Hi guys, it’s Kris Stokes from Custom Fitness here, your personal trainer in Amarillo, Texas.  Custom Fitness is personal training studio where we can customize everything that people need. We provide more of a boutique approach to personal training. We are going to not only provide you with a unique customized solution for your goals, but also make sure that you have every piece of the puzzle. That includes knowing whether or not the workout that you’re doing is right for you. A lot of times people can go either way on this, you can feel different things from it. If you’ve got a workout that’s not right for you, it’s not going to get you to your goals and where you need to be. It also has the possibility of doing some physical harm to you that may or may not last a lifetime.  If you would like a second opinion on your workout or you’d like a fully customized program where you will train like a celebrity, give us a call: 806-322-3188.

Today we are looking at the differences between good and bad workouts. I’ll show you  what to look for when you’ve got a workout that’s just not getting you the results you want.   Lately we’ve been posting a lot about exercise techniques on Facebook and our blog. We have posts about burpees, lunges, and more if you’d like to start taking a closer look at the workouts you are doing; feel free to check them out.

There are times when people get out of shape.  The industry calls being out of shape  “deconditioned”.  Being deconditioned isn’t a bad thing just means you haven’t been working out in a while. Maybe you haven’t pushed your muscles in that way in a while, or gotten your heart pumping.

No Results

I have had several clients over my years as a personal trainer in Amarillo tell me the same story.  When they realized they were deconditioned they all took the same approach. Suppose  you wake up one morning, knowing that you are out of shape; you’re tired of breathing heavy at the top of the stairs, or you want to chase your kids around the playground.  You are determined to make a change happen ASAP.  You make a plan to workout in a class or lifting weights, or going on a run.  You’ve decided this workout is going to be great and your mind  has really built it up for you (2 week abs fantasy, anyone?).  So you show up to workout and you get through it, but you leave feeling like it wasn’t very effective. Maybe you feel like that wasted your day, your time, or your money; maybe you don’t see any results at all. A lot of people still go back the next day and the day after hoping that the first time was a fluke and that if they can just go to one more session that’ll be when they feel progress.  That’s not always the case if you’re not exercising correctly.

When my clients tell me those stories, I am so glad they realized their mistake and they came to see me.  If you are experiencing the scenario above, you may be performing the wrong work out for your body.  If you’re not seeing physical results, feeling good things happening within your body, or seeing changes happening to your sleep and energy levels, your workout may not have the right combination of things to get your body into shape.

Pushing Too Hard

To me, your physical safety is my priority. This issue is very important to me; yes, money and time are valuable, but without being safe you could be out of both of those things for a while. Many people who experience the above epiphany, they say “today is the day! I’m deconditioned, but I’m going to go in, I’m going to make this work out great, and in 4 weeks from now I’ll look awesome!” So, they show up to workout and they push too hard. Did you know that when you go overboard right off the bat your body physiologically just can’t handle it?  These folks will start to notice some pangs of trouble (i.e.feeling dizzy, faint, light headed, “seeing stars”, wanting to throw up, wanting to pass out, etc.).  

If you being seeing or feeling any of those symptoms then you know that you are pushing way too hard. Honestly, there is no need to feel like that when you are working out. I know there’s a whole group of viewers out there who were involved in sports like football, where the mantra was if you didn’t work hard enough to throw up, you didn’t work hard enough and your workout wasn’t good enough. I will tell you the if you are pushing for your general goals  (not trying to be an athlete, not trying to train for a major event, etc.) you can do workouts that feel good. Yes, you will get sore from them, but you can still put your shirt on the next morning.  You may feel a little stiff the next day, but you can still get up off the toilet by yourself without having to take a buddy to the bathroom with you. There are a lot of ways to work your body that won’t leave you feeling like crap the next day.

When you work out you need to think about if you are pushing yourself too hard by asking ourselves repeatedly, “how do I feel right now?”  Your deconditioned the body can’t do what you can do say 10 years ago 20 years ago when you start your journey towards conditioning. Instead, it can do what it can do today. We need to analyze and assess where we’re at today.

We’ve posted got some great information on our website about assessments; the when and why of assessing your body in its current physical state. Assessments are part of our process at Custom Fitness because we want to make sure that we are doing what is appropriate for you today and not what was appropriate for you in highschool. We want to make sure that you’re pushing your own current levels.

Chronic Issues

The first situation was that you could go and push too hard in that first workout. Let’s tease this out some more. What happens if you make it past the first workout? What if you keep pushing too hard? You keep working out while doing the wrong things (ex. weights, exercises, techniques) even when your body is not physically ready? Firstly, you can lead yourself to injury. You can go too hard in the paint and end up tearing something, breaking something, or causing something to move incorrectly that will require 3-6 months to heal. That just kind of ruined that goal of getting back in shape ASAP.  You can also cause some internal effects that people don’t see as much. You can do anything from jacking up your metabolism, to you throwing off your hormone balance, to throwing off your internal systems causing them to work against you and your health goals (i.e. muscle gain, building tone, losing weight, etc.).  So your body will work against you as you are trying to push it too hard in the wrong direction.  

How to Fix it?

There’s always a great path to take: it is effective, efficient, includes the correct intensity, combines the right things at the right time for our bodies. Finding this plan, however, takes bit of knowledge. We live in a do-it-yourself Nation, do-it-yourself era, where the whole world wants to be able to step in and do everything themselves. I can guarantee you that if I stepped into your job today, I would try my best, but I would still need a lot of help from people who are experienced in your field.  Know that whenever you’re going into a situation where you really want to see results, it’s not always a do-it-yourself situation. Sometimes you can with good results, but other times you really need to seek some help.  

Whether you get a workout or attend a group class at our studio or you download a workout program that’s published online, or you follow a book.  There are a lot of different routes that you can take to become conditioned, but you want to check the safety of whatever route you choose.  Make sure that it is the right work out for you, right now,  so that you’re not wasting your time your money. I tell people you can always make money back, but you can’t earn back your time.

So today I just want you to remember, if you feel terrible or just not right during your workouts, it is not the right work out for you. If you feel great during your workouts, even if it is just that you enjoy a great sweat, that’s great just make sure that you’re pushing to the level you are at today and not trying to be who you were ten or fifteen or twenty years ago. I hope that you’ll get on our website and check out some of our other blogs at https://customfitness.biz/news/, or if you’re interested in getting started with a customized plan that is full of accountability and tailored to you, we would love to talk with you about your goals. Give us a call for a complimentary consultation when you mention this video. You can contact us at 806-322-3188 or e-mail us at info@customfitness.biz. At Custom Fitness, we are YOUR personal trainer in Amarillo. Bye!