Jeremy's Personal Training

This super simple protein smoothie is a great way to start your day.

Cinnamon has been linked to numerous health benefits. It contains high amounts of antioxidants, helps fight inflammation and improves insulin sensitivity -Great For Weight Loss.

Some noted benefits of nutmeg are – Helps Bad Breath and Can Improve Brain Function.

Cinnamon Nutmeg Protein Smoothie — Jeremy's Personal Fitness Training

I get it, we are all busy and only have so much time to spend at the gym. However, warming up before you perform your higher intensity exercise has many benefits.....

How To Warm-Up Before You Exercise l Jeremy's Training l Dallas, TX Personal Fitness Trainer — Jeremy's Personal Fitness Training The warm-up is probably one of the most overlooked aspects of a lot of peoples exercise program who are exercising for general health and fitness purp

Getting enough sleep each night will have a huge impact on your overall health. Even if you are exercising right, and eating right, a lack of sleep can have a big impact on your overall health. Sleep deprivation has been linked to numerous health complications.

According to sleep scientist Matthew Walker: "Every disease that is killing us in developed nations has causal and significant links to a lack of sleep"

Here are 4 quick tips to help make sure you're getting the most out of your nightly sleep....

1.) Make sure you get about 8 hours of sleep per night. Getting 6 hours or less on a nightly basis can lead to chronic sleep deprivation.

2.) If you can't fall asleep right away, try getting out of bed and moving to another room and reading a book. This will help your brain to associate your bedroom with sleep.

3.) You can't make up for a lost nights sleep. In other words, if you only get 4 hours of sleep the night before, you just can't take a nap the next day or sleep for 12 hours the following night to make up for the lost sleep.

4.) Avoid alcohol, caffeine, and sleep pills before going to bed. These are known sleep disruptors that prevent you from achieving the deep sleep that you need in order to reap the many health benefits of sleeping. The quality of your sleep matters.

Slow Cooker Beef Street Tacos:

This is a great slow cooker weeknight meal. Paleo friendly and packed with tons of flavor.

Ingredients:
4lb chuck roast
1 large onion, chopped
1 5oz. bottle Frank's Orignal RedHot Sauce
3 4oz. cans, diced green chiles
1 tsp chili powder
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp cayenne
Iceberg lettuce leafs

Directions:
1. Trim off any excess fat on the chuck roast and turn slow cooker on high.
2. Place the chuck roast in the slow cooker along with onion, Frank's Orignal RedHot Sauce, diced green chilies, chili powder, garlic powder, and cayenne.
3. Let cook for about 6 hours.
4. Remove chuck roast from slow cooker and place in large glass baking dish. Shred the roast using two forks.
6. Place shredded roast inside lettuce leafs, drizzle juice on top of the roast as desired.

Note: You can also add your choice of diced tomato, avocado, onion, cilantro on top of these as well.

When it comes to "superfoods" there are not too many, if any at all, more super than avocados.

They are packed with nutrition - monounsaturated fatty acids, fiber, potassium and much more you can read about here. In fact, most people are surprised to find out that avocados contain more potassium than bananas.

I personally try to eat at least one a day and generally recommend my clients to try and do the same (even if trying to lose weight).

Take a look at this detailed article on all the health benefits you can receive just from eating avocados on a regular basis:

http://www.well-beingsecrets.com/health-benefits-of-avocado/

19 Science-Backed Health Benefits of Avocado (#13 is WOW) You probably know that avocado has a lot of health benefits. In this article you'll learn all avocado health benefits BACKED BY SCIENCE. It will shock you!

Foam rolling should no doubt be a part of your regular exercise routine. Doing these simple, yet very effective exercises will help improve your joint mobility and increase circulation. Both of these things will help your body move better and recover faster from your workouts.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/18/foam-rolling-mistakes_n_4980975.html

Foam rolling on a regular basis helps break up a fibrous layer of connective tissue called fascia. Fascia surrounds all your muscle tissue and can restrict joint movement when it tightens up, leading to potential joint pain.

Using a foam roller and various other similar "tools" is the number one thing I focus on to help keep my joints as healthy as possible.

