How to eat for optimal performance and workout

We all need carbohydrates for optimal performance. If you do not have enough carbohydrates when you are working out or competing you are simply going to run out of fuel. 

But not only do you need to eat carbohydrates to perform optimally you also need to time when you make them. Your body can only store 500 to 600 carbohydrates in your liver and muscles. So you not only need them to get a maximum workout or complete you also need to eat carbohydrates after your workout to fully recover and for your muscles to grow. If you combine some protein with your carbohydrates, your body will be even able to absorb even more carbohydrates thus giving you even more fuel.

For those are doing endurance sports or doing long time intense workouts carbohydrate loading can be very beneficial. Endurance training stimulates the sent synthesis of muscle glycogen,  So by doing carbohydrate loading you can increase the way your body stores carbohydrates.

Since I play and do high intensity sports and workouts I tried to eat A meal of 

60% carbohydrate

15% fat

25% protein

I want to make sure I am fueled sufficiently to have as intense workout as I can get. I do not want to push myself and then run out of energy. And as I stated before I make sure I eat again within two hours after my workout. 

Remember when you're doing intense muscle building or straining workouts your body continues to burn energy two- three hours after you are done working out,

So make sure you include your diet when you are planning out your workout routine. It is not unlike promising your car you will give a gas tomorrow when it is on empty today. Your car will not move and neither should you. If you do not have enough carbohydrates your body is going to use your muscles for a fuel.  Thus you can lose weight and actually look worse than you did before

Get your workout in each week  

How many of you missed your workout today? How many of you had business, a personal issue, and something else come up when it was time to workout? How many of you have been skipping you workout period,  because you have broken the habit of exercising on a regular basis.   

Well I think I would see a lot of hands up there. What happened to a lot of you and why? Why do you find yourself coming home and eating and not exercising at all? Why do you find it hard to get back into a schedule after you have broken yours?   

Well let's analyze this a bit. I have worked with numerous athletes and people who want get in shape and train who have all started like gangbusters. They have their diets and workouts written up and they make little checkmarks each day as they complete their routine or their diet.   

But soon you find that you are missing one or two workouts and soon that becomes most of your workouts, You are no longer exercising, or eating healthy and you soon begin to feel like crap most days.   

What went wrong? Well you had a plan and you then stopped following it. What if you :   

•  Showed up at work 2-3 days a week instead of 5 days a week? Well, you would get fired. 

•  Studied for classes only 1-2 days a week? Well, you would flunk most of them! 

•  Showed up for a business meeting 3 hours early or 3 hours late? Well you would be the only one there. 

  You see in order to be successful in any of these endeavors you have to have a plan of action and you have to stick to it. Otherwise you will fail.   

So I do not care what workout you do as long as you do a workout each day. You need to find a consistent time to exercise and then make sure that your exercise at that time each day. 

  YOU WILL FEEL BETTER – LOOK BETTER- AND YOUR LIFE WILL BE THAT MUCH BETTER!

So get up each day and make sure you have set a time up to work out and follow that schedule. I work out in the morning so that nothing can interfere with my workout. But I realize some of you cannot do that. So regardless of what time you work out don't think about it just give it make it habit and get your workout.

How much should you warmup 

before you exercise

How much should you warm up before you exercise? I have received thousands of e-mails from athletes- bodybuilders- and working people asking this question.

First of all it depends on your type of workout you will doing and also on your individual body type. That being said you need to follow some general guidelines

1) The best warmup for lifting weights is to do the exercises you are about to do with a light weight and go through the full range of motion. That will warmup your body muscles that you are just about to use. DO NOT GO YOUR HEAVIEST WEIGHT ON YOUR FIRST OR SECOND SET UNLESS YOU WANT TO GET INJURED!

2) Do not go to do a long aerobic workout before you lift weights. You can often burn up the glycogen from your muscles before you even workout a that will give you a worthless workout. You need the glycogen to help you lift and get results.!

3). But one thing you need to do is to get your body temperature up some before you start. Whether that is done on the treadmill or some quick light weights it does not matter as long as you have got your blood pumping.  If I did not want to do a light set of all my exercises for warmup sometimes I would get on a exercise bike and ride it with no tension for about 8 to 10 minutes to get my blood flowing

The physiological reason you do a warm up is to assist your circulatory system in pumping oxygen-rich blood to your working muscles. You want to increase circulation throughout the body in a gradual manner. A good warm up w ill safely prepare your body for the increased demands of your exercise routine. When your muscles are cold muscles they do not absorb shock or impact as well, and are more susceptible to injury.
Always make sure you do not just walk in and try to handle your heaviest weight. That just shows lack of discipline and patience in your workout and you will end up paying the price and injuries. 

