New Year, New You?

January 11, 2013 by ·

Latest blog post from W10 trainer Rob:  Check out Rob’s blog here>>

As we ease into 2013 and everybody and their dog embark on their own personal ‘get lean for 2013’ campaign I want to give you an insight as to what I am starting to see all too often when people aim to eat healthily. It’s a common misconception that in order to lose body fat you need to eat less and whilst this may be true for some of the world’s greediest people I am yet to meet one of them. In fact most people I meet under eat, yes you heard me correctly, under eat.

It seems that when people are consciously trying to watch what they eat in their quest for fat loss and health they quite literally starve themselves, think porridge for breakfast, chicken salad for lunch and chicken with veg for dinner. Now unless you weigh 40kg wet through you are not going to be consuming enough calories. Yes you will lose weight but that weight is going to be at the expense of muscle mass. This is the last thing you want when trying to reduce your body fat and ever have a chance of seeing your abdominals. Muscle mass is your engine, it’s what burns the calories and if anything you want to increase muscle mass and that is just not possible when you are starving yourself.

Another thing when under eating is that you will inevitably ‘fall off the wagon’. Your body is very clever, when you are not giving it enough fuel it will let you know. Your blood sugar levels will drop and you will get horrible cravings and you will eventually crack. This isn’t a lack of will power on your part but more a sign that you are not giving the body the fuel it needs. If you are fuelling the body correctly and giving it everything it needs to function optimally and cope with the day to day demands you place upon it then you shouldn’t crave crap food, you may want it but that is different to uncontrollable cravings.

So what it tends to look like is you have 3-4 days of being “good” (under eating) then on day 5 you crash, you feel horrible, tired and grumpy then eat everything in sight (over eat). You then swear to yourself it was a once off and you are back on it tomorrow. Sound familiar?

This form of eating is very stressful to the body and as you may know, stress can be very harmful to your fat loss goals. Your body will switch into survival mode meaning that the last thing it wants to do is preserve muscle mass and rid body fat, I mean, it’s struggling to survive here!

So as your body holds on for dear life its only option is to down regulate your thyroid. The thyroid is what drives your metabolism and metabolism is what burns calories, so now you are not only starving yourself, you are also training your body to burn less calories not to mention your energy levels have fallen through the floor and you now feel like crap. I think you will agree that this is not where you want to be in a few months’ time. So cut yourself some slack and don’t starve yourself.

Remember, muscle is an expensive luxury in terms of its caloric demands but necessary for your long term fat loss goals. Quick and, inevitably, short term weight loss is easy, don’t give your body enough calories and it will shed muscle. Smart and permanent fat loss requires a little more time and patience but will have you feeling and looking better in no time.

If you are unsure about your nutrition and would like some help in reaching your fat loss goals why not try out our W10 Performance Online Coaching Program. See our website for details.

I hope you have found this information useful and as always let me know your thoughts

Stay healthy

Rob (W10′s shortest trainer)

Filed Under: Blog, Motivation, Nutrition, Q&As, Weight Loss · Tagged: , , ,

Keith drops 11kg in 7wks since starting at W10!

January 18, 2011 by ·

Amazing fat loss stories from personal trainer W10

A little hard work goes a long way!

Huge congratulations to Keith Moore, a W10 client who has lost 11kg in seven weeks with us!  The transformation to date has been nothing short of amazing, and is nothing more than Keith deserves for the early mornings and sheer effort that he’s put into his training.

Keith came to us weighing in at 168kg, with his goal to reach 110kg.  Something which would be no mean feat by anyones standards!  He’s well on his way and we’re looking forward to help him realise the change he came to make.

Keep up with progress by following Keith’s blog.

Filed Under: Blog, Exercise, In the Gym, Motivation, Nutrition, Weight Loss · Tagged: , , , ,

Guest post by Jason Ferruggia – Top 5 tips for Muscle Building & Fat Loss

January 15, 2011 by ·

By Jason Ferruggia

I was interviewed for a big name fitness magazine recently and they asked for my top five training tips. Here’s what I told them…

Train like an athlete - You should be training for enhanced performance and your strength work and conditioning/ cardio should be hard, heavy and fast. None of the light weight, slow tempo nonsense, and no medium intensity, steady state cardio that drowns your fast twich fibers in lactic acid, turning them slow.

Use big, compound exercises and add in some throws, jumps or strongman training whenever appropriate. Always strive to increase your performance from one workout to the next by lifting more weight, doing more reps, jumping higher, running faster or getting done in less time.

