Home

About

Free Trials & Special Offers

Free Weight Loss Tools

I am going to say it again “There are only two types of diet”. Many people out there are devising new diet plans and they will happily sell it to you. You may think that buying the book and putting it on your bookshelf, or eating the book will mean that you lose weight but you are wrong. To lose weight you need discipline and exercise. So you discipline what you eat and you move the couch potato off the couch. I do not care if you go to a gym or exercise at home but move your body. Your body reacts very badly when the only exercise you get is changing channel on the TV using the remote control and driving the car, especially when you are eating too much.

What about all the different diets that you and others spend millions of pounds on every your? Look at the list. Tick off those that you have bought and when you finished the diet or quit you quickly put on those pounds again.

It might surprise you to read to know there are only two diets in the world. Now I am sure some of you will say that isn’t a true statement because I can name more than two diets.

To save you trying to name them all I will list some of them here for you. This is a list of some well known diets that are around. It isn’t a complete list as I am sure you could keep adding to the list yourself.

• Atkins Diet
• South Beach Diet
• G.I Diet
• Mediterranean Diet
• Weight Watchers
• Slim Fast Diet
• Jenny Craig
• Blood Group Diet
• Negative Diet
• Cabbage Soup Diet
• Grapefruit Diet

All of the above diets and other diets that you many of you have tried over the years are exactly the same. Now I know some will say, “Hold it there!” there is nothing similar between Atkins and Weight Watchers. Well, in one sense you are correct but in another they are the same.

But the reasons they are all is the same is that they are about weight loss. That is the main focus of them and people gauge how successful they are in terms of pounds lost.

The majority of people who join these plans may have a certain amount of success in losing weight depending on how committed they are to the plan, but in the long run most will regain the weight and many will gain even more weight weighing heavier than they had been before.

The main problem with all of these plans is they don’t work long term, if they did then people would lose weight and remain at that weight without the yo-yo of losing weight, gaining weight that plagues so many people.

How many gain weight over holidays because they ignored their diet, as they are unable to eat the same foods over and over again.

Have you ever been to an online diet site? If you have then you will understand what I am saying. I for one know there are some excellent diet sites online, and some diet plans are better than others. But you only have to go to a diet forum where people report their weekly or daily weight loss/gains.

Peoples’ moods change depending on what the scale tells them. So many will say I only lost 0.04 lbs this week. I only lost 2 lbs. They get depressed because of the figure on the scale and even more depressed when they get on the scale to find, horror of horrors they have gain even 0.5 lbs during the week. They find that over time they are losing and gaining the same few pounds which means the overall balance of weight loss is negated.

The same people struggle to keep off pizza, chocolate, cookies, soda and so many other foods. However hard they try, there will come a day when they will eat what their plan tells them is a bad food. Then they feel a failure and it is almost always at that point they give up.

One slice of pizza or even a whole pizza shouldn’t make you give up. It should make you take notice at what you have done and you should be asking what lessons can I learn from this? But give up and yes you are a failure.

Why is eating pizza bad for you? Who decided that was the case? Why is chocolate bad for you? Again who decided that was the case? The diet industry changes and new diets are introduced. They are different in what are seen as good and bad foods but they are all the same in that the focus is about weight loss.

How long do people manage to follow these plans? That depends on the person but I know people who have spent the last 20 + years following a plan and still have over 100 lbs to lose. Does that tell you something?

And look on these same diet forums at the occasional person who has been successful and kept the weight off for 2 years. Wow! They are treated with so much respect and can almost become a god on some sites. People hero worship them because of the success they see.

Yes they deserve respect and they have worked hard, but what about the future? Two years isn’t what it is all about. Now some of you might say, I would love to lose my excess weight and keep it off for 2 years. But I would ask “what then?” Have you learnt enough to know it is something you maintain for the rest of your life?

What is the other type of diet; I am sure you are asking? The other doesn’t focus on weight loss. If you are overweight you are more than likely to lose weight but the focus is on diet for health. It is about education, about nutrition, about making good choices which you can do for the rest of your life.

The diet for health will show you how to be healthy. It won’t tell you not to eat any food but to balance what you eat. If you want pizza then go ahead but not a whole one everyday of the week. It will teach you how to make a pizza which has less fat and calories. It will show you how to eat foods regardless of where you are. It is all about lifestyle changes and how to know what to eat and when to eat for the rest of your life.

I would imagine most of you have been on a diet for weight loss. Many of you might not remember a day when you were not on a diet. If you have been on such a diet for 5 years or more, and you have followed the plan to the letter, then let me ask you a question. Why are you still overweight? Why didn’t it work? In 5 years you should have lost your excess weight? Something is wrong. And you need to work out what is wrong.

