“Hey everybody! Welcome to today’s video. Today I’m going to cover spot reduction, the spot reduction myth. The reason I’m going to cover this in this video is I get tons of questions. It’s “Hey Sam, how do I tone my tummy?”, “How do I get rid of this flab on my arms?”, “What about my hips? Is there anything I can do specifically to that?”
So first thing to know, spot reduction, meaning targeting a specific body part, just to burn fat off that area is a myth. Your body when you burn fat, burns it from all over the place. Now there are a few things you could do to target specific areas, to make them look a little bit toner, but all of those are going to include building muscle.
So we’ll take the back of the arms for example. So if you do have excess flab on the back of your arms, as most people describe it to me… simply by doing a bunch of tricep push downs or exercises that target the area are not going to just burn fat specifically localized to the tricep.
What it will do is it will build a little bit of a muscle and it may give it a slightly tighter appearance, but ultimately it’s not going to burn the fat off of that area. That’s just one example. Same thing goes most common one is probably the lower stomach for the abs to get those areas to kind of really tight tone look you’re looking for. You’re gonna have to drop overall body fat and that’s going to come through what I’m always talking about – Getting good sleep, good nutrition, and good training, and being consistent over time, dropping your body fat as a whole. So take away from this video spot reduction is a myth you can not just hammer away one body part and expect it to all suddenly shrink, that is not going to happen. You have to work the entire body full body movements, compound movements are proven to be the most effective. And of course, it’s going to come down to nutrition and consistency over time. So that is all for today. Stay strong.”
“Hey everybody! Welcome to today’s Q and A… That’s right. We’re bringing back the question and answer. Very common question I’m getting asked is “Hey Sam! What do I do when I have no time to workout?” or it could be phrased as “I don’t have any time to workout.” So I’m gonna address this in two ways. First way is going to be the mindset around you don’t have time to workout. And if you actually think that, and you’re saying, “Oh, I just don’t have time” or second one is going to be, what do you do if you’re really running short on time? So I’m going to address both of those.
First, the mindset around “I don’t have time”. So everybody is busy. Your life is not going to get less busy. You’re going to have to find time to fit into your schedule, to take care of yourself.
Think of the airplane analogy. I’m sure you’ve heard you got to put your mask on before you put anybody else’s mask on. You’ve got to help yourself first before you can truly help others. You have to take that mindset when it comes to making time to workout. Sometimes it may feel even a little bit selfish, but what’s actually selfish is being a less than optimal person. So that way you can not provide a hundred percent for whoever it is that you’re trying to take care of. So whether that’s your children, your spouse, whatever it is, if you’re not a hundred percent, you’re not giving them a hundred percent. So shift that mindset and make time, because what you prioritize will grow, and that includes your fitness. So that’s kind of the first thing.
Now let’s say that you’re just saying, “Ahh, I don’t have time to workout today”. Maybe you workout very consistently or you’re running really short on time. What should you do? Really? You have three options and I’m going to kind of tell you what I would probably recommend, it’s the number one:
Option #1, (1) you could do something very high intensity that requires 10 minutes or less. A common misconception is that you need hours plus to workout – That is not true. You, we do all of our training in person and online designed to be under 30 minutes. So you’re going to get, and they get phenomenal results. So really, if you have about 10 minutes, you could do something high intensity.
However, most of the time I’m gonna recommend the 2nd option, which is (2) mobility. That’s going to be kind of more flexibility, mobility type things. Even if you just wanted to sit in a deep squat for a few minutes, just to kind of open up everything that is better.
Then the 3rd option, which would be (3) doing nothing at all.
And sometimes doing nothing at all is valuable because things can really, if you’re training really hard, it’s going to stress the body. But I do typically recommend the 2nd option. Do some mobility work, a lot of people are lacking in their mobility work. Keep me anything, think of what you’re trying to improve… Maybe it’s your shoulder, look up some mobility exercises for your shoulders. If you need help with those, please reach out and I can direct you or make some videos for you.
