Rachel Cosgrove's Online Journal

We have moved....

2010-06-17T06:45:00.000-07:00

Check out my new site at www.rachelcosgrove.com where I will be continuing my blogging from now on.

Changing the way fitness is done. Period.

2010-04-22T07:59:00.000-07:00

This past week our manager of Results Fitness, Cameron Hedges (who is a rock star by the way) sent out a team email to our team at the gym and at the end he said- "We are changing the way fitness is done. Period." I loved this and have been using it ever since because that is truly what we are passionate about is changing the way fitness is done and encouraging more people to get "hooked" on fitness the way it is done and should be done now.

The first person to start to shake this industry up and tell people- "Aerobics Classes are Dead!" "Machines are no more!" "Personal Trainers as you know them are done!" "This industry is changing!" was Thomas Plummer.

It was over ten years ago and Alwyn and I had just opened our doors of what was then called Cosgrove Fitness and Sports Training Systems, now known as Results Fitness. We were the trainers who had gone to every certification, had every training book, had every letter we could get after our name and were not happy with the industry we were in. The gyms we worked at had very poor standards for their trainers and for their business as a whole. We did not see a long term career for ourselves working at any of the gyms we were at and had to figure something else out. What did we do?

Opened a Business! We had no idea what we were doing, no idea how to run a business, not a clue on what profit and loss was, or what it meant when our clients would ask us- "Are you in the black?" All we knew is that we could get people in shape and we hoped that was enough. But 6 months in to it with our first two employees working for us we had no money, were working insane hours and our employees were living the life, buying new cars while we could not even take a day off for a vacation and scrounged every month to pay the bills. Up to our ears in personal credit card debt, owned an old used Dodge that we shared, lived in an apartment that was a half hour away where the rent was less expensive(and in a neighborhood that we got broken in to and robbed 7 months after opening our business). We were feeling like there was no way out and knew this was not the long term plan for our life.

We went looking for an answer- We had heard of Thomas Plummer and had one of his books and saw he was having a seminar coming up. Could we afford to go? Could we take the time off? ....Looking back, we could not afford not to go. I went by myself because at the time we couldn't afford for both of us to go and take time off because someone had to keep the gym open and train clients.

At the time Thomas Plummer HATED trainers. He told a great story about a trainer who holds a stick while he trains his clients and Thom saw him hang his client upside down doing bicep curls yelling "Squeeze!" and Thom ended up getting in an all out brawl with the guy. This story was hilarious (especially Thom telling it) and very typical of what was out there in our industry and exactly why Alwyn and I decided to open our own gym because we did not want to be on the same team with the guy hanging his clients upside down yelling "Squeeze!" But we also did not want to be a slave to our business for the rest of our life.

I was the trainer in the front row of Thom's seminar who as Thom says, by the end of his seminar had my arms folded across my chest because "WE ARE DIFFERENT..." Thomas Plummer has a way of inspiring you and pulling out the best in you, a true coach with an innate ability to get your wheels turning of what is possible. Leaving this very first seminar was life changing in so many ways. Although most of his advice was for big membership based gyms, I took what he taught and applied it to our small 1000 square foot personal training gym at the time. I had many Aha's and a list of action steps we could take leaving the seminar. I came home and stayed up all night writing our first employee manuals, figuring out our numbers, working on our marketing plan, coming up with our systems and for the first time working ON our business, not IN our business. Thom had introduced us to the concept of having an "Exit Strategy" which has ever since been built in to everything we do.

I discussed with Alwyn having a system of him writing all of the programs and that our trainers would do the programs he wrote with our clients. Alwyn looked at me like I was nuts and couldn't believe how this seminar had driven me to get as much done that week on our business as I did. And he couldn't help but get hooked into the contagious drive Thomas Plummer had ignited to work on our business and make it work. Both of us went to work applying what I had learned.

We became Thomas Plummer followers. Whatever Thom told us to do we did it. We took his advice, didn't question it, just did it, applied it to our small gym and made it work. We attended his seminars, his advanced seminars, read his books over and over again and went from being trainers to owning a business. That first seminar with Thomas Plummer was a turning point for us in our business and our life.

Thom is not afraid to say it like it is and make you think. We always appreciate that no matter how much we implement and get done, Thom always has something else to pull us just an inch further to be even better. He has been our coach throughout the ten years we have been in business and has pulled the best out of us and our business and continues to do that.

We are celebrating ten years since we opened the doors of Results Fitness next month having just closed our most successful quarter ever. That first seminar with Thomas Plummer and every seminar, conversation, phone call, email, article of his, and book since has changed our mindset and our direction forever. He got us hooked into business and hooked into studying and reading business books, studying other companies like Starbucks, Zappos, and Virgin Atlantic opening our minds to what we could learn.

We were no longer just trainers, we are now business owners, thinking like business owners, reading business books and studying other businesses and our turning point was meeting Thomas Plummer 10 years ago. It is amazing looking back because now 10 years later we have come full circle and have trainers who are in the same position we were in 10 years ago asking us for business advice because we have been able to set up a gym that runs on systems, generates a profit and is not dependent on us. We have found a new passion in studying and applying business concepts to the fitness industry, coaching other fitness professionals and changing the way fitness is done all because of that first turning point of meeting Thomas Plummer.

So naturally when Thom's newest book came out, Where did that member go? We had to get a copy and I have to say of all the books he has written this book sums everything up and really is THE source every gym owner should have and should buy for every one of your staff. I have purchased one for every team member on our staff and it will be our training manual for our staff trainings the next few months.

Thom has always taught us that member service is what makes us different and that we need to really use that and be the best at having legendary customer service. We always thought our clients came to us for our scientific training programs and our cutting edge fitness philosophies - but Thom taught us that our clients come to us for the experience and our legendary customer service. We embraced the mission statement Thom gave us - We Are The Best Part of Our Member's Day Everyday! And our entire team yells this as a team cheer on a regular basis and lives by this mission statement. Thom encouraged us to focus on the customer service aspect of what we do and the experience we create for our customers and it has led to a busier and busier gym, with more people absolutely "Wow'ed" by our customer service. Just last week one of our newest members asked one of our front desk team(we call them the "We Got Your Back Team") how all of us remember everyone's name and if we had a trick. She was amazed that everyone on our team remembered every single member's name and that we actually don't have a trick. The key is that we really do care about our members and focus on getting to know them, who they are, what they are about and providing customer service like they have never experienced. Our gym truly becomes their home and we welcome them to it everyday as our "guest." Thanks to Thomas Plummer and his concepts of treating your members like your guest and the mission statement - We are the best part of our member's day everyday!

We will continue to nurture the environment we create for our members by training our staff and living by one of our core values which is constant learning and never ending improvement. Our text book will be Thomas Plummer's new book-

Our goal at Results Fitness is to "Change the way fitness is done. Period." and thanks to the advice, ongoing support, books, seminars and ideas from Thomas Plummer we are able to take on that as our mission helping our clients, helping other trainers and living the life we want to live. If you are a trainer, a gym owner, or work in a gym or are thinking about working in the fitness industry or you have a trainer you can get it for do yourself a favor and buy the above book and learn the concepts Thom teaches and apply them and join in the movement to change the way fitness is done.

Act As If and get out of If...Then...Thinking.

2010-04-20T06:45:00.000-07:00

Fit Female Credo #1 -
Act as if you are a Fit Female

Get out of "if...then" thinking. Many women are guilty of this "If...Then" thinking when it comes to our bodies. We never stop and enjoy - Now. I recently read the book, Drive by Daniel Pink where he talks about this in relation to management and leading a team in a company. This was interesting stuff which I immediately started to think how I could apply it in our business. He talks about using intrinsic motivators as the way to drive people to give their best long term instead of using "If....Then" motivators or extrinsic motivators.

And then I realized this is also a very powerful concept to use with my clients and the people I coach. In his book, he touches on using this with your health and weight loss as well and it made me think....

Many women are in the mindset of "If...Then." Especially when it comes to the scale- "If" I weigh X "then" I'll feel good. Feel Good starting NOW and live by Fit Female Credo #1 and start to act as if! Start to tune in to how you feel and the intrinsic motivation you have to drive yourself to accomplish what you want to accomplish.

I was actually reminded of this recently because I have a Red Covertible Toyota Solara that I have had for 6 years. It is paid off and I still enjoy it. For my birthday recently I decided to get it all fixed up and get all of the evidence of anything I had ever backed into removed(I am infamous for backing in to things...). For the 6 years I have owned it I had accumulated quite a few dings and I hadn't been parking it in our garage. I started to think....eventually when I get my next new nice car then I'll take care of it. But then I realized that I was using "If...Then" thinking. "If" I had a new, nice car, "then" I will park it in the garage and take care of it. I decided that I would get my Toyota fixed up, looking brand new and start parking it in the garage and treat it exactly AS IF it is my brand new dream car. It is amazing how instantly my car now feels like a brand new dream car to me.

This is the same as your body. You will never enjoy your body, if you keep putting off enjoying it until....you weigh X amount of weight or until you are a size such and such....

Are you guilty of "If...Then" thinking? Start to catch yourself and change your mental dialogue. Enjoy your fit female body today and start acting as if and really tune in to how it feels to be fit and feel good about yourself!

Re read the Fit Female Credo in my book and keep yourself focused on making progress but also enjoying the progress you have made so far.

The Female Body Breakthrough Book Tour

2010-03-08T06:57:00.000-08:00

On of my stops on The Female Body Breakthrough Book Tour was at Fitness Quest 10 in San Diego. Check out the clip from the talk I did. It was so great to meet and help get the women their started on their fit female journey...

The Secret Reason You Have A Pooch!

2010-03-02T06:04:00.000-08:00

inspired by an email exchange with Adam Campbell, author of The Women's Health Big Book of Exercises: Four Weeks to a Leaner, Sexier, Healthier YOU!

Working hard to lose fat but you just can’t lose that stubborn fat on your tummy? Here’s a little secret…When you sit all day----as almost all of us do----your butt muscles turn off. This causes your hip bone to tilt forward which puts stress on your back—causing, yes, lower back pain—but it also pushes your belly out. So you look like you have a gut, even if you don’t have an ounce of fat! This is also the case if you are spending a lot of time in spinning classes which are a huge culprit for tightening the hip flexors and creating this pooch. I talk about this in The Female Body Breakthrough: The Revolutionary Strength-Training Plan for Losing Fat and Getting the Body You Want and include an exercise that will help fix that!

