Jes Reynolds…Your Fitness Coach

There are numerous gym tips I can share to help you achieve performance or fitness related goals.  There are so many in fact, that I feel it’s important to first take a general approach, and you can then insert the previous tips I’ve shared into your each step.

1) Determine a clear and specific goal.

2) Evaluate yourself in the three areas of fitness – exercise, nutrition, psychological.

3) Use your goal to create a step-by-step road map that includes incremental victories and ultimate.

4) Find a partner with similar goals and motivation.

5) Re-evaluate yourself each week and identify areas that need improvement.

These basic gym tips are the true steps to achieving any fitness related goal.  For example, if you have a general weight loss goal, but you don’t evaluate yourself in each of the three areas of fitness, you could be totally missing that one final piece of the puzzle.

Think of this, you work hard in the gym all 5 days during the week, you eat relatively healthy and get lots of sleep, but for some reason when the weekend comes, it’s a no holds barred food binge.  You know you’re sabotaging all your weeks’ hard work, but for some reason you keep doing it, week in and week out.  You missed one of the most important aspects of achieving fitness related goals, the mental aspect.

Olympic athletes do it, why shouldn’t you?  It’s the practice of visualizing yourself achieving your dream.  Whether it’s to run a marathon or lose 10 lbs, this mental practice makes all the difference in the world.  In addition to visualizing, you should also ask yourself questions like:  Why am I doing this?  Why am I sabotaging myself?  Do feel like I’m constantly denying myself?  Am I still afraid of being fat?  Am I running away from the ‘fat kid’ I was in middle school?  These questions should elicit feelings and answers that help you understand more about yourself and the things motivating you to either achieve or sabotage your goals.

I hope these gym tips have helped give you insight into what it really takes to achieve your fitness and performance related goals.  As a personal trainer, I’ve worked with hundreds of clients in each of these areas, and I guarantee that as you master each of these tips, you’ll succeed in reaching your goal.

Gym Tips & Workout Ideas – Tip # 1: Start with a clear and specific goal

Whether you are a fitness novice or seasoned expert who aspiring to achieve new things, clear and specific goals will create your path to success.  Defining how to set clear and specific goals has been characterized in many ways, one of the most common being by setting S.M.A.R.T. goals (from Wikipedia): 

S = Specific
M= Measurable/meaningful
A= Attainable
R = Relevant/realistic
T = Time-bound

When you have decided to reach a new level of health, fitness, or athleticism (such as a new 5k or triathlon time) start with the end in mind.  Define exactly what succeeding means to you by using the S.M.A.R.T. goal setting system.  Once you’ve defined your goal, then create a realistic plan that takes you forward step by step until you’ve achieved your objective.

This is one of the simplest yet most important gym tips I can share.  There are millions of health club members working out each day with the simple goal of losing weight, yet year after year their weight stays the same, and it’s not due to lack of desire!  Almost everyone wants to lose weight! 

What is it that holds so many back from achieving this simple goal?  I believe it’s lack of clear direction combined with an influx of confusing, hypnotic marketing messages that fill peoples minds with unrealistic and often unhealthy expectations of what they can achieve.  Long term health and true weight loss does not come from a bottle or a pill, it’s the result of hard work and tenacity, derived from dedicated effort in one direction.

Unfortunately, the goal of ‘losing weight’ + a health club membership does not = weight loss success. It’s just not that simple.  While purchasing a health club membership is a step in the right direction, if you’ve been doing that same workout year in and year out with no results, it’s time to reassess. 

Instead of having a general weight loss goal, try to make it more specific and attach a time factor.  For instance, reducing a pant or dress size in one month or building 5 lbs. lean body mass and losing 5% body fat in three months are both goals that fit within the S.M.A.R.T. guidelines. 

Once you’ve determined your goal, develop a realistic plan to help you achieve it.  Realize that your plan may have to include health and fitness education, either through books or the services of a personal trainer.  If you’ve set an athletic goal, you might employ the services of a sports specific coach or a nutritionist.

Using this method to set health, fitness, and athletic goals will allow you to measure your success or failure to achieve them.  If you missed achieving your goal, refuse to give up.  Instead you can reconfigure your plan and identify strategies that did and didn’t work for you, set a new time frame, and continue forward.

While it may seem trite, this simple concept combined with the appropriate health and fitness education is more effective than any of the popular supplements, workout ideas or gym tips you might find in popular magazines or fitness products.