All right. That’s all for today on what to do if you do not have time to work out. Just to recap if you’re in the mindset of, “Oh, I don’t have any time, my life is too busy…” You got to change that or your body’s never going to change. Second thing, if you’re just running short on time that day you’re somebody that works out consistently, you can do a high intensity workout. However, I don’t recommend that. You can just take the day off if you really want to, or you can go with the third option. What I recommend do some mobility training, just like 10 /15 minutes that’s all you’ll need. And you’ll be feeling great going into whatever activity you have later that day. That is all for today. Thank you for the Q and A’s, we’re going to keep them rolling as always, stay strong.”
“Today I’m going to show you an exercise you could do anywhere. It’s a great conditioning exercise. If you’re on vacation, or just looking for a total body workout, you can implement this. It’s going to seem really easy and very simple. And that’s the point so you could do it anywhere. Really, I challenge you to start out, try to do this for 2-3 minutes straight, take a break for about 2-3 minutes and then do it again… See what your heart rate is. So all you should do is this simple exercise.
(1) We’re going to start off standing up nice and tall.
(2) You’re going to go down into a high plank here,
(3) and then you’re going to go down into a low plank. You’re going to squeeze for a second.
(4) and then walk yourself back up just like this.
(5) Raise your hand over your head and then go right back down into it. And then just repeat it.
Again, you’re going to do that for 2-3 minutes and that is a great conditioning tool. It will spike the heart rates, surprisingly high and then you’re going to get a full body head to toe workout. Perfect exercise if you’re traveling or just looking for something quick to do, or if you need a quick warmup, that is a plank to stand.”
“Good morning everybody! Today’s video I’m going to cover what to do if your progress has stalled, maybe you’re stalled on, maybe you’re stuck at those 20 pound dumbbells. Maybe you’re stuck at a certain weight and you’re not seeing that scale budge. What can you do? Three things we’re going to cover today. I’m going to give you 3 simple steps. If you follow these, you should see that progress pick back up.
(1) So the first thing where you need to look at our routine, what are you currently doing? If you’re stuck, it’s important to remember that what you’re doing currently is not going to take you to where you need to go. You’re going to have to change something. So first let’s look at the exercise routine. Have you been doing the same thing for awhile? Is it the same sets/reps? Are you doing the same amount of frequency each week? Are you only working out once a week? Maybe you could add in another day, but more than likely what I always have clients start out with is let’s change up things like your reps, your exercises, and then we’ll go from there. So if you’re doing the same thing consistently over time, your body is going to adapt. It’s going to become very efficient with it. So change up your routine.
(2) Second thing, just how your body adapts to exercise, it also will adapt to your nutrition. So maybe you’ve been at the same caloric intake. You’ve been eating very similar foods for a long time now, your body is going to get very efficient, and it’s not going to want to drop any weight. So if you’re looking for fat loss specific if you’re stalled at that weight, you may have to adjust your nutrition up or down. It’s not always down. Sometimes we’re so low, our body feels in a state of stress and it’s not going to drop excess body fat. So really examine your nutrition. You may need to change things up there as well.
(3) And then the third thing, very important… check your sleep. Oftentimes progress is simply halted because people are not sleeping enough. Again, your body is not going to build muscle or burn fat if it is feeling like it hasn’t slept in years. So make sure that you’re getting good, consistent sleep.
So again to recap, what you’re going to do is first, look at that exercise routine. It may be time to change things up second, look at the nutrition. Again, you may need to change things up in that as well. And then third, make sure we’re getting a restful night’s sleep. That is all for today. Stay strong.”
“Hey everybody! I wanted to make a quick video about the 5 myths that I commonly hear about strength, training, or resistance training. These 5 myths I’m just going to run through them really quickly. I usually get them in assessments when I’m talking to new people that are coming in, looking for training, or even sometimes, current clients, if I haven’t clarified these myths in a long time, they’ll get brought up. A lot of these myths are derived from social media, the news, and just have been presented to us over decades.
(1) So the first myth, myth #1, you needed at least an hour of strength training to make it effective. This is completely false. 20 – 30 minutes is more than enough time. If you’re doing that consistently, you’re going to get better results over long-term. Anyhow, people that tend to work out an hour plus are usually not as consistent. You want to make it manageable to your schedule. If you can do an hour plus that’s perfectly fine, but you do not necessarily need an hour to effectively strength train.
