Nick Mitchell's Ultimate Performance » Fat loss

101 Tips to lose fat and get lean (25): Is fresh food the best?

Nick — Sun, 16 May 2010 08:49:04 +0000

Tips to lose fat and get lean: Is fresh food the best?

I realise that this is a bit of a left of field fat loss tip. After all, fresh produce is ALWAYS better for us, right? This is true, but only when the peas are plucked from the pod in your own garden. I read an interesting Australian study recently that demonstrated that the vitamin content of frozen peas, beans, carrots and cauliflower was substantially higher than that of so-called fresh imports.

Frozen food can often be better for your health than so-called fresh produce!

This study has prompted me to rethink and partially reassess my “fresh is best” philosophy. After all, I buy an awful lot of imported vacuum sealed, frozen wild meat – ostrich, bison and springbok being hard to come by in the fields of England, and it literally makes me feel great for the rest of the day (wild, grass fed meat has a handy trick of being extremely good for you as well as elevating the mentally sharpening neurotransmitters such as dopamine and acetylcholine), so why do I have an instinctive problem with frozen vegetables. On analysis it isn’t logical, and this study aptly demonstrates that the act of quick freezing seals in both the sweetness and the all-important nutrients of the vegetables. Plus, and this is the real clincher for those of us with overly busy, stressed out city lives, frozen veg is just so much more convenient. In fact one of my favourite fat loss focused dishes is to just cook up a giant pot of frozen vegetables, flash fry some lean, organic ground beef, and then stir and blend the mixed concoction together to make a very hearty soup. I’ve been known to get through a kilo of meat in one extended sitting in this way, but that’s the old bodybuilder in me still lurking in the shadows! You may want to feed your family, or stretch the feedings out a little bit longer.

101 Tips to lose fat and get lean (24): Intelligent Late Night Snacking

Nick — Sun, 18 Apr 2010 10:19:56 +0000

Tips to lose fat and get lean: Intelligent Late Night Snacking For Fat Loss

Any of you who have ever dieted for any length of time will know that as easy as getting through the day can be (if you get your nutrition right), managing an evening without a raid on the fridge or the biscuit cupboard can be the hardest thing.
I myself have always been a “muncher” and late night snacker – so when I am idle and sat in front of the TV or reading a book I just don’t feel myself unless I have something to snack on. Unfortunately the obvious snack choices of chocolate and crisps don’t really cut it if you are trying to lose fat and get lean. There are two ways to really get a handle on this potential problem of late night snacking:

1) Never have junk food in the house in the first place. Perhaps easier said than done if you don’t live by yourself. My solution – put your foot down and educate the guilty party!

2) Prepare healthy and “optimal” later night snacks beforehand. This strategy works well even if you don’t have “bad food” in the house (after all, Dominos is just a few clicks of the mouse away for all of us!), but is especially potent if the lure of the cookie filled biscuit barrel is just a few steps away. When dieting I have always found it extremely helpful to keep ziplock bags filled with various sliced raw vegetables (carrots, peppers, celery sticks), and for the protein conscious amongst us beef jerky makes a great chewable late night snack that is ideal for both fat loss and muscle building.

And as an aside, please don’t be overly concerned with eating late at night. So long as your digestion is working properly (GERD sufferers will know what I am referring to – acid reflux exacerbated by laying down) there is absolutely nothing wrong with late night snacking so long as you make the right nutritional choices!

Methinks Kerry Katona might benefit from reading up on intelligent late night snacking!

101 Fat Loss Tips: Be lavish with coconut oil

Nick — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 18:01:14 +0000

Tips to lose fat and get lean: Be lavish with coconut oil

Coconut oil / butter isn’t just good for moisturising the skin or for adding an exotic flavour to otherwise mundane dishes (cooking your scrambled eggs in coconut butter adds a deliciously different tang by the way). It is choc full of healthy nutrients that make it one of the absolute best fat loss choices you can have for using as a butter or a dietary fat.

I have written previously about the myriad fat loss benefits of consuming fresh coconut, but the oil / butter version (butter when chilled in the fridge, oil when left for any length of time at room temperature), and the one key thing you need to bear in mind with coconut oil is that it contains medium-chain-fatty acids (otherwise knows as MCTs, or medium-chain-triglycerides) that have long been a staple of many bodybuilders’ fat loss diets. The rationale, backed up by research published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, is that you can’t really store MCTs as fat and that instead the body uses them for a rapid energy boost. Almost like a sugar rush without the attendant blood sugar crash and fat gain.

I have never been one to believe that MCTs are the miracle fat loss “secret” that they were once (way back in the early 1990s) heralded as being. But anything that has an abundance of them is certainly healthy and a better alternative than 99.9% of commercially available oils and butters. So why not try coconut oil – the strong chances are that both your taste buds and waistline will approve!

101 Tips to lose fat and get lean: watch out for your fat friends!

Nick — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 20:15:29 +0000

Tips to lose fat and get lean: watch out for your fat friends!