Avoid some of the common mistakes people make by reading this article. Find out some ways to improve your foam rolling technique as well.

Are You Foam Rolling All Wrong? By Christine Yu for

A rep or repetition is simply the number of times you complete an exercise. For example, lowering your chest to the floor and then pressing yourself back up completes one rep for a pushup.

A set is the number of times that you will complete the given number of reps. For example, you could do 4 sets of 10 reps doing pushups.

Why is this important?

Your two most key variables when working out are how much work you are doing (volume) and how hard that work load is (intensity), to achieve a specific desired result. These two variables are primarily controlled by how many sets and reps you perform in a given resistance training workout.

If you want to get stronger generally you will want to perform more sets (4-6) and fewer reps (1-6). This would be considered to be a low volume workout, high-intensity workout.

If you want to lose weight and become leaner generally you will want to perform fewer sets (2-4) and more reps (12-20) reps. This would be considered a high volume, low-intensity workout.

Knowing how to manipulate sets and reps is key to making your exercise program progressive so that you don't hit a plateau. There are no perfect combinations of sets and reps to follow, your goals and overall fitness level will determine how to best combine them to get the result you desire most.

Corrective exercise is a term used to describe an exercise that addresses your bodies specific weak points and generally helps improve your posture.

Everyone overtime has muscles that will become out of balance, usually due to our daily habits. For example, most people develop tight chest muscles due to sitting with improper posture for hours each day. Along with tight chest muscles, they also will experience an increase in the curve of the middle part of their spine (i.e. thoracic spine).

Corrective exercise is designed to help correct this imbalance within our body that we get from our daily habits.

So given the above example, a corrective exercise would be doing a chest stretch to loosen the tight chest muscles and mobilizing (loosen) your thoracic spine using various exercises.

Using corrective exercise to address your bodies specific weak points will help you improve your posture, reduce joint pain, and overall feel better.

When talking with people about their current exercise programs they often refer to doing exercise's that they have heard are "good" for them. For example, people will tell me they do planks all the time because they heard that it is a good exercise for the abs.

Now planks can be a great exercise for your abs if they are strong enough to do them correctly and they are helping you achieve your overall fitness goal.

However, as good of an exercise a plank can be, it also can be just as bad of an exercise if you don't have the strength in your abs to do them correctly and they are not helping you achieve your overall fitness goal.

If you can't perform a exercise correctly for whatever reason, your injury chances go way up, and the benefit you will receive from that exercise goes way down. As well, no matter how great an exercise may be, if it's not appropriate for your specific fitness goals, it's not doing you any good.

Keep this in mind the next time you hear about how great "xyz" exercise is for you. Ask yourself, can I perform this exercise correctly? Is this exercise going to help me achieve my fitness goal?

Squatting is no doubt one of my favorite exercises. If you have ever worked out with me you already know this. Unfortunately, many people will shy away from doing squats because they are afraid of getting hurt or they simply just don't like to do them.

Here are 3 quick reasons why you should be squatting...

1. Squats Build Muscle: Not only will you build up your legs but if performed at high enough intensity you will notice muscle gains in other areas of your body as well. This is because of the large amounts of testosterone and growth hormone that get released with high-intensity exercise. This is great as well if you are trying to lose weight.

2. Improves Hip Mobility and Flexibility: Tight hip muscles and weak core muscle are a couple of the main causes of lower back pain. Squatting can actually help improve both. Moving your hips through a full range of motion can help combat the effects of long hours spent sitting at our work desk.

3.) Highly Functional Movement: Squatting is one of the most common movement patterns we perform each and every day. We have to squat every time we get in and out of our cars, sit down on a chair, doing yard work, have to lift an object up off the floor. Being able to squat efficiently and effectively is essential to performing everyday task, without getting hurt.

Start adding some squats into your exercise routine and not only will you start building more lean, toned muscle tissue, but also greatly improve your hips flexibility and mobility, making daily task easier.

When someone is talking about "doing" a superset, they are simply referring to combining two exercises back-to-back with minimal rest in between sets.

This is a great way to get more out of your workout in less time.

There are numerous different ways you can pair exercises to complete a superset. Two of the most common ones are...

