TriLastin SR was seen on the Tyra Banks show as women dished on the best topical creams to remove stretch marks

Stretch marks do not apply just to pregnany women. If you gain weight quickly you have increased risk.. The skin is elastic and capable to stretch a bit, but with extreme weight gain in both men and women it is common to get stretch marks. There is no miracle cure to remove them, but topical creams like TriLastin has been shown to help the skin tighten and even reverse the effects of stretch mark damage on the belly and hips. This is good news for men and women.

Here is an excellent overview of the main myofascial release exercises with the roller:

This doesn’t mean that periodization is bad for weightloss. But you have to design your periodization program around your goals! A typical fat loss diet will control total calories and carbohydrates and you need to take this into account as it will deplete the energy your body can utilize.

There are a few things you can do to manage the stress on the body:

• Make sure you are getting adequate protein. At least one gram per pounds of lean body mass.
• You can still eat carbs, just make them green and fiber and nutrient rich.
• Adjust your periodization program to use shorter cycles.

The idea of short cycles with a periodization program has become popular for people and trainers focusing on weight loss. Many of the “lose fat” workout programs today basically boil down to a different type of workout during the week. So if you are exercising three days a week, one workout would focus on max strength, one on total hypertrophy, and the last on strength-endurance (i.e. high reps and olympic style movements).

This form of undulating periodization program is perfect for weight loss because it taxes different systems in the body all the time and when combined with interval training it can literally melt the fat off.

Drink plenty of water. 10-12 cups of water a day.

Eat 5-6 times a day. Three square meals and 1-3 “flat tummy cocktails.” The cocktail is really a protein shake of water, almonds, whey protein, fat free yourt, fiber, and stevia mixed with your favorite fruit.

Make sure you exercise your abs and lower back. Crunches are a favorite here because they stimulate the digestive system and promote overall health. Pikes, leg lifts and other similar exercises work too.

Go low carb at night. Eat a dinner free of starches. This will give you advantages of the Atkins diet without the pain throughout the day. Your insulin and blood sugar levels will remain balanced throughout the night and while you sleep. This helps with fat loss.

Robb cannot emphasize enough the importance of digestive health. He recommends fat free yogurt or probiotic supplements as a way to clean out your colon and fill your stomach with the good bacteria it needs for healthy function. You can’t lose belly fat without it.

Along these lines, you should use coconut oil. The fatty acids in coconut oil rev your metabolism and burn harmful bacteria and yeast in your stomach.

Finally, eat a fiber rich diet. Fiber keeps everything flowing through your system and blocks the absorption of additional calories of fat around the belly. Fiber also pumps up the power of the B vitamins in your body - giving you more energy.

Follow these steps and you will be able to lose belly fat almost at will.

The second exercise is the snatch. You pick a weight off the ground and in one motion bring it overhead. You can snatch with a barbell, dumbbell, kettlebell. Most people will benefit just using a dumbbell as this is much cheaper than a good kettlebell. The kettlebell is a canonball with a handle attached. They are a classic Russian fitness tool popular in Europe in the 1800s and early 1900s.

Snatches are fast, explosive movement. They are one smooth movement, fast and dynamic. When using a dumbbell for snatches you do a one handed snatch and alternate left and right every set. You don’t need to worry too much about hunching your back or your feet with the snatch. The body is very forgiving on all olympic style movements.
Using these two exercises you can make two routines - A and B - and do them on alternating days.

In the A workout you do snatches on the left side and right. Do sets of 5-10 on each side and rest as needed. Do this for 15 minutes. After one 15 minute segment you can rest for 5 minutes doing some hamstring and back stretches and then do another 15 minute segment of snatches followed by 5 more minutes of stretching the hamstrings and back.

