Thank-You For Voting Get Fit NH

For the second year in a row Get Fit NH was voted 2nd place as “Best Fitness Center or Health Club” by the readers of the Concord Insider and YOU. 

We really appreciate all the support, and are humbled and extremely honored you would take the time to vote for us. Considering that the 1st and 3rd place winners dwarf us in size, I think we did pretty good! 🙂 

You Guys Rock! 

Habit 3: Eat At Least 5 Servings of Veggies per Day

Can you believe that next Monday, April 28th, we are halfway through S3?

Time Flies!

With that halfway mark comes the introduction of the 3rd habit.

Habit 3: Eat At Least 5 Servings of Veggies per Day

Vegetables (and fruit) are loaded with vitamins, minerals, antioxidants and fiber. There is no substitute for the power of vegetables as part of your nutrition plan.

Your mom is not the only one who knew the scoop on how great vegetables are for you. Here’s what Dr. John Berardi over at Precision Nutrition has to say:

“Eating higher levels of veggies and fruits are associated with a lower incidence of:

• Cardiovascular disease
• Colon, prostate, cervical, lung, ovarian, pancreatic, thyroid, and breast cancer
• High blood cholesterol
• High blood pressure
• Type 2 diabetes
• Obesity
• Stroke
• Osteoporosis
• and a lot more that aren’t on this list…”

Here’s a pretty cool graphic (also from PN) that illustrates another great thing about vegetables – they fill you up, literally!

Getting in 5 servings a day is much simpler than you might think, so no worries – ok?

When it comes right down to it 10 servings per day is where we want you to be, but you gotta start somewhere, right?

Think about it.

If you have a salad for lunch with 4 cups of spinach and 15 cherry tomatoes, you’ve got your five.

That’s not that hard, now is it?

Here’s a handy list, with amounts, to get you started:

5 broccoli florets
10 baby carrots
1 tomato
4 slices of onion
1 cup of leafy greens (spring mix)
15 cherry tomatoes
0.5 bell pepper
1 cup of spinach in a Super Shake
1 banana
6 strawberries
2 plums
15 grapes
1 apple
1 peach

Important notes:

Eat 3-5 servings of vegetables for each serving of fruit. Veggies First.

There are no potatoes or corn on this list. That is not an accident.

Other vegetables to try: cauliflower, cabbage, bok choy
Check out this list: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_vegetables

So how do you score your point starting in Week 5 (Monday May 28th)?

By doing S3 Habits 1, 2 & 3

• S3 Habit 1: Eat within 1 hour of waking or consume post-training nutrition
• S3 Habit 2: Eat lean protein with at least 3 meals per day
• S3 Habit 3: Eat at least 5 servings of veggies per day

Make It Happen!

S3 Nutrition Knowledge 101 Seminar

Sizzlin’ Summer Slimdown Team Transformation is in full swing, and the competition is close! Keep building those habits and logging those points – your team needs you!

Next week we are going to be hosting the “S3 Nutrition Knowledge Seminar” in order to help you get even more out of all the work you have been putting in.

You won’t want to miss it, as we will be rolling out more details about Habits 3 & 4, and answering the following questions:

1. What’s wrong with eating cereal for breakfast?
2. Isn’t that a lot of protein to be eating? Isn’t that hard on my kidneys?
3. What’s your deal-io with whole grains anyway?
4. Why do you hate milk so much?
5. What do you eat – tree bark?
6. Don’t you know eating healthy is expensive?

All actual questions we have received.

We will spend some time going over the “why’s” and “how’s” of the S3 habits, and taking some time at the end to answer some questions.

S3 Nutrition Knowledge 101 Seminars

Seminar 1: Get Fit NH Concord. Tuesday May 22nd. 7:00pm to 8:00pm

Seminar 2: Get Fit NH Epsom. Wednesday May 23rd. 6:00pm to 7:00pm

Keep Making It Happen,

Coach Dean

Rock N’ Race: Team “Get Fit NH & Beat Cancer” Update

The Rock N’ Race is almost here. Next Thursday May 17th is the big day to lace up the sneakers and get rockin’.

You all have done a fantastic job this year. As of this writing we have 74 team members and have raised $3,405, led by Christina Gaudet-Pelletier, who has raised $690, Sharon Klardie, with $400 raised, and Jenn Harper, with $195.

Incredible job Ladies!

Because you have formed such a large team, we have been asked to pick up our team shirts and distribute them to you. We will be picking them up on Tuesday afternoon, and they will be ready for distribution at the gyms no later than Thursday morning first training time.

There is also a slightly modified training schedule because the race is on a Thursday, and some of the coaching staff is participating in the race.

