Love Notes by Jari Love

Things You Can Do At Night to Promote Weight Loss

Of course nights are great for going on dates, binge-watching Netflix, doing work, chatting on the phone—you name it. But you know what else they’re great for? Setting yourself up for bigger and better weight-loss results. Just follow these tips to get yourself that much closer to your goal weight.

Have a Low-Sodium Dinner
“If you want to wake up feeling less bloated, definitely skip the Chinese dinner,” says Keri Gans, R.D., author of The Small Change Diet. What happens is the salt stays in your system overnight, so you wake up puffier than you normally would. The best option is to cook a healthy meal of steamed veggies and a lean protein—neither of which should be loaded with salt.

Make Sure Your Bedroom is Super Dark
The hormone melatonin can help your body produce more calorie-burning brown fat, according to an animal study published last year in Journal of Pineal Research. Since your body already produces melatonin when you’re in complete darkness, make sure your room is light-free to boost and promote weight loss.

Turn Down the Thermostat Before Hitting the Hay
The idea of burning more calories while you sleep may sound too good to be true, but a National Institute of Health Clinical Center study found that people who slept in a 66-degree room burned seven percent more calories than people who snoozed at 75 degrees. Seven percent isn’t a ton—but it can’t hurt!  SEE MORE that will PROMOTE WEIGHT LOSS

Top Foods to Gain Muscle

People that workout in the gym want to build muscle tissue. Both men and women know that toned, firm muscles look great. You need to workout to achieve good growth, but to build large muscles, you need to eat right. Finding the top foods to gain muscle can help you build, while also reducing the amount of fat on your body. Even if you don’t want big guns or washboard abs, these foods help people shed fat, too. Not only do you need to build muscle tissue to get that sculpted look, you need to take off a layer of fat that might be hiding all your hard work.

Start with high quality protein.

Lean red meat is often what people think of when they consider protein, but there are many other types of food that fit that category. Eggs are one source of protein that offers not just high quality protein, but also healthy fat and other nutrients. Eggs have high amounts of leucine that boosts muscle growth. Salmon is another protein choice that provides high amounts of protein, but also high amounts of omega-3 fatty acids and vitamin B. Both play a role in building muscle when you’re exercising.

Which came first, the egg or the chicken breast?

While eggs are powerful in your diet for boosting muscle growth, so are chicken breasts. In fact, many trainers make it one of the most often used protein sources if their client is working to gain muscle mass. It has high amounts of B vitamins that are important for muscle gain, as well as aiding in losing fat, which is just as important for showing those muscles off to the world. While you’re at it, add some “chicken of the sea” and include tuna in your diet. Those omega-3 fatty acids slow muscle loss in older adults and increase muscle growth.

Dairy can help boost muscle growth.

If you want a snack that’s great for your after workout protein, try Greek yogurt or cottage cheese. Both contain high quality protein. You can boost the amount of protein by adding some whey or casein protein in it. Stick with Greek yogurt over regular yogurt to get the most protein per serving. Choose low fat cottage cheese if you’re cutting calories. Cottage cheese has leucine, a beneficial protein that helps build muscle tissue.

• Vegetarians can use beans to build muscles. Beans provide plant-based protein, fiber, B-vitamins, iron, magnesium and phosphorus. They also boost your immune system.
• Almonds, peanuts and edamame—immature soybeans—are great snacks that provide more than just protein, they also provide folate, vitamin K and manganese.
• Have you tried chickpeas? You may know them as garbanzo beans and maybe even don’t like them, but there are some dynamite hummus recipes made from chickpeas that can add to your list of muscle building snacks.
• It’s not all about protein, you need carbohydrates and fats, too. Healthy carbs help you workout harder to build muscles. Consider adding brown rice to your diet for that.