Try not turn too many of your meals into grand social affairs. Research at the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition found that those who eat with a friend will typically consume double the calories than if they were eating with an unfamiliar peer. That’s an awful lot of extra and unnecessary eating in between gossip and chit-chat!

Social Eating In Action!

So the take home lesson here is to minimise social activity whilst dining and perhaps save it for the post meal coffees. Sans chocolates of course!

As hard as it may seem, very often we have to perceive food as being FAR more about function and less about an indulgence of the senses or an extension of one’s social life. I am rediscovering this myself right now as I go through a total sea change in my dietary habits due to an H Pylori infection (more on this in a later post), and it is always worth reminding ourselves that all, and I do mean all, of our great fat loss transformation clients have broken ingrained dietary habits to get themselves in stellar shape.

“No Matter What…” – What It Takes To Transform Your Body

Nick — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 17:56:05 +0000

The following paragraph is part of something I have recently written for my upcoming book. Many people want bigger muscles / a leaner, more defined body but do they really have the heart to go all the way for a radical fat loss transformation / muscle building revelation?

To paraphrase Arnold Schwarzenegger in Pumping Iron, building a muscle is all about having the determination and the courage to push on through a set no matter what the pain and no matter how much your body wants to stop. Great training is all about heart and having the mental fortitude of a champion. If you journey into any hardcore gym in the world you will readily observe that the biggest and baddest men are those who push past the pain barrier and milk each and every set to its fullest potential. The techniques for extending a set past the point of no return are manifold and manifest and can be taught and explained with ease. What isn’t easy however, is the execution. Overriding the burn of the lactic acid, pushing the nausea to one side, ignoring the light-headedness, and embracing the feeling of microscopic muscle trauma as you tear down muscle fibers that will later be remoulded as bigger, faster and stronger units takes grit and determination and is not something that can be taught off the page. It comes from within and is what separates the men from the boys.

The photo below is a taster of what can be achieved by following the principles I will explain both in the new book, and of course to our personal training clients here at Ultimate Performance in London. The full story (and photos) of this remarkable 12 week fat loss transformation (with an over abundance of muscle building thrown in for a total body change) will be coming soon to this blog. The results are simply fantastic and could only have been achieved through a tonne of educated effort and the courage and the determination to go on “no matter what”.

An Incredible 12 Week Fat Loss Transformation!

If you’d like to register your interest in the book (that has already gone through so many tenative titles that it remains as yet unnamed!) please email caroline@UPFitness.co.uk and she will put you on the list.

101 Fat Loss Tips – Be Realistic About Your Fat Loss Targets

Nick — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 22:52:11 +0000

Tips to lose fat and get lean: Be Realistic about your Fat Loss Targets

Setting realistic, step by step goals to hit your fat loss targets is the only way to make sustained progress and achieve that lean, ripped body you so desire. Too often I see people come to our London personal training centre with crazy goals that are doomed to fail.

"Look in my eyes" - THIS is the right mindset for fast fat loss success!

The latest example who springs to mind is “Mr Delusional Fat Loss”. This is a man who claims to follow the bodybuilding lifestyle, obsesses to the tiniest detail about his supplement regime, and yet is carrying almost 30% body fat and is verging on the clinically obese. He wants it all and wants it now, which is why he is doomed to continue down his spiral of dieting failure. This is a character who understands nothing of the discipline of fulfilling small achievable goals (small steps eventually add up to long progress) because he sat opposite me and with a straight face claimed that he wanted to hit sub 10% body fat in less than 5 weeks. Given that he was carrying an excess of at least 70lbs of fat he would have to burn off 14lbs a week for 5 weeks without losing an ounce of muscle mass. Our clients are well known for achieving some pretty stellar results and I am very confident that I am a great personal trainer, but I am not that great! Only the Lord Almighty can help this guy and unless he starts to root himself in reality he will never drop a decent amount of body fat and continue to look and be an unhealthy fat man.
So the lesson here is that you should set yourself small goals all aiming towards your one big long-term goal, whether it be getting lean for the beach or shredded for the bodybuilding contest stage!

101 Tips to Lose Fat & get Lean: Eat Fat Before Bed

Nick — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 22:36:09 +0000

Fat is NOT the enemy of effective fat loss! Forget about what your pyramid shaped dietitian tells you! Not only do we need fat for overall cellular health (interestingly enough we don’t have any vital requirement for carbohydrates or grains no matter what studies the Cereal Board and Kellogg’s may sponsor!), but we also need fat to actually best spark the fat burning process inside our bodies.

Fat also fulfills another supremely important for the sometimes hungry dieter. Fat gives us satiety in a way that protein, and most especially carbohydrates, cannot. It is common sense that if two foods are of equal calorific value and one fills you up for longer, it will be that “longer lasting” food that can help us stick to our fat loss diets for longer. Take two eggs and compare how long they may fill you versus a bowl of cornflakes! This aspect is one of the reasons why consuming extra fibre / roughage can also enhance a fat loss regime.