The hip extension and all you need is your bodyweight. This exercise will stretch out your hip flexors, engage your core and switch on your butt muscles which will lead to your hips getting into the right position flattening out your pooch!

Position: Lie on your back on the ground, arms outstretched at 90 degrees from the body. Bend one knee so the foot is flat on the floor as it would be in a sit up.

Movement: Keeping the other leg straight and in line with the trunk at all times, drive down with the bent knee foot, causing the body to lift. The top of the movement is when the straight leg is in line with the thigh of the bent knee, which is about a 45 degree position. Make sure the body is straight at this point and both hips are even.

For more secrets on losing your belly fat,

check out the latest article up -

Click Here to read 5 foods to help you lose belly fat.

Me vs. the Vegan

2010-02-04T04:53:00.000-08:00

I was invited to speak for a group in our area last week (I try to get in front of a group locally twice a month as a form of marketing for our gym each month). This particular group was a group of women - my specialty! The organizer did tell me that there would be another speaker and then I would be up.

I got there on time and took a seat in the audience as the first speaker started to do his talk. This became very awkward as he started to preach about his Vegan lifestyle and how it is the only way. This was especially awkward because I had a few of our clients in the audience who were nudging me his entire talk because they knew I disagreed with what he was saying. I sat quietly listening, even as he completely contradicted concepts I have in my book, saying that there is no scientific evidence that we NEED protein. (Ahem- there are 3 studies cited in my references)

Now, don't get me wrong- I have HUGE respect for anyone who can be a complete Vegan. Heck I have HUGE respect for anyone who can be a vegetarian. It takes incredible self discipline and planning to follow this kind of lifestyle. I simply don't agree that it is FOR everyone. I, myself, spent 10 years of my life not eating any red meat.

I decided one day that I thought red meat wasn't good for me and that I was going to eliminate it from my diet and stuck to it for 10 years. It wasn't until I started to learn more and more about nutrition and how a lot of the foods I was eating(besides red meat) were wreaking a lot more havoc on my body than a lean, high quality steak would. I started questioning myself- why am I not eating red meat again? For health reasons? Then I also need to eliminate all processed foods, sugar, etc because those are a lot worse for me and are what really cause health problems. This was the wake up call that having a steak was something I was avoiding for the wrong reasons. I had bought in to the world view that red meat was bad for you...but was it? I don't believe so now and think it should be a part of most people's diet in moderation(preferably from an Organic source).

The Vegan continued to discuss how all of our health problems are because we eat protein and protein containing foods have cholesterol- BAD!. He himself eats a zero cholesterol diet but he also admitted that he is on the borderline for needing to go on cholesterol lowering medication. "If you don't eat some cholesterol your body will produce more cholesterol!!!" I wanted to stand up in the middle of his talk so many times...but I didn't...I sat in my chair and exercised restraint. He proceeded to put up a list of meats, dairy and things that are on my grocery list and labeled them with - BAD. And then he put up Oatmeal, Broccoli and a loaf of bread and said- GOOD! Since when are a loaf of bread and broccoli in the same category????

Again I have complete respect for anyone who follows a Vegan diet for ethical or religious reasons. My issue is when people preach that it is healthier for you which is what he was teaching.

These recommendations were looking very similar to the old food guide pyramid with a base of all of your carbohydrates and moving up the pyramid to eat protein sparingly. The exact food guide pyramid that since being followed, our society has become more and more obese and we have had an increase in childhood obesity and diabetes.

FINALLY - He finished and it was my turn...how would I approach this awkward situation? I know all of my clients were dying to know how I was going to respond. So I started by discussing exercise and how we need to shift our paradigms with exercise...I figured, let's not jump into the nutrition just yet...(Oh, and he was using Dave Scott as an example because Dave Scott did an Ironman as a Vegan and seemed to do ok on minimal protein...huh??? How can this audience of women in their 30s and 40s trying to find 2 hours a week to exercise use Dave Scott as an example?).

I proceeded and stuck to my talk, what I know to be true and what I know to work in my experience and in the research. I did not want to go into defense mode but instead I started with what we have in common - "As our earlier speaker was stating fruits and vegetables are VERY IMPORTANT part of a healthy diet and you should eat them at every single meal." Then basically I had to "relabel" his foods and make the loaf of bread a splurge and explain that bagels, loafs of bread and all processed carbohydrates will wreak havoc on your blood sugar. Which is why you need protein to change your body- because it will blunt insulin and keep your blood sugar stable. So, I had to remove the "BAD" label from Chicken breast explaining that it actually is a part of a healthy diet and so is cottage cheese(if you don't have a dairy sensitivity), etc...

I always try to learn from everyone and I realize that his journey has brought him to these conclusions and I have respect for that. In my experience, I have never been able to get the results of helping someone to lose body fat and transform their body with a client who is a Vegan or a Vegetarian. It is always much more difficult.

The funny thing was the email I received after the event of the visual of me versus him-

"You were completely awesome last night. In spite of some seriously potential awkwardness, you were just phenomenal. By the way, it would have been a most interesting visual to have the two of you stand side-by-side: he, the sunken, colorless picture of emaciation; you, the vibrant example of good health, inside and out---shiny hair, glowing skin, bright eyes, etc. Rachel, you were incredibly gracious, plus very inspiring."

A guest post- Lift for Haiti

2010-02-02T05:23:00.000-08:00

Today's Post is from a friend who has organized "Lift for Haiti" where they will attempt to lift a ton of weight(literally) and in the process raise money for Haiti.

Please help him out on his quest to make a difference. Click Here to make a donation

Click Here to make a donation.

Women kicking butt on the Spartacus workout

2010-02-01T11:07:00.000-08:00

This weekend our group class did the Spartacus workout featured in Men's Health Magazine. If you are a guy and you think it is is a tough workout, check out the fit females at our gym who kicked butt on the workout this weekend.

How Much Does Your Purse Weigh?

2010-01-26T06:27:00.000-08:00

For those of you who missed it I was recently on TV on WGN in Chicago and then on Fox. I got hit with some great questions but because you are on limited time (about 4 minutes) I wasn't able to fully answer each question....

On the first show the anchor said to me, "You want us to lift 20 lbs??? That's a lot of weight!" And my response was- "How much does your purse weigh?" I don't think most women realize that they lift a 5-10 pound purse daily, maybe a 15-20 pound kid daily and 10-12lb pound grocery bags on a regular basis.

The Key- Doing what your body is already used to will not change your body. If you go in the gym and lift 5lbs - 15lb weights you are lifting a weight that you can already lift and do daily.

Doing what you can already do daily WILL NOT CHANGE YOUR BODY.

You must put a demand on your body that it is not used to in order to get it to change. Most women can START by lifting 15-20lb dumbbells and progress from there.

Start to think about what you do in your daily activities and make sure that when you go to the gym you are putting a new demand on your body beyond what it is used to to start transforming your body. And go ahead....weigh your purse...how much does it weigh?

Common Questions from TFBB Answered

2010-01-10T08:12:00.000-08:00

One of my reviews on Amazon(thank you for reviewing my book, anyone who can go give it a review on Amazon please do...as long as it's good:)The Female Body Breakthrough: The Revolutionary Strength-Training Plan for Losing Fat and Getting the Body You Want
) Questions answered-

Review- "I really love this book and will be using this plan in my life. The book did leave me with two questions though: Is this book for women of all ages? I noticed that she didn't include women that were over 50 or speak about menopause. The other question is: What do you do if you exercise first thing in the morning when you are supposed to eat breakfast within 15 minutes after getting up in the morning? Other than that, the book is laid out really well and it is easy to understand what to do."

Answer- This book was originally written for the 20-35 age group and was originally going to be a women's health branded book and they asked me to write it for 20s-35s(their target demographic). I work with more women in the 40 and up age group in the gym and many of the stories in the book are on the upper borderline or are way above the 20-35 age range(two of the women are over 50 and another one of the ladies in the book is turning 50 this year and you'd never guess- we snuck them in as 20-40 yr olds). So- YES absolutely the concepts and philosophies in the book will work for women over 50, and have worked for women over 50 many times. You are right that I didn't touch on menopause because of the target demographic of the book but it also leaves it open for a Book #2 aimed at the over 40 crowd....which their seems to be a demand for and is the demographic that will benefit even more from the information but the information is the same. I would just change the hormones shmormones chapter but overall the concepts in the book will get you through menopause healthier, stronger and easier- having a stable blood sugar helps keep your hormones more stable.

As for training first thing in the morning- one of the Fit Female Credos is to be an early riser so you're right I should have given a strategy for this because this has been a question asked more than once. Two options-
1. Make your workout shake and drink half before and during and then finish it post workout, then eat breakfast within an hour after your workout.

2. Have something small and quick such as some yoghurt or hardboiled egg & a banana before you leave the house to train then a shake during and post workout.

For more answers to commonly asked question go to my FAQ page- Click Here.

Next stop.....2010!

2009-12-28T07:45:00.000-08:00

Christmas snuck up on me and then just like that is behind us...

.....next stop 2010!

I love January because in our industry it is so much fun- everyone is motivated and focused and it is such an exciting time of year for many people to have a fresh start. Anyone who knows me, knows that I am a planner and yesterday I filled out my new planner for 2010 and I am so excited for the year ahead!

With our Counting Reps to Counting Revenue Tour - Click Here to Find out when we will be in a city near you.

And our coaching group and mastermind meetings who are an amazing group of trainers that Alwyn and I are so excited to work with this year to help them take their businesses to the next level. www.resultsfitnessbiz.com

And then my book
which has been selling really well and I am so excited to get my message out to so many women who need it. I plan to be very active working with the community in my website this year- www.thefemalebodybreakthrough.com and speaking and meeting women to help as many women as I can have a breakthrough! If you are in the Chicago area or anywhere near come and meet me on January 14th at 6pm at the West Loop Gym. I will be doing a discussion, Q and A and book signing- come out and meet me!

And ofcourse our gym, Results Fitness (www.results-fitness.com) which is going to be celebrating 10 years in business this year! And will be so much fun with the new added space and our awesome team in place who do such a great job! I can't wait to do a workout in the new room! We will continue to "Keep Leading" as one of our core values.

If you are ready to plan out your year (Remember If you Fail to Plan, you should plan to fail) start by getting one of these fabulous calendars my friend Krista Scott Dixon made-
http://www.stumptuous.com/schwag

It is full of inspiring pictures sure to keep you focused all year long!

And get 2010 off to a great start!

Happy New Year everyone! Hope to see you at an event in the new year!

The Exercise Encyclopedia has arrived- Released Today!

