Fit For Life: What is Results Fitness?

Sunday, September 10, 2017
Matt Espeut, GoLocalWorcester Health +Lifestyle Contributor

Some say it’s the scale going down. Some say it’s their pants fitting looser. Others say that their endurance increases. All those accomplishments are great indicators of success. Whatever benchmark you are using to measure your progress doesn’t matter, it’s the fact that you are doing what it takes to accomplish your own personal goal.

But, to be truly fit, you only need to accomplish 2 things, and that’s building muscle and burning fat. Some folks lose weight by doing excessive cardio. Others do it by restricting calories too heavily. Both of those are the wrong approach to reaching your fitness goal. The reason for this is because you aren’t building any muscle using these tactics.

At Providence Fit Body Boot Camp, we stress health first, then fitness will follow. Building muscle and losing fat through proper nutrition, and high intensity exercise is the only way to get fit and healthy, and maintain it forever. If you don’t do resistance training, and don’t eat enough quality food, you won’t build muscle, and therefore won’t reach ultimate levels of fitness.

Here are some tips to accomplish fitness and health:

1) Hydrate, hydrate, hydrate

We were developed on a cellular level and cells require water. We hit the gym to build muscle and muscle is composed of millions of cells. We need enzymes to digest food to build muscle, and water aids in digestion, and the ability for enzymes to travel. To move without cramping our muscles need water. Get the picture? And that just deals with the exercising part. Being properly hydrated also prevents headaches, and free radical cell damage, caused by environmental toxins. Think: the solution for pollution is dilution!! Along with aiding your kidneys, and bladder in elimination. It is also responsible for shuttling water soluble vitamins to cells, so when you dehydrate yourself it is tougher for the body to absorb nutrients. I recommend 1/2oz of water for every pound of body weight, any less and you are doing your body a disservice.

2) Sleeping

Eight hours is not a luxury, it is a necessary component to your well-being. When you sleep, great things happen to your body as well as your mind and energy levels. Improving cognitive brain function, and increasing energy levels creates a huge network of positive attributes to the body. I hear the excuse all the time: I am too busy to get that much sleep. Do NOT confuse busy with productive, and if you are well rested you will become much more productive, than when you are tired, lethargic and miserable. The proper amount of sleep will allow you to wake happier and more energetic. Proper rest allows you to wake with clarity, and feeling more energetic. When you have the right mindset from the beginning of the day, you accomplish many more tasks and are able to focus more efficiently. When you get the proper amount of sleep you wake up on fire and ready to go. Many people think that they are building muscle in the gym. Sorry, but that theory is wrong. When you work out you are breaking the body down. Training causes micro tears in the muscle, and the only ways to recover from this is with proper sleep and nutrition. If this is not achieved, then you will not recover from physical activity, making positive gains or results nearly impossible.

3) Qualify food

Not eating quality food frequently throughout the day is probably the biggest cause of not getting the results you want. When you eat efficiently you will get results faster and achieve your goals. When you consume garbage, processed, food you cause inflammation in the body. Our defense systems prioritize and fight off the most damaging invaders first. Meaning when you are sick you shouldn't work out because our immune systems are fighting sickness and breaking the body down causing the immune system to work too hard, prolonging all ailments in the body. When you eat garbage, our systems are too busy fighting inflammation and are too drained to build and repair and do the positive things our bodies need to get results. When you eat quality food, our systems work smoothly and efficiently allowing the body to uptake nutrients effectively thus triggering results and progress.

4) Working out

Work out with resistance. To make our muscles stronger, we need to overload the body with resistance. Building muscle will speed your metabolism and burn fat faster. When you combine resistance with cardio training you get the ultimate formula for success. We do it in 30 minutes at Providence Fit Body Boot Camp by combining the two techniques in one action packed 30-minute session. This is the most effective and efficient way to reach all your health and fitness goals.

To simplify and summarize: 1) drink lots of clean water 2) get to bed on time 3) eat quality food throughout the day 4) Move your body 3-5 times a week for 30 minutes of HIIT training.

Follow these 4 simple steps, and I can guarantee you will start feeling better, looking better, and performing every aspect of your day better.

Matt Espeut, GoLocal's Health & Lifestyle Contributor has been a personal trainer and health & fitnesss consultant for over 25 years. He is the owner of Fitness Profiles, a one on one, and small group personal training company, as well as Providence Fit Body Boot Camp, located at 1284 North Main St., on the Providence/Pawtucket line. You can reach Matt at (401) 453-3200; on Facebook at "Matt Espeut", and on Twitter at @MattEspeut. "We’re all in this life together – let’s make it a healthy one