For Life: Tick-Tock

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