In the B workout you focus on presses. Do sets of 3-5 repetition of barbell or dumbbell overhead presses. Rest 3-5 minutes between sets. The goal here is max strength and progress. So start with a weight you can lift 7 or 8 times and just do sets of 3-5. Do 3-5 sets of 3-5 reps with 3-5 minutes of rest. You can then repeat this “3×5″ workout segment using either a side press or a windmill.

The trick here to get lean muscles is to alternate workout days and workouts. So on Monday you do workout A, Wednesday workout B, Friday workout A. Then the next week you pick up on Monday where you left off and do workout B, then A, then B, etc.

With just the snatch and press you are well on your way to sculting lean muscle and a great body.

Men need to have a body fat percentage below 10% to show a six pack. Women need it to be around 15%. For that lean muscular look you need to lose fat and be strong. Your workout program needs to emphasize strength and endurance. Bottom line, you need to be able to do a large amount of “work” every time you exercise.
The most important thing with any workout program is managing fatigue. If you want to get as strong as a powerlifter or as cut as a bodybuilder or run a marathon, you have to avoid injury and manage fatigue. This is especially difficult when losing fat is anothet goal at the same time.

The normal program of sets, reps and rest times do not work. The problem is that it is too easy to plateau and be unable to make further gains. Over the years, periodized training methods have been created to break through plateaus and prepare athletes for peak performance when needed. These programs are usually very complex and are not suitable for someone focused mainly on losing fat and looking great. You can use the concepts of managing fatigue and increasing the work you do every workout in simple and effective ways. Here is the idea.

1. Work out in 15 minute segments. A typical workout is a 5 minute warm up, 15 minute segment, 5 minute rest, 15 minute segment, and 5 minutes of cool down or static stretching.

2. For each segment do two exercises - one upper body, one lower body. Also mix pushing and pulling exercises. So for a segment you could have an upper body pushing movement like nemch press and a lower body pulling like deadlifts. This provides for a total body workout each segment and maximized fatloss.

3. Use a weight you can do 10 reps of, and start with sets of 5. Do the exercises in superset fashion, alternating between them. Again, start with sets of 5 and rest as needed. The goal is to track your total reps of each exercise and manage fatigue. You may want to rest more and always do a 5 rep set. An alternative is to rest less and start doing sets of 4, 3, 2, or even 1 rep. Again, the goal is to maximize the number of reps in the segment and manage fatigue.

4. For each exercise, use the same weight. You are starting out doing 5 reps of your 10 rep max, so initially it will be easy. The goal is to track total reps and try and exceed this every workout. Once you have exceeded your baseline by 20%, increase the weights the next time you exercise.
Break your workout into segments of 15 minutes each. In each segment you are going to do two exercises, back and forth. One exercise will be a lower body exercise, one will be an upper body exercise. One will be a pulling motion, and the other will be a pushing motion. This upper/lower, push/pull exercise pairings are great for total body training and fat loss.

An example workout segment is deadlifts and military press. Deadlifts are a lower body pulling exercise. Military Presses are an upper body pressing exercise. Try and always use big, compound movement exercises and avoid machines. Sample exercises are squats, deadlifts, lunges, step ups, bench press, military press, push ups, pull ups, rows, and lat pull downs.

Do one to three 15 minute segments, resting 5 minutes between each segment. During an exercise segment, use a weight that you can do 10 repetitions for each exercise. Do alternating sets, starting with 5 reps. Rest as needed and track how many reps total you do in a session. You may decide to rest more and always do 5 rep sets. You can also rest less and lower to 4, 3, 2, or even 1 rep sets.

The goal is from workout to workout to do more work than before. Work is the weight times the reps. Once you’ve done 20% more work, increase the weight for the next workout.

Here’s an example 45 minute workout that will cut and sculpt your entire body and melt fat off:

• warm up for 5 minutes
• segment 1: deadlift, military press
• rest 5 minutes
• segment 2: dumbbell squats, rows
• rest 5 minutes

For example, did you know that eating more garlic (in raw or cooked forms) is associated with a lower incidence of heart disease, owing to its anti-oxidant properties? Onions also have a similar effect. Munching on small amounts ( 1 to 2 oz. ) of nuts such as peanuts, almonds, and walnuts is extremely beneficial for the heart. These are rich in fiber and mono-unsaturated fats (the good type).

