Toning Trainers and Barefeet Running

Last week Reebok were fined $25 million because of false claims about their “toning” trainers http://bit.ly/nVBEvs. Then at the end of the week a small study was released claiming that more than half of the women studied showed no benefit from wearing barefoot running shoes http://nyti.ms/o792cP. So, I thought I’d shed some light on the situations and give you my thoughts about these two different types of products and whether they are worth your money.

“Toning” Trainers?

So far I’ve called them “toning” trainers but from here on out they shall be referred to as, “Rounded-Underneath’s-Bought-By-Idiots-Seeking-Health (or rubbish) trainers. Reebok seem to have muscled their way in to a market that has been about for a couple of years. These “rubbish” trainers have been around for a while, each with the same principle; by having a rounded, unstable sole the trainers are supposed to make your leg muscles work harder when you walk to keep you balanced. Reebok came in, put the fantastic body of Kelly Brook at the front of a big advertising campaign and have sold quite a few of these trainers. And I’m not surprised; the suggestion of a body like Kelly’s just by wearing a pair of trainers is an attractive offer for most women.

The Problem

Reebok have been fined because their claims of your muscles working harder have been false. However, even if their claims were true, I would still advise people to take steer clear of these “rubbish” trainers. The selling point of them is an age-old method of selling anything in the health and fitness sector – do less and get better results.

But let’s think about it, even if these trainers make your muscles work harder, when would you wear them, to work with your office wear? I don’t think your boss would be impressed with your new casual look? Would you wear them for all of your outside of work activities, when all your short journeys are taken by car? The point is most people would only wear these trainers at one specific time, their dedicated exercise time.

Swap exercise for walking?

So, you’ve started wearing the trainers and you’re going for some walks. Great, I’m not going to say anything bad about someone willing to try to exercise and improve the health and fitness. I will say though that it is naive to think that, because you’re wearing your brand-spanking-new-give-me-a-body-like-Kelly-Brook trainers, all you have to do is walk and you will give your muscles a workout.



"Wow, if I get some of these trainers, I could look like that?" Um, no!



Bottom line

You will not get a Kelly Brook bum (no pun on the subheading intended) by wearing these rubbish trainers. You will by exercising.

Barefoot shoes

In the running community barefoot running is growing in popularity. The theory goes that we are biologically wired to run barefooted. In however many 1000s years BC, man hunted and man’s advantage over beast was that man could run and run and run and run and.....you get the picture. Usain Bolt can run 100m in around 9.5 seconds. In the animal kingdom this is embarrassingly average.  Patrick Makau  ran the Berlin marathon in 2 hours 3 minutes and 38 seconds. Not many animals could match that. Humans were made to run and we have ran barefooted for thousands of years.

Man no like soft, cushioned foot thing

I've always thought my toes would be happier if they were
seperated and hugged, individually by my running shoes

Along came the commercial world and they said, when running cushion your feet, our trainers will save your joints. Trainers were built up and today you can buy all manner of shoe to make it feel like you’re running on pillows. The fad now though is switching back to minimalist. The reason is that this way your joints will be spared of huge forces and pressure. This happens as you switch from striking the ground with your heel, as you do in cushioned trainers, to striking the ground with the ball of your foot as you run.

Do they work?

The study that I linked to at the beginning looked only at the Vibram FiveFingers but most of these shoes follow the same principle; they are light and thin, offer little cushion and support and are basically there to stop you cutting your feet on the ground. In my opinion there are too many positive things coming out about these shoes for me to think they aren’t worth the hype. I haven’t tried them myself but I am very, very tempted to.

 In the study the half that continued to heel strike first when wearing the FiveFingers were doubling the impact compared to traditional trainers. But, those who switched to a forefront strike reduced the impact compared to traditional trainers.

One of the reasons why half of the women saw no benefit has been said to be that they made no effort to modify their form. A conscious effort may be needed to change your form and adjust to the minimalist shoe. It was suggested that the transition from traditional to minimalist shoe was slow and progressive to ensure that the correct form and technique developed.