How does stress affect your body and your workout

High levels of stress will promote muscle breakdown and it will also release a lot more free radicals into your bloodstream.

" Stress is the body's reaction to any change that requires an adjustment or response. The body reacts to these changes with physical, mental, and emotional responses" ( WebMD).
First the good news.  

Getting exercise and a good workout increases the production of your endorphins. These are your brain's feel-good neurotransmitters, called endorphins.  So when you have a lot of stress getting a good workout in is going to make you feel better and relieve some of the stress you have.

Your workout will also focus your mind on what you were doing at the moment, and this will allow you to forget whatever is causing you stress in your life.   This can also make you feel happy and put you in a calm state of mind. Thus taking your thoughts away that which is causing you to have stress. 

Now for some of the bad news about stress. Recent studies have linked cortisol, a hormone that is released during times of stress, to cause cravings for sugar and fat. It is a believed that cortisol binds to receptors in the brain that control food intake. Plus if you are already overweight you may find you even more susceptible to these cravings.
This is why when you're under stress ice cream, cookies, or any other kind of sugar or fat food sounds good to you.  It almost feels like this would be comfort food to make you relax and releave the stress you feel. But in reality it is going to affect your body to cause even more stress.

Plus cortisol may also increase the level of fat tissue in your body and may also enlarge the size of your fat cells.   So it is essential that we limit the amount of stress in our life to control the amount of cortisol that is produced in our body.  This can also cause insomnia, and increased the sugar level in your body.

So we are to train hard and be able to compete and  we must also work just as hard to keep stress under control in our life. That means you need to set priorities make sure you keep organized and do not allow clutter, to come into your life i, and try to minimize any kind of distractions.  In other words try to simplify your life as much as possible.

Tried to keep to as much of the schedule as you can and keep your life organized into small time compartments. Then when you go to workout you will be at your optimal state which will also give you your optimal results.  

That you can train as hard as you should and you will get the results that you want.

Cook Healthy Meals For Your Children 

At Manhattan's Private Calhoun School Chef Robert Surles cooks healthy meals for his Kids. "Chef Bobo " as he is called, cooks from scratch, keeps the portion sizes small, and provides healthy food instead of the preservative loaded, high sugar junk that most students are asked to consume.

He states that " studies have shown that it may take up to 15 times of tasting something before a child will like it." So rather than give in, Chef Bobo, will keep putting out his healthy food dishes until his students find the particular dishes they like.

He also tries to avoid any food that has corn syrup in it. He feels this is one of main reason that diabetes is running rampant in our children is that corn syrup is so prevelant in all of our foods. One of his examples is ketchup. Ketchup has more sugar in it than ice cream and he will not serve it to his students.

One of his recipes is for Rutabaga fries, which are tossed in olive oil, salt and pepper, and then cooked in a convection oven.

So you parents need to get on the bandwagon. You need to buy healthy foods from the grocery store, like lean meats, fresh vegetables, fresh fruit each week. You need to cook your meals from scratch and avoid the frozen prepared meals in the freezer aisles, which are pumped full of preservatives and sugars. You need to take the time and effort to plan and out and prepare healthy meals each day.

I would not only recommend that you eat most of your meals together as a family, but also did you get your children involved in cooking and preparing the meal. This will give them the routine of cooking and of preparing healthy meals, and they should carry this routine for the rest of their life

Give your child the gift of health! All of your effort will be worth it, and they will be able to carry this habit of health with them when they go out on their own .

 60 years old and starting new training routine

I have been super busy teaching, coaching and working my websites but now is time to start my own new training routine. 

This picture was taking 3/17 today and I'm just starting to put in your training routine together.  

My current stats are 

6 feet

205 pounds

I will probably drop 5 to 10 pounds in the next 2 to 3 weeks, I am also going to really increase my training level and completely clean up my diet.

I have found that I have no problem maintaining my weight and strength no matter how much I run or play sports I do each week.  My muscles and straight still increase even when I am playing tennis for 2-3 hours a day, or high or run sprints.

So now I want to see just how far I can take my training in the next three months.  The one limitation I have is some carpal tunnel syndrome in my right hand that may limit my training some extent, but since I am off this week I intend to stretch my right hand out and see if I can get rid of this.

I will be taking pictures each week and tracking my results and putting them up on my blog and my websites

How much protein do you need to compete

Recent studies have shown that the average American gets too much protein in their diet.  Of course being a bodybuilder or athlete you're not the average American. You are going to need more protein if you're training hard then they would because you will be breaking your body muscles down much more each day.

Athletes require more protein than inactive people to build, maintain and repair muscle and other tissues in the body. The more intense you train and the more intense your work out,  the more protein and nutrients you going to require to recover sufficiently.  If you do not get enough protein your body will not recover,  and you will actually lose muscle.   When you eat protein your body breaks it down into amino acids and these can be used for several different things. It can provide energy, but that is not it's main purpose. It is used for building and repairing muscle and tissues, red blood cells, hair and finger nails and for synthesizing hormones.

