s ’ r e n n i g Be t n e m e v o M Guide
with
Matt Brown
Book 1
Contents Contents
02
Welcome
03
What To Expect From Your Programme
04 - 05
The Benefits Of Exercise
06 - 07
Basics Of Nutrition
08 - 11
Can You Lose Weight Without Exercise?
12 - 13
Movement Advice For Beginners
14 - 15
Diet - Portions & Control
16 - 17
Effects Of Cardiovascular Exercise
18 - 19
Ways To Get 10,000 Steps
20 - 21
Instructions For Your Programme
22 - 23
Doms & Soreness
24 - 25
Week 1
26
Week 1 Tracker
27
Week 2
28
Week 2 Tracker
29
Week 3
30
Week 3 Tracker
31
Week 4
32
Week 4 Tracker
33
Weight Loss Tracker End Of The Programme
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34 - 35 36
Welcome Hello and welcome to your Beginner’s 28-Day Movement Programme. Your programme has been devised and will be presented by Matt Brown – a Personal Trainer who specialises in supporting those who want to add more movement to their daily lives. Within this programme, you will find all you need to get started with adding movement to improve your weight loss in a simple and easy-to-follow format. This 28-day programme has been carefully crafted to ease you gently into movement and activity, with simple, but effective exercises and activity designed to challenge you and raise your heart rate. This means, no matter what fitness level you are at, we know you will feel fitter, healthier and happier simply by taking part and completing the 28 days. Within this booklet, you will find articles on movement and exercise and how it helps – to remind you why you are doing it! Before you start with this programme, remember to take and note down your measurements, please turn to your tracker to complete your measurements on the day you start the programme and then again on day 28! Please also remember to get the advice of your doctor, before you start an exercise programme. We really hope you enjoy your beginners’ guide, and we can’t wait to see what you achieve in the next 4 weeks!
Good luck!
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What to Expect From Your Movement Programme Starting a movement programme is a big step, and we appreciate the step you’ve taken to get here, so really well done. Within this beginner’s guide, you’ll find a great selection of circuits, all designed to challenge you, but leave you feeling strong, healthier and happier. But when starting an exercise routine, we can often go in with the blinkers on and we wanted to make sure you were equipped with all the knowledge you need in order to be successful on this 28 day plan.
Equipment We’ve kept this movement programme really simple. So for the entire 28 days, you will need the following: •
An exercise mat
•
Space to exercise
•
Light weights
•
Slightly heavier weights to progress to
And that is it. That is all you will need to complete the full 28-day programme in this booklet
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Physically The soreness you will feel sore if you haven’t exercised in a while, but turn to our page about DOMS & Soreness to find out how to combat this. Sleep you should find that your sleep is vastly improved (providing you don’t do exercise too close to bedtime!) Energy your energy levels will increase and you’ll feel less lethargic Hunger You might feel yourself a little hungrier than usual. If you are on our weight loss mediation, this should help, but make sure to have some lower-calorie snacks available and don’t reach for sweet treats.
Mentally Mentally, you will need to be prepared too. Motivation and Willpower You might feel really motivated when you begin the programme, but we know life can get in the way and motivation wanes. As you use your willpower more, it grows, just like your physical muscles do too. So when you least feel like it, push through and do you exercise for the day and see how incredible you feel afterwards. Stress You might find you are able to handle stress better due to the endorphins flowing through you! Concentration You might find yourself more productive and your concentration improved through exercise Set backs you will experience set backs in this programme, but it is how you get back up and carry on. Don’t give up. You can do this. Moods your moods will lift and you might find that you’re better able to cope with the things that once annoyed you! Tracking all these changes is important – which is why we’ve given you a tracker at the back of this guide to ensure you are able to see the improvements you are gaining from exercise and movement!
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The Benefits of Exercise Dictionary Definition: engage in physical activity to sustain or improve health and fitness. We know that exercise is a fairly key element in a weight loss journey. We know it strengthens and tones our muscles and helps us burn more calories in a day, meaning we are more likely to lose weight (providing we don’t over-eat). However, there are many more benefits to exercise than simply burning calories and toning our bodies. If you’re not keen on exercise, we at The Slimming Clinic want to show you how amazing it is to add exercise to your lifestyle and what brilliant benefits you can expect when you do!
Happiness
Improves Sleep
Exercise is well-known to improve your mood, outlook on life and reduces your feelings of depression and anxiety and can relieve stress.
Exercise can help you get better, deeper sleep, giving you a proper chance to rest and recuperate overnight.
This is because exercise produces endorphins – your happy hormones – which help increase positive feelings in your brain.
Linked with better mood, simple, moderate aerobic exercise helps sleep by reducing your stress and helping you drift off easier.
