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Winning At Losing

 

Don’t be fooled while reading this: this isn’t a post about weight loss.  On the contrary, it’s a post about eating right ALL the time and why that’s better for your health and fitness than the crash diet approach.

The weather seems to be turning, and it’s finally coming up to swimsuit, wedding and holiday season!  As much as we CrossFit enthusiasts may hate to admit it exists, there is often a last minute panic out there before heading to the beach, down the aisle, or off on vay-kay, when many people try to shed extra pounds by adding some sort of amped up dieting regimen to their regular exercise regime. While to many folks that might *seem* to be a reasonable plan, we know that in fact the best way to lose those pesky persistent pounds is not by dieting, but rather by taking a consistent non-diet approach to weight loss.

Here at CrossFit, we already advocate that eating well consistently and staying active does wonderful things for your body like lowering blood pressure, decreasing body fat, and improving cardiovascular fitness, energy levels, and muscle mass.  It’s important to know that carrying excess body fat, especially the fat that tends to accumulate around the internal organs (visceral fat) and is visible at the waistline, increases the risk of heart disease, diabetes, and high blood pressure.  Hence, this is BAD fat.

Those of us who follow a consistent exercise routing know that eating well and being active not only helps us maintain a healthier body mass and strength level, but it also helps reduce stress, improves sleep, and makes us feel good about ourselves and what we can achieve.

Many of the population out there have a habit of buying into those more extreme ways of losing weight over the short term. Things like grapefruit diets, cabbage soup diets, low-carb diets, sugar-buster diets, and so on, may produce sudden and dramatic weight loss.  But this comes at the expense of compromised nutrition, decreased athletic performance, and potentially serious side effects.  Furthermore, unless a person commits to real long-term lifestyle changes, these body changes are not sustainable.

But you CAN take steps to maximize your chance of long-term success without compromising nutrition and increasing your risk for harmful health side effects.  How?  You already know the answer to that: healthy eating, regular activity and vigorous exercise, and just plain feeling good about yourself.

If you’re already a subscriber to the Zone or Paleo way of eating, than you’re way ahead of the game.  If you’re not, try keeping these things in mind as you approach your personal nutrition:

1. If the amount of energy you burn exceeds the amount of energy (calories, carbs, etc.) you eat, you’ll naturally increase your lean body mass and see max results.  It’s that simple.  All the exercise in the world isn’t going to help you if you continue to eat portion sizes that aren’t proportional to your activity needs, and consume the wrong types of foods.  Eat good food and burn good energy!

2. Try eating more frequently.  Sounds crazy, but it’s important to continue putting gas into your body’s tank at regular intervals to avoid those hunger pangs and insulin crashes.  Eating frequently, rather than purposely eating less, allows your metabolism to function more effectively, prevents overeating, and helps maintain neutral blood sugar levels.  Bonus: keeping your energy up via well placed meals and snacks will keep your performance up in the gym!

3. Listen to your body.  Don’t ignore your hunger and fullness cues!  If we trust our bodies to tell us when we’re hungry and stop eating when our bodies tell us we are full, we will eat to suit our energy and nutrient needs.

4. Shop wisely.  Remember that what you have on hand is what you’ll have to choose from when hunger strikes.  Stock your kitchen with the right, nutrient rich, healthy foods.  And if you ARE going to buy a special treat, purchase a single serving to avoid tempting yourself later!  Rewarding yourself is important too, but moderation is key.

If you feel lost on the nutrition front and could use some friendly assistance, don’t forget to book your complimentary nutrition consult with one of our Coaches.  We’re here to help you succeed in your pursuit of elite fitness, and that includes assessing your personal food and nutrition habits and how they currently relate to your success at The Zone.

Eat right, and enjoy the benefits!

Today’s Workout

NOTE – if you are intending to do Friday’s Sectional Workout, I would suggest just working on some easy skill stuff today.  You could do the deadlift portion but only to 85-90% effort (not necessarily 85-90% 1RM!) as long as you recover well from them.

Buy-in: Deadlift – 2 sets of 5, 2 sets of 3, 2 sets of 1.  Increase weight steadily through all sets.

Example (Coach Turts):  315×5, 335×5, 355×3, 375×3, 395×1, 405×1

WOD:  “Barbella”

This is a barbell complex that works “on the minute” and will help refine several movements in one.   Work on precision and speed as opposed to scaling the weight too high. Each minute on the minute for 8 minutes you will complete:

  • 3 hang power cleans (75/115)
  • 3 push presses
  • 3 overhead squats

Zone 4 – scale to 65/95

Zone 3 – scale to 45/65

Zone 2 – scale weight as needed

Zone 1 – scale WOD as needed

Cash-Out: 50 knees to elbows, 50 double crunch, or 50 situps for time.

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