The Thursday 6:00pm Epsom only is moving to Wednesday night at 6:00pm. This will allow Coach Nancy to get into Concord and lead the charge on Thursday evening.

All other training times, including Concord 5:30pm will be held as scheduled.

As far as the night of the race, as is our custom we will meet at the Clock Tower at Eagle Square at approximately 5:30pm. Nancy will bring any unclaimed Epsom shirts in at that time, Concord please make sure you go down to the gym to pick yours up.

If you have any questions drop us a line or give us a call.

Great job leading the pack Get Fit NH – you never disappoint!

Keep making it Happen!

Habit 2: Eat Lean Protein at Each Meal

Alright guys, so for the past two weeks you have been making sure you get nutrition in your body within an hour of waking and/or getting in your recovery nutrition.

Keep it up!

To score your point for weeks 3 and 4 you must continue S3 Habit 1 AND complete S3 Habit 2 – All In!

Why is protein so important?

Because without an adequate supply of Amino Acids in our bloodstream, the product of protein digestion, our bodies don’t function well.

Our bodies use proteins to produce enzymes, hormones and antibodies. Protein is the “building blocks” of our cells and without it we can not replace worn out cells or repair muscle tissue from training.

Take some time to get the complete lowdown on protein, the “why’s” and even “how much’s” by reading “All About Protein” on the Precision Nutrition Site. You’ll be glad you did!

So that brings us to S3 Habit 2: Eat Lean Protein with Each Meal

For our purposes that mean you will need to eat lean protein from the following sources a minimum of 3 times per day. This is not an all inclusive list, but it is a great start.

High quality protein.
3-4 oz of cooked lean meat, poultry, or fish
1 cup of cooked seafood
4 egg whites
2 large eggs
1/Ž2 cup of cottage cheese
1/Ž2 cup of plain yogurt
2 oz of part skim cheese
1 scoop of protein powder
1 cup cooked lentils or beans
3-4 oz of tempeh or tofu
1 small veggie burger

Conversely you want to avoid low quality protein. Most of these are very high in fat, contain tons of sodium, nitrates and other nasty stuff.

These Don’t Count
Bacon
Lunch Meats
Sausages
Pepperoni
Protein in “fast food” restaurant meals (chinese take out, etc.)

So how do you score your point starting in Week 3 (Monday May 14th)?

By doing S3 Habit 1 and 2

S3 Habit 1: Eat within 1 hour of waking or consume post-training nutrition

S3 Habit 2: Eat lean protein with at least 3 meals per day

***

To help plan some high quality meals quickly and easily, follow this handy dandy chart.

Quality Protein Fibrous Carbs Compliments

and Happy Anniversary, from Coach Dean

Tuesday May 8th marks the 4 year anniversary of Get Fit NH Bootcamp. We wanted to take this occasion to thank you for choosing to train with us, whether you have been here for a week or since we opened the doors. We do not take it for granted, and it our goal that we prove that to you every day.

From our very humble beginnings in establishing a true “home base” in our hometown of Epsom in the very house I grew up in to our expansion into the Capital City, we are grateful for the past four years.

Anytime a date with some significance occurs it causes me to reflect, take pause, and think.

It would be great to sit at the keyboard and write that the past 4 years have been nothing but sunshine and rainbows. Smooth sailing the whole way.

Life just isn’t that way, and neither is starting and growing a business. Challenges must be faced and overcome. There are good days and better days. There are surprises and disappointments and failures. Sometimes you fall on your face, and say and do things that shouldn’t be said and done. And you ask forgiveness and you pick yourself up and you keep going. Sort of a microcosm of life in general I suppose.

But none of the challenges compare to the joy of getting to do what you love. Of seeing your clients get a little better every day. Of watching someone get their first “real” pushup or chinup. Of having someone tell you they haven’t fit into “that dress” for years, or they just got off their blood pressure and cholesterol meds. Of watching a group of people come together every day and encourage each other, laugh with each other, and yes, sometimes even cry with each other. A family in the best sense of the word.

When a client walks through our doors we always try to treat them like we would want to be treated. With kindness and respect. Everybody has bad days, and while we don’t always have the answers we have two ears and we can at least listen. Our goal is to make Get Fit NH the best part of your day – every day.

So thank-you to our clients for making us part of their lives. Thank-you to the coaches who have and continue to make Get Fit NH what it is. Erin and CJ are not only great coaches but great people, and we are grateful to have them on staff. Thanks to God for the privilege of living in a country where small seeds of ideas can still grow into big things.

I was also thinking about the state of the “fitness industry” over the past few years since Get Fit NH started, and more to the point the way our training has evolved and improved.