(2) Second one. You’re going to get bulky from lifting heavy weights or bulky from strength training. This is completely false. People that are bulky from resistance training have spent a lot of time and effort and energy kind of transforming their body that way. And it also has a lot to do with the nutrition. So getting into strength training alone is not going to make you bulky. In fact, it’s very, very rare.
(3) Same thing kind of for the third myth is you have to lift lightweights, a bunch of high reps to get toned. That is also not true. That’s been presented through the media… That is not true. You do not need to lift lightweights and high reps to tone the muscle.
The fourth and fifth myth kind of run together. They are, you have to have muscle confusion and you need a lot of variety in your, in your strength training routine. (4) So we’ll touch on muscle confusion first. That is also just a marketing gimmick, completely false. You don’t need to do all these crazy things. (5) And then with variety, it’s kind of along the similar lines, really there’s 7-8 core exercises that if you just have it in your routine consistently, you’re going to progress consistently over a long period of time, you’re going to get great results. You’re going to get a nice aesthetic looking body if you pair that with the proper nutrition.
So again, to run through those 5 myths really quick, you do not need at least an hour a day to strength train. You’re not going to get bulky, very low likelihood of that. You don’t need to lift light to tone. You could tone through a variety of sets, reps. Muscle confusion, not a real thing. And you don’t necessarily need a lot of variety in your strength training routine if you’re just sticking to 7-8 core exercise movements. If you want to know more about that, you want to know what those movements are, you can reach out to me. I would be more than happy to answer them directly to you. I hope everybody has a fantastic rest of their day and as always stay strong.”
“Hey everybody, I’m going to deliver a quick, concise message today. And I just want to let everybody know your workouts… They don’t matter. I know some of you are like “What?!”, “Sam, you’re always talking about resistance training being the best… you say, I need to strength train 3 days a week to see the best results.” That is true. But what I’m trying to say here today in this video is most of you are putting way too much emphasis on your workouts and not on the little things that are actually going to get you results. Specifically, if we’re talking about fat loss. So the reason I’m bringing this up is I have a lot of conversations with clients and they usually go something like this. It’s “Hey, Sam, I’m really thinking about increasing my workout intensity. I want to see better results. So I’m going to start retraining for a marathon, but then I’m also going to do a powerlifting meet. So I’m going to be training 3x a day. How’s that sound?”
Okay…That’s a bit extreme, but usually that’s what it sounds like to me. People are wanting to add more intensity, do more and more and more and more and more. And in fact, most of the time I respond with why don’t we stop drinking so much alcohol and get to bed before 1:00 AM. That’s probably going to get you better results. So there’s really 4 things that you need to master before you even worry about increasing your workout intensity. And these will yield great results, long-term even if you just did these four things, you’re going to get great results.
(1) You want to drink at least half of your body weight in ounces of water. So you want to be consuming a lot of water there. So if you’re 128 pounds, you can be drinking half a gallon of water. You can scale it obviously to your weight, but most people are grossly under consuming water. So for example, a 200 pound male, that’s a hundred ounces of water. That’s nearly a gallon a day. So that’s where you need to be at, at a minimum.
(2) We need to be sleeping seven hours a night at a minimum. Try to average that out through the week. Maybe some days you can’t, it’s not in your schedule. So you can only sleep six at night. We’ll try to get that average out to be at least seven at the minimum; sleep is so crucial.
(3) Steps. We want to get at least 10,000 steps in a day. You gotta move that body, that alone is going to make a high caloric burn.
(4) And then the last one for fat loss, you have to eat in a calorie deficit. You can’t, it doesn’t matter how much you work on. Yes, you’ll put on more muscle, but you’re not actually going to lose the weight. A lot of you want to see if you’re just stuffing your face and still working out. So you have to eat in a calorie deficit deficit. You have to know what that means to your body.
So again, less on the intensity, less on the workouts, master those four fundamentals and you will be all set, that’s all for today. I hope everybody has a fantastic day and stay strong.”
“Hey everybody! For today’s video, I had to have a seat because I’m going to talk about a very controversial topic – nutrition. I’m going to talk specifically about the differences between a low carb or ketogenic diet or a low fat diet. All right. So let’s get into it first and foremost, I’m making this video because a lot of times people first come to me, I’ll sit down with them for nutrition consultation and they’ll say, “Sam, what should I do? Should I be on a keto like my aunt Beth, or I don’t know, she’s lost a lot of weight, but I’ve also heard on the news that a low fat diet is the way to go, which is… what do I need to start doing?” So we’re going to address both kind of what the keto diet is and what a low fat diet is.