Extra protein does not build muscle or bulk. For that you need to increase your exercise level. If you do not exercise the protein was just sit your body and it will soon flushed out.

So make sure you get plenty of protein in your diet each day. That will ensure that your body can recover and make games that you agree should training well

Following link provides a good list of some of the most protein rich foods to eat

http://healthyeating.sfgate.com/athletes-need-protein-inactive-people-2794.html

Should you handle Heavy or Light Weights to get Results 

This question has been asked for years now from every bodybuilder, fitness competitor, and athlete in every sport.

In over 40 years of training and training  with athletes I have seen it all.  From bodybuilders and athletes doing Max lifts of 1-3 reps in almost every workout to some huge athletes doing sets of benches with 135 lbs, but doing every rep as slow, controlled and with as perfect form was possible.   

So there is a wide variety of different philosophies out there on what you should be doing for the best results.  So here are some initial tips on what to do:

• Do not got for max lifts more than once a week 
• DO NOT CHEAT ON YOUR LIFTS AND USE BAD FORM
• Do not use so light a weight that you are not straining at all to finish your set
• Do not lift heavy all the time - it will be to hard on your joints 
• Throw a high rep - light weight day in your routine every two weeks.   

Also do not overtrain!    If you are constantly tired and dragging then you are not going to be making any gains either.  Take a day or two off or better yet do some cross training.

Speaking of cross training I always do some form of cross - sport training.   My routine includes 

• Tennis - I am ranked player and coach
• Sprints -  Agility drills - LOVE THEM
• Jiu Jitsu - wrestling -  a great way to get strong, flexible, and have fun
• Hiking -  we have a ton of great hiking trails here

Now all of these activities burn calories, work my fast twitch muscles,  work my core,  and build explosive muscles density.   I LIKE to eat and so by cross training I am not eating dry chicken breasts and dry salads which i did when I was bodybuilding and had stopped cross training.  Those days are gone forever.  

Now I can eat a healthy diet but sill have carbs when I want to.  AND I do.

My routine is weights -  Monday - Tuesday  - Thursday - Friday and i have a max of 15 -30 seconds between sets.  I KEEP MOVING BETWEEN SETS!   I do anywhere from 4 -10 reps and 3 sets of each exercise. 

REST?  I have heard and believe the saying " you are not ever overtrained you are just under rested" .   You need to have some down time and you need to  have some fun.   Do not ignore your Family.   Get out to a park and hike-  play tennis - basketball-  go bowling - swimming and TAKE EVERYONE!    That means go out and exercise and have fun while you do it. 

Keep track of your weights and try to increase them 

Why do you need to eat breakfast each day

First of all breakfast is the most important meal of the day. You are literally "breaking the fast" of the night. Now I do not mean eating thre sugar loaded " cereal' that they have in the grocery store. That is nothing more than eating a "candy bar".

Studies have shown that you significantly increase your chances of being obsese if you skip breakfast! Also those same studies have shown that you also increase your chances of living longer by eating breakfast. 

Eating breakfast lets you start off your day with enery, vitality, and WILL ENABLE YOU TO EAT LESS DURING THE DAY FOR YOU WILL NOT CRAVE FOOD AS MUCH, 

Your body needs protein to recover from the fast of the night and to build muscle. If it does not get protein then it will canibalize your bodies muscles to get the protein it needs to meet your bodies needs each day.

For you parents scientific tests have proven that kids who do not eat breakfast are less able to learn and excel at school, and they do not get enough iron in their diet. Iron is a essential nutrient that's is needed to make hemoglobin, the oxygen-carrying component of red blood cells (RBCs). Red blood cells circulate throughout the body to deliver oxygen to all our cells, and are essential to get oxygen to our muscles and tissue. Plus these same children are more likely to be overweight. 

So make sure you eat a healthy breakfast each day to start your day.

When is the Best Time to Train for Bodybuilding or Fitness

I spent over 17 years training a 4am at Golds Gym in Venice Beach California. Now I did not think anything about this for there were 20-40 other people in there also by 4:30AM and that included many females bodybuilders and athletes.

Was I stiff at that time of the morning? Not really but it does take longer to warmup the earlier you start. And you may not be as strong as you will be in later in the day, but I found that my strength was just about the same in the morning as it was in the afternoon. 

But you will also get your workout in each day not matter what happens for nothing, work-Family- etc issues will not be able to interfer with your workouts for you will have already got it in before you start your day.

Yes as you get older you will sometimes you need to stay late at work, you have dinner meetings, and Family events which will make you postpone or cancel your workout.