Summary

So, let’s conclude. Reeboks “rubbish” trainers probably (maybe even definitely) won’t give you a bum like Kelly Brook. Minimalist shoes might not help you reduce the impact when running straight away but will do if you take the transition to these shoes slowly and make a conscious effort to change your form.

Thanks for making it to the bottom. Please feel free to make comments on any of the posts. If you like what you’re reading then please subscribe to the blog. For daily health and fitness tips, links and more follow us on twitter at @FSLifestyle

Ways to stay unfit and ruin your fitness plan

Are you happy with having a tyre around your stomach? Do you want your weight loss program to fail? Is your fitness training just too fun and giving you too much personal satisfaction? Then look no further, we have the definitive list of ways to make your programs fail.

Do the same type of exercise all of the time

Cross train to avoid injury? No thanks. Mix up training intensity to hit different physiological systems and different types of fitness? Nah, not us. Try a completely different sport/exercise program if you’re getting bored? Don’t think so. For us that want to fail, we’re going to do the same thing until we’re blue in the face. And then we’re going to do it some more.

Don’t match your diet to your personal aims

Want to lose weight? Get a huge fix of calories each day. Looking to gain muscle? Green leaf salad twice a day is plenty. Training more than once a day? Forget recovery food, train your starved muscles to the max. To make sure we fail we don’t need to bother thinking about what we eat in terms of our goals. We definitely don’t need advice from people who know better than us, advice is for wimps.

Never Warm-up

Who needs to get their heart rate up slowly? What’s the point of getting blood to the muscle’s where it’s needed before training/performance? Do your muscles need warming-up, stretched a little? Do they heck. Feel the ping as your cold, stiff muscles snap by going from nothing to all out max by missing a warm-up. Warm-ups take all of 5 minutes which is way too much time to take out of our incredibly busy lives.

Not warming-up? Why bother cooling-down

When we’re done, we’re done. There’s no point in helping the body recovery so it’s ready for next time. Help get rid of all that lactic acid that’s built up in the muscles? Start to repay that oxygen debt? Those things are for mugs. The next time we train/perform, our aching, tired and unrecovered muscles will be grateful for not doing a cool down.

Train in unsuitable clothes

Office suits are great for race-wear

Trainers that are suitable for your feet and for your exercise? Reflective clothing at night? Comfortable clothes that aren’t restrictive? Why bother? You can’t beat combinations like jeans and flip flops for cycling, your work suit for weight lifting and short skirts and heels for trail running.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggXmKPMaHMo

Thanks for making it to the bottom. Please feel free to make comments on any of the posts. If you like what you’re reading then please subscribe to the blog. For daily health and fitness tips, links and more follow us on twitter at @FSLifestyle

Honey, I blew up the kids

A lot has been written in the last few years about the way the way there are more obese children than there previously have been. Everyone has been bombarded with reasons and fingers have been cast at who is to blame. The hard fact is that, if you are overweight, your children are more likely to be overweight and if your kids become overweight, they are more likely to remain overweight throughout adulthood. The key is to do the right things early on in their lives. I’m sorry for the clichés and bad sayings but, a leopard never changes its spots and you can’t teach an old dog new tricks. If you have brought your children up in a certain way that has seen them put on weight then it will be very difficult to then try to convince them to change.

So, how old are we talking and what sort of things should you be doing?

Well, first of all I’m not saying anything radical or extreme like all 1 year olds should do sit-ups or new-borns should on a salad diet. There are certain things that you can do though.

Ditch the buggy

Once your child is 2 or 3 and are confident walkers, encourage them to walk as much as possible. Start to use any sort of push chair sparingly when you’re out and about. Walking is a fantastic, gentle exercise for your spawn of your loins, as well as yourself.

You can’t beat sleep

Sleep is vital for kids’ growth and development. A lack of sleep can also lead to eating more during the day. Try to get them into a routine of going to bed and waking up at the same time each day. Having a warm bath 90 minutes before bed can help soothe them into a peaceful night’s sleep without the need of counting sheep. Avoid them having anything sugary a couple of hours before bed as this can make kids hyper and less likely to settle into the land of nod.