So ketogenic diet first and foremost is 75% of that is coming your caloric needs or coming from fat. 20% of your caloric needs are coming from protein and the fiber or less are coming from carbohydrates. The reason that I tell you those statistics is most people will mess that up and they’re just kind of keto-ish, which isn’t a real thing. It’s just, then you’re just kind of eating more fat than you normally would. So that is the ketogenic diet, kind of the way it’s broken down.
Some pros from the ketogenic diet are it does have a good impact on your insulin. There’s a lot of recent research that suggests it has good benefits for insulin sensitivity. Also people when they get into ketosis, which is a very small percentage by the way that people that actually embark on the ketogenic diet ever feel ketosis but when they do that has good mental benefits.
Some cons… performance, a lot of people notice that their performance will dip when they’re on a ketogenic diet. That’s because of the lack of carbohydrates, that they’re accustomed to feeling their workouts. Also, the sustainability is also a huge factor. A lot of people I have met, a whole lot of people that have done the ketogenic diet six to eight years. A lot of them met a lot of people that have tried it out for a month or two, but no one really sustaining long-term. It is also important to note that I have done both of these diets personally, I have personal experience with them. Yeah, the sustainability of the ketogenic diet is just not something long-term, taking in that much fat. And then over time, people will really rev up the fat, which has more calories per gram, than carbohydrates. So people can overeat on the ketogenic diet as well. A lot of times this diet is popular because people will lose weight right away from flushing out all the carbohydrates. If you think about carbo – hydrate, what they do is they hydrate you. So a lot of the weight is water weight initially, just to be aware of that. And the reason that both these diets do work is because they were strict a certain macronutrient. So in this case would be carbohydrates on the ketogenic diet, the low fat diets obviously fat. When you restrict one of those, you’re going to have less calories overall, thus, a negative energy balance, and you’re going to lose weight. That’s kind of the trick behind it. So not I went off on that tangent, let’s talk about the low fat diet.
A low fat diet… You’re going to have very little fat 20% or less on a low fat diet. I believe this became popular because a lot of people in the 80s, early 90s were saying, you know dietary fat is directly related to heart disease, things like that, a lot of research since then showing that there is no correlation there, just to be clear on that. So low fat diet… What I’ll notice with clients is sometimes especially female clients have to be careful because a lot of hormones are produced, and transported through the things we get in our dietary fats. So you’re not going to be as easily absorbing specific nutrients, such as fat-soluble vitamins like A, D, K, and E. So you have to be very careful about micronutrient deficiencies when you’re out on a low fat diet.
So here’s my 2 cents on it all just to kind of wrap it up… a balanced approach is the way to go. I would throw either one of these diets out. They’re not sustainable. I haven’t seen people last very long on either one of them I’m talking to, you know, a decade plus, and that’s what we’re looking for. Sustainability long-term health, a good way to kind of approach a sustainable diet would be to organize it around these, take kind of the ideas from the ketogenic diet and the low fat diet and organize it around that. So a way to do that would be… okay. I’m not going to have fats and carbs in the same meal. So for example, you can for breakfast, have a protein, a vegetable, and a carbohydrate. For lunch, you could have the same thing. And then for dinner, just take out that carbohydrate and swap it with a fat. So then you’re going to have protein, vegetables, and fat for dinner. That’s going to keep you well balanced and that’s kind of where we start most of the clients that I work with.
So I hope you found this video valuable. If you liked it, give me a thumbs up, give me a heart. If you didn’t write in the comments, you suck whatever. Or if you have any questions, leave them in the comments. I look forward to responding to all you guys’ messages. Again, I hope you found this valuable. That’s all for today and as always stay strong.”
Hate to break it to you but… cardio exercise is NOT weight loss. Here’s why:
People always come to me with the belief that they just need to add more cardio when the weight loss stalls. This belief is false.
Let’s look at the facts of the cardio – weight loss relationship.
1. You can lose weight while doing cardio, but can also gain weight while doing cardio if you EAT in a SURPLUS.
2. If you are eating in a deficit, do you lose weight without cardio? YES. If you’re eating in deficit with cardio do you lose weight? YES.