Use exercises that allow you to move your body through space – When you move your own bodyweight (or bodyweight plus resistance) like you do in a chin up, pushup, squat, parallel bar dip, etc. you activate more muscle fibers, thus you will get bigger, stronger and leaner a whole lot faster. As far as conditioning and cardio goes, you have to realize that the human body wasn’t designed for repetitive steady state activity but rather short bursts with a wide variety of different movements. This is exactly what you do when you play most sports. When you pump away on a machine for 30 minutes you are fighting evolution.

So focus on bodyweight and free weight exercises like chins, dips and sprints, play as many sports as possible, and avoid all strength or cardio machines like the plague.

Less is more - When training for size, strength and speed, quality is always more important than quantity. If you undertrain you will make some progress, albeit slowly. If you overtrain you will make zero progress. When in doubt, do less. Limit your workouts to 45 minutes (excluding warm up) and 12-16 total work sets.

Eat only organic whole foods – If a caveman couldn’t eat it you probably shouldn’t eat it. Almost nothing that comes in a box or plastic wrapper or that contains any artificial ingredients whatsoever can be considered healthy. Focus on getting the majority of your calories from vegetables, fruits, nuts, seeds and lean, grass fed beef, free range chicken and eggs, and limited amounts of wild caught fish like salmon. If you can’t chew all of your protein add in a top quality protein powder likeSun Warrior.

Be sure to drink nothing but pure water and the occasional cup of green tea or glass of red wine. Also, remember to avoid conventional, pasteurized dairy, corn, wheat and sugar as these cause inflammation throughout the body leading to pain and disease.

Sleep - Getting 8-10 hours per day of high quality sleep is simply the best thing you can do for recovery, building lean muscle, burning bodyfat, improving insulin sensitivity, enhancing immune system function, repairing damaged tissues/injuries, improving brain function, etc, etc, etc. If you are not sleeping you have a major problem and it needs to be addressed with high priority.

Filed Under: Exercise, Fitness, Motivation, Nutrition, Weight Loss · Tagged: , , , , , ,

Check out our feature in the January edition of the Grove Magazine!

January 14, 2011 by ·


by Natasha Paulini

It’s not that I’m lazy. Truly. I just have a physical aversion to physical activity. Beyond dance classes in my teens, exercise and I have had an uneasy, passing relationship.

Six years on a certain health magazine for men meant I was surrounded by all the good advice one could want. But as a fashion editor, I could disdainfully look down my nose as co-workers huffed and puffed back from lunchtime jogs.  But then, I turned 30 and my once fast metabolism slowed to a sluggish crawl.

Yoga and Pilates have enjoyed the get-fit limelight now for many years, but there’s a growing trend for a tougher approach. And just off St Mark’s Road in Ladbroke Grove, there’s a group of guys that’s leading the charge.

“When I looked around me at the gym I noticed no-one else around me was getting the same results,” shrugs founder Jean-Claude Vacassin. “The gym industry is driven by physios – fitness trends are the product of rehabilitation training. Sure, it gets you out of pain, but it doesn’t make you lean and strong.”

Read the full article>>

Filed Under: 12 Week Transformation, Blog, Exercise, Fitness, In the Gym, Nutrition, Weight Loss · Tagged: , , , , , , , , ,

W10 training tip: Do the FULL rep

January 13, 2011 by ·

Complete repetitions will make you both lean and strong!

Half reps = half results.

If you only complete half of the movement, you’ll recruit half the available muscle.  This means that you’ll burn less calories and get less strong.  You’re also likely to rapidly develop muscular imbalances that will restrict your mobility.

None of these desirable, so DO THE FULL REP!

Filed Under: Blog, Exercise, Fitness, In the Gym, Weight Loss · Tagged: , , , , , , ,

Lauren’s 12-week Elite Programme Blog

January 11, 2011 by ·

One of our clients is keeping a blog for her 12-week Elite Performance Programme (EPP)

Lauren has decided that  2011 is the year that she’s going to make some lasting changes to her body, and she’s brought us along for the ride!

Check out Lauren’s Blog to see what the first day panned out like.  It would be great if we could all get behind Lauren by following her blog and lending our support along the way!

The first days food was delivered this morning from the guys at NOSH, which although looked like it wouldn’t touch the sides, has apparently proved pretty substantial and much to Lauren’s surprise, not left her feeling hungry!  (that’s what happens when your food is nutrient dense!).

Our first session in the gym consisted of body composition testing, flexibility/mobility evaluation, postural analysis and functional movement assessment, all of which will provide the basis for our programme.  Day two tomorrow, and it’s our first workout…….

Filed Under: 12 Week Transformation, Blog, Exercise, In the Gym, Nutrition, Weight Loss ·

Happy New Year from the team at W10!

January 3, 2011 by ·

A very happy New Year from us all at W10 Performance!