Don’t use food as a reward

If you start to use food as a reward (all you “if you be good, we can go to McDonalds” parents, you know who you are) your kids will start to see these sorts of foods as treats and use them as their go-to food when they want something they enjoy. Next time they start to feel down, they’ll hit the junk food you gave them as a treat to try and cheer themselves up. Why not use a family day out as a treat or create a rewards and penalties chart and make them work up towards those football boots or bike that they want so much.

Let them watch Scooby Do and Lazy Town, not Charlie and Lola, apparently

The Department of Health has released a list of kids programmes which ranks the shows based upon how much physical activity is done by the main character, it’s great to see the hard-core issues being tackled. The group of Doctors, who were in all probability paid to do this, placed Scooby Do at the top of pile and Charlie and Lola were left slouching in last place. The full list is below;

1.       Sccoby Do

2.       Shaun the Sheep

3.       LazyTown

       4. Peppa Pig

       5.Bob the Builder

       6. Tom and Jerry

7. Dora the Explorer

8. Looney Tunes

9. sponge Bob Squarepants

10. In the Night Garden

11. Ben 10

12.  The Simpsons

13. Phineas and Ferb

       14. Sarah Jane Adventures

       15. Tracey Beaker

       16. Postman Pat

       17. iCarly

       18. Horrid Henry

       19. Garfield

       20.  Charlie and Lola

 

Before we get into anything serious here I just want to say how funny it is that a group of adults who have gone through years of medical training have sat around a computer discussing whether Peppa Pig is more active than Sponge Bob Squarepants.

The important thing here isn’t the order of said list (which is completely wrong, how is Shaun the Sheep more active than the forever running Tom and Jerry or the walking delivery man that is Postman Pat?). The important thing is why is there a list at all. Surely the message should be “try to cut down how much tele your children watch”, and not, “watch Scooby Do because he runs a lot”. Actually, isn’t this the same Scooby Do that constantly talks about eating and eats all manner of food without eer gaining weight? Sorry, again, that’s beside the point. It’s a struggle to work out how such a “study” (that term is used very, very loosely) gained funding, or publication. It offers nothing of any use to the public, parent’s behaviours will not be affected and it will do nothing to help get kids active. Why not promote kids watching sport on tele, or, crazier still, why not promote actual physical activity for kids. Watching Scooby Do will not help your kids 2-5 how to live a healthy lifestyle, having well-informed parents will. Why not publish a list of 20 alternate ways to entertain your child whilst you are doing the house work or whatever else you may need to get on with. Something like playing in the garden, a small enclosed trampoline?

So, turn off the tele (even if it is Scooby Do), ditch your buggy , help them get a full nights kip and stop using food as a reward and your kids will be on the right path to a healthy lifestyle.

Thanks for making it to the bottom. Please feel free to make comments on any of the posts. If you like what you’re reading then please subscribe to the blog. For daily health and fitness tips, links and more follow us on twitter at @FSLifestyle

Little Bit Extra

So, I’m sure wondering how I’ve been getting on has cost you some sleepless nights lately. Well, worry over, I’m about to tell you. After finally getting my girlfriend to come running with me, the next day she followed me on the bike as I did an interval run. All she was missing was a mega-phone and a spatula. I had the last laugh though as the ancient bike has the most uncomfortable seat in the history of bike seats and so she was struggling to walk afterwards due to a sore derriere.

Not sure if she is planning to do a triathlon or something but the next morning we hit the swimming baths. I’m not sure at what point you become serious at swimming training and switch to the Speedo. Whatever that point is, I’m not there, I’ll stick to the shorts. Swimming went well though and it was good to get a bit of cross training.