If you are asking…..“But Sam. Which one should I do?!” If you have weight loss as your goal — always address your NUTRITION FIRST and add cardio as a bonus. Not the other way around. This will give you sustainable results and allow you to progress consistently.
“Hey everybody! I wanted to deliver a simple message today. My message today is cardiovascular activity or cardio as most call it, does not equal fat loss. Now I know a lot of you are thinking “What? My aunt, my sister, my cousin, my uncle, all of these people have been running and they lose weight. I see it all the time.” That is correct. That can happen. But I’m here to tell you that cardio is not fat loss in every instance. It is not where you should be putting the most of your emphasis on, especially if you are new to resistance training, if you’re new to developing a healthy lifestyle, it is not where you should be putting the majority of your emphasis cardiovascular activity does have a great health benefits to it so I’m not saying you should neglect it completely, but please often what I see is people will start out new fitness. They’re all hyped. They’re getting on the elliptical for 45 minutes. That’s not what you should be doing. That’s not a good use of your time. So I’m going to tell you right now, kind of what we need to be focusing on as you’re starting out and why cardio does not equal fat loss.
So if we look at the equation of fat loss, we know that to lose weight, you have to be in a calorie deficit. So for example, those of you that don’t know what a calorie deficit is… If my baseline level of calories to maintain my current weight was around 2000. And if I ate anything more than 2000, that means I would gain weight. That’d be a calorie surplus, but anything less than 2000 and this has to be consistently over time. If I eat anything less than 2000, let’s say I’m consistently eating 1600. I know over time that I’m going to lose weight and that’s that’s science right there.
So if we look at the equation of cardiovascular activity, it’s very simple. You can lose weight. Yes, doing cardio and being in a calorie deficit, you can lose weight, just being in a calorie deficit. You cannot lose weight if you’re doing cardio and in a calorie surplus. So the main message here is if you’re starting out new focus on your nutrition first, put what matters first. If you’re looking for fat loss, put what matters first, your nutrition, dial that in. Know what your maintenance level of calories is, know how to go below that… and that’s going to get you fat loss, sustainable fat loss over time, far superior than cardiovascular activity alone. Well, that’s my message for today. I hope everybody has a fantastic rest of their day as always, stay strong.”
Hey everyone! It’s Whitney from EarthFIT. So today I want to talk to you about “Eating On The Go”. So just because you’re away from home, doesn’t mean you have to make poor food choices. So the first thing I recommend is be prepared. If you’re meal prepping or you’re focusing a lot on nutrition, you need to prepare your meals. You need to have them ready to go for the day, at the very least. That way we know for your schedule, you have everything you need to hit those targets that you’re doing. Now, say you’re not meal prepping, you’re just trying to eat right, you’ve been working on nutrition: You do want to be prepared. So, a few things you can do is if you know you’re going to be away from home, or you’re not going to be able to eat what you need to eat, you want to bring stuff with you. A few things you can bring with you for snacks are… I like to tell people, bring protein. That’s the easiest way to get good nutrition is having a good amount of protein. And you can do that through like a protein shake. You can do that through hard boiled eggs. You can do that through some chicken breast. You can do that through tuna. There’s a lot of easy protein snacks that you can bring with you on the go. If you do a protein shake, you might want to have a bottle or something – a shaker, something easy where you don’t even need a ball. You can get one that has a top that you can mix a protein already. I like to use this one because it also has at the bottom, a separate pouch that you can keep things dry. Sometimes I’ll put nuts in there depending on what my macros are for the day. If I need some fats, those are some options.
Now say last resort, you are out, you don’t have any snacks with you… What can you do? So you have a few options. I like to give people is: (1) You can completely fast. Just because you’re feeling hungry doesn’t mean you need to eat. Sometimes you’ll do better if you don’t eat anything at all, you wait so you’re in a place where you can have a proper meal and you can make sure you’re staying on track with nutrition. A little hunger is not going to kill anybody. That being said, if you have diabetes or something where you do need to monitor blood sugar, that’s a different story. But for most people you can fast. Now, say you can’t fast and you’re like, “I really need something.” I recommend try starting drinking some water first, having some water. Sometimes people think they’re hungry, but really they’re dehydrated.