2009-12-22T06:25:00.000-08:00

Years ago at our gym we started an exercise encyclopedia to have every exercise picture and description in one book. The book is still lying around the gym somewhere but was never finished because this task of thinking of every single exercise and getting pictures and descriptions became overwhelming and the book got shoved aside never to be finished....

But thank goodness - Adam Campbell took on the project and made a BEAUTIFUL book that will now be the Exercise Encyclopedia. The Men's Health Big Book of Exercises: Four Weeks to a Leaner, Stronger, More Muscular YOU! will now be our Encyclopedia at Results Fitness and will be the "Go To" book for anyone we work with including new employees, our Results Fitness Biz coaching members and online clients.

Adam thought of every possible exercise you can think of....Believe me - I was there for the photo shoot helping him and I couldn't believe the exercises we were shooting - EVERYTHING! Click Here to read about my experience on the photo shoot. I am honored to have been a part of such an amazing book!

Plus he included some of the best minds as contributors (including myself :), the women's version has one of my skinny jeans workouts) putting together programs along with information on how to train, nutrition and what works. This book is the complete guide to every exercise and how to use the exercises to get results.

You still have time to order and get it here before Christmas from Amazon. There are two versions(I'll be ordering the Women's version,The Women's Health Big Book of Exercises: Four Weeks to a Leaner, Sexier, Healthier YOU! for all of my online clients to save me from ever having to create pictures and descriptions again which is the most time consuming part of writing a program for an online client- thank you Adam!)

Order Today!

Last Minute Holiday Gift Ideas

2009-12-16T05:10:00.000-08:00

9 Days until Christmas!!!!!!

If you are anything like me you still have more than a few people on your list to get gifts for and time is running out. Is it just me or did Christmas sneak up faster this year? Well, I have a few last minute gift ideas for you or ideas that you may want to hint to someone near to you....

Under $5.00

Fit Female Credo Poster - If someone in your life has been reading The Female Body Breakthrough a great stocking stuffer is The Fit Female Credo Poster for Only $2 bucks.

Click Here to Purchase Now

Under $20.00

If you have a female in your life you have to get her a copy of The Female Body Breakthrough. For less than $15 you can change her life with the information in this book.

Under $50

Pick up Training Jill not Jack DVD or The Body Weight Training DVD

Under $100

One Month Membership to The Fit Female Community

for only $97.00 you can give the female in your life me as her coach for one month inside TheFemaleBodyBreakthrough.com along with access to exclusive content and a community of fit females.

Click Here to Sign Her Up for one month Now

Happy Holidays everyone! I hope Santa brings you everything you desire!

Excerpt from US News &World Report- 6 Stupid Holiday Diet Tips you should Ignore

2009-12-14T16:06:00.000-08:00

This is an excerpt from an article by Katherine Hobson-

Click Here to see the article.

Make "healthful" versions of holiday favorites—like nonfat, no-sugar cheesecake.

OK, I made up that example; I'm not sure such a thing exists. But, says Cosgrove, substituting ingredients or making "lite" holiday dishes is rarely a good idea. "Usually, it still isn't very healthy, and now it just doesn't taste as good," she says. "Life's too short not to have my grandmother's sweet potato pie." Her suggestion for the holidays (and the rest of the year): Eat healthfully 90 percent of the time, and then give yourself the freedom to splurge during the other 10 percent. Rather than taking the fun out of all your holiday meals, pick the ones at which you want to indulge, and, at the rest, pass up the goodies.

What are your core values?

2009-12-07T21:02:00.000-08:00

In our company we have core values that we live and breathe by as a team. These are core values that Alwyn and I have in our personal life and as a company they define who we look for in people we hire for our company. Everyday, any decision that gets made gets filtered through these core values.

I wish I could say we had these in place from day one when we opened our business(10 years ago) but we didn't. It would have kept us from making some of the mistakes we made like hiring the wrong people at times. We had core values but it wasn't until I started studying the company, Zappos that we redefined our core values and really started to use our core values in everything we do. We are always learning from businesses outside of the fitness business to make sure we "Keep Leading" which is one of our core values.

What are your core values? whether you have a company or simply have them for yourself it is a powerful exercise to sit down and decide what do you stand for? What drives you?

Our Core Values-

Bring your best
Be Professional
Integrity, honesty and transparency
Only good days and great days!
WE, not ME.
Constant learning and never ending improvement.
Fun and Humor.
Strive for profitability.
Exceed expectations.
Keep leading.

Starting with a solid base of core values to build your company on

is one of our secrets to unlocking your success as a business. We

will be teaching a TON of fitness business success secrets at our

upcoming seminar.

We are in Rhode Island this weekend.

Don't miss it- Click Here

Attention Trainers- Fast Track to Fitness Business Success

2009-11-30T06:26:00.000-08:00

Have passion for what you do.

Do what you love and the money will follow.

Work Hard and success will come.

Dream big, think good thoughts and life will fall in to place.

All great ideas....but all LIES.

I know that some of you reading this blog are a lot like me- love what you do, very passionate about helping people and would do it for free. No matter how passionate you are, no matter how much heart and soul you put in to each and every day....when it comes to business you HAVE to learn a system to make it work. And if you are in the fitness industry as your career long term and want to help as many people as possible, you HAVE to learn how to run a business. Business skills not only help you with your career but will help you in life.

Alwyn and I opened our gym 10 years ago and we had passion. In fact, when we first opened we decided we wouldn't focus on sales, numbers or selling anything because if we got people in shape and were good at what we do our business would be successful on it's own. Love what you do and the money will follow.....right?

Very quickly we realized....we weren't making enough to pay our bills, we were working insane hours, working VERY Hard, and there was no end in sight unless we changed a few things. We started to read every business book we could, hire business consultants and attend seminars and conferences on business and started to learn how to run a business. In addition we learned from every single mistake we made (and there were a lot of them, 55 Mistakes at least- read about them in our book and don't make the same ones)

If you learn how to run a business, you can help a lot more people and fulfill your passion even more. But you have to get your nose out of the exercise and training books and get yourself off of learning new exercises(You know enough exercises by now...) and on to how to run a business!

At this point our business does not depend on us. We have 250 people who come through our doors weekly who we are changing their lives with the systems we have in place. We have an amazing team who follow the system. Alwyn and I don't have to be there. Not only that but every month we are in the magazines with editors calling us monthly as fitness experts and Alwyn and I each have published books with major publishers and speak around the world on our passion- fitness. Not only that but recently we were quoted by IHRSA as Business Experts (this is a huge milestone for a couple of trainers:)) - check it out.

We have built a very successful fitness business that supports the life we want to live and you can learn EVERYTHING from us- every mistake, every secret, how to start and build your own fitness facility, how to become a highly sought after expert in the industry and how to reach and change as many lives as possible.

We are now teaching the exact system we use at our gym. We are teaching EVERYTHING we have learned over the ten years in business. We can save you so much time and so many mistakes.

Alwyn and I feel that at this point the way for us to help even more people is to reach out to the other trainers who are where we were ten years ago and help them to create businesses where they too can have hundreds of clients changing their lives. We want to give you what we call "Aha moments" where you have one idea that completely changes your life and your business. We have been in your shoes and we want to help you to build a successful business.

We guarantee we can fast track your business and you success in this industry!

If you are a trainer (or thinking about switching careers) who loves what you do and wants to be the best at it, Do Not Miss this opportunity! If only we had something like this when we first started out!

In two weeks we will be in Rhode Island. If you are anywhere near the area DO NOT MISS THIS. Or check out the flight deals on Virgin America- only $39 bucks from a lot of places to Boston(about an hour drive to RI)- No excuse! And you can get CEU's too! And it is a tax write off- so basically it is Free!

Start 2010 armed with the information you need to fast forward your career and

CHANGE YOUR LIFE!

Click Here to Sign Up Now and we will see you in 2 weeks!

The Female Body Breakthrough Vs. Afterburn

2009-11-27T07:00:00.000-08:00

I have had this question in my inbox more than once this past week so thought I should address it.

"What is the difference between Afterburn and The Female Body Breakthrough? Both of them have workouts to do and nutrition to follow? Which one should I get?"

The Female Body Breakthrough is the most up to date product we currently have of what we do in our gym. Afterburn when it was written was exactly what we do in our gym and it still works very well but since then we have changed the way we do our warm ups and our core exercises. We have also changed the way we do interval training with our clients. We are constantly upgrading what we do sticking to one of our core values as a company which is to "Keep Leading."

They are not the same program. I wrote The Female Body Breakthrough Program from scratch but based on the same philosophies as After burn so the similarities will be there. If you have done Afterburn and are looking for more then check out my book. Plus my book is written very specifically for women.

But they are both based on the same principles- full body programs, using bang for your buck exercises in a circuit fashion, changing the reps and exercises every 4 weeks. A program that works and has been shown to work over and over and over again.

Wouldn't you be skeptical if you picked up my book and it looked nothing like Afterburn which is what we have been saying works? The products we produce are based on real programs that were done with real people and the principles of these programs, what makes them effective is exactly the same so the actual programs are not going to be too different from each other.

What's the decision- get both! My book is less than $15.00.

Click here to buy now and take advantage of Amazon's Black Friday sales!

Strategize to Survive the Holidays!

2009-11-25T06:00:00.000-08:00

The holidays are here and I am sure this week has you running around getting everything ready and making sure everyone else is taken care of. Stop and take a deep breathe and make sure you are taking a few moments for yourself each day.

Last week at my book launch party we had a discussion on surviving the holidays and we approached it as a strategy session. Having strategies (one of the Fit Female Credos) is key this time of year. The key take aways from this seminar-

1. Think ahead the next 7 weeks through the holidays. What splurges should you absolutely plan on? We actually as a group pulled out a calendar and figured out that we had 43 days left to get through the holidays (as of Thursday last week). At 5 meals a day, that is 215 meals which means you have 21.5 meals over the next 7 weeks that you can splurge on and still see your body change. So over the holidays one of the strategies is instead of looking at a week at a time, look at the next 2 months and think ahead. We went through the calendar and put an X on each meal we knew we needed to plan a splurge. We put two X's on Thanksgiving and an X the day before and an X the day after. Then we put 8 X's for either each night of Hannukah or to use over Christmas eve and Christmas day since for most people 5 X's on Christmas day is not unheard of and having 3 on Christmas Eve wouldn't be out of the question. We put an X on one day in December as a baking day and we put an X on every Saturday night in December. This still left us with about 3 X's to use how we choose and we decided to keep them in our back pocket for those unexpected occasions that pop up over the holidays.