The health of your heart is a gift that’s yours for the taking. It’s time for a change of heart. Let’s take a look at the do’s and don’ts for a healthy heart.

Some diets are bad for your heart. A high sugar, low fiber diet. (pizzas, breads, rice, pasta) A high sodium to potassium ratio. (salted foods, low intake of fresh fruits and vegetables) A diet low in calcium and magnesium. (low intake of dairy products) A diet high in saturated fats and low in essential fats. (high intake of fast foods and red meats, low intake of fish and nuts) Each of these can be corrected in part, by a simple nutrition plan, which is outlined below.

Choosing the right kind of carbohydrates is important. Ask yourself if you find it difficult to get by without the following foods - Cakes, candies, chocolates, cookies, etc.
If you do, then it is time to cut down slowly. Eat more whole-wheat cereals, bran, oats, oranges, tomatoes, sprouts, mushrooms, cabbage, cauliflower, and lettuce. Make a fresh bowl of soup each day with these vegetables. Eat lean meats, chicken and fish regularly. Soda is a big culprit in obesity and heart disease. Just try and substitute it with plain old water!

The importance of minerals cannot be overlooked. A lack of calcium, magnesium, and potassium can increase blood pressure. Decrease the intake of sodium, and substitute regular salt with sea salt, which contains an abundance of minerals. Magnesium is strongly correlated with heart health. Non-fat milk, fish and yogurt are great ways to get extra calcium, without the saturated fat. If you take calcium supplements, ask your doctor if you can take a magnesium supplement as well.

Fat plays an important role in heart health, more specifically the type of fat. While we all know the long-term benefits of low fat eating, few realize the immediate repercussions of high fat foods. For example, eating a single high fat meal on Sunday night can increase your risk of having a heart attack on Monday morning!!

In a nutshell, the following foods / factors can prevent heart disease: seafood (omega 3′ fats) and olive oil. Nuts like walnuts, almonds (omega 3’s and magnesium). Fruits, vegetables. (Anti-oxidants). Grains, legumes. Garlic and onions.

As always, try and minimize stress and avoid smoking. Check your blood pressure and cholesterol levels regularly. Don’t forget your annual physical!

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For more information and to register for free and get full-color exercise routines, diet plans and grocery lists, visit http://www.best-weight-loss-programs.net/ , for exercises for women, visit http://www.toningforwomen.com/ and to train with Nitin, visit http://www.phonefitnesstrainer.com/

What makes our life style different than other cultures around the world?

Why do we suffer so much from diabetes and heart related diseases?

How can we make better decisions in choosing the right foods to support a healthy lifestyle? In my most recent trip to South America, I have learned about the eating habits that help support a much more healthy life style free; one free from prescribed medications and free from the struggles of obesity and weight related diseases, such as heart and diabetes. I observed some striking differences about how South Americans live their lives, both in their eating plans and how they approach life itself. I really believe we can learn many things from other cultures that we can pass on to our children in the form of healthier living and creating a life style change that will reduce the risk of obesity in this country.

Here are some of my observations.

What you don’t see in South America : fast food chains on every corner, people eating tons of processed snack foods like potato chips and nacho chips that are loaded with bad fat, high sodium, high bad carbohydrates, and tons of preservatives, donut shops or convenience stores everywhere

What you do see is people making lunch their main meal of the day and dinner the smallest meal of the day.

You also see are foods that are rich in vitamins and minerals, foods that are completely organic and eaten from their most natural state. The South American Culture consumes tons of organic and natural (and I might add unbelievably delicious) fruits and vegetables along with seafood and meats that support a natural healthy lifestyle.