1. Supersetting competing muscle groups (i.e. performing a set of squats, immediately followed by a set of leg extensions.)

2. Supersetting non-competing muscle groups (i.e. performing a set of squats, immediately followed by a set of bench press)

Which of these two methods works best for weight loss?

Alternating between upper and lower body exercise will help stimulate your metabolism more effectively because of the increased number of muscles engaged in a singular workout. Supersetting the same muscle group (competing muscles) generally works better for muscle growth (hypertrophy).

Try ramping up the intensity of your next workout by adding in some supersets!

If your goal is weight loss, you want to make sure that you are using compound exercises as your primary type of exercise selection.

What are compound exercises? Compound exercises are exercises that require multiple joints and muscles to work together to complete a given exercise (i.e. squats, bench press).

Compound exercises help to elevate your metabolism much more effectively than isolation exercises (i.e.bicep curls, seated leg curls). Raising your resting metabolism should be the main goal of your exercise program if you are trying to lose weight.

The reason these exercises will have a bigger impact on your overall resting metabolism is because you are working an overall larger amount of muscle tissue at higher intensities when compared to isolation exercises.

Using compound movements will also help you add more lean muscle tissue onto your body much quicker. This is yet another reason why these types of exercises will help you increase your resting metabolism. Muscle tissue is very metabolically active and helps you burn more calories while at rest.

If you're not currently incorporating compound exercise's into your resistance training and are trying to lose weight, your missing out. Get more out of your workouts by simply adding in some compound exercises.

How Many Day's Per Week Should You Workout....

When a new client is starting my program I generally recommend 3-4 days per week. But, the reality is that it depends on your personal goals and the amount of time you are willing to dedicate towards your fitness program.

I recommend 3-4 days per week for most people who are exercising for general fitness because I find this to be realistic for men and women who have other family and work obligation.

Working out 3-4 days per week will allow progress towards your goals, without feeling like your whole life revolves around working out. As well, most people will push themselves harder knowing that they don't have to workout every day.

If you design your exercise program properly, you could get away with working out 7 days a week and not have any issues. Now, if you were to do this you need to have a well-planned mixture of higher intensity training days and lower intensity days. This will prevent over-training.

The main thing to remember is that the more days per week your are exercising, the more variation in your program is need.

Having a few sore muscles after your workouts is perfectly normal....especially when starting out on a new fitness program. They actually have a technical term for this called DOMS (Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness).

DOMS is simply the soreness you feel in your muscles post workout and is caused by placing stress on to your muscles that they are not accustomed too.

DOMS can start in as little as 12 hours post workout and last as long as 72 hours. A lot of people are surprised to know that your muscle soreness can be greatest between 48-72 hours post workout.

Although, there is no way to 100% prevent muscle soreness, there are ways to help reduce the soreness quicker.

The fastest way to help reduce muscle soreness is by doing some low-intensity aerobic exercise, such as walking, light jog, slow bike ride, playing your favorite sport at a low level. This helps stimulate blood flow, which brings oxygen and nutrients to your muscle tissue and helps them recover faster. The key is to keep it low intensity.

Being unactive and sitting for prolonged periods can often times make the soreness feel worse. You can also use a foam roller or take an Epison Salt bath to help stimulate blood flow and reduce muscle soreness quicker as well.

One of the most common questions that I get a lot from new clients is...How should I be warming up before my workouts?

I recommend a simple traditional warm up for most of my new clients.

A traditional warm-up consist of performing light physical exercise, like walking, jogging, stationary biking, elliptical for a duration of 10-15min.

The goal of your warm-up is to increase muscle temperature, and prepare the body for higher intensity exercise, by sending out extra blood and oxygen to your working muscles. You should have a light sweet going by the end of your warm-up.

This is a very important part of your overall workout. Warming up properly will help minimize the risk of injury and other complications that can arise from trying to perform high-intensity exercise, too quickly.

There are several other different and more advanced methods you can use for an effective warm-up, such as foam rolling, and dynamic flexion techniques.

Sprint training, when done properly is hands down one of my favorite overall exercises, especially for weight loss.

Sprinting is a very intense exercise. This is a good thing if you're trying to lose weight because higher intensity exercise will help increase your metabolism.

