Christmas guide – how to not eat yourself silly over Christmas whilst still having and eating all the things!
 
Okay so everyone knows that Christmas Is about connecting, giving, faith, love and of course pigs in blankets and any other food you enjoy, but pig in blankets!
 
So how do you eat 3kg of them a day over Christmas, well you don’t, you eat 1.5kg a day, you also buy the ones with the lowest calories, You don’t cook them covered in them oil, butter or any other very fatty/calorie dense foods like cheese.
 
You do this for all your favourite foods, you buy the Lower calorie version, if they don’t have the ‘light’ versions then buy less of it, if you only buy the 1kg packets of whatever because ‘well I’ll get through it all anyway and it’s Christmas’ yes you will get through it, it’s your favourite food/s but buy less! That way you might run out one day, may for a few days but you would of saved yourself eating another 1000 calories over per day.
 
Drink as much water as you can all the time! Water will fill you up so you won’t be able to over eat because you’ll be too full from the water, buy flavoured, zero calorie sparking water, this will keep you even more full and it tastes nice, there are about 10 different flavour options so don’t just say I don’t like it, try the different flavours!
 
Try and move as much as you can, go out for a walk in the morning if you have kids, take them to the park for an hour and run with them, take the dog for a walk, just try and move, don’t spend the days sitting at one end of the sofa and watching the home alone marathon, die hard and elf. Get it and do something! Anything is better than nothing especially at this time of year when it’s cold so you spend more time sitting around doing nothing. DO SOMETHING!
 
A really easy way to rack up the calories is in liquids, gin and tonic, get zero calorie tonic water, whiskey and coke get Pepsi max, Coke Zero, Diet Coke Anything zero calories! If you go out and buy all your drinks for over the Christmas period buy zero calories version option of as much as you can, that way you aren’t tempted, you have no option but to drink 0 calories options.
 
And the really easy way to make sure you don’t over eat is by intermittent fasting(IF), so don’t have breakfast and don’t eat anything after 8pm-ish so that will give you a decent sized window of 16 hours if you eat at 12pm and with the hustle and bustle of Christmas you probably won’t miss breakfast much, its important that when you do IF you drink loads of water and only have a black coffee in the morning, the milk and sugar will bring you out of the fast.
 
Fill up on high protein foods, so have extra chicken/turkey for dinner, have a protein shake if you can that way you get the fillings effects of the water and protein, just again make sure the chicken/turkey isn’t fatty, leave the skin off or put it to the side.
 
Fill up on high fibre foods so the same concept as protein but eat more carrots, sprouts, broccoli,  butternut squat, parsnips but not potatoes, these are normally covered in goose fat, and made to be light and fluffy so they are easy to over indulge on and calorie dense!
 
And the last little tip, DON’T BE SO GODDAMN GREEDY!  A lot of the time we just eat, we aren’t hungry, the bowl of celebrations are there, we are full but our hand still goes toward that celebration bowl and grabs more and more chocolate, stop this. Just sit further away from the bowl, put a glass of water in front so you have to put more effort into getting them, honestly it works anything that makes getting them harder to reach will work!
 
I hope you have an amazing Christmas and get everything you wish for, and if you don’t then be grateful you have a roof over your head, access to free health care, hot water and the ability to understand and appreciate this time of year!
 
Dan
Personal Trainer

Which ones, when, why and common ones that are sold as “the ultimate thing EVER!!” but really aren’t worth the money the tub they are put in! Supplements, Which, Why and When:
 
We will start with Creatine – this is the safest, most tested supplement on the market, doses shouldn’t exceed more than 0.05g per KG of body weight, so for someone who weighs 75kg that's a daily dose of 3.75g per day, as most scoops are 5g, then its roughly one scoop per day, you don’t need to load it (which is where you take, in some cases triple the daily dose for 1 week and then reduce, but it’s pointless) there is also no need to cycle creatine as by keeping at the maximum of 1 scoop per day you keep your muscles very full of it, the only people who would cycle it are fighters or weight making competitors, it is the safest supplement out there!
 