Bottom Line- You can enjoy every food you love, every experience you want to have and everything about the holidays and not completely blow it. Planning ahead is the key and having a strategy. Pull out your journal or calendar and put your X's in place now and commit to sticking to splurging where there is an X and otherwise eating clean, foods that make you feel good 90% of the next 7 weeks.

If you aren't sure what your 90% should look like check out Precision Nutrition. We use their system at our gym. TODAY ONLY they are having a HUGE sale(and they never ever do sales seriously) of $99.00 for you to get the entire Precision Nutrition system including their Gourmet Recipes book plus a one year access to the website and one year in their Results Tracker Program plus FREE shipping. Take advantage of this but only TODAY!

2. Most people go into black and white thinking, on or off, good or bad....or maybe this sounds familiar, "I may as well not even try and just start in January." DO NOT DO THIS! You will be sorry when you have an extra 5-10 pounds to drop in January. Instead plan ahead by using the above strategy and come out of the holidays feeling fabulous at your New Years Eve party! Remember you want to be the Bitch this year at your New Year's Party, don't you? Be Inspiring Totally Confident and Hot!

3. Don't drop your workouts this time of year. The only reason you can have 21 splurges and still change your body is because you are consistent with your workouts and keeping your metabolism revving. Make a commitment to get to the gym at least twice a week and I would recommend getting it done early before anything else gets in the way.

Remember - It isn't what you eat between Christmas and New Years, it's what you eat between New Years and Christmas!

If you aren't getting my video coaching sessions go here to sign up for them -

Click Here to sign up now

Have a Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

What size are your Thermometer Jeans?

2009-11-24T04:00:00.000-08:00

Thermometer Jeans are your pair of jeans that tell you whether you are Hot or not. They are a much more effective and powerful measurement than the scale. They will absolutely tell you if your body is changing. As a trainer I have my clients bring their jeans in so I can hang on to them to keep them accountable. If you want to change your body instead of having an amount of weight you want to lose, have a pair of jeans you want to get in to. I have had clients lose 2 jean sizes in 8-12 weeks consistently. Using a pair of jeans instead of the scale works!

So what size are your thermometer jeans? This is the key. Get your own size jeans that are the jeans you want to fit in to. I don't care if you are a size 12 getting in to a size 8 or if you re a size 20 getting into 16's, your thermometer jeans are your thermometer jeans and are about two sizes smaller from where you are.

Many times women put unrealistic expectations on themselves wanting to look like the celebrities we see on TV.

Ok! Magazine printed an article on celebrity jean sizes. Pretty interesting at how tiny celebs are and how unrealistic the expectations we place on ourselves to look and be the size they are. Keep in mind, the average woman's clothing size is a 12 to 14 or a Jean Size of 30 to 32. So below average would be a size 8 to 10, Jean Size of 28 to 29. But these celebs are way below average....most being a size ZERO.

Check out how tiny they are-

Jennifer Anniston

Size 0 to 2

Jean Size - 26

Jessica Alba

Size 0 to 2

Jean Size- 26

Jennifer Love Hewitt

Size 2

Jean Size - 27

Kim Kardashian

Size- 4

Jean Size- 27

Eva Longoria

Size 0

Jean Size- 24

Some that have the appearance that might be more realistic-

Brooke Shields

Size- n/a

Jeans- 29

Jennifer Lopez

Size- n/a

Jeans- 28

Mariah Carey

Size- 6 or 8

Jeans- 29

What size are your thermometer Jeans? I know that being a size 0, 2 or even a 4 is not realistic for me. My Thermometer Jeans are a Size 28 which is a size 6 or 8 and I feel great that size and know that trying to be a size ZERO will never happen and I would be miserable trying to get there! I am happy in my fit female body looking good in my thermometer Jeans, fueling my body with food and not feeling deprived!

Get your Thermometer Jeans out where you can use them as your measurement and stop looking at the scale and stop comparing yourself to celebrities and instead get to your fit female body in your thermometer jeans!

Becoming the B I T C H

2009-11-23T05:00:00.000-08:00

Maybe you have read some of the posts about my new book,The Female Body Breakthrough: The Revolutionary Strength-Training Plan for Losing Fat and Getting the Body You Want

or saw the name of the interview I did with The FitCast: Fitness and Nutrition PodCast and thought....gosh, calling yourself a Bitch or wanting to become the Bitch seems very negative and derogatory. Maybe this has turned you off from picking up my book because you aren't interested in becoming a bitch or a chick....

Well, let me explain myself if this is the case. Anything taken out of context may seem negative or derogatory so I want to make sure you get the bigger picture so that you "get" what becoming the BITCH means and "get" the message within my book and share it with as many women as possible. I don't want you to think this is just another Skinny Chick or Skinny Bitch book- it isn't. It is based on very solid research (two pages of references) along with real world stories with before and after pictures and my own experience. But it is written in a very girlfriend to girlfriend voice to make the message very approachable and understandable to as many women as possible.

First of all, let's set up the scene- You are at a holiday party or a social gathering and maybe you are feeling less than fabulous, in fact a little frumpy. Instead of getting your slinky holiday dress out to wear you opted for the frumpy sweater because you didn't want anything that would cling to your stomach too much. Attending the party, it never fails, a woman possibly an acquaintance of yours will show up feeling fabulous wearing her sleek dress and looking amazing.

Maybe YOU have never thought this but I am sure you have had a friend say it to you.... "Did you see so and so? What a bitch showing up in her slinky dress looking amazing like that? What's her problem anyway?"

My point- When you are feeling frumpy and less than fabulous it is hard not to resent someone who looks amazing in their party dress and start to gossip about what starvation diet she must be on or how she has it so easy. Instead of resenting her and coming up with reasons why she is fabulous and you are frumpy, instead become her. Become the woman in the room that the other women are calling a "bitch." Be inspired by her.

BITCH now stands for Be Inspiring Totally Confident and Hot! So, I use the word Bitch in a very positive sense. Basically I want women who read my book to become the women the other women envy with the goal being that you inspire them to make their own breakthrough.

Get The Female Body Breakthrough: The Revolutionary Strength-Training Plan for Losing Fat and Getting the Body You Want Now and Become Inspiring Totally Confident and Hot!

Feeling Less Intimidated in the Gym

2009-11-18T14:45:00.000-08:00

Just picked up the latest Women's Health and saw the article they have on feeling less intimidated in the gym. Jen Ator did a great job with it but I wanted to add my two cents to help women to feel less intimidated in the gym as they are picking up my book and getting ready to hit the weights. So listen up girls!

1. Have a plan. Go into the gym with your plan of attack. If you know exactly what you are going to do you can confidently walk over to the weight training area and get to work. Wear your headphones so you don't even have to acknowledge that there are intimidating men around. Go into your zone and get your workout done. Photo copy phase one of the Fit Female Workout plan if you don't want to carry the book around with you (although I am hoping that gyms across America have women walking around carrying my book with it lying open in the weight training area). If you don't have your copy of the book yet- What are you waiting for?!?!?!?!

Click Here to get it NOW!!!

2. No judgements! Know that the men in the gym will only be intrigued by a confident woman walking in to the gym and heading to the weights instead of to her usual stair master or treadmill. The men in the gym won't mind if a female starts encroaching on their area especially if she has a plan and knows what she is doing. Men will welcome us into the weight training area and soon enough we will out number them. That's how it is in our gym. Check it out-

3. Even if you are terrified and totally intimidated there is a saying- You should do something that makes you uncomfortable once a day- Get out of your comfort zone, it is good for you! And know that it won't last long and probably you'll start to enjoy yourself and feel comfortable. Know that your workout will take you less than an hour so get in, get it done and get out of there.

4. Stay focused on the fact that you are boosting your metabolism and going to have an after burn effect that will burn calories for the next 24-48 hours and don't worry about what anyone else in the gym thinks.

5. If you are still not sure about hitting the weights at your gym tonight then all you need is a bench and some dumbbells and you can get everything done in Phase One of The Female Body Breakthrough Program. Grab a bench and some dumbbells and get a corner to yourself and get it done.

Soon enough your body will be transforming before your eyes, you'll be hooked on the feeling of empowerment and confidence lifting weights gives you and the gym will be your domain.

Come on girls! Let's take over the strength training floor and stop letting those men intimidate us! There are way more benefits for us to lift weights than there are for men.

I have decided to continue offering the FREE GIFT of Video Coaching for ANYONE who bought my book so if you missed out last week you can still take advantage of Video Coaching with me.

Click Here to get Free Video Coaching with me for 3 months to get your Female Body Breakthrough Started!

That moment

2009-11-16T05:00:00.000-08:00

The reason I do what I do is to see that moment in my client's when they realize they CAN do whatever they set out to do. That moment when they have an "Aha!" and finally figure out what works to feel the way they want to feel - confident and empowered. This weekend one of the members of my website, www.thefemalebodybreakthrough.com, did her first Powerlifting Competition. She had trained for marathons in the past never achieving her fit female body.

Watch this video and you'll get to experience her moment. You can also see that her body has transformed to be fit, toned and smaller than the picture of her below when she was running.

What she says about her moment-

"Thanks Rachel! I love that I finally have a "thing" that I can do, I enjoy doing it and am looking forward to getting better in! Not to boot that it makes me smaller while doing it! I attached a before picture of me this summer before I started in your training program. Of course it would be of me running in a race and proving that running doesn't make you smaller!"- Roxane G.

Thank you so much, Roxane, for letting me be a part of your journey and your moment! Keep it up girl! You rock and will inspire others!

The Female Body Breakthrough on Tour.....

2009-11-12T21:01:00.000-08:00

In this day and age when a book comes out instead of a Book Tour....I went on a Blog Tour! And it was so much fun being able to share my message with so many audiences at once without even getting on a plane. I owe a big thank you to all of my hosts. Each one of them went above and beyond my expectations.

Go on my blog tour for yourself and see why you need to get my book if you haven't already. You don't even have to pack any bags or get on a plane!

StrengthCoach.com Blog

The Blog of Valerie Waters

Precision Nutrition

The Blog of Coach Dos

Turbulence Training Blog

Nick Grantham's Blog

Pat, Nick and Jim

The Blog of Thomas Plummer

Skwigg Blog

Naked Nutrition Blog

Stumptuous

My very own Husband, Alwyn Cosgrove's Blog

Athletic Body System

Slim People in Progress Blog

The Blog of Paula Owens

The Blog of Cassandra Forsythe

The Fit Cast

Fitness and Spice

If you haven't got the book yet, what are you waiting for?

