It’s not been a good few days when it comes to the training regime of Danny O. To be totally honest I’ve been bloomin’ lazy and I have been a touch decadent too.

Since last thursday all I’ve done is a single swim and I did that on Monday night. It was a good swim, mind but nowhere near enough.

I’m determined to go and do a good run tonight before heading out to a restaurant opening (bound to undo all that good work there).

Note to self: must try harder.

Today seen the start of my training regime that actually begins today and not january 1st as many people thought!
up and out of bed at 04.38 some bran flakes glass of milk and NO coffee as i had ran out.
so started with a jog to warm the muscles then tackled tha amari hill at the south end of patong beach.
up and down that hill 10 times plus a 10 minute warm down was enough,well until later tonight anyway,
talk soon
the doris

I usually swim in my local swimming pool as it allows me to keep an accurate record of how far I’m swimming or how fast or a combination of the two. If I’m going further faster then I know I’m getting fitter and stronger.

Yesterday, however, at the request of a friend I swam in the sea after work as sunset was approaching. It was a fantastic experience and although I’ll still favour the pool when it comes to training, doing laps of the swimming zone while watching the sun set was great.

Didn’t swim all that far if I’m honest but something is better than nothing….

Did you create a New Year’s Resolution this year? Again? Yeah, me either! However
every year I do secretly say to myself this is the year I will, get fitter, stronger, more
flexible, eat better etc etc. I’m sure you have heard it all before. You may have said
those same things to yourself.

I’m sure I am not alone in keeping an athletic bucket list. You know the things that you
would like to achieve, before you officially retire yourself as a weekend warrior athlete,
the things that keep driving you to do more, to be more, to be able to say to yourself…
look what I did, look at what I achieved!

I think that New Years is a great time to do that soul searching and ask yourself what
you would like to achieve this year…but, you can also do it on any given day, because
who’s to say that you will get another chance to be the best you can be. Like I have
said before, money is not the most valuable commodity…time is, and as Rod Stewart
sings, “…like a fist full of sand, it can slip right through your hand”!

So with that in mind, I’d like to give my top 11tips, being 2011, to being the best you can
be, relative to your health fitness and wellness…

11. Sleep Well…and long. Too few of us get enough sleep and enough quality sleep.
Too few hours in the land of dreams plays havoc with our ability to recover from
exercise and if your goal is to increase lean muscle tissue, then it is only around the
7 – 9 hour mark that we release Growth Hormone which is the essential hormone
that allows our muscles to become bigger and stronger resulting in an increased
metabolism, which means we burn more fat at rest. So sleep to get slim!

10. Drink Plenty of Water. Water is the life. Our bodies are made up of 70 water. Our
blood is made of up 90% Blood Plasma and Blood Plasma is 95% Water! Enough
Said…Just Drink It! 3litres a day and more if your exercising!

9. Weight Train….Male or Female. Young or Old. Black or White. We are all made up
of the same skeletal muscle and if we don’t use it…we lose it! Our bodies are amazing
machines and incredibly efficient and it gets rid of anything we don’t need….but believe
me, we need muscle. It’s the only thing in our bodies that allow us to move and grove
our way through our daily chores. In Sweden alone in 2009, the biggest killer of the
elderly was fall related incidents. Falls are a resultant factor of not enough strength in
our quadriceps muscles or hip flexors which flex our hip significantly enough to allow
for our knee to flex enough which in turn allows our foot and more importantly our big
toe to clear the ground when we walk. Did you follow that?? If our big toe doesn’t clear
the ground…we trip and fall and break a bone which in turn creates a blood clot which
may travel to the heart to cause a blocked artery and could cause heart attack or it
may travel to the main artery in the brain where it would cause us to have a stroke.
Strength Training…The concept seems simple and yet has far reaching implications.
Whether you want to impress the ladies, your husband of 25years, or the lifeguard at
the beach…do some resistance training today!

8. Walk don’t Run…Walking is the best activity to burn fat during the activity with
minimal impact on the joints of the hip, knee and ankle. At 8km/hr, Billsborough (2000)
stated that we burn just as much fat as we do jogging at the same speed with a lot less
injury occurring. If your new to exercise, a little overweight or just want to be healthy and
lean and enjoy smelling the roses once in a while…lace up the shoes and start walking.
The longer you walk, the more fat you will burn, and because its low intensity, you can
do it for a long period of time. Power walking of the 80s is back!

