Given how hectic and busy our lives are, it is rare that we take (make) time to pause and reflect on our current situation.

I believe this process is absolutely crucial to ensuring continued improvement in life, not merely health and fitness.

Here are some more common questions I regularly receive and my solutions/suggestions/answers. Hope they help!

I often get asked many questions regarding fitness, training and nutrition. Here I want to compile some common ones complete with the best answers I can possibly give without being too general....

We live in an age where information is more freely available than ever before. This is definitely a good thing in many respects. Answers to complex questions are just the click of a button away. However, with this mass of information can come confusion. 'Paralysis by analysis' often sets in and we do not know where to start. So when it comes to fat loss, where is the best place to start? Take a look at the diagram below...

Every year Bondi beach plays host to a barefoot soft sand run. For anyone who hasn’t tried running in soft sand… well don’t bother! It’s horrible. It’s like running in treacle, on an unstable surface. 

Anyway, I set myself the goal of running the 10km in under an hour (but in my head I wanted to get below 55 mins). So here is what running 10km on soft sand taught me: -

Following on from Part I , here is Part II of your fitness & nutrition questions answered:

Question: Should I incorporate supplements into my training and nutrition plan? If so which supplements and when? Yes. There are only a few I would bother consuming, which are: -

This week is the second part of a look into how to effectively build muscle mass. Part I can be found here.

This week the emphasis is how to train effectively for gains in lean muscle mass. After looking last week at how slow gains in muscle mass can be, it is important, therefore, to try and optimise any training program to be as effective as possible at building muscle. 

In order for a muscle to grow, there are 3 main mechanisms:

• Mechanical Tension: The amount of mechanical force produced by the muscle. The more load (weight) you lift, the more tension created. Therefore ensure you select exercises within your program that allow you to lift the most loads.
• Metabolic Stress: Refers to the build up of metabolites and the increased acidity of the blood. These metabolites build up as the muscle fills with blood and is starved of oxygen.
• Muscle Damage: Lifting weights causes localised damage to the muscle tissue and is experienced as delayed-onset of muscle soreness (DOMs). Our muscle cells try and adapt to the perceived threat by reinforcing their structure, much like we saw with metabolic stress. 

How do you build muscle mass? Well bro-lore would have you thinking that you lift a tonne of weight and eat of tonne of food and et voila...You're jacked in no time.

However, this is rarely how things pan out. Most people just end up a bit, well, fat (for want of a better word). 

The point here is this: You cannot force feed muscle growth. More calories don't equate to more muscle gain indefinitely. Sure, you need to ensure you are eating enough calories to support muscle growth. However, more isn't always better.

So how quickly can we gain muscle? Thankfully this subject was recently researched by Lyle McDonald. Here are the figures:

...there are both environmental and genetic components to obesity (Speakman, 2004). Becoming obese is neither solely the result of your behaviour, nor is it solely genetic; your genetics have a large impact on your behaviour: -

“Our genes predispose us to obesity, but genes can only be expressed in environments, and it is the gene-environment interaction that is most important” (Speakman, 2004)

Working with Paul has been great- I've made progress far beyond where I thought I previously could and at no point has it felt too strenuous or unenjoyable.  I would fully recommend him (and lots and lots of cauliflower) to anyone that would like to see the kind of result I've seen.

Is Cardio the best way to lose weight? Does eating smaller, more frequent meals speed up your metabolism? Is eating before bed bad for you? Unfortunately we are awash with many half-truths, myths and fallacies in the world of exercise and nutrition. It is important to cut through the noise and ensure people are receiving good quality information. Here is part 1 of a set of questions I received from clients and gym members and my responses to them. I hope you find them helpful. Part II will follow soon.

A 'Diet Break' can be considered a period of time when you aren't following a rigid diet and have far greater autonomy and freedom with regard to food choices and eating patterns. Diet breaks can be both planned (i.e. dieting for a set period of time with a diet break planned after a period of time to offset the adaptations listed above) or unplanned (you have to travel for work for several weeks making the maintenance of your current diet almost impossible).

Diet breaks fulfil both the physiological and psychological needs of the dieter. 

After my recent rant about the glorification of junk food my message here is simple: We are getting increasingly fat and sick as a nation. It's time to wake up to the serious implications this is having on our health, well being, self-esteem, and overall quality of life. A top-down approach is needed on the one hand to stop junk food infiltrating the offices of our nations. Why do office workers need 1,000 calories-worth of doughnuts to sit still all day?

On the other hand, it's time we all took some personal responsibility for what goes into our mouths. The doughnut doesn't get there by itself! Preparing your own food requires some time and organisation. However, the implications to your health and waistline can be profound. Many clients I see cite having 'no time' as a reason why they cannot prepare their own food. This isn't true. Everyone has exactly the same numbers of hours in a day to work with. These people just haven't made it a priority, perhaps because they can't see the value in doing it.

Question 1. Can you explain why fat loss isn't just as simple as just cutting calorie intake (or is it?)? My assumption was that as long as your burning/using more than you are taking in, you should lose fat.

The quick answer to this question is that, for the majority of people, most of the time, fat loss is simply a case of creating a sustainable calorie deficit to induce fat loss. However, it isn’t always just this simple. Here are some other factors to consider: -

It appears that burger joints, pizzerias and fast food outlets of all descriptions are creating insanely calorific offerings in a bid to out-do one another. And I wouldn't have a problem with this if it weren't for the fact that as a nation (Australia in this case, but the same can be said for almost all developed nations) we are plain fat.