The one thing that is constant is that we are always changing – when we have the evidence, both scientific and empirical, that we should.

Some of our clients have been with us since we held our first training session, under the halogen lights attached to the basketball hoop at 5:00am.

They can tell you that first training session was quite a bit different than what we do now. Was the training “bad” back then? Not at all, but it’s better now.

Why?

We spend a lot of time studying ways to make our training more effective and our clients better. We don’t just jump on the latest fad and ride it until the next thing comes along. When you see a new tool in training you can be confident that it has been studied, tested and proven before we put it in your hands. Is it effective, is it safe, is it versatile, is it fun? Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should (sledgehammers indoors never really made sense to me 🙂 TRX, Kettlebells, Bands and Sandbags are in our facilities because they meet the criteria, not because they are cool.

The same goes for programming. If you have been with us for very long you know my first tenet of training is this:

If you are injured, you can’t train.

Now that doesn’t always mean you can’t train at all, but what it sometimes does mean is that you can’t train as hard, effectively and efficiently as you could otherwise.

That’s why we are always evaluating movement patterns and exercise selection and asking: Is there something inherent to the exercise movement that in this environment is likely to cause injury, either now or in the future? That could be on the macro level (is it appropriate for anyone in this training environment) or the micro level (is it appropriate for this client to be performing). Can you keep every injury from happening? Probably not, but you don’t have to purposely program certain movements when others can be just as effective.

You probably wouldn’t be surprised to know that a lot of people, clients or otherwise, ask me about a lot of different “stuff” that is out in the marketplace. P90X, insanity, zumba, crossfit, to name a few.

I do my level best never to ascribe poor motives or anything else to proponents of any exercise program. It’s no lie that all of these have enjoyed success in the marketplace and will likely to continue to do so, at least for awhile.

But it always boils down to this for me.

If the evidence showed there was a better way of doing things, we would do it that way. I am sure in the future we will continue to grow as we follow the evidence of our own and others credible research and results.

And no, I don’t know everything there is to know. Which is why I and all our staff spends time and money, studying, looking at the research, traveling to conferences, talking to other coaches, and learning.

Too often marketing gets in the way of reality. More is not always better. Faster and harder is not always more effective. Our lives move in cycles, in patterns, and in rhythm. Our bodies can take a lot of punishment, for awhile. I want to train into my sixties, seventies and beyond.

It really isn’t always a matter of what I can do, but what I should do. My “should do’s” for my clients is doing my best to keep them training for the long haul, not just the here and now.

So again thank-you. For putting your trust in us for these many years. For putting in the hard work to get better. For choosing every day to be extraordinary, to go out of your comfort zone, to make your health and fitness a priority.

Here’s to many more years…

of Making It Happen!

Coach Dean

What’s Your Perception?

Did you know there is a scale that is designed for determining exercise intensity levels?

Actually there are more than one, but they are usually a modified version of the original Borg scale.

(Not the Borg for which resistance is futile. Around here resistance (training) is what it is all about. If you are a Star Trek fan you know what I am talking about, if not – sorry.)

The Borg scale is intended to measure your Rate of Perceived Exertion. In other words, how hard you feel you are working during exercise. This is a subjective measurement to be sure, but it is still very useful. And while not perfect, it has been found to very closely correlate with actual exertion as measured by a heart rate monitor.

The original scale asks you to rate your exertion from 6-20, with 6 meaning “No exertion at all”, and 20 meaning “Maximal Exertion”. Borg later updated his original scale to go from 0 to 10, with similar descriptions.

As your fitness level improves, your perceived exertion will go down if you do not change your exercise variables.

In other words, if you are still working with the same load, at the same speed, for the same amount of time now and 6 months from now, you won’t feel like (or actually be) working as hard.

This is critical to understand when your goal is to keep improving – which it is.

And that’s why we design the training the way we do, so you can consistently keep improving.

So here’s the question – On a scale of 1 to 10, what should my perceived exertion during a Get Fit NH training session be?

The foundation of our training is Metabolic Resistance, which can be defined as intense sessions that combine resistance (strength) training with metabolic (typically called cardio) stimulation. Study after study and client after client show this to be the most efficient and effective way to train for fat loss and body composition.

So we want your RPE while doing this type of training to be high – 7 out of 10 – at least.

In other words we want you to work – very hard.

Doesn’t matter what the person next to you is doing – work harder than them.

And then recover.

Your body likes being just the way it is, you have to MAKE it change.

So think about it.

If I ask you what your RPE is on a typical training day, would it match what your coach thinks your RPE is on that day?