The next ‘supplement’ is whey protein, I hate that this is classed as a supplement, it’s very much a food, it’s made from separating curds and whey in the cheese making process, so its 100% all natural, I personally believe essential for if you come to the gym and I’ll go as far to say if you don’t too because of the effects it has on you and your health. It is perfect for a quick meal in between meetings, post workout, before bed with warm milk, if you get the mixture right it can make an incredible mouse for pudding, In the morning if you want food but don’t have time to make something proper (by proper I mean a solid meal). It will also boost your immune system, improve bone density, improve muscle mass, it’s also been linked to improved cognitive function, it really is essential and as far as I know it is still unrivalled in terms of protein quality and bioavailability!
 
Next up we have vitamin D3 – Now this would be fine to skip IF you lived in a sunny country and you worked outside or spent most of your time outside, but hey welcome to Sunny England with our clouds, rain and blisteringly cold winds but before we get sad about the weather – Vitamin D is essential for the following reasons, it will help with:
- Skin
- gains
- fatigue
- recovery
- can make you feel happier
- reducing chances of some cancers
- improved muscle function
- helps with bone density
- decreased risk of both type-2 diabetes and Cardiovascular disease, the list just goes on!
 
So, make sure you pay a bit more to get a good bio-available one - at the moment that strand is Cholecalciferol, 3000 – 5000 iu per day will do you the world of good!
 
Multivits and Multiminerals – Same as the above in terms of paying for a better one, the better the product (note: not the most expensive, the most bioavailable forms) the more your body will be able to actually use, these are one of those things that a lot of people have an opinion about when they really shouldn’t, if you could take a couple of pills that meant almost every one of your vitamin and mineral targets are hit for that day, WHO THE HELL WOULDN’T?!
That's what these are for, they aren’t to replace any fruit or veg or meats or any foods, you have to have variety, but in today’s day and age who really eats 30 different fruits and veg every day, think of these as your safety net, these will help keep you healthy, why risk not having them?
 
Omega 3 – this is just pure brain gains, you want to be able to look at something and move it with your thoughts? This is the thing you need! (Cannot guarantee it will give you Jedi powers) but on a serious note, the only fish I can tolerate eating is salmon and that has to be pre-cooked and flavoured, this supplement won’t do anything for you if you eat oily fish 3-4 times a week, if you don’t eat that amount of fish then grab a seat buddy omega-3 will take you on a ride! It can:

• help fights against depression
• improved eye health
• brain function
• heart health
• improved joint strength
• improved sleep
• improved skin

pretty decent, isn’t it? Get some now….
 
Caffeine – My lifeline, I wish I can be #sponsored by monster but unfortunately that is impossible at this present time but in the future who knows?!

Everyone know caffeine is good for fat loss, but only if you are in a calorie deficit,
 
 
That is about it for the good supplements Part 2 will be about the pointless oversold supplements!

​ 





​Okay – so what we have here is a food label so first thing to look at is the amount of calories this food/drink has – which is outlined in blue – you can see that per serving is 118ml, which is an absolutely stupid amount, how you are meant to measure that precisely is insane so ignore than and look at the Per 100ml – this carton has 4 servings at 118ml so its roughly 500ml which is 5 x 100ml – easy to work it now!

So you just multiply the amount of calories per each 100ml so 68kcal x5 is 340 calories per bottle, which seems very high.
Next you look at the protein, which is outlined in orange the higher protein isn’t necessary better as the protein they use might be crap quality however, try and go for the most protein as you can, this means the food will keep you fuller for longer, will help with gains and a higher protein diets trumps every diet in the science tests for weight loss and health etc. so it’s generally a good thing to go by!

Next have a look at Fibre, which is outlined in the green this can sometimes be categorised under carbohydrates but where ever it is on the label look at it, the higher fibre the better for your digestive health (more research needs to be done, but this is what it seems like) to a limit, obviously you don’t want to eat so much fibre you don’t poo for a month!
A good way to see how much you need is – 14 grams of fibre per 1000 calories or 30 to 38 grams a day for men and 25 grams a day for women between 18 and 50 years old – personally I would go a bit more just because the days you get more, then great but the day you don’t hit your target you might still actually be getting enough.
Next is Fats and Carbs, the reason these are last are because the priority for you is completely different to the other people reading this, you choose which levels you want, are you Keto, high carb, low carb, high or low fat, high or low polyols, high or low sugar, high or low saturated, trans fats?

