12wk Health Blitz Challenge - Week 9

The Breakfast Club

The reasons for eating breakfast far outweigh the time saved walking out the door on an empty stomach. Eat breakfast everyday. Breakfast kick starts your metabolism, helps you to concentrate and perform better at work and aids in weight loss.

Eating breakfast is simply breaking the fast. We haven’t eaten for up to 12hrs and need to refuel. Think of your stomach like the petrol tank of your car. You put petrol in the tank of you car after it has used up a tank of fuel so that it keeps running. Why wouldn’t we do this for our body?

This week’s challenge is to eat breakfast everyday. Here are the top 8 reasons why we should eat breakfast:

Top 8 Reasons to Eat Breakfast

1. Better focus and better productivity at work, school or at home. Studies on those who work at labor type jobs have shown that those who do not eat breakfast are unable to work as hard until lunchtime and studies on children reveal that they are unable to complete schoolwork.

2. Maintaining healthy weight. People who skip breakfast are shown to choose less nutritious and fast foods choices to curb their appetite. Poor eating habits lead to eating throughout the evening. This is the worst to eat because calories are stored in the evening as the metabolism slows down. Calories stored = fat.

3. Setting an example for your children and helping them develop healthy eating habits at an early age that they can carry on throughout their lifetime. If they see you eat breakfast, they are more likely to as well.

4. Essential nutrients. Many of us do not meet the essential nutrients such as vitamins and minerals needed daily. i.e., calcium, iron, fiber and Vitamin B1. Skipping breakfast guarantees we will not meet these essential nutrients.

5. Lowers cholesterol, which reduces the risk of heart disease. Research has shown that people who eat breakfast consume less dietary cholesterol then do people who don’t eat breakfast. If you eat oats it will lower your cholesterol.

6. Increase your metabolic rate. People who skip breakfast have a slower metabolism rate than normal, which may lead to weight gain of 3.6kg per year!

7. Eating breakfast can have long-term effects and prevent Obesity, High Blood Pressure and Diabetes.

8. Breakfast foods are delicious! Avoid the processed, fatty foods. Skip the breakfast burgers and you will prevent yourself from consuming 560 calories and a whopping 32 grams of fat! That’s not even including a coffee and a hash brown. Why not eat something healthy such as a fruit smoothy, oats or add fruit to fruit free muesli? (Carmen’s is my favourite)

Topic: Breakfasts of champions

Fact 1: Eating first thing in the morning stimulats your metabolism through a process called Thermogenesis

Fact 2: A 2005 study found that participants who consumed a high protein breakfast had enhanced feelings of eating satisfaction, fullness and lower food intake compared with those eating a low-protein breakfast.

Fact 3: Cereal is the number one food bought in supermarkets today. A vegetarian created the first breakfast cereal in 1863 in New York.

Healthy Eating Tip: If you cannot stomach solid food for breakfast try drinking smoothies

Motivational Tip: Change your language! We use negative language to keep us stuck and re-living the same results. Try replacing negative words with positive phrases such as the word “Can’t” with “I choose not to” and “Too Hard” with “its unfamiliar”

12 wk Health Blitz Challenge - Week 8

Chocolate Free

This week for the 12wk Health Blitz Challenge we are going Chocolate Free!!! However, before you panic we will make an allowance for a little bit of Dark Chocolate. 

So your probably asking yourself why are we allowing Dark Chocolate but not milk or white chocolate?

Well there is growing research that indicates that Dark chocolate unlike the other varieties are full of antioxidants which helps fight against cardio cardiovascular disease.

If you would like to know more about the health benefits of Dark Chocolate here are some great articles on the topic..

http://www.webmd.com/diet/news/20030827/dark-chocolate-is-healthy-chocolate

http://www.rd.com/health/3-health-benefits-of-dark-chocolate/

Topic: Eating out

Fact 1: Research (CDC 2006) has found that the world increase in Body Mass Index matches the increase in frequency of eating at Restaurants

Fact 2: Portion sizes or snacks and meals has increased significantly over the last decade.

Fact 3: In 1972, we spent 3 billion a year on fast food - today we spend more than $110 billion

To overcome these issues when eating out follow the tips in this great article.

http://www.uhs.wisc.edu/docs/uwhealth_eating_out_203.pdf

 

Healthy Eating Tip: When eating a meal put your knife and fork down between bites and have a sip of water before picking them up again.

Motivational Tip: Create a playlist of music that motivates and inspires you to keep focused and on track. Play them every morning and whenever you feel you need extra motivation.

12 Wk Health Blitz Challenge - Week 7

All things Green and Wonderful

This is a great week to go and try those fresh fruit and vegetables that you have seen but never tried before. Have fun with this and go to the Adelaide Central Markets and see what you can find and then cook a new recipe.