Jari Love – original creator of Get RIPPED! DVD series and group exercise classes. The hot-selling and critically acclaimed Get RIPPED! series enables individuals of any fitness level to burn up to three times more calories than the traditional weight-training program, and has received rave reviews from fitness critics throughout North America since the first title debuted in late 2005.

Lower Your Blood Pressure With Exercise

If you get the verdict from your doctor that you have high blood pressure, it’s not too late to take action.

While you should always follow your doctor’s orders and make sure he okays a program of exercise, you might be able to avoid taking blood pressure medication for the rest of your life. You can lower your blood pressure with exercise and a healthy diet. It takes time, so don’t get rid of your medication right away and never without getting the blessing of your health care provider.

Exercise makes your heart stronger.

High blood pressure comes from the pressure on the arteries. If you’re heart is weak, it has to work harder, increasing the pressure. When you workout regularly, that builds a stronger heart that doesn’t have to pump with as much effort, relieving the extra exertion on your arteries and decreasing your blood pressure at the same time.

Exercise helps you lose weight.

Obesity can make your blood pressure climb. Not only does it affect you while you’re awake, it can cause sleep apnea, which also increases your blood pressure. Exercise helps you lose weight, but you need to have a healthy diet, too. Just losing 2.2 pounds can lower the mercury one millimeter, so you can imagine how much you’ll improve your blood pressure if you have even more weight to lose and accomplish your goals.

Reducing stress can lower your blood pressure.

Stress is a killer and it can be one of the causes for high blood pressure. In fact, you can almost feel your blood pressure climb when you’re in a stressful situation. You can get relief from working out in the gym. Exercising hard can burn off the hormones of stress and replace them with ones that make you feel good. You’ll lower your blood pressure, while you burn off the stressors of the day.

• The changes to your blood pressure don’t occur overnight. It takes between one to three months to see any difference. Even then, the problem will return if you quit working out.
• Exercise can help reduce inches around the waist, which is visceral fat, the most dangerous type of fat that affects all your organs and can increase blood pressure.
• The food you eat can raise or lower your blood pressure. Foods high in sodium can cause your blood pressure to rise, while food high in potassium can help you reduce the effect of sodium on your blood pressure. Eat more whole foods and eliminate processed foods that often have a high sodium content.
• If you smoke, quit. When you workout regularly, it can help you through the rough parts of quitting, but even then, it will be tough…but worth it!

The Only Trend that Matters

by Jari Love

Do you keep up with new trends in the world of fitness? There always seems to be a headline proclaiming the latest and greatest trend, each promising to be the solution that you’ve always needed.

Of course, these trends pass with the seasons, quickly being replaced with something newer and more popular.

Today I’d like you to consider the only trend that really matters to your health and fitness progress: the trend of your own behavior.

Here’s what I mean: Have you ever noticed how easy it is to do the same thing today as you did yesterday? This applies to both your activity level and your diet.

• If you got up at 5am yesterday to get in a workout, then getting up at 5am again today is going to be pretty easy. However, if you slept in until 7am yesterday then getting up at 5am today is going to be much more difficult.
• If you ate pizza and beer for dinner last night, then eating pizza and beer (or a burger and fries) is going to feel pretty natural. However, if you ate grilled chicken and broccoli for dinner last night, then eating a salad and grilled fish for dinner is going to feel easy.

Remember learning about inertia in school? Inertia is the resistance of any physical object to any change in its state of motion. This has incredible application to your fitness journey.

The longer you can maintain a healthy fitness trend in your own behavior, the easier it will become to maintain that trend. Isn’t that great?!

This simple concept, of maintaining your own daily fitness trend, is the way to continue towards your goal, to avoid setbacks, and to maintain your forward momentum.

So the next time that you see a flashy headline about the latest fitness trend, simply smile to yourself and focus on keeping your own daily fitness progress on track.

The POWER of Habit

by Jari Love

John Dryden famously said, “We first make our habits, and then our habits make us.”

Confucius said, “Men’s natures are alike; it is their habits that separate them.”

