In the video below I talk about a discussion I had with a few of my clients on my running boot camp. The conversation was about how they believed that if you run you just need to put up with niggles and injuries and par for the course.

Unfortunately, stats show that they are right, at least 50% of all runners will get at least 1 injury per year that prevents them from running for a period of time. 

In my mind, this is simply not acceptable. Why on earth does a sport that has no outside interference from other participants, involves almost zero rapid direction changes and has so much money invested in shoes and equipment to prevent injury have such a huge incidents of injury?

Well it's simple, in my mind there are 4 reasons. Check out the video below for my top 4 ways to avoid running injury so you can train with more consistency, get stronger and faster.

If you would like some help with your running technique and you would like to learn strength and conditioning techniques that will help prevent injury and turn you into a more efficient runner, then why not hit the button below to find out more about my Faster Running Boot Camp.

So this is something I see a lot in the fitness industry. Planks being performed incorrectly, even when taught by personal trainers. People's posture is all wrong, either their ass is too high in the air, meaning they get very little benefit from the movement or their hips are sagging in the middle, putting a great deal of pressure on the lumbar spine.
In the video I share with you a great little adjustment, where you can really target your abs and improve your strength and stability in the plank position.
WARNING! THIS WILL CAUSE YOUR ABS TO WORK VERY HARD

​So this is a part of the training process that still has some contentious issues. Most notably, whether stretching will help you recover after exercise. What is absolutely nailed on in terms of science though is the 15-20 minute window we have to consume the right combination of protein and carbs to help us establish better protein synthesis and ultimately better muscle growth and fat loss.
 
So let’s try and put everything together so we can come up with a definitive list of what exactly works. What will help you recover faster, ache less and stimulate as much muscle growth and fat loss as possible.

1. Don’t Stretch post workout  
​
This is basically a waste of time. It will probably make you sorer and won’t really make any difference to your muscle building or fat loss results. Check out the link to one of my previous articles where I talk a little bit more about stretching and what works best (click here). So basically you can skip this and spend less time in the gym, meaning more time to recover, relax and grow.

2. Get a good combo of protein and carbs into your system as soon as humanly possible.

​Now the research into how much varies but as a rule, anything between 2-40g of protein and 40-60g of carbs will do just fine. You can do this through food but after a really tough session most people don’t really feel like consuming a meal. This is where a good recovery shake can come into play.
 
There are a number of these on the market but I tend to go with this one from The Protein Works which has really given me and my clients good results.
 
If you would like to purchase Recovery Protein from The Protein Works or find out more, click the link below
 
The Protein Works Recovery Protein
 
3. Move more: Get in some active recovery  
​
This is a big one, recovering from a high intensity workout means there will be a lot of lactic acids and waste products floating around your system that you need to get out. One of the jobs of the muscular system, especially in the legs is to aid blood flow and removal of waste products via the lymphatic system. Activities like underwater running, and low grade dynamic mobility drills have been proven to aid this and help speed up active recovery between bouts of high intensity training.

4. Sleep  

Sounds obvious but we need to be getting around 7-9 hours of sleep every 24 hours. When we sleep we are in the best possible state to promote both physical and mental repair. This amount will not only help our bodies recover between training sessions but also keep our metabolism at optimum levels for fat loss. Another benefit of this amount of sleep is that it helps out brains repair mentally too. Helping our stress levels to stay low, keeping our cortisol levels down and our testosterone levels up.

5. Train Smarter  

Keep your training programs short sharp and intense and don’t over-train. 40-50 mins of high intensity training about 3-4 times per week is optimal to develop good improvements in fitness and body composition. Most of us are just normal guys who want to stay in shape and we can get pretty awesome results without feeling like we live at the gym. Don’t get me wrong, if your goal is to compete in body building or any other sport at a high level then you are going to have to train more than this but to get lean and strong, this amount of sessions and time will be enough. In fact, one of the ways I helped my client Greg get in awesome shape was by doing just this. Limiting his training to no more than 4 sessions per week and cutting down the amount of time he was spending in the gym (click here and scroll to the bottom of the page to check out his results).

So I hope this has helped clear a few things up for you and helped you get some clarity into not only what works well for recovery but also how to structure your gym visits to avoid overtraining and allowing your body enough time to recover sufficiently to promote fat loss and growth.
 
I would love to help…
 
If you like the content of the blog and would like even more help to get you to your training goals I would love to talk to you. Click on the button below to get in touch and schedule a free strategy call.

Here I can help you set out meaningful and achievable goals and give you a blueprint of how exactly you can achieve them.
 
I will look forward to hearing from you soon.

In the video below I take you through some of my top mobility drills to help mobilise your ankles and hips to allow you to squat deeper, keep good form and ultimately go heavier.