Now for some technical analysis. ! The latest research on your body's circadian rhythms, which are its internal clock, have shown that the peak of several of the most important (anabolic) hormones occur at both 3 and 11 hours upon your awakening. Well, according to science, if you wake up at 5:00 am, you are at your strongest at either 8:00 am and 4:00 pm..

Furthermore according to many strength coaches - such as Olympic Strength Coach Charles Poliquin, your joints like your knees, shoulders, may not be warm first thing in the morning.

What they are referring to is the synovial fluid which lubricates your joints require about 3 to 4 hours to reach an optimal level of warmth which will increase your bodies flexibility. This will provide a increase in athletic performance while decreasing the chnces of injuries.

So if you have the time to train at the 3 or 11 hours upon wakening then you now know it is your optimum training time. But do not worry if you do not. Some of the best bodybuilders and athletes in the world have trained at every hour of the day. When i was in at 4AM many of the top bodybuilders and athletes where right in the gym with me

Are you training for a sport or want to increase your speed or power? Then try plyometric training.

http://power4sports.blogspot.com

Healthy Power Egg Breakfast 

I believe in eating a good healthy breakfast to start each day off.  

This is my recipe for my power egg breakfast.  

Use 6 eggs

cut tomatoes

turkey sausage

mushrooms

red and orange peppers

cut onions

Cook them all in a large frying pan sprayed lightly with pam.  

When all of this is cooked then add LOTS of Spinach to your eggs for the spinach will cook way down to where you can barely see it

Now you are ready to eat.   I put homemade salsa on top of mine and eat it with 1/2 piece of whole wheat toast

Enjoy it! 

Flexibility training 

This is something that we all  need to do regardless of our age. 

As we age of course the first thing that we lose is flexibility.  Our muscles. spine, and joints tighten from the force of gravity,  aging of our body and the pounding that we do each day.  This causes injuries, curvature of the spine, and can also cause arthritis in our joints.

So we need to spend time lengthening and elongating out body each day.   This can be done with traditional exercises like yoga which are static or they can also be done with non-static exercises like karate - jiu jitsu etc.  

I like a combination of both methods.  But either method you choose you need to make sure you get your body temperature up so that your muscles are warm and you can then stretch your muscles to that maximum ability.   When you body is cold you muscles are tight and inflexible.  That is the reason the so cold "Hot Yoga" classes are so hot for they heat your body up as you do the stretches. 

I really like to use the pool in the summer for flexibility training.  I can do high knee running from side to side - also high knee side -to side shuffle running to start off.   I also do high knee kicking ands arm pumping when treading water for 30 minutes sessions.  

I then do high kicks as i walk from side to side -  burpees in the shallow end - and squats and kickbacks in the shallow end.  I follow this up with explosive jumps across the pool.

You can use a chair to do a variety of stretching exercises bringing your knee up from the front and the side,  and also then doing slow karate kicks to the front - side - and back.  Do them slow and controlled.  Do not jerk your body as you do them.  Keep balanced and controlled at all times.   We also lose some our balance functions as we age so this is a great set of exercises to do. 

Do not always handle heavy weights all the time.  You need to have some light - form days to take the stress off of your joints and to also keep your body flexible and injury free.  Also this is where cross training comes in ( jiu jitsu) etc to keep your body flexible and to keep from getting stale in your workouts. 

If you are sitting in front of a desk all day make sure to get up every 15 minutes or so and move around and do some stretching.  Do not sit in the same position either.  Change your position every 15 minutes.  I also like to sit on a exercise ball instead of a chair,  The ball takes a lot of stress off of your spine and also stretches your spine out as you move around on it too. 

So add flexibility training to your routine each week and make sure you keep it there for the rest of your life

Carmen and Parker Training 03/02/14

So Carmen has had a leg injury for the last 5 days and could not train hard at all.   But she came over to train on Sunday night and did situps. pushups, stretching and then 20 minutes of jiu jitsu.  

She gained 2 lbs over the 5 days with no exercise and so she was ready to get back at it to get her routine going again.  

She has still been staying on her diet, drinking lots of water and using her juicer too, But it is very hard to lose weight when you cannot train,

This week she should be coming back hard at it and get back on the program,

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If you need to contact via email you can do so via email at 

kentjamesganevsky@gmail.com

or 

kentg@earthlink.net

Also you can contact me via my website:

bodybuilder.com 

Carmen's Training 03/01/14

She lost 5 lbs last week but she also pulled a muscles in her leg going way to HARD and LONG in jiu jitsu practice. 

Remember moderation is the key.  She is on the mend and should resume training this week.

Her diet has been clean, she has a new job, and she is motivated to get this done

And she will - a little bit more each week,  She should be back on the mats next week or so and back at the gym hard too