Saturday I had  a football match (we lost) and Sunday was a rest day. Monday I went for a tempo run and led me to a question. What is the etiquette for a runner when going past another runner? Casual nod? A smile? High five? I went past a few people on this run. As I saw them coming I thought I’d go with a smile and “alright?”. I thought that would be the most polite thing. As they past I flashed the smile and was about to open my mouth to speak, when I realised I was being blanked. Is that bad runner etiquette? Surely it is.

Anyway Tamworth 10k is the next race I’m entered in. Less than 3 weeks to go. By the weekend I’ll have a good idea for a target time.

Thanks for getting down to here.

Wierd Ways to a Better Body

Sorry for the longer than usual gap between the last post and this one. The reasons are because my last post was a Guest Post for the “me, exactly weightloss blog” by Erin Weem at http://meexactly.blogspot.com ( check it out, it’s very good) and then after that I have been away in Palma for a few days.

While I was in Palma, racking my brain as it crisped in the sun or another blog idea, a new blog topic literally fell from the sky. I was in one of those generic, foreign water parks with over-priced entrance, water slides, “dad pants” and at least 2/3 people slipping over on the wet floor. They had a Diving show that they were showing a few times throughout the day and I decided to go and have a watch. While I was in the queue before it started, two men were walking around in speedos. I agree, in normal circumstances, in a water park, men in speedos wouldn’t be so strange or noteworthy. However, these particular men had airbrushed bodies; tanned, waxed and toned to perfection. I am not trying to reveal a guy-crush across the platform of the world wide web. The point I want to raise is that this is something perhaps people would not think about, a sport like diving to get fit. I am not sure what training divers have to endure (if you do then please feel free to let the rest of us know in the comments) but it is obviously physically demanding enough to produce well toned bodies.

Would you normally think about diving as a way to keep fit? Or a way to lose weight? The guys doing the diving were great at what they did; they put on a great show and looked good technically, but the best thing was that they looked like they enjoyed it.

After the water park and the Diving show, I went to a diner show in the evening. And, low-and-behold, I was presented with another example of a weird way to keep fit. The “Pirates” show that I watched was full of dance, gymnastics and contortionists that were all incredibly fit and athletic. The dancing girls did high tempo routines that would tire most people; the gymnasts could bend and fold as if being shaped by someone doing origami and the contortionists had superhuman core strength. The  contortionists in particular really impressed me; what they could do obviously takes hours and hours of training each day. Again, the point is, these are three ways that you may not associate with fitness or first think of if you were to try and get fit/lose weight.

The contortionists at the Pirate Show looked incredibly toned and showed unbeleivable strength doing things like this

I’m not saying we should all go out and try diving/dancing/gymnastics/contortion, but why not? Or, why not something similar?

Little Bit Extra

So , what’s been going on with me?

Went on an easy 5 mile run on Tuesday morning. Does anyone else listen to podcasts and laugh out loud, only to get weir d looks from the people you go past? It happened quite a few times today.

Had a football match in the evening, won 4-2 playing with 10 men for the second half. Very tired afterwards so made sure I had a good stretch and a cold shower after the game.

Wednesday, something unbelievable happened. After over a year of trying, I finally got my girlfriend to come running with me. It helped show me the struggles some people might have if they try to get fit and how they might quit early on. My girlfriend really struggled and we had to stop a few times. We managed to go 2 miles altogether and I am really proud. I do empathise with people who might struggle now, despite all the best intentions. What I think it did as well was to show me how important a supporting friend is. She may well have stopped sooner if I wasn’t there encouraging and saying how well she was doing.

So, if you are the struggling new comer, ask a fitter friend to go with you, whatever activity you want to do. Or, if you’re that fitter friend, think about encouraging friends to start exercising, go with them and offer advice.

Hope this was a little better than last time, if not, you know where the blog stops and this starts, just look for the footsteps.

Do the Little Things Make a Difference

 Outrage has begun to descend across Britain as the U.S. has begun to meddle with a British favourite, HP sauce. This trademark British condiment is to have its recipe change in order to comply with a pledge signed by U.S. company Heinz to reduce salt and fat levels in food. This has left some of Britain furious, saying that it has changed the taste.