What is even better, you don’t even need to do super intense workouts to benefit from these happy feelings – it could just be a little walk that helps!
But, make sure you’re not doing exercise too close to bedtime, or it could have the opposite effect!
Energy Levels Whilst exercise uses up a lot of your energy to do, it also gives you more in return. In fact, regular exercise can reduce feelings of extreme exhaustion and can help you get over fatigue.
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Increases Brain Power As we get older, we do find that our brain power decreases. Sad, but true! Exercise has been proven to support the part of your brain that looks after memory and learning and can support cognitive decline that can happen later in life.
Self-Esteem Boost Exercise has shown to improve people’s perception of themselves and show them how strong they are. Whether it is lifting heavier in the gym, managing one more squat today or running a little further than normal, there is no doubting the incredible feeling and gratitude you show your body when it pushes through just that little harder.
Drives Productivity Research has illustrated that those who engage in regular exercise are more productive and have more energy than those who don’t exercise! If you’ve been putting off some work, try exercising and seeing if you can boost your productivity today! As part of our beginner’s guide, you should start feeling these benefits really early into your programme. It can take time to find the right exercise for you. Remember, exercise isn’t punishment for what you ate, or how much you ate and it should be something you enjoy. If you don’t enjoy the exercise you’re doing – try something else!
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The Basics of Nutrition When starting an exercise programme, it is really important to fuel our bodies correctly, and get our nutrition right, to get the most from our new-found movement plan.
When it comes to nutrition, the easiest thing to do it to take what we are eating, one meal at a time and go back to basics with it. With each meal, we should make it up of some basic components, so let’s look at those components in more detail and why they should be part of our diet!
Fruits and Vegetables Always start your daily food intake with fruit and vegetables when you are thinking of healthier eating and weight loss. When it comes to fruit and vegetables, you should aim for around 5 x 80g of vegetables and fruit daily, as a minimum. Try to have as many varieties of fruit and vegetables as possible and try not to have the same fruit and veg all the time. Aim to have 30 different varieties over the week. This is because vegetables and fruit are great sources of water-soluble vitamins like Vitamin C, antioxidants, poly phenols which are all important to support and protect your body after exercise. Ideally you want to steam, stir fry, roast your vegetables and if you are boiling your veg you want to do it in as little water as possible, so you keep the nutrients in. If you are not keen on veg include more fruit and vice versa – but make sure you’re keeping your varieties up and ‘eating the rainbow’. If you are really not keen to eat them, you can add them to soups and smoothies – but they won’t have as much filling power in this form. from these happy feelings – it could just be a little walk that helps!
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Protein Protein is essential in our diet as it is needed for growth and development, and body cell renewal – particularly if we are upping the amount of exercise we are doing. Protein also helps make up your muscles, ligaments, cartilage skin and helps repair the muscles after strenuous exercise. When it comes to protein in your diet, the key is diversity – so make sure that you have variety and not just chicken in your diet. Sources of protein are meat, fish, chicken, beans, lentils, pulses, dairy (milk, cheese, yoghurt) tofu, tempeh, quorn, nuts and seeds. You could also try having different types of fish, shellfish, red meat, white meat and legumes! A great thing about protein is that it also fills you up so by including it in meals and helps keep you fuller for longer.
Fats By now, you probably know that not all fat is equal some fats are much better for us than others. We should limit our intake of saturated fat like butter, processed fats, lard, animal fats and increase our intake of plant fats, oil fish and monounsaturated fats. When looking to add fats, some better fats for us are olive oil, rapeseed oil, avocados, seeds, nuts, oily fish these are all cardiovascular protective. When you’re on a weight loss diet with The Slimming Clinic we do not advocate a no fat - we encourage a lower fat diet if you are trying to lose weight as fat is so key to your health. The great thing about fat is that it also makes food taste nice as it is a flavour carrier, and it is important to get food satisfaction so using fat in moderation can make food much more enjoyable!
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Carbohydrates Carbohydrates get a bad reputation and are often left out when we are on a weight loss diet, but carbohydrates are really important in our diet! Additionally, they are a brilliant source of energy, to give us the boost we need to do our exercise! So, to get the most out of your carbohydrates, it is about having wholemeal, wholegrain varieties and trying to stay away from over processed kinds like white varieties. Good carbohydrates are full of fibre and fibre helps lower cholesterol levels, protect us from bowel cancer, support our gut microbiome which in turn supports out immune system so carbs are really important in our diet. Good sources of carbohydrate are wholemeal bread, pasta, wholegrain rice, quinoa, buckwheat, oats, oatcakes, rye bread and crackers. Remember where you can aim for wholemeal, and you will get more nutrition for your carb source.