The other key is they consume most of these rich in nutrient foods early in the day and reduce their food consumption later at night, as well as consuming 5-6 meals per day. This sounds familiar, with some of the latest advice from some of the current diet books out promoting smaller more frequent meals and reducing your food intake as you move towards bedtime.

Now that we have a place to start from, let’s talk about the foods that make you FAT! Foods that can make you fat have a few things in common:

• High in total calories
• High in total fat
• High in refined sugars
• High in calorie density
• Low in nutritional value
• High in Sodium
• Loaded with preservatives
• Loaded with artificial fillers and additives

These foods come in a box from the middle aisles of the grocery store and have words that you cannot pronounce on the label. Of course, over the years we have called these foods “junk foods” and in the United States, these “junk foods” have continued to grow in popularity for many reasons.

• They are ready to eat right from a box (convenient)
• They really tease our taste buds with tons of :

• Salt
• Sugar
• Fat

• They make you want to eat more and more of them

Here are the Top Foods that help make you FAT:

Ice cream, donuts, pastries, cakes, pies and cookies Typically high in:

• Bad fats
• Refined white sugars
• Refined white flours
• All fried foods
• High in fat
• Refined white flours from the breading
• Soda and fruit juices
• High in refined sugar and artificial additives Look out for other forms of sugar High fructose corn syrup Corn syrup Sucrose Snack foods, ie. potato chips, nacho chips, etc. Typically high in:
• Bad fats
• Refined white flours
• Sodium
• Refined white sugars
• Artificial flavors and colors
• Preservatives that you cannot even pronounce Processed meat items - Typically “fast food” Hot dogs, Hamburgers, Bacon, Sausage, etc.
• High in bad, bad, bad, fat
• High in Sodium

Usually served on refined white flour breads High Sugar Breakfast cereals High in Refined white sugars High in Refined white flours

If your meal plans are made up of a high percentage of these foods, then you are probably not reaching your fitness and health goals and are struggling to keep the weight off.

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Robert Adams is a Nationally Recognized Personal Trainer, Fitness & Nutrition Coach as well as the Head Fitness Expert at: http://www.myhomepersonaltrainer.com - My Home Personal Trainer Offers FREE Online Personal Training and Complete and Balanced No Nonsense Nutrition Solutions.
Robert also supports a Total Personal Fitness Solution with his Online Personal Training Resource WebSite:
http://www.body-perfect-fitness.com - My FREE Online Personal Trainer Featuring Cutting Edge Fitness, Health and Nutrition related FREE Online Resources

Sometimes, of course, traveling is purely for a vacation – including a vacation from training. Occasional time off from intense training is beneficial and necessary to let your body recover and rejuvenate completely from chronic training stress, just as time off from the office is needed to disengage your mind for a while. It’s also true that it really doesn’t take much to maintain fitness once it is developed, and an abbreviated, but still effective, workout routine could certainly be used, if you choose, when you’re on the road.

However, you still have healthy eating to think about and just because you’re traveling doesn’t mean you can’t follow your regular exercise regimen. Why settle? If you want to continue to improve your physique while on the road, you can! Here are 10 ways that I did it on my last extended business trip that you may find helpful as well. It begins with a simple decision.

1. Decide to improve while you’re traveling and to come home in better shape than when you left

Nearly every time I travel (the exception being if it’s a complete rest and relaxation vacation), I set a goal to come home in better shape than when I left. The only reason most people usually come home with lower fitness and a few extra pounds than when they left is because they didn’t make a decision to do otherwise. In fact, many people hold a belief that it’s “impossible” to stay on their eating and exercise program while they are traveling! Why not get in better shape no matter where you are? The truth is, all it takes is a decision and some planning. I find it a fun and exhilarating challenge to improve myself no matter where I am in the world.