And Aristotle noticed that, “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then, is not an act, but a habit.”

It’s pretty clear that the habits you adopt will shape who you are. What are your habits?

Do you eat the same thing for lunch, go through the same exercise routine, and fall into bed at the same time each night?

Or maybe you’ve made a habit out of eating something sweet before bed, avoiding the gym, and staying up as late as possible.

When it comes to your fitness, the two habits that define you are your eating and exercise habits. In fact, everyone that you know who is in great shape has dialed in these two important habits.

If you aren’t happy with your body, then simply adjust your eating and exercise habits.

Here’s how to adopt a habit:

• Decide on the ONE habit that you would like to develop. It’s tempting to pick up 3 or 4 healthy habits but choosing just one new habit is realistic and doable.

Here are some healthy habit ideas:

• Do not eat after 7pm each night.
• Bring your lunch to work instead of eating fast food.
• Exercise 4 times a week after work for 45 minutes each time.
• Only eat fruits and veggies as your afternoon snack.
• Get up early and exercise for an hour each morning.
• Workout with me 3 times a week.

Here’s an example:

• My new habit is to work with a personal trainer 3 times each week.
• My 3 main motivators are 1) to feel confident in my bathing suit this summer, 2) to have more energy, and 3) to fit into my skinny jeans.
• The obstacles I will face are 1) not having the energy to go to my session after work, 2) not having enough money to pay for sessions, and 3) not having my spouse’s support.
• I will overcome these obstacles by 1) doing my workouts before work instead of after work, so I have more energy, 2) cutting down on frivolous spending to ensure that I can afford it, and 3) asking my spouse to join me so we can get in shape together.

Commit fully to your new habit, in a public way. This could mean posting it on social media, or simply announcing it at the dinner table. Put yourself in a position where you’ll be embarrassed to give up on your new habit.

Keep track of your progress. You could keep a detailed journal or simply make a check mark on each calendar day that you successfully exercise your new habit.

Once your new habit becomes second nature, usually in about 30 days, feel free to add a second habit by going through the same steps.

Jari Love – original creator of Get RIPPED! DVD series and group exercise classes. The hot-selling and critically acclaimed Get RIPPED! series enables individuals of any fitness level to burn up to three times more calories than the traditional weight-training program, and has received rave reviews from fitness critics throughout North America since the first title debuted in late 2005.

Hitting an Exercise Plateau: What to do

by Jari Love

What is an exercise plateau?

When you reach an exercise plateau, your body becomes accustomed to a workout routine, regardless of intensity. The body has adapted or become accustomed to a specific exercise stimulus. A plateau can also be caused by over-training. Be sure to allow the body adequate rest between workouts to allow the muscles time to repair.

How do you know you’ve reached an exercise plateau?

You no longer feel energized after a workout; instead you feel fatigued and lacking motivation. You may not even feel the drive to complete a workout that you’ve started.

What is a weight-loss plateau?

A weight-loss plateau results when your body adapts to a lower caloric consumption and goes into famine mode. The result is a decrease in metabolism in an attempt to preserve fat reserves. The trick to overcoming a weight-loss plateau is to increase your activity level to give your metabolism a boost.

Tips: What to do when you’ve reached an exercise plateau

1. Change your routine. You can vary your workout routine by trying different cardio exercises, by trying free weights instead of weightlifting machines, or by trying different exercises that target the same muscle groups. This forces the body to adapt, which leads to physical and physiological changes. Change your routine once a month to avoid reaching a plateau and to avoid boredom.

2. Give the body time to rest. Take a week off from your usual structured workout routine and try some less structured, leisurely activities for a week, such as walking, hiking, swimming, or yoga. When you do start back up again, be sure to make a change to your routine.

3. Evaluate your caloric consumption. As your fitness level and muscle mass increase, your metabolism increases, therefore you burn more calories. You may no longer be consuming enough calories to sustain your caloric expenditure. Be sure to listen to your body. If you are hungrier than usual, you may need to increase your caloric intake.