Your body will thank you for introducing more green vegetables to your diet as they are one of the main dietary sources of fibre and are full of antioxidants, vitamin and minerals.

For more information on the benefits of “All things Green and Wonderful” have a read of this great article by Natural Health Australia –

http://www.natural-health.net.au/articles/nutrition/green-vegetables

Keeping things flowing – the importance of fibre  

Here are some interesting facts on fibre, which is found in abundance in green fruit and vegetables.

Fact 1: Fibre is a plant-based food that your body cannot digest

Fact 2: Fibre helps to transport cholesterol out of your body

Fact 3: Fibre helps you fill fuller for longer

Healthy Eating Tip: Replace processed food with whole and natural foods. Think of the “Human Interference” factor, the more interference the stronger the case to replace it.

Motivational Tip: Find a picture of the body you want and place a copy of your face on the picture. Then place this image of you on the fridge door or somewhere you look at everyday.

Good luck with week 7 J

12 Wk Health Blitz Challenge - Week 6

I'm Sweet Enough! Lolly Free Week

Congratulations on reaching the half way point of this challenge. Already we are seeing and hearing great results from those who are sticking to the challenges each week. Well done! Stay strong and devoted across the next 6wks. What have you got lose other than more kgs!

Here is a link to this weeks article - http://weightloss.com.au/articles/healthy-diets/sugar-and-weight-loss.html

Topic: Sugar!

Fact 1: All carbohydrate we eat is converted into blood sugar

Fact 2: In one 600ml bottle of soft drink there can be between 12 to 15 teaspoons of sugar

Fact 3: Research (Journal of Nutrition, 2009) has found that Sugar can affect the brain chemistry leading to addiction.

Healthy Eating Tip: Drink water instead of soft drinks or carbonated drinks. Read the labels and look for hidden sugar in the foods you eat.

Motivational Tip: Nominate a non-food reward for sticking to your plans and set aside a time for you to take it (massage, going to the cinema – GOLD CLASS)

12wk Health Blitz Challenge - Week 5

Ditch the Dessert – No Cakes / Cheeses

Week 5 of the 12wk Health Blitz Challenge is all about  “Ditching the Dessert. No Cake or Cheese.!”  For some this could be one of the hardest challenges to date however achieving it will mean subtracting 100s of calories from your diet each day. Remember you need to burn 3500 calories to lose approximately ½ kg of body fat. The calories from dessert just sit & turn into fat. So unless you’re intending to workout at 10pm at night, avoid that dessert!

We have heard this said before: ‘I am so full, but I will make room for dessert’ or ‘I’m so full Mummy, can I have dessert now?’ Having a dessert after a meal is not one of those ‘must have’ things and has little nutritional value. Desserts are one of those foods that we tend to eat for taste rather than hunger, as we are already full or had enough to eat from our main meal. They are actually classified in the ‘not real food’ basket because they have little or no nutritional value.

Here are some tips to help you to avoid desserts and to conquer this week’s challenge:

• After having the main meal clear the table and go for a walk.  This way you are not tempted to have dessert and you get extra exercise in too.

• This week, don’t buy and keep any desserts in your cupboard or fridge/freezer. That way if they are not in the house you wont eat them.

• Wait 30 mins after your meal and if you find you are still hungry have a piece of fruit. This will help fill you up and it is a healthier alternative.

• Drink plenty of water during the day and before a meal. Have a hot cup of low fat milk after your meal. 

When we say no cheese for this weeks challenge we mean the dessert cheeses such as the soft white cheese, blue cheese and fruit cheeses. As these are the cheeses that are full of calories and don’t have the same nutrition value as the hard cheeses.  We also tend to eat these cheeses in larger quantities. Low fat hard cheese is ok in small quantities during the week as we still want to include protein in our diet. However, still remember those portion sizes so a small matchbox size of hard cheese is one serving.

Week 5 - Extra Topic

What do the Food labels mean?

Fact 1: A US study found that those who take up the label-reading habit are more likely to lose weight than those who don’t.

Fact 2: the word “Light” or “Lite” on the label can mean light in flavour and not light in calories

Fact 3: The ingredient list must be listed from the most to the least amount within the product

Healthy Eating Tip: When reading the label aim for less than 30% fat, less than 300mg per serve Sodium, and 5 grams of sugar per serving

Motivational Tip: Write down what life will be like when you have lost your weight. Write it as if it has already happened and then imagine what it will be like.

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***Found this awesome article written by the 'Food and Drug Association' on how to understand food labels. It is very comprehensive and I learnt a lot reading it. You have to read it is.

Click here to access the article - How to Understand and Use Nutritional Fact Labels

Please leave your feedback!

Have a successful week.

Jason