A message for you about my book launch

2009-11-12T07:40:00.001-08:00

A message for you....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUZTvuCjuZk&feature=youtube_gdata

Go to www.orderthefemalebodybreakthroughtoday.com

My book on the shelf at Barnes and Noble!!!

2009-11-10T13:50:00.000-08:00

Check it out! My book on the shelf at Barnes and Noble! Today it was released!

**** SPECIAL BONUS

Buy The Female Body Breakthrough by going to www.orderthefemalebodybreakthroughtoday.com on November 12th and collect your FREE GIFTS! You will get a poster with The Fit Female Credo mailed to you along with Video Coaching with Rachel Cosgrove to get you started on your journey and after buying the book on the 12th Rachel will share her #1 Secret to get you started along with 5 Fitness, Nutrition and Mindset related E-books to give you even more support on your journey.

IMPORTANT- The FREE GIFTS are only available if you buy the book from Amazon on November 12th.

Week One from Flab to Abs

2009-11-09T07:58:00.000-08:00

Week One after my Half Ironman went great. I bumped up my intensity and dropped my volume and I can already see my flab turning to abs. This past week I did 2 strength workouts (taken directly from my book) , 2 metabolic workouts (also taken directly from my book) and 1 interval session on the treadmill along with eating what I have in my book as the Base Phase Nutrition Rules which basically means eating "clean" 90% of the time. I did have 4 splurges including Mexican food one night complete with chips and Guac(my fav!) and a Corona.

This week I managed to lose 2 pounds of fat and a pound of water while starting to put some of the muscle I may have lost back on. On my way back to my Fit Female Body! Let me tell you- The programs and philosophies in my book absolutely work and I am real world proof! I know they work but it always amazes me how when I switch gears from doing high volume endurance training to strength training and metabolic workouts how quickly my body responds.

If you have been spinning your wheels or doing hours and hours of cardio - STOP! Get my book this week and switch gears and get your fit female body! You'll feel better within a week and already start to see your body transform.

**** SPECIAL BONUS
Buy The Female Body Breakthrough by going to www.orderthefemalebodybreakthroughtoday.com on Thursday, November 12th and collect your FREE GIFTS! You will get a poster with The Fit Female Credo mailed to you along with Video Coaching with Rachel Cosgrove for the first 3 months of your journey to get you started and after buying the book on the 12th Rachel will share her #1 Secret to get you started along with 5 Fitness, Nutrition and Mindset related E-books to give you even more support on your journey.

IMPORTANT- The FREE GIFTS are only available if you buy the book from Amazon on November 12th.

A few women at our gym "wasting" squat racks...

2009-11-04T19:30:00.000-08:00

This is an average day in our gym. Women lifting and all looking good doing it! This is how all gyms should be with women feeling uninimidated, totally comfortable and transforming their bodies feeling confident and empowered.....

"Waste a Squat Rack"

2009-11-04T12:47:00.000-08:00

A few weeks ago I did a seminar at one of Thomas Plummer's events, The Rockstar Personal Development event he put on in Chicago. I was speaking to a room full of gym owners and I spoke about what women will be looking for in a gym over the next year and how there will be a shift. I pointed out that over the last year I have been asked by magazine's such as Women's Health and Shape to provide information on how to help women to feel less intimidated in the gym. I was also offered two offers for my book on strength training for women and I recently contributed to a book that will be out next year with the Editor in Chief of Women's Health on how to Look Better Naked- all of these programs and what I get asked for have all been on a trend of women finally "getting" the benefits of lifting weights, "real" weights.

Most gyms still have a Women's Only Section of chrome dumbbells and a butt blaster or inner/outer thigh machine and do not have any area where women can lift "real" weights and not feel intimidated or uncomfortable. My suggestion to these gyms was to make a corner of their gym a "functional" weight training area where there is a rack, a pulley machine, dumbbells and a bench that women would feel comfortable using for many of these programs that are hitting newsstands and book shelves.

One of the male gym owners in the audience blurted out- "You want us to WASTE A SQUAT RACK...." I think I had fire come out of my ears and know that the look on my face probably wasn't too happy. I said, "Excuse me?" "Waste a Squat Rack on women?"

Pretty soon I had every woman in the room, whether they had ever even used a squat rack or not...passionately defending their squat rack and that WE WOMEN NEED A SQUAT RACK and It is not a waste!

Anyway, it was a pretty good exclamation point to my point that most gym owners don't give their female members what they need to change their bodies and as women are catching on that strength training is necessary for them we will be looking for gyms that give us more than chrome dumbbells and a pink butt blaster machine.

6 Weeks to Attack the Fat

2009-11-02T08:07:00.000-08:00

One week ago yesterday I completed my 4th Half Ironman Triathlon. In addition to 4 Half Ironman's I have completed one full Ironman in 2007. My tales of my Ironman are documented in Chapter 3 of my book, The Female Body Breakthrough, which will be out next week.

If you have been following my blog or read any of my articles you know that in my research and also in THE RESEARCH, I have found that as I train for these longer distance events and add more and more volume of steady state aerobic training my body changes and not the way I want it to. I don't lose weight and I don't fit in a smaller size in fact my weight and size usually stay about the same, despite a high training volume, but my appearance is different. I lose my abs and don't have the definition I am used to seeing and overall end up feeling a bit "soft" by the time of the event. THE RESEARCH also shows this to be true that using higher intensity, lower volume is the answer for fat loss.

Although I am in great physical shape, and am able to swim a mile, bike 56 miles and run a half marathon all in one 6 hour workout, for all of the training I have been doing my body doesn't look it's best. Again, I am the same weight and size and probably look the same in clothes covered up but won't be caught training in a half top for a few weeks.

I always start training for these long distance events and for some reason think- "This time it will be different, I will really keep lifting heavy and watch what I eat and will be able to keep my abs throughout the whole training and will do a Half Ironman looking like a Figure Competitor." I know many of you have similar thoughts because I get emails all the time- "How can I train for a marathon and lose body fat crossing the finish line looking defined?" I actually did an interview on this very subject a while back- Click here to read. And in that interview I state- "My ultimate goal is to cross the finish line of a triathlon looking like a fitness competitor and be able to maintain it but I don't know if it is possible. I am still working on that one..."

But, once again as my training progressed for this Half Ironman my abs got softer and I could not keep my definition no matter how hard I tried. It is probably a hint that the majority of people who cross the finish line of an endurance event have a softer appearance, even if they are thin they usually don't look defined.

So as for my "Ultimate Goal" I have realized that it just may not be possible especially when training for Half Ironman and Ironman distance. Training for a Half Ironman and training to look like a "Fit Female" are two totally different and opposite goals. To get the look of a Fit Female, as I discuss in my book, you want you have to challenge your body and keep it from adapting with intense exercise, on the other hand to complete an endurance event your goal is for your body to adapt to the workouts so that you can complete the mileage at a steady state but adapting means you burn less and less calories.

The key for me is to periodize my year and my training so that after completing a Half Ironman, which for me was totally worth it to have the satisfaction of completing the event and being a part of contributing to the Challenged Athletes Foundation so my niece can participate in sports and be a part of what they have to offer, I have a 6 week Attack the Fat Phase.

Now it is time to switch gears and bump up my intensity and drop my volume and get the definition I am used to having back and Attack the Fat. The plan is 6 weeks of two metabolic workouts and three strength workouts along with eating healthy, NO steady state cardio. I did this same plan of attack after my last triathlon and within 6 weeks was back to the way I like to look.

This is the exact same plan that is laid out in my book, The Female Body Breakthrough, which has 16 weeks of strength and metabolic workouts. This is also the exact type of plan we recommend for the members of our gym who most of them perform 1-2 strength workouts a week and 1-2 metabolic workouts and their bodies transform to look the way they want in 6-12 weeks.

You can also be on your way to reaching your ultimate goal and the good news is that you do not need to do hours and hours of steady state aerobic training to have the body you want, in fact it could work against you. Give me 2-4 hours a week.

I'll be blogging on my progress every Monday for the next 6 weeks as my body transforms back to the defined, strong Fit Female "look" I prefer. This is the same Fit Female look I discuss in my book. Get my book next week, start following the programs and join me on your own Fit Female Transformation. I'll try to get some pics up for you.

"Sport makes you whole."

2009-10-27T07:39:00.000-07:00

Bob Babbitt in his speech at the start of my race this weekend said,

"I believe that sport makes you whole."

I never really thought about it but it is so true. If I didn't have sports, fitness, athletics, a way to move my body and do something or achieve something I would feel incomplete. This organization that I was racing to raise money for, Challenged Athletes Foundation, gives people who have had sports taken away from them by having no legs or missing an arm or being paraplegic or quadriplegic or in my niece's case having cerebral palsy and not being able to participate in sport or fitness as most people do, the very thing that makes many of us whole.

This organization gets these individuals what they need to compete and to be an athlete. It was amazing to see these challenged athletes pushing their limits with sport and getting the feeling of achieving something. Many of them had bikes especially made for their disability, in the swim they had a partner either that they held their feet or that helped them to swim and a number of them have running legs which are prosthetic legs to run on. There were also two 8 year old boys who were double amputee, with no legs who did the kids swim and their dads grabbed them when they finished seeing their son for the first time accomplish a sport- it was so emotional.

I was with a guy on the bike most of the way who had one arm and this was his first triathlon and he was having a blast and so excited to be a part of it. He did the mile swim, the 56 mile ride and the half marathon. Imagine riding a bike with one arm. I know it seems like, with one arm you could do it but your balance and everything has to be off. He was kicking my butt though.

Sport makes you whole really means a lot more after seeing all of these people be a part of sports and athletics when something as simple as jump roping at school with the other kids may have never been an option for them. It also makes me appreciate being able to participate in an event like this and that I am able to do a Half Ironman and can do whatever I want physically. It reminds me not to take advantage of that or take advantage of the feeling of being able to do a sport and accomplish something physically.

Thank you for the amazing, inspiring event CAF! I was honored to be a part of it and look forward to it next year.

Doing it for the experience....

2009-10-23T10:42:00.000-07:00

This weekend I am participating in an event that I am so excited about the experience and being a part of something so special. It is the first time that I am going in to a race without a set time I want to hit. I haven't been totally Type A about my training like I usually am. I am really just looking forward to going and being a part of the event and being inspired by the others participating.

This morning I took my bike out for a 10 mile spin to make sure it's ready to go and spin my legs out a bit and the whole ride all I could think about was how honored I am that I can go and do this race which is a Half Ironman (1 mile swim, 56 mile bike and a half marathon) event among other's who are passionate about making a difference for someone and that it really doesn't matter what my time is as long as I give it 100% and bring everything I have.