Some Serious Fat Loss & Muscle Building went into changing this back in less than 2 months!

One good trick of top professional bodybuilders (men and women who must diet longer and harder for the tiniest ounce of last fat loss than any mere mortal can realistically comprehend) is to have a spoonful of (ideally organic) peanut butter before going to sleep. The fat sparks the metabolism and perhaps more significantly provides just enough “fullness” that it limits the chances of waking up in the wee hours with that bane of all successful fat loss programs, the dreaded munchies.

For more tips of fat loss see the 101 Fat Loss Tips section of this blog, or visit our main London personal trainer site.

The “Fat Burning Threshold”!

Nick — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 20:15:41 +0000

I was recently asked by a VERY big magazine to write some advice on how to best hit the “fat burning threshold” with interval training. My response probably didn’t fit with what they were looking for but here goes for you:

The “fat burning threshold” is a myth. What really matters is how much energy (calories) you burn. The more anaerobically (think a sprint versus a jog) you train the more likely you are to tap into glycogen stores rather than use fat for energy but do not let this be the excuse for easy training. Studies have categorically proven that the best way to use interval type training for fat loss is to take advantage of the EPOC (excess post-exercise oxygen consumption) that comes with creating a massive oxygen debt via highly challenging interval type training.

Try the following programme up to 3 times per week, striving each time to get your overall session time lower with each session:
400metre sprint
20 two arm kettlebell swings
20 Weighted Thrusters
25 Squat Thrusts
Repeat 3 more times

We don’t tend to do things like this too often with our personal training clients as there are better ways to lose fat and get leaner, but if you train by yourself or like to exercise outdoors (when the sun finally returns to London!) then giving the above protocol a whirl might be “fun”, and will certainly be effective at leaning you up. And please do remember that the “fat burning threshold” is gibberish made up by exercise machine companies to sound clever to trick you into thinking your are burning more fat whilst using their contraptions. NOTHING beats old fashioned hard work for radical fat loss! How do you think Ultimate Performance personal trainer Rich Phillipps achieved such an outstanding six pack (photo above)…not by messing about monitoring his pulse rate every 15 seconds but by knuckling down to sensible exercise prescriptions and putting his heart into every effort.

Fast Female Fat Loss!

Nick — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 13:44:35 +0000

Fast fat loss for females is often a bit of a tricky subject. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that it is harder for women to drop appreciable amounts of body fat than it is for men.

A lot of people have wasted a lot of time speculating on just why this is the case, but for myself when female fat loss stalls it almost always comes down to one or both of two main factors – a blocked up liver that requires an estrogen detoxification protocol and /or added resistance training to boost insulin sensitivity and raise Growth Hormone levels. Please note that this doesn’t mean adding tonnes of muscle mass! Women are very, very unlikely to ever add all that much muscle, but the positive hormonal implications of a properly loaded (ie challenging weights that are tough to eke out more than 12 repetitions with, not these ludicrous light weights touted by some so-called “experts” that are as challenging as lifting a bag of sugar!) resistance training session can work absolute wonders on the female physiology! This strategy is one of the reason why we have regular results such as overweight females dropping 1/3rd of their bodyweight in less than 5 months whilst eating more food than ever before. Of course this type of weight loss is at the extreme end of the scale, many of our female clients start at the same body shape as Lucy (pictured below) and then just keep on improving!

Female Fat Loss - a photo paints a thousand words!

If you are interested in learning more about how estrogen control can help break fat loss plateaus then looking further into our BioSignature Modulation assessments would most likely reap dividends for you. Furthermore, UP personal trainer and female weight loss expert Rich Phillipps has just written a great “Female Fat Loss” article all about estrogen and it’s impact upon stubborn lower body fat in females. Rich is one of the great up and coming personal trainers at UP and works with me closely on a number of our ongoing BioSignature Modulation studies. He is developing a great reputation as one the “go to” coaches for fast female fat loss.

BioSignature Modulation Fat Loss Results

Nick — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 10:18:51 +0000

I often write about the sort of results that can be achieved with clever training and nutrition and HARD work. One of the “secrets” of our personal training success is the combination of Charles Poliquin’s BioSignature Modulation principles with our own unique assessment methodologies in order to prescribe extremely precise nutrional and supplementation protocols.

Rather than bang on about how great we are as personal trainers and how we achieve consistently outperform the industry norms by a huge margin, today I’ll let the results do the talking, after all results are the only thing that really counts. Take a look at the photos below of what Ultimate Performance’s top London personal trainer Rich Phillipps did with just 7 weeks of advisory work using BioSignature Modulation and a few twists and tricks that are unique to our own fat loss methodologies. Eight inches oof the waist and a 12% drop in body fat in just eight short weeks are nothing short of spectacular!

How Much Will Your Body Change In Eight Weeks Time?