2. Write out your workout schedule in advance

There’s nothing like writing your goals down on paper to keep your mind focused and keep yourself motivated. In addition to writing out goals regularly, preferably every day, you should also commit your training schedule to paper and especially when you are traveling. Write down the days, the time of the day and the exact workout you plan to do and you will be amazed at how easy you will find it is to get to the gym and have great workouts.

3. Get a hotel with a kitchen

The single most important part of my travel arrangements was to book a hotel with a kitchen. For me, not having a kitchen is not an option. If you don’t have kitchen, you will be much more likely to skip meals, it’s very difficult to eat 5 or 6 times a day (as required by any good fat burning or muscle building nutrition program), and you may end up at the mercy of restaurant, hotel or convenience store food. For my most recent trip, I stayed at Homestead Studio Suites, one of several national hotel chains in the USA which includes a full kitchen including a refrigerator, microwave, stove – the whole works. Exteneded Stay America and Marriot Residence Inn offer similar accomodations

On previous trips, if there wasn’t such a hotel with a kitchen in the vicinity, I searched the internet for apartments for short term rental. You may be surprised at the type of lodging you can find and often you will be pleased with price as compared to hotels. I once booked a luxury condo for 7 days and it ended up costing less than the hotel I was first considering, and the hotel didn’t even have a kitchen. Nothing beats a full kitchen, but you may also find that many hotels will provide you with a microwave and mini-refrigerator if you ask for them.

4. Go food shopping immediately after checking in

The FIRST thing I did after checking in was to make a beeline straight to the local grocery store. I took a shopping list with me because on past trips I found that I nearly always seemed to forget one or two small items if I didn’t have the written grocery list. Once you have a fully stocked refrigerator and kitchen, your meal planning and preparation is NO DIFFERENT than it is when you are home.

5. check the local restaurant locations and menus and commit in advance to making healthy choices when dining out

Since I had a kitchen at my disposal, the majority of my meals were just business as usual. I cooked them right in my hotel room and brought them along with me wherever I went. However, when traveling, it’s likely that you will probably be having quite a few restaurant meals.

I make it a habit to scope out the local restaurants in advance and even check their websites. Most have their menus online these days. I make a decision in advance whether it will be a regular meal or a “cheat meal.” If it’s a cheat meal, I enjoy whatever I want, but I always keep portion sizes in mind. For example, last time, I split a slice of cheesecake with a friend. Was I guilty? Heck no, it was my planned cheat day, I only ate half a slice and it was the first cheesecake I had in 12 months!

If you walk into a restaurant without having made a decision in advance whether you are staying on your regular meals or having a cheat meal, you are much more likely to have a “diet accident” and make a poor choice on impulse, especially if you’re influenced by non-healthy-eating companions (don’t under estimate the negative peer pressure factor). All it takes is one unplanned cheat meal and that can often lead to guilt. Then “all or none thinking” tends to set in and you may tell yourself, “Well, I blew it,” so the next meal and then the rest of the week tends to completely fall apart as well.

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Tom Venuto is a natural bodybuilder, certified strength coach (CSCS) and author of “Burn the Fat, Feed The Muscle,”
which teaches you how to get lean without drugs or supplements using secrets of the world’s best bodybuilders and fitness models. Learn how to get rid of stubborn fat and turbo-charge your metabolism by visiting:
http://www.burnthefat.com . Visit Tom’s fat loss support community at http://www.burnthefatinnercircle.com

Hey Ray, I keep forgetting to book an appointment to sit down to try and lose more fat off my tire, so I’ll try and type out my diet thoughts here. It’s going to get long winded but here it goes. I’m sitting at 195lbs down from 242lbs after reading your book, and of course it’s not good enough for me. I have been eating the same portions and food since day 1 when I set up the meal plans for 226lbs. Here’s my game plan, let me know of it makes sense or not please.

- Doing the wild rose cleanse this week starting Thursday.