You see this race is a fundraiser for the Challenged Athletes Foundation. I have raised money for the foundation and in honor of my niece who is 7 years old and has cerebral palsy. She will be able to take advantage of what the Challenged Athletes Foundation offers and be a part of the experience. This makes this race especially special to me.

It is really a different amazing feeling to truly be going to the race to enjoy the day and be a part of the experience. I am looking forward to it! Stay tuned for my recap next week...

If you want to make a last minute donation go to my website at-http://sdtc09.kintera.org/rachel

Awesome stuff on Body Image- A Revolution!

2009-10-21T14:41:00.000-07:00

Did you see this story or hear about this picture of Lizzie Miller? It is so awesome what it has created- women who have realized that they they have to stop body bashing. In my book, The Female Body Breakthrough....coming out very soon....one of the Fit Female Credo's is to Stop Body Bashing and Celebrate your Strengths! I love this article which goes right along with the message I am trying to get out.

Seeing this story and what Glamour magazine is doing with it is awesome!

They are starting a revolution to finally end all of the negative dialogue going on in women's heads.

When I started writing my book over a year ago it was originally supposed to be a book about strength training for women but as I got into the book and interviewing my clients and other women I realized it wasn't about strength training at all. Strength training was just the form of exercise that is most effective to help women to change the way they feel about their bodies, think about their bodies and treat their bodies. My book went from being a book about strength training to a complete mindset, nutrition and training overhaul for women.

We currently run Skinny Jeans Challenges at our gym. The big key to this is that these aren't skinny jeans the style which the average woman doesn't fit in or look good in, and I don't even like the word "skinny." But these are YOUR Skinny Jeans. Every woman has a pair of "Skinny Jeans" in her closet, for some these might be size 6, others size 12 or 14 and of course a pair of Fat Jeans. I don't care what size YOUR skinny jeans are but when you are in them- you feel like a million bucks!

The interesting thing is that the average woman is a size 12-14. Yet, many of the fancy designer clothing brands max out at their biggest size being a 10, maybe a 12. Hopefully this revolution will have an affect on these clothing designers to start making clothes for real women with curves. Having a strong, toned butt is a very good thing!

For most people their skinny jeans will not be and will never be a size 2 or a size 4 realistically without starving themselves or doing some crazy fast...I know for me my skinny jeans are a size 8. When I am creeping up into my 10's I know I need to tighten things up. But I do not beat myself up to get into a size 4 because that is the ideal. Plus I feel great in my size 8 Skinny Jeans- I am fit, I am strong and I can actually eat and don't have to be consumed by workouts or counting calories or grams of food!

I have had clients go from a size 22 to a size 16 and feel sexier than ever and their confidence in themselves skyrocketed! They were so excited to be able to go shopping and not go to the Plus size section. THAT is what it is all about- feel confident and sexy in your own skin and finding the right type of exercise and nutrition to help you to feel that way in YOUR skinny Jeans no matter what size they are.

In my book I call them Thermometer Jeans. They tell you if you are hot or not. I am hoping we can rename them to be our thermometer jeans instead of calling them "skinny" jeans once my book comes out. The key is to keep your thermometer jeans close by, wear them once a week and make sure you are still HOT in your thermometer jeans. When you start to stuff them back in your closet and pull out the baggy clothes you know you need to get back to your workouts and fueling your body with healthy food.

Stop the body bashing once and for all and thank you to Lizzie Miller and Glamour Magazine for opening our eyes that we can feel confident, sexy and good about ourselves even if we aren't a size zero.

Another reason strength training is better than endurance for women...

2009-09-14T06:23:00.001-07:00

I was just thinking that one of the number one goals I have with my clients to change their bodies is to change the negative mental chatter that goes on upstairs all day long. Most women spend a lot of time each day talking negatively to themselves and have to consciously stop themselves and catch themselves. I had a realization that when women are using the wrong type of exercise to lose fat it not only doesn't work physically but it doesn't work mentally as well. Long runs or steady state cardio on a machine perpetuates this negative thinking that is so common for women.

Picture this - A woman running for an hour- what is going through her mind? Maybe she is thinking about her day ahead or her kids or a vacation that she has coming up but I bet you most women spend a lot of their time thinking- "Ugghh I can still feel my stomach jiggling when I am running...my thighs are rubbing together....gee, look at that runner- why don't I look more like her? Uh Oh, someone is coming up behind me and probably noticing how wide my ass is...How much longer...If only I hadn't pigged out last night I wouldn't have to torture myself like this..."

Ladies? I know you won't admit it but aren't these the kind of thoughts you might have while running at a steady state with nothing to think about except the tortuous exercise of repetitive motion you are doing to try to drop a few pounds and fit in your jeans so of course most of the time you will think about your body and how did you let yourself get here in the first place and beating yourself up?

Now Picture this- A woman goes to the gym to lift weights. Her focus is on the exercise she is doing, keeping her stomach tight and focusing on lifting the weight and keeping her form. She has to be thinking about what she is doing at that moment and most of her thoughts will be "I need to squeeze my butt and keep my stomach tight. I have 5 more reps, I can do this...."

I am not saying she won't have the occasional fleeting negative thought but it will be a lot less than if she has an hour of doing nothing but the same motion over and over again with nothing but her thoughts swimming around in her head.

So not only is strength training better for women for all of the physical reasons but it is better for them mentally too. And having less negative thoughts and more thoughts about keeping your stomach tight and being strong and finishing your set will lead to better results. The mind and body are connected. If you are spending an hour everyday doing steady state cardio thinking negative thoughts to yourself you could be undoing exactly what you are trying to do while you are trying to do it...Because your body is listening to what your mind is telling it.

I love my legs!

2009-09-01T06:07:00.000-07:00

It all started in dance class, looking into the mirror at my legs which were not as long and thin as I would like them to be. Other dancers in my class had long legs, but I was all torso with short legs. I used to use tricks such as hiking up my leotard with a string that I used to tie through and in the back with a bow to make it high cut showing more hip making my legs look longer. I also used to get in trouble from my dance teacher because I would tie a sweatshirt around my waist to cover up my lower body. And like many women, when I sat in a chair with shorts on I was self conscious of how my thighs spread and if I got a glimpse of myself in a window my eyes would go straight to my legs thinking - "Ugh! My legs are so chunky." I also remember standing in the mirror and from behind grabbing my inner thighs to see what I would look like if my thighs were thin and didn't touch. C'mon girls, you have all done this…if only I had longer, thinner legs…

My legs were strong and had muscle and could do lots of turns in dance class, I could even do the splits. Actually I tore my hamstring doing the splits when I arrived for a performance late and didn't warm up and went in to the dance cold and dropped in to a split and ripped my hamstring. I had to wear a big brace to school and hobble around. But my hamstring miraculously healed and I was able to do the splits again. Isn't the human body amazing - how resilient it is? But I never appreciated this; instead I just hated my legs.

As I started to learn more about exercise science and realized all of the aerobics I was doing might not be helping my lower body situation and was making me store more fat than I was burning there, I switched up my exercise routine and made strength training my priority workout. My legs started to look closer to the shape I wanted, looking more toned and defined.

But I could do all of the Pilates and stretching I wanted and my legs are not going to become "long lean dancers legs." They were still short and still my least favorite part of my body. Even with being in the best shape of my life, my legs would still be my least favorite part. When I competed in fitness competitions my abdominals would get leaner and leaner and my legs were the very last to respond. I would usually stick with baggy black pants, the baggier the better!

The ironic thing is I married a man who happens to be a "legs" guy. He loves my legs. If I had a choice I would always wear pants, but with his encouragement occasionally I started to wear skirts. Isn't it interesting how my least favorite part of my body is his most favorite part? Sometimes we girls are just so hard on ourselves instead of enjoying our bodies. We are our own worst critic.

But this past year I had a huge realization about me and my relationship with my legs. I finished writing my book, The Female Body Breakthrough, and in my Fit Female Credo I have a ton of stuff about mindset and having positive mental dialogue and how powerful it is. And every once in awhile I would still catch myself having the occasional negative thought of, "My legs look fat." I always catch myself and say something positive immediately because I know how damaging this mental dialogue can be, but I was disappointed at how often this would pop in my head.

Between my legs looking closer to the way I want them to(they still aren't long :)) by using strength training and wearing skirts more often and the fact that I had graduated from my big baggy black pants to tight black pants that hugged my butt and legs, I was pretty proud of myself and how far I had come. I feel confident wearing and showing off my butt and legs in tight pants and tight jeans and in a skirt and do it more often and very rarely have issues with my legs anymore.

As confident as I feel now about my body(which I do) I am still a woman.... And occasionally even I would slip back into my old ways and have negative thoughts enter my head about my legs. Then a client said something to me - "You always wear black pants. So do I because it hides my legs." And I thought to myself…hmmm, why do I always "hide my legs" with black pants because I wanted to tell her, "You should show off your legs - they look great and you have worked hard to look as amazing as you do!"…but I couldn't because I was guilty of the same thoughts - to "hide my legs" with black pants. I was still self conscious of my legs.

Then I had lunch with a friend who I used to dance with and she mentioned something about how she wore pants because there was no way she wanted to show her legs off in the gym where she was meeting me because she was self conscious about her legs. Again this seemed absurd - why would she think that she has to wear pants to come in the gym? She isn't overweight and in fact looks great. But then I realized these are the exact same thoughts that I have.

A few weeks ago I started training for the Challenged Athletes Foundation (CAF) Half Ironman and am raising money for the organization. My niece is my inspiration and is who I am doing it in honor of because she is going to be able to benefit from CAF and what they offer to get her involved in sports she may otherwise not be able to play. I was out on my bike riding 50 miles or something crazy like that and it hit me - Why in the world would I ever spend another day, minute, second not being completely grateful for my legs and what I can do with them - I can run, I can bike, I can lift weights, I can dance, I can do anything with these wonderful legs and my niece would love to have them. I love my legs! My legs should be my most favorite body part, not my least!