It’s a relevant question, and it could be the key that unlocks your potential and results.

Make It Happen!

Coach Dean

3 Bean Tuna Salad from Gourmet Nutrition

Tuna Salad? Seriously?

That’s kind of what I thought, but this is no ordinary tuna salad. Chocked full of healthy fat, protein and fiber, this delicious dish can be made in under 5 minutes!

You can find this recipe and many more healthy and delicious favorites in Gourmet Nutrition. Get Some!

P.S. Not a big tuna fan? Try grilled chicken instead!

Running 101 – Thank-you Dr. Coapland

I hate to admit it (just kidding) but I had a great time at our “Running 101 – From Beginner to Advanced” this morning, as did the other 25 students who were there.

Many thanks to Dr. Brett Coapland, who covered everything from warm-up, to foot wear, to nutrition, to recovery, and much much more.

The hands on was fantastic, as we were able to analyze running mechanics as well as discuss turnover rate and finding the proper pacing. We also dug in with how to assess potential strength and mobility challenges that can lead to injury, lessen performance or both. I am really going to have to practice that toe thing (technical term) we learned!

We will be sending out a resource package to all attendees shortly, but I wanted to share some great online resources with everyone who is interested in getting better!

http://www.runblogger.com/

http://halhigdon.com/

http://www.runblogger.com/

Thanks all – can’t wait for the next one!

Food For Thought – Observations from Inside the Grocery Store

I received this note this morning from a client. One of your team members. Just the fact that it was written tells me this person gets it, and cares enough about the other members of the team to write it. It is blunt and on face value may seem even a little unkind. But look deep inside and tell me it isn’t true.

I share it because it hit home. When I was overweight and unhealthy it was almost exclusively because of this path:

grocery store shelves to grocery cart to car to house to cupboards to table to my stomach.

The results weren’t pretty. I was killing myself. Obese, high blood pressure, pre-diabetic. Nobody’s fault but mine.

You are in so much more control of your health than you understand. It starts with the choice you make every day, 3-4 times a day.

You can fuel the tank with junk or with high test -the choice really is yours.

It takes more time and effort to plan and prepare meals – I’ll give you that. I would dispute that it costs more money. Have you looked at the price of a box of cereal lately? Add in the cost of the medications you are currently taking or will be taking in the future.

How’s the math looking now?

So a big thank-you to our mystery writer.

There is much wisdom in these words.

Coach Dean

***

I have spent more years than I would like to admit working in a grocery store, but I have observed a lot of people, and food for that matter. The grocery chain that I work for brings in hundreds of thousands of dollars each week from people of all shapes, sizes and socioeconomic status. Hundreds of people throughout the day come through the lines of the checkout area. There are the regulars, first time shoppers, once in a while shoppers and the passing through, so we decided to stop here, shoppers.

With that said, I will begin by saying that there was not a formal study of anything I am about to say, no control group, no variables and certainly no scientist behind it, just some interesting observations from inside the grocery store.

A cashier’s job is monotonous, going through the every day motions of “Hi, how are you? Cash or credit and have a nice day.”

To prevent the mind from going crazy from the beep of the register for hours on end, cashiers begin to focus on the customers and their purchases. I am not saying that you are being “judged” by the staff at the grocery store, they are completely desensitized to any items that you can put on the belt, trust me, and they certainly don’t say things like “oh my god, did you see what SHE bought?”

However, most of the cashiers and baggers that have been in the industry for a while can predict what items you will be buying, just by looking at you. The converse also applies, a cart filled with groceries can easily be matched with its owner.

Looking at someone’s shape, size, behavior and how their kids are acting (if they have any) really tell you a lot about what you are going to find in their shopping cart. The next time you go to the grocery store, look at people and what’s in their carts, and you will see what I mean.

Now, I am happy to say that I only work weekends at the grocery store now-a-days. Still, I see many people that go to Get Fit NH and it makes me laugh, as they make the connection that we train at the same place. At least once a weekend, I bump into someone and they look at their groceries then at me and say “Oh it’s so and so’s birthday so we are having this stuff” or “ I don’t eat like this all the time” or “It’s not for me, I am shopping for so and so.” I couldn’t imagine what they would say if they ever bumped into you, Dean, at the grocery store.

Now I am not saying that I am in any way, shape or form a nutrition guru. In fact, I consider myself to be pretty nutrition impaired. But the
combination of matching people to the groceries they buy and bumping into other Get Fit NH bootcampers at the grocery store has led me to the following conclusions:

You really are what you eat.

and,

If you are embarrassed to have it in your grocery cart, take it out.

Chances are, it isn’t good for you.