Dairy / Plant based Milks Dairy intake is recommended as part of a balanced diet as it is a great source of calcium, protein, magnesium, and phosphorus which are all needed to protect and develop our bones. The recommendations are for most of the population 3 portions of dairy per day •
So, a portion is: •
1 glass of milk
•
30g of cheese
•
1 pot of yoghurt
If you are vegetarian or vegan, you need to make sure that you are taking in fortified plant-based milks. They are good sources of the vitamins and minerals required from cows’ milk, but they naturally tend to be lower in protein. Lactofree milk and yoghurt again has the same properties as normal milk and yoghurts but it has had lactase enzyme added to it and then filtered to remove any lactose.
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Hydration As humans we are made of about 60% water and some of our major organs like our brain and our heart are over 70% water so it is vital to be well hydrated. When thinking about how much water to drink, The Slimming Clinic recommends about 30ml per Kg of body weight, but this does also depend on how warm your environment is and if you are exercising that day. As a general rule of thumb, you do not wait until you are thirsty and watch the colour of your urine you are looking for a pale straw coloured to say how well hydrated you are. Additionally, we do recommend that you try to limit fluids that dehydrate you like coffee, carbonated drinks like cola and energy drinks. If you sweat during exercise, remember to take fluids on as you move and add more water to your day to rehydrate.
When you start on a weight loss diet… …make sure that you are including all the components above! But if you’re worried you just don’t know how to get your diet right, give us a call at The Slimming Clinic. Our weight loss doctors and experts can support you in getting the right nutrition to support your exercise efforts! 11
Is it possible to lose weight without exercise? We get this question a lot at The Slimming Clinic and we want to tell you that, yes, it is completely possible to lose weight without exercise! However, having a balanced diet and a fairly active lifestyle is key to reaching your goals for weight loss and improving your overall health.
So, by starting this beginner’s guide to movement, we know that it has taken a big, brave step for you – so well done! With this guide, you will find out how adding movement slowly and consistently could be the best way to lose weight for you! In this article, find out why exercise can and will improve your weight loss efforts!
We know that have a lot of patients who haven’t exercised for years, don’t enjoy exercise and don’t know where to start to incorporate exercise for weight loss into their lives.
‘You can’t out-train a bad diet!’ Firstly, no matter how much exercise you do, if you haven’t got your diet plan for weight loss correct, you will never lose weight. So, by adding your beginner’s guide, it doesn’t mean you can simply stop eating well and getting your nutritional balance right. With up to 80% of a weight loss journey being determined by the food you eat, not how much you move or exercise, it is key to remember to eat well, whilst you add exercise. Getting your nutrition right and making sure you are eating a healthy, balanced diet is the best way to kickstart a new healthier lifestyle and will start the pounds dropping off.
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A slow, gentle exercise for weight loss plan Once you have been able to implement changes to your diet for weight loss and are comfortable with the adjustments you have made, the next stage of your healthy weight loss programme is to begin to add light, easy movement into your life – like this beginner’s guide! But, it isn’t just about exercise programmes, adding movement to your life can be as simple as small, incremental changes just to get you moving: •
Do you drive to work? Could you park a little further away and walk in? Could you cycle?
•
Do you walk the dog? Could you take them on a longer route tonight?
•
Do you take the lift? Could you take the stairs?
•
Are you seated for most of the day? Could you get up every 30 minutes and walk around for 5 minutes?
As you can see, adding movement to your life to support your weight loss diet doesn’t need to be structured to begin with. It can be as simple as adding more steps to your day or doing something that raises your heart rate slightly.
But what is the best exercise to lose weight? Once you have added some movement into your life at a comfortable level and you are seeing your weight decrease, it might be time to start ramping up the intensity. Really, there is no best exercise to lose weight as it is a very personal thing to everyone. This is where you need to find something you enjoy that raises your heart rate substantially, gets your blood pumping faster and makes you sweaty! We’ve put together this guide for those who want some structure and guidance to their weight loss, but the key to exercise for weight loss is finding something that you know you can keep doing and don’t mind doing 3-4 times a week. This could be a mixture of activities such as Zumba, running, HIIT, weight lifting, badminton, swimming, or simply fast walking. Whatever you enjoy, make sure you are scheduling in 20-30 minutes of it 3-4 times a week alongside your weight loss diet and soon you will begin to see your weight loss really speed up!
At The Slimming Clinic, we know that it is possible to lose weight without exercise, but we want you to reach your goals quickly and safely. If you need more help and advice with movement, mindset or with your diet, contact The Slimming Clinic doctor and get the support you need.
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0800 917 9334 info@theslimmingclinic.com