You see, my niece came in to this world with determination, born 3 months premature and weighing only 2 pounds. She is truly a miracle. She spent the first months of her life in an incubator at UCLA to continue her development until her lungs were strong enough to breathe on her own. She had to have Lasik eye surgery a couple times because her eyes weren't developed yet, she also had to have a shunt put into her head which drains fluid off of her brain and she will have that for her lifetime. And as she grew into the unstoppable girl that she is now we discovered that being born premature had resulted in her having Cerebral Palsy (CP). Her CP affects her lower body and basically means that her nervous system is telling her legs to be switched on all the time so she can't relax her muscles and then contract them, instead they are always contracted and in tone. This makes it difficult for her to control her legs and walk without a walker. She has to wear braces to put her feet and ankles in a position so that she can walk on them. She can take a couple of steps, but needs a walker or help for anymore and is unable to run. This is a permanent condition and will not get worse, but is not something she will grow out of. She has hit many milestones in her development and has pushed her limits to do more than the doctors thought she would. When she was first diagnosed, the doctor said - "See how she doesn't move one leg and then the other." Well, within the week she was moving one leg and then the other. Then it was that she couldn't go from kneeling to up on her knees and once again she was kneeling no problem within the week. It was like she just needed to hear what she couldn't do and she was determined to prove them wrong. After being told she would never be able to get around on her own she now, using a walker and with braces on, gets around with no problem.

Marie is 7 years old now and has had more obstacles in her first years of life than most of us will ever have in our lifetime. Heck this little girl has had 5 brain surgeries, and 2 Lasik eye surgeries and she is legally blind in one eye. So having CP isn't going to get her down or keep her from doing everything she wants. Where there is a will there is a way, and let me tell you this little girl has the will! She has an amazing personality, is so outgoing and smart and is one of the most popular girls in school because she is so friendly. The last thing she wants is for you to feel sorry for her. She just wants to be your friend and may need some help getting around every once in awhile, but loves to have fun! Like I said, she came in to this world determined and will go after and have everything she wants in life. Nothing will stop my niece as she grows up and overcomes the obstacles she has been faced with at such a young age. She is always asking me to go exercise and loves coming to the gym to do a workout never putting any limitations on her self.

Despite having, as my niece's best friend at school puts it, "legs that don't work very well", my niece will grow up being active, using her body and loving her legs and everything she has because she is a miracle. She doesn't see any limits for herself. I hope to inspire her to be the best she can be. I feel like my niece and I are kindred spirits - she inspires me everyday and my motivation for what I do in life is to be a role model for her as she grows up.

I think about her when I think about the vision for our gym in 5-10 years and how it will be a place she can come to exercise, she can work, and be involved in exercise and fitness. I think about her when I work out and how I have no excuse because she doesn't give herself an excuse. She inspires me every day.

Then it hit me - How can I possibly hope to be an inspiration to my niece if I am still having occasional thoughts that my legs are fat. How can I even think that? Why would that even cross my mind?

I have no reason to complain. I vow that I will never ever have even a fleeting negative thought, feel ashamed, self conscious, or ever feel anything other than total and complete appreciation for my legs and what I can do with them. I will wear shorts and skirts more often, I will show them off and I will even try to stray from my favorite black pants every once in awhile. Although I do love my black lululemon pants, so no promises to not still have them as a staple in my wardrobe, but I promise to not use them to "hide my legs" and instead to show off my legs! My legs will be one of my favorite parts of my body!

I hope this article will open the eyes of other women in the world who might feel self conscious about their legs to once and for all enjoy your body! Enjoy your legs! Run and cycle more miles with them, lift more weight with them, dance to more songs with them, do those last few reps you didn't want to do with them in your workout and never ever have a negative thought about your legs again! Think about my niece who doesn't complain and I think you can agree you have no reason to complain!

I hope you will join me in this vow to stop body bashing as the Fit Female Credo goes (learn more about this in my book, The Female Body Breakthrough, released November 10th) and enjoy your body!

To help me raise money for the CAF organization click my website to make a donation - http://sdtc09.kintera.org/rachel

If you think you can or you think you can't....

2009-08-13T13:35:00.000-07:00

I was working out and I had a set of 10 box jumps at the end of my workout.I did the first set of these no problem, flew up and landed softly on the box. Then the second set I did one and my office manager came around the corner and said, "Show off! I couldn't jump to that box. I have a mental block."

I said to her- "It is completely in your head. You must be thinking that you can't do it so ofcourse you can't do it." Then I... with the thought of, "you must have been thinking that you can't do it..." in my head go to jump on the box and completely miss by not jumping high enough and practically tripping myself. My office manager thought is was hilarious but I thought it was such an amazing lesson that you have to have your mindest right when you head into a workout. If you have negative thoughts floating around in your head while you are working out, every rep you do you will not do as well as you can. Now it is obvious on a jump like this but it may not be so obvious on a lunge or a row but if your mind is not giving that movement 100% and doing everything to focus and lift as much with perfect form as you can you will be cheating yourself out of better results. Interesting isn't it?

I think it was Henry Ford who said, "If you think you can or you think you can't you are probably right..." So true!

So I want to challenge each of you to enter in to each workout with a focus and attitude of challenging yourself to see what CAN you do. Keep focused, positive thoughts in your head and get the most out of every rep leading to a more effective workout, more calories burned and faster results!

You can only go up from here...

2009-08-06T09:59:00.001-07:00

Do you ever think about the fact that where ever you are right now you will only improve, get better, make progress and move forward from there? It is a pretty exciting, motivating thought when you think about it. This, right now, is basically the worst it will ever be (which doesn't necessarily mean it is bad now)...

What is "it"?

"It" could be:
1. Your fitness and health
2. Your finances
3. Your career
4. Your business
5. Your relationships
6. Whatever it is in your life that you want to improve.

If you decide to improve and take forward action to do that you can guarantee yourself that this is the worst it will ever be, today right now and you are still living and breathing...

So instead of focusing on where you are today, focus on where you are going and that you will start now making forward progress toward where you want to go. You will start to move away from where you are now into a forward direction to fulfill your ultimate vision for yourself.

If you aren't happy with the way you look and feel, start making forward progress toward where you want to go and don't dwell on where you are today because by tomorrow you will already be one step closer to your goal. Infact, with your next meal or your next workout you will feel a little more empowered and confident that you can take steps to get to where you want to be.

Don't be a victim of circumstance but instead realize that you are in complete control. Decide what area in your life you want to make forward progress in and start today and move away from where you are right now with your actions.

Don't Let Madonna's Arms Scare You!

2009-07-31T07:24:00.000-07:00

Just wanted to share my thoughts on Madonna's arms...since she has been getting some press lately and frankly looks pretty scary! I don't want her to scare anybody away from lifting weights. That ain't weight lifting that is giving her that look. Especially because her trainer is Tracy Anderson whose philosophies revolve around lifting 2-3 pound dumbbells maximum.

I don't know what all is going in to the way she looks (possibly dehydration, supplements, over exercising, starvation...) but the way Madonna looks has more to do with her extremely low levels of body fat, over training and a very restrictive diet losing too much fat and getting what some would call "ripped." This ripped look is what many Figure Competitors look to achieve which takes an extremely regimented, strict eating plan to the point of deprivation along with hours and hours of working out. This look has nothing to do with the amount of muscle she has... but everything to do with the lack of body fat and taking a good thing like a healthy diet and exercise way too far. When you see veins in her arms like that, it means she basically has no body fat. My goal for women is to achieve a look that is strong and healthy and above all that they feel good about themselves, and have energy. Performing exercise 2-4 hours a week and enjoying a splurge guilt free. It is not about losing every last ounce of body fat, being deprived and looking emaciated. Madonna is doing 2 hours a day of exercise (most of which consists of cardio and 2-3 pound dumbbells- OPPOSITE of my philosophies). Doing 2 hours of working out a day, you cannot work at the intensity I recommend you work. Less is more when it comes to exercise. And let's face it she definitely has some genetics playing in to the way she looks.

Just wanted to give you my 2 cents in case you had seen some of these pictures and been a little frightened to touch another dumbbell. Instead, know that you absolutely should lift weights, boost your metabolism and get the benefits of strength training but the most you should work out is 4-6 hours a week (not 12 hours like Madonna does) and you should EAT! Do not starve yourself. Having some body fat is a good thing and keeps you looking feminine. It is about finding a balance to look amazing, feel great and live life to the fullest!

Just wanted to reassure you that the way Madonna looks has nothing to do with lifting too much weight in the gym. Get to the gym, lift weights, push yourself for 45 minutes to an 1 hour max, getting your metabolism cranking so you can eat more, enjoy an occasional splurge and look feminine and feel sexy!

Getting the workout done on vacation

2009-07-28T08:12:00.001-07:00

Just got back from a vacation in Cabo and had a great time. Did some jet skiing, swam with dolphins and laid by the pool. It was the perfect vacation and Alwyn and I managed to work out everyday while we were there too. (We had to offset the Coronas and Chips & Guac somehow :)).

No excuse not to take 30-40 minutes and get a workout in while you are on vacation. Somedays we hit the gym for intervals on the treadmill which was harder than ever since it was over 100 degrees and super humid and the gym was open doors looking out over the ocean which was pretty but why they didn't have it closed and the A/C cranking I don't know. Just standing there you were dripping with sweat. An interval workout that normally wouldn't be so hard feels a lot tougher than it should. I also did a functional strength workout in the corner one day. There were no dumbbells or benches at all in the gym so I did a circuit of T Push Ups, SHELCS(they had a swiss ball), Lunges, Forward Ball Roll Outs and One Legged Squats. The gym is right by the pool and like I said is open air so as I was doing my one legged squats some old man was pacing watching me and then eventually stood there in his swimming shorts drinking his beer watching me do my set and then gave me a thumbs up. Now that's motivation! :) Later at the buffet he came up to me and said- "You are in good shape and strong, congratulations!" Why is it such an impressive sight for people to see a woman who is strong? I hope when my book comes out this will be more common sight to see- women who are strong. One day Alwyn and I even tried to do the circuit of fixed machines realizing why we never use machines EVER- I think we both hurt ourselves, they are so awkward and do nothing for me.

But our best workouts were on the TRX which we brought with us. We hooked it to a Volleyball court post and busted out a TRX workout which in that heat was one of the hardest workouts either of us had ever done. Packing a TRX is easy to take with you and you don't have to depend on the hotel having a good gym. And it is a great workout! We did a circuit of Bulgarian Split Squats, Push Ups, One Legged Squats, Inverted Rows and then we finished with a sprint run paired with Fall outs. It was tough!

We were both drenched with sweat and metabolisms up and ready for a day of lying by the pool and rehydrating when we were done.

Don't forget to pack your TRX for your next vacation! If you don't have a TRX- Click Here to get one today so you don't miss a workout on your next vacay.

Improve your 5K time!