Heinz have reduced the salt content of the recipe in compliance with the pledge they signed, the overall aim of which is the government’s hope to reduce the amount of salt people eat by 1 gram per day. It has been estimated that this could save the NHS £46m a year within 3 years. I am not sure what calculation was used to work that figure out and I feel sorry for the person who was handed the task of working that one out. Maybe he/she thought they were being asked how much money Arsenal should have sold Fabregas for.

There can be no denying that something needs to be done in order to reduce British health problems. But what people have taken issue with is that the taste has been sacrificed for the sake of a small reduction in salt. If you think how much sauce a person has each time they have some and then how often they have sauce, does it really make a difference how much salt is in our HP sauce?

This does indeed seem such a small, insignificant difference. If you imagine that nothing else changes in a person’s life other than the salt content in their HP sauce goes down a little then yes that is an insignificant difference. They might be putting that sauce on a greasy fry-up that could feed a family of 5. But if the salt content in their sauce goes down, they park in the furthest space from the shop instead of the nearest so they have to walk a little, they have less sugar in their tea or coffee....the little things soon turn into a big thing. By changing lots of little things you would be surprised how much you could improve your lifestyle. You will not shift stone after stone or inch over inch over night, but your long term health will improve gradually. Part of the problem is that too many people have too many little bad habits like parking close to the shops or taking the lift not the stairs or eating larger than necessary portions. It could be that the build of all these little things is what has lead to a person being overweight.

So is our HP sauce worth the sacrifice? No? What about the weekly Chinese? Things like this can be seen as a sacrifice to your life in order to improve your health. But if you are overweight then some “sacrifices” have to be made. But is it a sacrifice to have a something else or do something else. I do not want to go into something completely different but it may be that people aren’t sacrificing taste or convenience by switching what they eat and what they do, just their habit. If you do something every day for most of your life and then someone tells you that you need to stop, it probably will feel like a sacrifice.

The point is, yes HP sauce tastes different and the difference in salt is slightly insignificant. But something has to change in order to make the population healthier. There is too much food out there with high salt or fat or sugar and people just accept it. If everyone changes some of the little things, they may end up surprised by the big difference they might see in their health.

Thanks for making it to the bottom. Please feel free to make comments on any of the posts. If you like what you’re reading then please subscribe to the blog. For daily health and fitness tips, links and more follow us on twitter at @FSLifestyle

Little Bit Extra

I’ve decided to keep you all in the loop about my own health and fitness. At the minute I play football (soccer if you’re American) and I enter a few long distance races. I’ve always played football but only just started running. I’m hoping to move from a middle of the pack runner to a front runner in these races. Come along for the ride as I tell you about all the runs I get up to, my recovery and let’s see if I can get better. So....let’s get started.

I have just got back from Palma where I enjoyed a great 4 day break. Unfortunately, despite my best intentions and me taking my running trainers, I only went on one run and it was only 1 mile long. Poor showing I know. The day I got back, I went on a run that I planned to be 6 miles but I only managed 3 as my calf was in agony. Bit of RICE (rest, ice, compression and elevation) the rest of the day yesterday and then I’m going to see how it is during an easy run this morning then I’ve got a football match tonight.

Sorry that it wasn’t terribly exiting this time. But stick with me, next time there’ll be more stuff to read I promise.

Is your high maintenance hair making you pile on the pounds?

The secret to your weight problems may not be what you eat, your genes or metabolism, as some leading scientific research would suggest. No, the reason could be in the shape of heated metal-plated tongs (aka hair straighteners) or in the shape of hot air blowing devices (aka hair dryers). This is what U.S. Surgeon General, Regina Benjamin. Those who spend hours on their hair are apparently less likely to exercise than those who spend seconds.

Evidence

If a U.S. Surgeon General is ready to cast aside the widely held beliefs of the causes of obesity or weight gain (or actual FACTS) and instead throw in a new, radical approach to the obesity epidemic plaguing both the U.S. and the U.K. where we attack it one hair styling product at a time, then surely she must be backed up with some research or study. Well apparently not. The claim seems entirely based on her own experiences;

“Often you get women saying, “I can’t exercise today because I don’t want to sweat my hair back or get my hair wet”, she was quoted as saying.