Is it time to move from a diet for weight loss where your success is measured by the amount the scale shows each week? Is it worth keeping on trying to lose the same few pounds that you have for the past few years? Is it time to move to a diet for health?

Finally it is time for you to make a decision.

Will you remain on a diet for weight loss? Will you continue to be depressed by the gain of a pound? Will you continue to be bound to your scale and losing and gaining the same few pounds?

Or will you start on a diet for health? It will be hard work and you will be looking at areas that you won’t want to look at?

Neither type of diet will make you lose weight. You are the only one who can do that. Both diets will give you information. Whether that is a diet plan which shows you what you can and can’t eat. Or a diet plan that teaches you about health, nutrition and fitness.

Bodybuilding, as a sport goes way back to the 12th century in India where the first training techniques and bodybuilding nutrition were invented. By the 16th century, bodybuilding has become a national pastime and by this time, people from various parts of the world have also taken up its concept and used stone and wood to create the first dumbbell, thus spawning the vital component of bodybuilding which is weightlifting.

The late 1800s to the early 1900s led to bodybuilding becoming a widely popular commercial sport, especially among the general public. This was also the period where the first national and international bodybuilding competitions took place mostly around Europe.

Eugen Sandow was a key figure in pushing bodybuilding into the kind of sport it is today. Known as ‘The Father of Modern Bodybuilding,’ he incessantly promoted his fitness and bodybuilding ideology and even published one of the first bodybuilding magazines, Physical Culture. His persistence in endorsing bodybuilding finally bore fruit when the first official weightlifting contests were held. The sport was first incorporated into the Olympic Games as a main event in the 1896 Olympic Games in Athens, Greece. And five years after that, Sandow was honored as one of the judges in a bodybuilding event that drew 2,000 spectators in the Royal Albert Hall in London.

The 1920s saw bodybuilding as an increasingly popular sport and a very profitable industry. New muscular celebrities like Charles Atlas came to the spotlight, adding more to the whole furor over bodybuilding. Commercially manufactured dumbbells and barbells were selling like hotcakes all over the world while new developments in exercise devices, diet plans, and bodybuilding strategies were increasing in volume every year.

The Golden Age of Bodybuilding happened around the 1940s to the 1970s. This was the era of muscle beaches, movie franchises like Hercules and Tarzan that featured bodybuilders-turned-actors, and bodybuilding legends like Joe Gold, Harold Zinkin, and the two-time Mr. America John Grimek. During this time, bodybuilding separated itself formally from weightlifting. Its basic ideology was finally solidified and its goals set on health, strength, fitness, and aesthetic muscular building.

From 1966 to the present, the latest breed of professional builders led by the charismatic Arnold Schwarzenegger promoted the sport to new heights. Using his talent, charisma, and amazing physique, Mr. Universe Arnold Schwarzenegger transformed his body into the materialized version of every bodybuilding fans’ ideal form to achieve.
It was also around this time that anabolic steroids were gradually introduced in professional bodybuilding and other competitive sports. Its existence and the role it plays tainted bodybuilding as a sport but even so, bodybuilding retained its universal appeal for its core values never changed.

Learning how to seperate real diet tips from myths, urban legends etc., is one of the first steps to being able to control your weight.

There are many diet tips that can help you to lose weight. However with every good diet tip there are also diet myths you should be aware of. A few of us might still believe these diet myths work when all it is doing is delaying your weight loss efforts and possibly harming your health. From counting calories to burning fat below we go over the most common dieting myths.

Diet Myth 1: Drastically Cutting Calories will not result in losing weight faster! When you cut down your caloric intake, you are actually sending your body into starvation mode. When your body thinks you are starving your metabolism slows down and you won’t lose any weight.

Diet Myth 2: You don’t have to give up all your favorite unhealthy foods. If you allow yourself your favorite treat now and again it will help you to stay motivated with your weight loss and you are less likely to binge or overeat your favorite snacks and foods.

Diet Myth 3: Strict diets that completely eliminate certain food groups are less effective as an end result. You will quickly become tired of your healthy food, feel deprived and want to throw in the towel on all your weight loss efforts. Rather than cutting out food groups completely, just cut down on your intake and learn portion control and serving sizes.

Diet Myth 4: Late night eating causes weight gain – this is not entirely true. All things considered, it’s not so much when you eat but rather how much you eat and burn in a day. Whether eating in the morning or at night, your body turns the extra calories into fat.

Diet Myth 5: Most people think they shouldn’t eat between their meals when in fact, eating a small healthy snack between meals helps regulate your blood sugar while keeping your metabolism going. Eating snacks in between meals also helps to not over-eat during your meals.

