Every year near the end of the summer fitness professionals, enthusiasts and consumers convene at Can-Fit-Pro Conference and Trade Show, Canada’s largest fitness conference. I attended this year to expand on my personal training skills, fitness knowledge and seek out new fitness gear. I’ve spend about 90% of my time attending various sessions covering everything from advanced nutrition to training to injury recovery to corporate fitness opportunities. Some sessions were very informative and fun and others were less exciting. In this post I just want to share some of my highlights and takeaways.
Attended a great lecture by Dr. Len Kravitz. Dr. Kravitz discussed amazing strategies on how to burn more calories and boost fat metabolism. Including everything from nutrition tips to training to how hormones affect fat storage. His lecture and teachings were based on solid scientific proof and research. For example, he provided great findings that illustrate ideal exercise intensity needed to maximize fat loss.
There were many practical/workout sessions during the conference. One of my favorites was Personal Training session sponsored by adidas. Learned a couple of really good stretches that can be done in a shorter period of time while targeting many major muscle groups.
In total I attended over 10 different sessions. Here are some other quick tips I picked up along the way:
- eat veggies, then eat more veggies
- low GI foods give you energy to train longer
- spinach is amazing, learn to love it
- when taking on a diet program, see if the results are backed by scientific (independent) research or credible case studies
- hormones are extremely important. we need to be learning more about them and how what we eat and do affects them
- celebrate your fitness accomplishments with something that gives you an opportunity to show off your fitness
… and there are so many other things I learned and discovered that I will be incorporating into my training routines and with my clients.
We’re right in the midst of the barbecue season. There’s nothing more that I love in the summer than barbecued meat. There are some good and healthy meats you can throw on the grill and there are many unhealthy choices. I went to local grocery store to get some healthy burgers. My decision was based strictly on the nutritional content. Good ratio of proteins to fats to carbs. Brought it home and threw on the bbq. As the burger was about to finish, I noticed something oozing out of it, again (I noticed this before in other store-bought burgers). Since I’ve been eating a lot of healthy homemade meals lately, I was dissgusted by what I saw on my grill. So whatever the ooze was, whatever the manufacturers load up their burgers with couldn’t be good. It didn’t look natural and made my stomach churn.
I decided I make my own healthy homemade burgers. With less than 5 minute of prep time I made some delicious and healthy beef burgers. This type of nutritional content can’t be beat by boxed burgers.
1 Homemade Beef Burger Patty (5 oz): Calories 256, Fat 12g, Carbs 11g, Protein 24g
Homemade Beef Burger Ingredients:
- 1 lb of extra lean ground beef
- 1 egg
- 1/2 small onion, diced
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1 oz breadcrumbs
- 2 tsp Worcestershire Sauce
- 1 tbsp Diana Gourmet BBQ Sauce (optional)
Put it all into one bowl, mix it up and make it into 4 patties.
Grilling the burgers doesn’t take long, but make sure you flip them regularly and cook them thouroughly, especially if your patties are as thick as I like to make them.
Lastly, don’t add extra calories. Don’t put on ketchups, mayos and sauces. But if you really want to, just lightly brush some Diana Sauce on your burger. If you add tomatoes, pickels and lettuce, your burger will be juicy and delicious. For buns, choose a healthy variety like 100% whole wheat or multi-grain. A complete meal with a side salad is under 500 calories.