We hope that everyone enjoyed the festive celebrations and are approaching 2011 refreshed and raring to go.

We open our doors again tomorrow (not that they shut for a few die hard clients!) and we’re looking forward to welcoming everyone back after a no doubt indulgent couple of weeks……! We’ve certainly done our bit to contribute to the celebrations and are looking forward to getting back to the norm of regular training, clean eating and regular sleeping patterns.

We’re excited about 2011. Our new website is up and running and our new programmes, packages and the new W10 Bootcamp (no, it’s not the usual star jumps, burpees and ‘see you next time’ nonsense!) offer the most comprehensive and results-orientated health and fitness programmes you’ll find anywhere – and as always, RESULTS GUARANTEED!

We’ve got something for everyone who wants to make positive changes and we look forward to seeing you all in 2011!

Wishing everyone and happy and prosperous 2011.

The W10 team.

Filed Under: 12 Week Transformation, Blog, Exercise, Fitness, In the Gym, Motivation, Nutrition, Weight Loss · Tagged: , , , ,

Is it safe and/or sustainable to lose more than 2lbs per week?

November 8, 2010 by ·

Yes, absolutely.  We have known people lose upwards of 7lbs almost overnight, simply by cutting out foods they’re intolerant to (typically wheat and dairy).

If we’re talking specifically about two pounds of actual fat, then this is probably not far off the mark – depending on your starting point.  But weight fluctuations on the scales can occur without any change in body fat.  Muscle mass, bone density, hydration, toxicity, menstrual cycle and so forth can lead to weight fluctuations.

Despite our obsession with them, the scales alone are not a great indicator of actual fat loss!

Filed Under: Blog, Nutrition, Q&As, Weight Loss · Tagged: , , ,

How much jogging should I be doing to for weight loss goal?

November 8, 2010 by ·

In most peoples cases, a lot less jogging than you’re currently doing.  People do too much steady state cardio training for fat loss – without realising that long term, it makes people structurally weak and predisposes them to store fat!

We’re not anti jogging and we work with plenty of people who run both competitively and recreationally.  If you like running, or it’s your sport, all well and good – but in terms of losing body fat, running it’s not the most efficient way to go.

The full explanation of this goes beyond a brief Q&A section, but we’ll try and give you the ‘short’ version.

The key to fat loss is good nutrition and increased metabolic activity (exercise). A  run will burn calories and give your metabolism a nudge, for the time that you are actually jogging and for say 4-6hrs after you stop.  The heavy breathing and sweating will help with detoxification, pounding the pavement will strengthen you legs (initially) and you’ll also lose weight when you start out.  Good stuff.

Over time however, long runs break down muscle tissue (disastrous for fat loss), reduce bone density (a very real concern for women especially), and cause a spike in stress hormones, which frankly most of us could do without.  In most people jogging also compromises posture, causes musculoskeletal problems (often knee pain), ankle stiffness, calf tightness and results in imbalances between the muscles at the front and those at the back of the body.  Not ideal.

Also, think about it this way – efficiency is the enemy of fat loss.  The first time you put your pumps on and do your fifteen minutes around the block you burn say two hundred calories.  As you get ‘fitter’ or more efficient, the same jaunt around the block is less taxing and you need to expend less calories to complete it.  So, next time you have to run for say twenty minutes to hit this two hundred calorie mark.  Twenty five minutes two weeks later, half an hour the week after that, and so on (great if you are actually training to run further!).  Before you know it, you’ve trained for a marathon, your knees are killing you, and guess what?  You’re still just as disgruntled with the way you look!

Filed Under: Exercise, Fitness, In the Gym, Q&As, Weight Loss · Tagged: , , ,

Are Branch Chain Amino Acid’s worth taking to enhance my training?

November 8, 2010 by ·

BCAA’s are absolutely worth taking to accelerate your training, but only if you’re on top of the key areas such hydration, nutrition and basic supplementation.

We are all for anything that is both naturally occurring and will help you reach your goals, but only when there is a framework for it work effectively within.  Spending money on expensive supplements before you’ve get the basics (clean food and water for example!)  down pat is backward!

What differentiates BCAA’s from the other essential amino acids is how they are metabolised.  All other amino acids are metabolised in the liver, whereas BCAA’s are metabolised directly in muscle.  This means that they have huge anabolic (muscle building) and anti-catabolic (muscle breakdown) properties and are also an excellent fuel source – especially useful for those following fat loss training programmes.

The key is getting the timing and dosage right (you need to use them in high quantities to make it worthwhile).  And go for the capsule version as the taste of the powder will put most off!

Filed Under: Exercise, Fitness, In the Gym, Nutrition, Q&As, Weight Loss · Tagged: , ,
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