Diet Myth 6: All fat is not bad. Everybody needs some fat in their diet. In fact, some fats are good for you, such as Omega-3 fatty acids found in fish and shellfish are very healthy and good for you.

Diet Myth 7: Skipping meals will not help you lose weight. Skipping meals will actually result in weight gain. When you skip meals your metabolism plummets and you get over-hungry. Believe it or not, eating breakfast will help you to lose weight and most people skip it!

Diet Myth 8: Drinking water is good for you and will help aid in weight loss but just drinking water without changing your eating habits will not result in weight loss.

Diet Myth 9: Most people give up dairy products when trying to lose weight and switch to non and low fat varieties of dairy products. However, women especially need the calcium in diary products. If you do cut down dairy products you should take a calcium supplement.

In the end diet tips and diet myths aside, it all comes down to willpower. Controlling your willpower may be hard at first but with some consistency and practice you can overcome it. Don’t deprive yourself of your favorite foods and set eating habits that are too strict for you to live with. But instead just eat less unhealthy snacks; giving in every now and again is good for you!

What does it mean to be addicted to carbohydrates? Estimates say that 75% of overweight people are carbohydrate addicts but most don’t know what that really means. Carbohydrate addiction is caused by too much insulin in the body, which creates a craving for foods high in carbs and for eating often. Other signs of addiction to carbs are fatigue, swings in mood, and headaches/migraines caused by the sugar dropping.

With carb addiction, the body is trying to consume as many carbohydrates as possible prompting you to eat a whole bag of chips or way too much cake in one sitting. Even though you are eating a great amount, you will never fill full.

For carb addicts there is an official diet plan. On this diet, your first two meals are made up of protein and vegetables. The last meal is made up of protein, veggies that are not starch heavy, and carbohydrates. With this meal, you can even have a dessert. The idea is to stay away from carbs on two of the three daily meals.

The designers of the carb addict plan think that this plan will allow the cravings for carbs to be defeated over time. The carb cravings should have disappeared by the second week of the plan. If they have not gone away by then, you probably need to review how closely you are following the plan.

Of course, portion sizes at each meal are important just as in any other diet plan. If you are working hard to curb the carb cravings but let the portions get out of control, you will be defeating your attempts at weight loss. Similarly, if you let the one meal with dessert take control of you with overindulgence, the plan won’t work. The idea is make sure that each meal has high but lean protein sources. To do this, choose fish, chicken, and other lean meats. Try removing chicken skin to help lower its fat content.

The Carb Addicts diet plan also bans artificial sweeteners. If you use that in your morning coffee, you may find this aspect to be challenging. Once you start seeing the weight loss, however, you may consider it well worth the effort.

The reward meal, the one with the carbs, can be served at any time, but the designers suggest that it be saved as the last meal of the day. The evening meal is best since it allows the 12 to 24 hours necessary for the body to recuperate from the carb overload. You also can look forward to the reward meal throughout the day giving you a goal to help you stick to the plan.

The reward meal should start with a leafy salad with the rest of the meal divided into thirds. The first third should be made up of low-carb vegetables. A third should be low fat protein. The last third should be the carbs. Many have achieved satisfying long-term results while following this plan.

Just like any other diet, the hardest part is staying with it. Dieting has to be a lifestyle change, and it can be difficult even with the daily rewards. If you commit yourself to the program, you face the difficult challenges.

You can find testimonies to the effectiveness of the Carb Addicts Diet if you research it on the Internet. Of course, keep in mind that each individual’s results will vary. From moderate to rapid weight loss, your body will react at its own pace.

Some consider the Carb Addicts Diet to be a fad while others see it as a breakthrough in diet theories. Differing opinions exist among medical professionals as to the nutritional soundness of the plan. You will need to work with your own doctor to determine if the plan is best for your situation.

Walking for Fat Loss

by Jesse Cannone CFT, CPRS, CSPN

With obesity and disease increasing dramatically, many fitness experts are recommending walking for weight loss and fitness. Some are even going so far as saying that walking is the best way to burn fat and lose weight. I strongly disagree with this and am going to show you why walking is NOT effective at burning off body fat.

Yes, you read that correctly…

Walking is NOT effective at burning body fat and if your goal is fat loss you might be wasting your time. I am not saying that walking is not beneficial, I am saying that if fat loss is the primary goal, there are far better choices that will deliver far better results.

The primary benefits of walking are increased blood flow and circulation, improved recovery, and a strengthened immune system. There are several reasons why walking in not the best choice when it comes to fat loss. Here are just a few:

1. Walking does NOT burn a lot of calories

The lower the intensity of the activity or exercise the smaller the number of calorie s burned per unit of time. For example, you can burn more calories in 15 minutes of bicycling at a high intensity level than you can in 45 minutes of easy walking.