I know the squat is a pretty individual exercise with everyone having slightly different mechanics and compensatory patterns, so while these drills may not work for everyone, they have proven to be a really effective base in helping a lot of my clients get better at squatting.

Integrate them into your warm and perform them regularly for best results and please let me know how you get on in the comments below.

​See you next time, Darren

As a follow on from the faster-six-pack-solutions.html blog post I wrote a few weeks ago I though I would put this short video together to give you a few more ideas of the type of movements and exercises I use with my clients to create a stronger and more functional core.

There are literally thousands more movement variations to access but here is a run through of my top 5.

​Give them a go and comment in the box below to let me know what you think.

So you have all probably heard the sayings

“Six packs are made in the kitchen”
“We are what we eat”
“Eat big to get big”
“You cannot out-train a bad diet”
​
Well unfortunately these all ring true. The mere fact that you are reading this blog post tells me that to at least some degree, you want to drop body fat and build muscle mass. If that is the case then your diet and the things you put into your mouth are a vital ingredient in how successful you will be. When I talk to clients, they all seem to get this point. They know, as I am sure you do that nutrition is important. What they find difficult however, is understanding what works and how they can fit this into their lifestyle so they can stick to it and create sustainable and long-term changes.
 
Breakfast is a hugely important part of any nutrition regime especially when it comes to getting bigger and leaner. So here are my top 5 reasons why we need to ditch the cereals and instead go for tasty high protein breakfasts that will get our results motoring.
 
1. High protein breakfast make you feel fuller for longer. In a study by the AJCN (American Journal of Clinical Nutrition) it was found that high protein breakfasts reduced the secretion of Ghrelin (the hormone responsible for hunger stimulation) which will stop you feeling hungry and prevent you from craving high carbs/sugar snacks. 

2. High protein breakfasts help you target belly fat. It has been found in a study by Loenneke et al (2012) that high protein diets lead to a targeted loss of abdominal fat. So guys, if you want to get rid of that beer belly, then I suggest that it’s time to make the switch. 

3. Your body starts to catabolise protein as you sleep. Basically your body starts to go into a fasting state in the final hours of your sleep. This is where the term “break-fast” comes from. A high protein breakfast will help you quickly reverse the effects of this and put you in a position where you can get your metabolism firing faster, putting you in the right state to burn fat and build lean muscle 

4. You need to consume a higher intake of protein to stimulate muscle growth. Dependant on your goals, anything up to 2g of protein per Kg of body weight is required to stimulate muscle growth. For the average guy, around 1.5g/kg will do the trick. Getting started early in the day means that this is a much more achievable target compared to eating a carb based breakfast 

5. High protein breakfast recipes are usually healthier all round. So not only do these recipes have higher concentrations of protein, they are usually accompanied by other good food choices such as fruit and vegetables, beans and pulses that have a huge number of other health benefits. So making this change will mean that you are not just helping yourself to hit your protein targets, you are also helping yourself to pack your bodies full of amazing vitamins and mineral to further ensure you stay healthy and feel ready to train harder. 

Free Faster Abs Recipe Book

So now you know the importance of a good protein rich breakfast, why not let me help you out even further by supplying some great recipe ideas that will allow you to implement the information in this blog post straight away.

Not only is my Faster Abs Recipe Book packed full of great breakfast ideas, there are also some great ideas in there for lunches and dinners and even some healthy snack ideas for when you are peckish between meals.

​Click on the button below to download your copy now!

​At Faster Fitness Solutions we specialise in helping guys who are short on time get quick and effective workout that helps them maximise their results. With this in mind, I thought I would ask the question…
 
 Do we really need to be wasting time lying down and training our abs at the end of a workout? 
 
Now there is nothing wrong with doing this other than the fact that it isn’t very time efficient also, when we look at the relationship between traditional core stability exercises and their effect on athletic performance the research doesn’t really support their effectiveness. In fact  most of the research suggests that traditional core training may only play a slight role in performance improvements but certainly does not warrant spending a significant amount of time on (Okada et al 2011, Shamrock et al 2011, Thomas, Nesser and William 2009).
 
So, let’s be straight, I am not saying the core isn’t important and if we are honest, we all want a six pack don’t we? What I am saying is there are ways of integrating and training your core in far more functional ways that you can directly include in your workout. By simply adding some movement and functional tweaks into your training you can target your core while still getting great strength and muscle building training into the rest of your body.
 
Check out the video below where I take you through an uneven barbell training matrix that will not only give you a great six pack but also give you a great shoulder and leg workout in a very small amount of time. So there will be no need to waste time on endless crunches, planking or sit ups.
 
Uneven Barbell Matrix