I know for me personally, if I’m feeling like I want fruit to eat, it’s typically the water in the fruit that I’m craving. It’s not actually food that I want. Now, worst comes to worst, you don’t have any options, you need to have something to eat. I like to think the worst case scenario is you go to a gas station. So, if you can find something healthy to eat it at a gas station, you can pretty much find it anywhere. Whether it’s a grocery store, a restaurant, your gas station is going to be the bottom of the barrel, for instance. So I’ve actually gone to a gas station today to show you some options that you can have that’ll work. And I’ll go over with those with you now.
Happy Friday, everybody! Thank you for tuning in to my question and answer. And today’s Q and A, I’m going to address what to do with those family members that do not support your healthy lifestyle. Now, this question gets posed to me in a variety of ways. It’s typically “Sam, my husband does not support me. He comes and brings home all kinds of garbage food, and it’s really tough for me not to eat it. He doesn’t like what I cook for him or my children won’t eat what I’m cooking for them. And I just find it very difficult to kind of maintain this healthy lifestyle. They don’t like to go out and walk and things like that with me, they would rather sit and watch movies. What can I do?” So today’s video. I’m gonna address all of that.
So the first step to do when you’re dealing with resistance from those family members or those loved ones are made as the people that you live with need to expect it going in, right? So especially those that have just recently changed to a healthier lifestyle. You’re going to get resistance from those, especially if you’re trying to put your new found healthy lifestyle on somebody that’s not ready for it, right? You can’t shove your, what you love down their throat, or you’re just going to create more turmoil, more tension in that relationship. So expect the resistance going into it. Now, after you’ve grasped it, there’s going to be some resistance. You can do this either ahead of time or, you know, right after you start getting into your healthier lifestyle is you need to explain to that person why it’s important and not just saying things like, Oh, I just want to be healthier. It needs to come from a true place then you need to explain your why to them. So an example, and this is just something I’m going to make up off the top of my head, but like an example you would say to someone, I would say to someone that’s given me a lot of resistance, it would be… “You know, I am trying to get healthy right now because I have a generational problem in my family of men that are dying early. And I don’t want to pass it on to my children. I am afraid that if I don’t get healthier, I’m going to have a heart attack tomorrow. That is why I’m doing this. I’m not just doing this for no reason…” Something along those lines, the side note if you’re talking to children, it doesn’t have to be that in depth. You can simply say something along the lines of… “it makes daddy or mommy feel better when I eat healthier foods and I’m active that way I have more energy to play with you.” again, that’s just a generic example, but you get the point.
So if you explain to this person or the people that are giving you resistance why it’s important to you really, you need to set the example day after day before you can expect any change out of anybody. So you need to just be living that healthy lifestyle, letting your light shine through being that beam. Once they see how happy and how much more energy you have, how you’re feeling, how you’re looking, that’s going to wear off on them eventually. And then they’re going to be more receptive to the healthier lifestyle. Then maybe you could start incorporating, you know, family exercise, or there’ll be more receptive to your healthier meals. But at first, when you haven’t set the example at all, there’s going to be a lot of resistance. So to kind of recap that you need to go in expecting the resistance. You need to explain a true why it’s got to come from a deep place on why it is important to you. And then you have to set the example and it can’t just be one day, one week. It needs to be day after day and just be positive about it.
And then over time, they’re going to change. Now, if you don’t have any children, or you don’t want to hear any on soliciting parenting advice, you can turn this video off right now. Cause I might go on a slight rant here. So those common question I get is Sam, what do I do? My kids won’t eat healthy. Well, you need to really ask yourself a few things. One, do you want your kids to be unhealthy? Do you want you to set your kids up to have an unhealthy lifestyle? That’s something you need to get in the mindset. And the second thing your kids, when you’re cooking for them, they might not eat it initially, but eventually when they get hungry enough, they’re going to eat what you put out on the table, especially if that is their only option. That’s the end of my rant there again, if you don’t want to take my unsolicited parenting advice, I’m not a pediatrician. So you don’t have to. All right. That’s all for today’s video. Again, expect resistance. Explain why it is important and be the example for your family. That is all for today. Thank you for all the questions I’ve been getting. I’ve been loving it. Everybody, stay strong. I’ll see you Monday.
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