I don’t know – unless your my client, but most of you won’t be and most of you reading this are probably reading other and listen to other advice and have then probably made up your minds of which level are best for you, not only health wise but consistency wise. So read these and make up your decision.

If it doesn’t might your macros (Protein, fats and carbs) or even your calories I can almost bet there is a high/low protein, fats and carbs version and a lower calorie version somewhere so if you really want the food then go and find it somewhere!

Then salt you don’t really need to pay attention to for years now food salt levels haven’t been too bad because of the health scares of salt which are vastly exaggerated – if the food is highly salted then just drink more water and it will balance that out, unless you have a medical reason then it should go without saying, be careful with salt levels.













So just the quickly recap – in priority order:

1. Calories/Energy
2. Protein
3. Fibre
4. Carbs and Fats
5. Salt

 
I really hope this helps you and I hope that with this you can shop with better food choices – I will do a part 2 to this where we go through ingredients labels and how to understand what all the chemical sounding names are, because some of them are just the chemical names for vitamins/minerals.
​
Thank you for reading!
Dan

Diet hacks and smart food swaps

This will be a quick guide to give you little hint and tips to be a diet ninja and be able to know if you are going to binge smarter swaps.

With out beating around the bush dieting in really bloody hard, its hard to stick to, it's hard to maintain and it's hard to choose which approach to go down, I would recommend 2 differerent approaches, which I'll explain in another post.

Now when you are on your diet you get mad cravings, everyone has had them, everyone will get them, so can foods can you swap/add/take away to give you the best reults you can get...

The first are biscuits and crisps, Biscuits... there really isn't a good food swap, you cant get healthy biscuits however, you can change for better biscuit, so if you count calories pick biscuits with added protein. crisps you really have no hope, there are low calorie crisps but they are like eating flavoured dust, so before you know it your 15 packs down and still hungry.

Next is chocolate - now this is managable, when you have a chocolate craving, change for dark chocolate or chocolate coated nuts, a little advisory warning though, dark chocolate tends to have higher calories so if you do have dark chocolate then stick to one or 2 bars of 75% +
and thats the same for the nuts, buy the little snack pots they are more expensive and you get a lot less, so over feeding on those is very costly!

Fizzy Drinks - This is easy - if you drink coke, change for coke Zero, coke pay millions to make there stuff taste the same and those millions arent wasted, Coke and coke Zero honestly now taste the exact same, if you drink Lucazade, you can get... lucazade zero - Monster zero, relentless zero. Changing drinks is the easiest way to get rid of a sweet tooth and most at 0ish calories you really cant go wrong.

Butters and spreads - This is a tricky one, as you can live your life calorie watching, so smarter spread anf butter swaps are crucial, instead of margerine get some olive oil spread, things like low fat phillidephia, or spreading cheeses are amssively helpful, it kills your cheese craving and gives you a tasty low calorie alternative.

Next is choices of meats - you need the lowest calorie ones, so reduced fat everything!!! appart from fish, pick the oiliest mofos you can get, not only do you get the saturated fat from salmon you get a massive hit of omega 3.

Sandwhiches and wraps - this is hard, people have compared wheat to Herion on the addiction scale, but its a mental thing, people believe they genuinely need bread to survive, you really don't. im against bread but its a crap food, it has nothing to it. You can now actually get low Calorie bread but it tastes liek cardboard, this is one of the things you are just going to have to say goodbye to and replace for nutrient dense foods, make a Jacket sweet potato (Sweet jacket potato? which one? lol)

You have heard me talk mostly about calories here, this is because you will not lose weight unless you are in a calorie deficit, you can do endless amounts of cardio, putting stress onto your joints, Have you ever looked at someone who runs alot and thought 'wow I want her bum' or 'Yo look at that dudes guns!'? I'm going to throw this out and say no.

So make some changes to your diet, lift some weights and go hit your weight goals!