4. Cross-train. You can change your workouts by varying the intensity of your workouts. Try alternating between low-intensity days, moderate-intensity days,and high-intensity days. You can also change up the intensity within a workout session by varying the level of difficulty. Try increasing the weights or increasing the repetitions. If you are using a heart rate monitor, keep track of your average heart rate each workout to ensure that you haven.t lightened the workout to a level below your ability.

5. Get enough sleep to allow for recovery and energy for the next day’s workout. If you can’t break through a plateau, ride it out. It may be that your body just needs a chance to catch up to a new body weight or fitness level.

Jari Love – original creator of Get RIPPED! DVD series and group exercise classes. The hot-selling and critically acclaimed Get RIPPED! series enables individuals of any fitness level to burn up to three times more calories than the traditional weight-training program, and has received rave reviews from fitness critics throughout North America since the first title debuted in late 2005.

Easy Ways to Burn More Fat

It’s not unusual to have someone ask me for some easy ways to burn more fat. A consistent program of exercise and healthy eating is already in place and a good place to start, but they want to boost their success. There are some things you can do to help shed more weight, while maintaining muscle mass, but most of the success comes from lifestyle changes.

Make sure your workout includes strength building exercises.
If you want to lose fat faster, you need to make sure you’re building muscle tissue at the same time. You might see those runners who are lean or hear that cardio burns calories, so you focus your time on cardio workouts. That’s a big mistake. When you burn calories doing cardio, the body burns both lean muscle tissue and fat. That makes it harder to lose weight. The more muscle tissue you have, the more calories you burn 24/7 because muscle tissue requires more calories for maintenance than fat tissue does. Strength building exercises, like weight lifting, not only burns a large amount of calories, it builds muscle tissue at the same time, helping you shed more pounds in the future.

Get more sleep at night.
What could be easier than getting more sleep. In today’s society, it’s almost a badge of honor to skip sleep frequently. However, that’s not good for losing fat. When you don’t get adequate sleep, it changes the hormone balance. Several studies show that lack of sleep can increase ghrelin and reduce leptin. Why is that important? Ghrelin is the hunger hormone and leptin is the hormone that tells your body it’s full. One University of Colorado study showed that reducing sleep to five hours a night caused their subjects to gain two pounds in one week. You’ll also have more energy and be more active when you have adequate sleep and be less prone to sugary treats.

Choose healthy protein and add spicy foods.
Not only does a meal high in protein provide nutrients for building muscle tissue, it fills you up and burns more calories to digest. It’s called the thermic effect if food that simply means the calories necessary to digest the food to provide the body with nutrition. Eating hot peppers can also burn extra calories, just as drinking cold water can. Your body has to burn extra calories to warm the water to body temperature. The capsaicin in the peppers boost metabolism.

• You continue to burn calories after the workout ends when you do strength training or do a HIIT workout because of EPOC—excess post-exercise oxygen consumption—also called afterburn.
• Drink green tea to boost your metabolism. Tea contains substances that help increase fat burning and boost your metabolism.
• Eat adequate fiber. Foods high in fiber are fruits and vegetables, besides certain whole grain products. You’ll eliminate the bloat that comes with irregularity and feel fuller faster, while maintaining blood sugar levels.
• Besides drinking cold water, drinking more water, whether hot or cold, can fill you up between meals and lower the amount of food you eat when you drink it before a meal.

Original Article: https://www.jarilove.com/blog/fitness-tips/easy-ways-to-burn-more-fat/

Jari Love – original creator of Get RIPPED! DVD series and group exercise classes. The hot-selling and critically acclaimed Get RIPPED! series enables individuals of any fitness level to burn up to three times more calories than the traditional weight-training program, and has received rave reviews from fitness critics throughout North America since the first title debuted in late 2005.