7. Run as fast as you can…Run Forest Run. If fitness is your thing…there are not too
many activities that can give you that endorphin rush that running can. It’s not called
the Runners High for nothing. Running is great for a whole host of things. It can take
you to places that you have never seen. It can train your heart to be as strong as a
racehorse and maybe even outrun one but, if your goal is to drop some weight on the
scales, then more importantly it can boost your metabolism for hours after you have
finished a session. Sure you could go long and slow…but that’s what your metabolism
is doing already so if you want a real metabolic boost…then run and run fast. Choose
a 100 to 400 or even a 1000mtr track and run intervals with periods of fast running
and a short rest break such as 30seconds and then repeat. A well known workout in
the sporting circles is simply called 100s. It involves a 100m sprint followed by a 100m
jog. Then repeat it 100times. Now we may not all be up for that one right now….but
just like a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, so it does here, or
more specifically, a 100m sprint! Just make sure you warm up with some jogging for
10minutes first and cool down with a walk for 10minutes followed by some stretching
and you have one Metabolic Booster workout!

6. Stretch what you Strengthen and Strengthen what you stretch…This is pretty self
explanatory but essentially what it does is get you to Strengthen your whole body and
then Stretch your whole body. You don’t have to do it all at once…you can break it up
and do different muscle groups on different days, but over a week, you can cover the
whole body. Now, that can’t be a bad thing can it?

5. The Five S’s

Strength, Stamina, Slimness, Stamina/Skill, Suppleness. Together they cover all
aspects of health fitness and wellness. When someone asks me whether they are fit, I
ask them which of the five S’s are they referring to….Specificity of training is everything.
Train for what you want to achieve!

4. Incorporate your husband, wife, boyfriend or girlfriend into your training….Not only
from a relationship point of view, but from a training buddy point of view, incorporating
your significant other into your training and workouts is the best thing you can do for
longevity in Health both the physical and your relationship health. Those who train
together have a greater appreciation of each other, a greater belief in each other and a
greater respect for each other. You can take each other to new heights both in and out
of the training arena. When all is lost…you know that there is one person in your corner,
and sometimes that makes all the difference in your life, love and happiness.

3. Choose a goal…Make it challenging and then go ahead and achieve it.

There are a million sayings about the loftiness of a goal, of course, I can’t think of one
right now, but if Mt Everest wasn’t such a challenge, would men have risked the lives
and everything they have just to put a flag on top of the mountain….Exactly! If your’re
not achieving your goals….it is not challenging enough!!

2. Be a Role Model to your kids….Success in life is determined many different ways,
but I believe, if you ask anyone who has kids, all they want is for their children to be
happy and healthy. Sometimes we are not given that chance. Sometimes that chance is
taken away from us….but sometimes it’s not and we throw it away by being lazy or not
believing it’s important. No child wants to be unhealthy and deal with self esteem issues
that have been proved to carry on into adulthood and affect their relationships, the
careers, and their quality of life. We all know what to do…yet how many of us actually
do what we know! Whitney was right, our children are our future and so is their health
and fitness! Help them become the fit and strong athletic adult they desire by being the
Role Model they Deserve!

1. Be the Person YOU Want to be in this world….Be YOUR OWN ROLE MODEL!

Enough Said!

quiet few days in afraid for mr.the doris.Thursday seen me in the gym pushed some heavier than normal wieghts and boy was i feeling it a few days later.
since then walking mostly with the running taking a back seat for some days as my knee doesnt seem to be 100% for some reason.
still doing the 1/4 marathon in june,,,,thats if i dont die trying.
going to be back power walking before the running again just to ease myself back into it.

Despite doing the odd bit here and there exercise-wise of late, I feel that I’ve been a bit on the lazy side as it doesn’t seem to be consistent. Maybe it’s because I haven’t got a specific event to aim for at the moment and am just staying in the shape I attained last year.

I do, however, want to be in good nick in the event that I go home for a holiday this summer so I’ve got to stop overeating and under-training; not a good combination….

I am getting faster when I do my runs, though. Yesterday I posted a 57min 22 second 10km – a new P.B and that was achieved without my iPod to spur me on over the last 20mins or so as the battery had died. A 56-minute effort isn’t out of the question; must make sure I keep my Shuffle charged.

Probably head to the beach for a late afternoon swim today and join a friend although that is unlikely to be the most strenuous of work outs….

Must ensure I eat well tonight and by well I mean healthily!! Until next time, blog fans…