 So, no hard figures on the number of women who won’t exercise in fear of ruining a well crafted barnet, no findings on the impact that this had on women’s desire to exercise in comparison to other factors, just the claims of one doctor who has had a few women through hers doors who are reluctant to exercise and have probably blurted out more than one excuse. I think we all know that person who you’re all waiting for when you’re going out, their hair is sculpted to perfection, but they’ve had stylists commissioned and they’ve been doing it for the last 8 hours. But does this happen every day? Would these people actually not exercise in case they messed up their hair?

Contradiction

A lot of people who spend a lot of time on their hair are image conscious. So is it accurate to say that someone would obsess with their hair but then completely disregard the gut? I would say the answer to this is yes and no.  I know people who don’t exercise, are overweight but still put a lot of effort into their hair. On the other hand, I know people who are very image conscious that exercise vigorously to get a perfect body as well as spending many nights annoying friends who wait on whilst they do their hair. My point is, I don’t think Regina Benjamin has a valid point. What she says is happening I could only imagine seeing on an episode of The Only Way is Essex. People who do not exercise will often find reasons not to. I have not seen the full interview with her, only what was printed on an online article. It may be that this was one of many things that Regina said but the article just put an interesting slant on what she said. If this is the case I apologise to her if she had made valid comments and can only slam the writer of the article for putting a nonsense spin on it.

There is an obesity problem in the U.K. and U.S. FACT. There are lots of underlying reasons behind this. FACT. Hair straighteners, hair dryers and a large group of women who are not willing to mess up their hair during exercise are part of the reason. NONSENSE

Thanks for making it to the bottom. Please feel free to make comments on any of the posts. If you like what you’re reading then please subscribe to the blog. For daily health and fitness tips, links and more follow us on twitter at @FSLifestyle

Want to Guest Post

 

I would love to have other writers put in their thoughts and experiences on FootSteps LifeStyle blog. If you're interested, please email me at  pughy5@googlemail.com with your article idea(s). Please put 'Guest Post' in the subject area.

FootSteps LifeStyle Guest Posting Guide Lines (The Rules)

Topics: 
This is a weight loss, health and fitness blog, so please keep the topics related to food, health, weight loss or products or people revolving around those subjects. If you have a fringe topic just email me and we might be able to work with it. I accept product reviews as well, except for products I already have reviewed or are in the process of reviewing. I'm also tentatively willing to accept articles about a product(s) you may be selling as long as it is healthy and revolves around this blog's subjects.

Be Unique:
Please submit something different and/or unique and not something that's been covered tirelessly by every other blog. Also, please submit material that you have not published before either on another website or your own.

Please include a Byline:
A Byline is a short paragraph about yourself and your website. You may have up to 2 backlinks in your Byline.


Other Links:
You may have up to 3 reference links in the main body of the guest post, but please keep them relevant to the article.

Editing:
I reserve the right to make small edits to the article to help with flow. If extreme editing is needed I will ask you for another draft. If you have images you want included in the article, please attach or link them in the article email with a few words on the source(s) of the images and I will stick them in.

After Publication:
I ask that you please check back to your guest post frequently for approx. 2 weeks after your article is published to answer any comments and questions. I also ask that you advertise your guest post with whatever social networking site(s) you like such as twitter, facebook, etc.

Reasons Why Guest Posting is Good for your Website or Blog:

1. It adds targeted backlinks for your website or blog
2. It exposes you and your writing to other readers
3. It connects you to other webmasters and bloggers
4. It gives you more traffic to your website or blog

And that's it! After you've submitted your post for review I will get back to you within one week to let you know if I'll be using it, and should be published within a week after that. Please note: if I have a lot of guest post requests I will only be publishing one to two guest posts per week; so it's first come first serve but I'll give you an estimated publish date if it takes longer than a week.