Increasing your metabolism is the number one thing your overall exercise program should focus on if your trying to lose weight.

Increasing your metabolism means that your body is going to burn more calories 24/7, not just during your workout.

Your body adapts very quickly to long and slow traditional cardio workouts. The more your body gets used to any type of exercise the less effect it has at stimulating your metabolism.

If you want to lose weight, trying adding in some sprint training into your routine and give your metabolism a boost!

Having a clearly defined, and reasonable fitness goal can help keep you motivated. There will be times when you simply don't feel like going to the gym for your workout. I have those days myself.

Your goal may be weight loss, increasing energy, increase strength, run faster, better overall health, improved flexibility/mobility. Pick a goal and stay focused on it.

Too many times I hear a person changing their goals each week. One week they want to lose weight, next week they want better flexibility/mobility.

In order to achieve any fitness goals, you must design an exercise program that focuses on ONE specific, primary outcome. A weight loss exercise program is going to use completely different training variables when compared to a program designed to help you increase strength.

If you do have multiple exercise goals, then make a list starting with your most important goals and work your way down. Now you can prioritize how you spend your time in the gym, focusing most of your workout on your top priority.

Have a goal and stay focused. You will be surprised at the difference it can make, and the results you see.

When designing an exercise program one of the key variables you must select are the types of exercises you want to use.

There are literally an endless number of exercises you can chose from. Your exercise goal will determine what exact exercises are best for you specifically.

However, there are 7 "primal" movements that you should try to include into your exercise program. This will help make sure that you don't develop any major muscle imbalances.

The 7 "primal" movements:
1. Squatting (back squat)
2. Lunging (reverse/Fwd lunge)
3. Bending (deadlift)
4. Pushing (push-up)
5. Pulling(seated low row)
6. Twisting (cable torso twist)
7. Gait (walk, run, jog)

That's it, almost all human movement and exercise you see will fall into one of those 7 categories or a combination of those.

How can you apply this? During your next workout be sure to include all 7 of these movements into your workout. Also, look around the gym and try to analyze the exercises other people are doing to see what categories they would fall into. This is a great way to expand your current exercise library.

Following a program that is designed around these 7 "primal" movements will help keep your body strong and stable in all planes of motion, making your daily task easier.

Understanding Rep Ranges...

One of the most important exercise variables that will have a big impact on the results you see from your exercise program are the rep ranges that you are exercising in.

There are three generally accepted rep ranges, each of which will have a different effect on your muscles...

Strength zone: 1-6 reps
Hypertrophy zone: 8-12 reps
Muscular endurance zone: 12-20 reps

You can see by simply looking at these ranges that knowing what your exercise goal is will have a big impact on what rep range you should be primarily exercising in.

If you're trying to get stronger, but are only exercising in the muscle endurance rep range, it is going to be very difficult to become stronger.

Vice versa, if your goal is to increase your muscular endurance, but your only exercising in the strength zone, it's going to be very difficult to increase your muscular endurance.

What zone works best for weight loss? Knowing how to strategically alternate between zones will work best for weight loss.

With weight loss you don't want your body to get comfortable with any one type of rep range, this will have less of an effect on your metabolism. High metabolism is key for weight loss.

Planning and preparing your food ahead of time is the best way to make sure you are consistently eating real, whole natural foods. The more consistent you eat whole natural foods....the better and faster results you will see.

Challenge yourself in the gym. In order to boost your metabolism as high as possible you MUST push yourself outside of your comfort zone.

There are no limits to what you can accomplish in life. You may plateau for a short period, but if you truly believe and want something bad enough....you will find a way to make it happen!

Workouts don't get results. PROGRAMS DO!

Stop looking for the "perfect" workout and start looking for a workout program thats going to help you achieve your fitness goals.

If you want to lose more weight and burn more fat make sure your nutrition plan isn't killing your metabolism. Restricting your calories to much, to often will slow your metabolism and prevent you from building lean muscle. Don't be afraid to eat ....just make sure it is real, whole food!

Be sure to let your body rest and recover between workouts. Training to hard to often will lead to over-training. A few signs of over-training are constant fatigue, restless sleep, and suppressed appetite.