2. Walking does NOT result in a large increase in metabolism

Another downside to walking is that because it’s generally low intensity it results in only a small increase in metabolism that will only last approximately 1-2 hours after the walk. On the other hand, metabolism increases are larger and last longer (4-24 hrs or more) when you perform high intensity cardio workouts.

3. Walking does NOT deplete muscle glycogen

Low intensity exercise like walking does not deplete muscle glycogen levels and therefore, later that day if you have excess calories they will likely be stored a s body fat whereas if you deplete the glycogen the excess calories will primarily be stored in the muscles.

So why then do so many fitness and health experts recommend walking for weight loss? One reason is that people don’t want to hear that they have to work hard so they figure some activity is better than none. Another reason is that the body burns more fat for fuel when exercising at an easy pace, however, the total amount of energy used is so small that you end up burning off little body fat. That’s also why when you choose the “fat burning” program on your treadmill or bike it has you exercise at any easy level. Yes, you’re burning fat, but so little that you’d have to exercise at that easy pace for hours and hours each day.

High intensity cardiovascular/aerobic exercise is much more effective in burning off the excess body fat. In fact, several studies have been done to prove this. In one study they compared one group who did moderate level aerobics for 45 minutes with another group who performed high intensity workouts for 15 minutes. They did before and after fitness testing including body fat analysis and found that the group who performed the high intensity aerobics lost nine times as much body fat!

Want more proof? Here’s something I cover in depth in my book Burn Fat Fast…

Compare the bodies of a walker, marathon runner, and sprinter. If you are not familiar with what a sprinter s body looks like, it is very muscular and has little body fat while on the other hand the body of a walker will likely have the opposite, little muscle and more fat. The sprinter does little or no low intensity exercise and does primarily short hard bursts of work while the marathoner overtrains so much they burn off both the body fat and the muscle and that’s why they tend to look almost sickly thin.

So what should you do then if your main objective is to shed those excess pounds of body fat?

Two things:

1. Perform some form of high intensity cardio 2-4 times per week

2. Stabilize blood sugar to minimize the storage of new fat

I know some of you by now are saying “I can’t do high intensity exercise, I have a bad knee” and don’t worry, I have a solution for you. The good news is that high intensity is all relative to you and your current fitness level. For example, fast walking up and down hills may be high intensity for you… it all depends. So don’t think that you have to start running or something like that. Just slowly start to increase the intensity of your cardio workouts while also maybe decreasing the time because you can either work hard or you can work long.

Also, you can make almost any activity or exercise high intensity…. here are a few examples:

increase your speed

use an incline or hills

increase resistance

perform intervals ( the most effective method)

Obviously, some exercises/activities or better suited than other s but the point is if you want to burn more fat and make your workouts as productive as possible you need to increase the intensity.

To learn more about high intensity cardiovascular exercise please check out the following articles:

Forget the Fat Burn Zone

In Search of the Ideal Aerobics Routine

Heart Rate Guidelines

As with any changes to your fitness program be careful and don’t over do it. Just because high intensity workout s b urn more fat don’t think that you’ll get even better result s b y doing it everyday - that will quickly lead to over training and a loss of muscle which will only make it even harder to burn off the fat.

Be sure to also check out my Burn Fat FAST! ebook and audio program here: Burn Fat Fast

The very foundation of having a physically fit body and healthy body is to develop healthy eating habits. This is necessary for the body so that nutrients can be distributed equally, according to what your body needs to sustain body metabolism and correct nutritional needs. Here are some tips to have a healthy diet:

1. It is important that you sustain your cholesterol intake below 300 milligrams everyday.

2. Avoid eating meaty products like poultry, egg yolks, and dairy products.

3. You have to measure your total fat intake. Make sure that the fat you take is less than 30 percent to the total calories you take.

4. It is recommended that you have to eat foods that have complex carbohydrates. Consider eating fruits and vegetables that will help you to gain the necessary dietary fiber that your body needs each day.

5. You must control your intake on saturated fat. Having too much saturated fat on the body can cause to high blood cholesterol levels and lead different kind of side effects and other health problems.

6. High intake of sugar is also the cause of having diet problems. Food products that contain sugar are also high in fat.

7. Include green leafy vegetables and fruits in your food intake everyday. You can eat vegetables such as carrots, broccoli, and fruits that are rich in vitamin C are very good in maintaining a balance diet.

8. You have to check your weight regularly. Be active in doing exercises everyday to burn the unnecessary fats in your body.

9. It is advisable that you get the necessary vitamins and minerals from food intakes than taking them from supplements.

10. Get your calcium intake from low fat products such as yogurt and skim milk.