Eccentric Training Part II:  Understanding Get Ripped! Jacked

 by Jari Love

Previously, we looked at eccentric training: what it is ( focusing on slowing down the lengthening phase of a movement), and the benefits (many including, but not limited to, greater strength gains, greater weight loss and the prevention and reduction of conditions such as osteoporosis, hypertension, heart disease, high cholesterol and diabetes).

The original idea of slow weight training was developed by Ken Hutchins  in the 80’s.  Hutchins tested his slow method on women with osteoporosis and  after 6 months of only 2 workouts per week,  the women had less pain, saw an increase in their  bone density,  an increase in  muscle mass and reduced osteoporosis (Calandra, https://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercise/features/lift-slow-to-get-fit-fast#1)

Today we are going to take a look at how Jari Love’s Get Ripped! Program has incorporated eccentric training into a new workout that will give you all the benefits associated with this in demand exercise program. Let’s take a look at Jacked!

The specific techniques and exercises selected for the Jacked program are based on extensive research in the fields of physiology, exercise, fitness and sports medicine.  Jacked! exercises offer significant rewards while ensuring safety by focusing on  low impact, and slow movements. Jacked! is designed to constantly challenge the muscles using different tempos in muscle contraction and elongation which results in progressive increases in fitness levels.

The exercises in Jacked! are multi-joint exercises. Multi joint-exercises involve multiple muscle groups which allows us to burn more calories, lift heavier weights and get stronger, faster! Because the objective in eccentric training is to push the muscles to failure, Jacked encourages the use of heavy weights. Eccentric training demands more energy expenditure from both our anaerobic and aerobic systems; therefore, exercises are performed in exercise sets interrupted by brief periods of recovery. The standard exercise list for Jacked alternates between upper and lower body exercises,  in order to allow constant work while muscles groups recover. This format promotes greater muscle growth and reduces the risk of injury.

Each exercise in Jacked is performed for a total duration of 2-3 minutes each.  Jacked uses different tempos, but all repetitions are slow and controlled in order to break exercise plateaus, build strength and of course, burn more calories!

Jacked is the perfect addition to anyone’s exercise regime and is crucial in preventing aging related decreases in health.  Did you know that the average body loses 30% of muscle mass between ages 25-50? Another 30% is lost between ages 50-70 and another 30% between ages 70-80.  With a loss of muscle comes a loss of bone density.  A loss of muscle mass and bone density results in reduced strength, weight gain, and higher rates of falls and injuries. However, resistance training can prevent this decline,  and eccentric weight training programs like Jacked have been shown to be the most effective types of training for preventing and even reversing conditions like osteoporosis. A recent study has shown the numerous benefits of eccentric training including: Increased metabolism, increased strength, increased cardio-vascular health, increased mobility, increased bone density and strength,  improved mood regulation, improved balance, improved sleep, reduced body fat, reduced symptoms of arthritis, reduced lower back pain, and studies suggest this type of training may even help reverse conditions like diabetes (American College of Sports Medicine. “Resistance training and the older adult.” ACSM Website, n.d. Retrieved from: https://www.acsm.org/docs/currentcomments/resistancetrainingandtheoa.pdf)  

Get Ripped!  Jacked! uses the best scientific research to develop a program that uses eccentric training methods to  reduce the risk of injury while promoting  maximal outcomes in wellness. Get Jacked! today!

Eccentric Training Part I: Smart, not Kooky  

 by Jari Love

         First of all what is eccentric training?  Eccentric training doesn’t mean exercising in a kooky way it simply means that the focus of the training session is on slowing down the eccentric, or lengthening, phase of the muscle movement. When we perform an exercise like a bicep curl, our muscles both contract and elongate. The contraction phase of the movement is called the concentric phase and when the muscle is lengthening, this is called the eccentric phase.