- At this point changing portions to adjust to 195lb BBE
calculations but up the protein from .8/lb to 1g/lb. Not
a lot of change for my diet actually for the cleanse except for fish instead of poultry, plan to keep protein levels high just using fish (likely lots of salmon), everything else is a match, or close to it anyway.

- When I am done the cleanse and go back to poultry, cottage cheese etc, I am looking at a few changes. The carbohydratess are a no brainer, just cut back a bit. For proteins I eat a pretty standard set of foods:

Meal 1 - cottage cheese 2- chicken / turkey 3- chicken or salmon 4-chicken / turkey 5 & 6- burgers or pork chops, just something other than chicken or turkey. My thoughts are to keep the daily proteins the same except maybe more emphasis on turkey, but change the night meals to white fish or some type - crab, cod, halibut, stuff like that with very low fat contents, or should I be switching everything to white fish to try and cut fat from the diet?

- Still have a protein shake at 10 am and eat ice cream at night (usually an ice cream bar) Ice cream is because I found myself getting dizzy a lot and realized it was lack of sugar, have felt a lot better since starting this.
Anything I can do different as I realize its not the best thing for attaining a 6 pack!

Work outs: Going to start running 3 miles, 2 or 3 days a week before work (this assumes I can drag my butt out of bed) to see if I can get things moving some more, otherwise I am fairly active in the evenings, more so when my shoulder smartens up.

Thoughts? Thanks again, Mack
>From Ray:

First I think you should start looking at body fat percentages now instead of the scale. I saw you the other night and you are getting really lean. I don’t know if you have a certain number you want to see on the scale, but if not, I would be more concerned with body composition than getting that scale to go down any more. After all, do you want to fight at 160 lbs and 10% body fat or 190 lbs and 10% body fat? Just a choice so let me know.

Now on to the diet. The cleanse is going to make you feel awesome after and I think you will see great benefits from it. So that is a go. As for the BEE calculations, I wouldn’t drop as low as 195. I would only go for a 210 for now. Big changes usually cause the body to freak out and rebel. You don’t want that, you have to just tease it a little and not totally tick it off.

With your activity level, I would not decrease the carbohydrates for the increase in protein. This is my opinion but I feel that if the carbohydrates are not available then your body is going to go after the protein next since it is not the macronutrient that is needed for survival, fat is. So it is extra muscle you are after, then add the protein on top but don’t decrease your carbohydrates right now. Not for an athlete.

As for fat, you do not want to cut it out totally. Fat should be at least 15% of your calories. You need this for hormone production buddy. I like the way you cycle your protein sources, keep that up and I would actually go for more fatty meats at night along with fibrous carbohydrates if fat storage is a concern. If that makes no sense to you then we can talk about the science on that later.

As for the ice cream at night, this is weird. You are considering cutting back on carbs for the sake of increased protein but then eating ice cream at night for the sugar you need. See what is happening there? This is another good reason why you need to keep your carb intake at the present levels or even bump them up just a bit. You only need to add a few grams of complex carbs here and there and the light-headedness will go away. Try some oatmeal with a banana any time you need a sugar/carb fix. It will break down fast at the start and slow burn on the end from the banana and oatmeal combo.

Now for the extra activity. I know you know the math of fat loss. 3500 calories per pound of fat is the magic number.
Now how many calories are you in deficit when you calculate your classes, gym sessions and good eating. If you are in deficit then the extra running should only be because you like it or need to improve your performance in running.
Doing excess work to burn calories can throw you into overtraining really fast. Watch yourself. I think you are doing enough activity already with the MMA, my class and the gym. If anything I would go with sprints in the morning if you must go for a run. 10 sprints for 100 yards with 30 seconds rest in between.

Hope that helps buddy! Keep going, your looking great!

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Ray L Burton is a personal trainer and author of the best selling internet ebook titled, Fat to Fit - The Journey.
You can learn more about exercise and wieght loss at http://www.buildingbodies.ca and read more about his weight loss book at http://www.fattofitbook.com