When you are trying to lose weight and get fit, getting your nutrition handled is crucial. If you don’t, then you’re results will be very limited. You can do the most intense exercises in the world every day and not lose a single pound if you are filling up your body with junk. Proper nutrition is KEY and learning to make better choices on a daily basis will sky rocket your results! Not even the most intense Burn Boot Camp workouts can “out train a diet”….
Here are ten foundational nutrition tips. Following these tips will take you a long way in achieving your fitness goals.
1. Eat five to seven small meals per day. You know the old “three square meals a day” mentality? Yea, that is nonsense. Rather than eating three large meals every day, eat five to seven small meals. It will keep your metabolism churning and prevent your body from hoarding calories.
2. Include a source of lean protein in every meal. Protein contains the building blocks of your body, and you should be constantly providing it to your body.
3. Eat seven or more servings of vegetables every day, along with three to five servings of fruit. These foods are rich in essential nutrients and critical to being healthy. Vegetables have fiber, which women need at least 25 grams of every day.
4. Drink plenty of water. You should be drinking at least three quarts of water per day to start with. To lose weight, you need to stay hydrated.
5. Limit processed sugars and carbohydrates. They are everywhere in the food served at supermarkets, so you need to be especially careful to avoid them.
6. Cut out diet soda. The fake sugar in diet soda has been shown in study after study to be counterproductive to your personal health and fitness.
7. Consume plenty of Omega-3’s. Omega-3 fatty acids are considered to be essential fatty acids, and an overwhelming amount of research has confirmed their extensive health benefits. Eating fish and supplementing with fish oils will help you get enough of these.
8. Consume plenty of monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats. Avoid saturated fats. A simple change you can make to do this is to cook with olive oil.
9. Consume more calories earlier in the day, especially carbohydrates. Contrary to popular belief, breakfast, not dinner, should be the biggest meal of the day. Load up your later meals with protein.
10. Cut portion sizes down. The “eat five to seven meals a day” trick only works if you are actually eating smaller portions.
Implementing these ten techniques will not be enough in themselves for you to reach your fitness and weight goals. You need four other key elements: high intensity resistance training, high intensity interval cardiovascular training, a strong support network and proper rest and recovery.
If you combine these nutritional adjustments with those other components, then you will be well on your way to making the kind of personal change that you want to make.
There is no such thing as “out training your diet”. Your training and nutrition must align perfectly and mesh together in order to reach your goals.
I CHALLENGE you to do this – write down everything you eat for one week. E-mail it to me, and I will personally look over it and give it a grade based on what your goals are.
This challenge starts on 4-26 and ends on 5-2!
Anyone who gets an A+ will get a special gift sent to them in the mail 🙂
LET THE GAMES BEGIN!