            Eccentric training uses slow, controlled movements during resistance training to enhance the overall workout quality. This type of training puts more stress on muscles in both phases. This stress means a higher number of muscle fibers are fired because in both phases muscles are both contracting and relaxing; consequently, a more complete workout is experienced. The objective in eccentric training is to push the muscles to failure.  This happens by making them bear the weight, therefore keeping them in tension, for longer.

            We are actually strongest in the eccentric phase of a movement. This means that we can bear a heavier load for longer when our muscles lengthen. Because eccentric training focuses on slowing down this stronger phase, we can build greater strength during this type of training. Studies have shown that eccentric training can build 50% more muscle in 10 weeks than regular weight lifting. No wonder celebrities like Brad Pitt use this type of training when they need to build muscle fast.

Eccentric training can be safer than traditional resistance training.  Because the concentration is on long, slow movements, there are no erratic or jerky motions.  If we lower, or worse, swing weights without control, then we not only risk injury but we also miss out on all the benefits of slow training. Eccentric training can be done by any individual safely because slow training diminishes erratic movements to allow greater attention to form and quality of movement.

Resistance training in general offers many benefits including: improved muscular strength, increased muscle mass, greater bone density, greater flexibility of joints. Additionally, as you build strength, this increased muscle raises our resting metabolism which means that we will continue to burn more calories even after our workout is over.  

Eccentric training delivers all these benefits as well as some extra advantages. By bearing muscle tension for longer periods of time, slow training offers many benefits. Eccentric training recruits of a higher number of reserve muscle fibers which allows for greater long-term gains in strength. Eccentric training also stimulates our metabolism to an even greater extent than traditional strength training and therefore can result in greater weight loss.

Bottom line: Eccentric training increases weight loss, improves strength, balance and stability, improves and stimulates gains in bone density reducing the risk of fractures and osteoporosis as well as reducing risks of hypertension, heart disease, high cholesterol and diabetes.

The Cure For Lazy

by Jari Love

Is there a cure for lazy? I wonder. I mean I know a lot of lazy people…People who would rather spend the day planted on their couch than anywhere else…who choose take-out over home cooked, every night of the week… who would rather have a root canal than go to the gym.

Sure, I know that we all have our occasional lazy day on the couch, but lately it seems that more and more people are turning laziness into a career.

What about you? Check if the following describe you:

• You are habitually inactive.
• You’d rather be a passive observer than an active participant.
• You’re a master excuse-maker.
• You find shortcuts in order to avoid the long haul.

If that’s you, don’t get down on yourself. There are many legitimate causes of laziness. Here are just a few…

1. Sleep Deprivation: When you’re short on sleep it’s easy to become unmotivated, which quickly turns into laziness. Get a minimum of eight hours of sleep each night in order to maintain enough energy to get you through the day. Some experts even say that ten hours of sleep each night is what you need to function at your best.

2. Caffeine Abuse: Starting your day with a jolt of java may help with your initial alertness, but the dip in energy that takes place a few hours later could be the reason that you become lazy later in the day. Avoid the rush and crash of caffeine and instead rely on your steady supply of natural energy.

3. Bad Habit: At some point being lazy simply becomes a habit. If every night after work you head straight to the couch, it soon becomes automatic and not a conscious decision. Breaking the habit of laziness is actually quite easy. Simply take yourself off of autopilot and make the conscious decision to do something productive instead—like heading to the gym rather than the couch.

4. Inactivity: If your job keeps you in a chair for hours at a time, and you don’t exercise when off the clock, then your body is just accustomed to inactivity. It’s time to wake up your under-used muscles and to reacquaint yourself with the joy of motion. A simple way to get back into the swing of things is to go on a 30 to 60 minute walk either before work or after you return home.

Laziness begins when you ignore that little nagging voice in your head. You know, the one that reminds you when you should take action on something rather than sit by and let the opportunity slip away.

Is today the day that you will kick laziness to the curb…the day that you will take action toward achieving your goals…the day that you will listen to that little voice of reason?