2009-07-13T06:32:00.000-07:00

I am a big believer in the right strength training program improving an endurance athletes performance. Think about it- why does a man always cross the finish line first? What is the main difference between males and females to make him faster? The only difference is strength. He is stronger than her. Improving your strength can improve your speed as well as decrease injuries and make you a better endurance athlete. I lifted weights with a functional strength program right through training for my Ironman.

A study done at Barry University in Miami Shores, Florida showed that using a strength training program 4x a week for 6 weeks, shaved a minute off of 5K times.

The program included-
Swiss Ball Crunches
Hip Extensions
Back Extensions
Russian Twist
and Bird Dog

These are all great core exercises and a pretty good regimine for a 5Ker. Looking back at past research most of the studies used extremely non functional strength training exercises like leg extensions or leg curls and ofcourse showed no improvement. No wonder strength training got a bad rap in the endurance community- they only had done studies using bodybuilder exercises that absolutely won't translate to a faster 5K time.

It is nice to hear about a study that used exercises that really work to see if there would be an improvement and there was!

Add in the above exercises to your regimen if you are an endurance athlete and feel the difference for yourself. Every step you take you will be more efficient, have more strength and therefore more power!

The Big Book of Exercises Photo Shoot

2009-07-07T05:55:00.000-07:00

In February when I went to do my photo shoot for my book I also ended up helping out another editor, Adam Campbell with an upcoming book called The Big Book of Exercises (out in the next few months). I had never been on a photo shoot so it was great experience to be able to work on Adam's photo shoot for a few days before my shoot(thanks for the practice Adam :)). And to tell you the truth I had a blast. It was a whole different day in the life for me than usual. I ended up staying for 2 weeks. You see Adam is trying to put every single possible exercise there is into this book of exercises. It is going to be the most comprehensive exercise book and should be extremely helpful. There is a women's version and a men's version.

Below is what it looks like on the photo shoot.

This particular shot was a pose and not an exercise. For the exercises I would go up and coach the model to do the exercise trying to get them exactly where I would want them. Then I would run back behind the camera and the computer and yell at the model to "tighten this or squeeze that or stand up taller or turn your foot this way, or suck your abs in or stick your hips out more or squeeze your butt more..." and when I liked the shot I would say- "Shoot!" and they would snap a few shots. I would look at the computer screen to see if the shot turned out ok and pick out which one to use and sometimes we would have to do more than one because many times what you are looking at looks different from what shows up on the screen and once we got it exactly right we would move on.

This sounds much easier than it was- you see, many of these models had never done any of these exercises before so no matter how good your coaching was you inevitably had a model who couldn't do an exercise or who you had to get to fake it or who even worse is more worried about how his hamstrings look than actually doing the exercise properly. We also had a few models show up with injuries- "By the way, I tore one of my obliques..." Huh? But you are our core model doing 77 Core exercises today... And when you are looking at the picture, you might be focused on- "Is their back in the right position?" because that's what you were looking at the most but in the mean time they moved their foot or something else. It isn't easy to get every single thing exactly right but I think we came extremely close for this book considering we had days where we would shoot 85 exercises with one tired model. By the 85th exercise the poor model was shaking and just needed some food. Not only did you have to make sure the exercise form was right but you also had a lighting guy who had to make sure the lighting was just right and with the females a make up person who needed the makeup and hair to look good. So every shot, one of us would go- Nope the lighting should be different, or nope her bruise is showing or nope he needs to stand up taller.... By the end we got it down to a science.

Things I learned-

1. Models look like that despite being able to do any functional exercise. Some of the models were amazing and made the day fly by because they obviously train with real functional exercises. But most of them I think have extremely good genetics and look amazing but don't have to train as hard as the average person does just to get somewhat fit.

2. To give them some credit- Those models worked their butts off! That is a tough job and I was just glad I was on the backside of the camera and not out there doing 85 exercises without probably having eaten for a few days. They work very hard! It is not all glamour as a fitness model.

3. Hanging out on a photo shoot with a bunch of Men's Health Models was not the experience I thought it would be :) It was work, I swear!

4. The female models have just as many insecurities as every other female I have ever worked with. Very interesting- the female psyche. Here are these women in amazing shape, models for a book and they even had hang ups about this or that about their body...

5. I have a whole new respect for any exercise pictures I see in a magazine or a book. It isn't as easy as you would think. Models show up with injuries or having never done an exercise before. Once you snap the shot and walk away from it, when you get the photos back- there is no reshooting, it is done. You have to get it right the first time.

Overall, I had a fantastic experience and I can't wait to see how the book turns out. Watch for it, The Big Book of Exercises.

No more "But's" to get your Butt in Gear!

2009-07-01T07:46:00.000-07:00

"Think about your thoughts" is something I tell my clients on a regular basis. Think about what you are saying to yourself in your own head daily. This can be very powerful because if I can transform the way they think, I can also transform the way they look and feel. Your body is listening to what your mind is telling it.

One way I can tell what their daily thoughts are is by listening to what they say out loud. A big red flag is when I hear the word, "But" a lot.

"I really want to lose this 5 pounds BUT I don't want to give up my wine every night."

"I would come to the gym four days a week BUT my schedule is too busy right now."

"I am trying to stick to my diet BUT during the summer I can't always plan and be prepared."

The list could go on and on....

Do you ever use the word "But"? The word "But" actually completely and totally negates everything you just said. It completely disqualifies whatever came before it. If you are going to use the word "But" you may as well not have even said your intention in the first place because as soon as you throw the word "But" in there you just gave yourself the out that what you said means NOTHING.

Think about your thoughts today and start to catch how many times you use the word "But," you'll be surprised!

Instead swap it out for the word "And." This will all of the sudden change your mindset to start looking for a solution to accomplish your intention that you said in the first place.

"I really want to lose this 5 pounds AND I don't want to give up my wine every night."

"I would come to the gym four days a week AND my schedule is too busy right now."

"I am trying to stick to my diet AND during the summer I can't always plan and be prepared."

See how when you change your "but's" to "And's" the first part of your sentence and the second part of your sentence can now coexist and you will look for a solution or a way to accomplish what you want to accomplish.

So from now on, the use of the word "But" is not allowed.

No more "But's" to get your Butt in gear! Now get your Butt to the gym!

And you better not say, "But...."

Alexandra placed in the top 10!

2009-06-24T06:20:00.001-07:00

Congratulations to my client, Alexandra! She placed in the top 10 in the Bikini division at Fitness Universe. Doesn't she look fabulous? She has been working hard for months and all of her hard work paid off!

Final Plug...Alexandra is off to Miami

2009-06-16T07:19:00.000-07:00

Check out the email my client, Alexandra, just sent out. She is off to Miami to do her first Bikini and Figure Competition at the Fitness Universe! She is raising money for a charity. Check it out-

Alexandra's email-

"Mission Miami is due to launch this Wednesday. Unbelievable! It seems only yesterday that I decided to embark on this personal challenge. And boy has it been an adventure. If I see another whey protein, piece of chicken, tuna, another alarmingly high pair of heels or high cut bikini bottoms…I will crack up. It has been such hard work but I wouldn't change it for the world.

First and foremost, I wanted to say a huge THANK YOU to all of those who have generously donated to our amazing charity Ability Bow. We have already raised £917 which thrills me to bits. I have fully achieved my goals listed below!

Well…apart from the last one, due to be ticked off the list this week! ·

To weight train 4 hours per week 100% ACHIEVED (in fact I worked out since end of January 09 I have trained 72 hours) ·

To consume a minimum of 100 grams of protein per day 80% ACHIEVED (I found this one very tough) ·

To maintain a single digit body fat percentage 100% ACHIEVED ·

Get on stage and compete in the 2009 Miami Universe competition TO BE ACHIEVED 19th & 20th JUNE

In addition to these goals, I also discovered yesterday that I have gained 3.2 kg since the end of January which means I have achieved my weight gain target of 3kg too! Now, does this stellar girl not deserve more donations??? Of course she does! You have until the 20th July to make your donations! So keep them rolling in!" http://blog.alexandra-wilson.co.uk/

90% On Average - Nutrition Periodization

2009-06-06T21:30:00.001-07:00

That last post was not meant to give everyone an excuse to take a week off. Actually I have been thoroughly enjoying getting back to my normal lifestyle- eating healthy, getting all of my workouts in and losing the bloat. Back to my normal self...

I always follow the 80-90% rule with my nutrition but one concept that I don't know if I have ever explained is the 90% "on average" concept.

When I have a week like we did last week in Britain I do my best to be close to 100% on track the week or two before we leave and then when I get back (this week) I am super motivated because I have had a break and am usually close to 100% for a week or two on the other side. So over 5 weeks-

Week 1- 100%
Week 2- 100%
Week 3- 50%
Week 4- 100%
Week 5- 100%

Guess what? On average the above equals 90%!!!! So on average I am actually right on track. The hard part about the above is being 100%. 100% means no meals can be missed, no vegetables can be skipped, and no wine can be drank(usually my weakness, a glass of wine with dinner 1-2 x a week). But knowing you are leaving on vacation in a few weeks keeps you focused and then because you let yourself relax, you are ready to be back on 100%. It works really well actually and is a strategy you should give a try.

I think too many people try to be 100% all the time and it just does not work long term. They eventually blow it, become self destructive and it gets them nowhere. Plus your body needs a break and will respond better afterwards.

It is periodization with your nutrition! We are always using a periodized training program, why wouldn't your nutrition be the same? Having periods of a more regimented food intake and other times of complete freestyling.

At this point I have 6 weeks until Alwyn and I head to Cabo for another vacation so once I again I will be on track close to 100% until we go because I know we will probably relax and have a few drinks while we are there. So overall, my year is 90% on track with what I should be eating and therefore I can feel good, look good and enjoy a relaxing vacation throughout the year!

What will you eat there?...Aahhh The British Bloat!

2009-06-02T15:47:00.001-07:00

Just got back from a trip to Scotland and London. Alwyn and I try to go once a year to see his family and friends who live there. Before I left I was at my hairdressers and she said to me-

"What in the heck do eat while you are there? There is nothing healthy, is there?"

To tell you the truth when Alwyn and I go to Britain we absolutely do not try to stick to our normal healthy diet and I definitely know that the nutrition regime that we usually follow a minimum of 80-90% of the week slips to probably 50% or even worse...Gasp!!! It is as the saying goes- "It isn't what you eat between Christmas and New Years...it is what you eat between New Years and Christmas." Basically if most of your year you stick to a healthy diet of lots of fruits and veggies and lean protein, you can give yourself room to relax and enjoy yourself when you choose to such as on vacation or during the holidays.

Life is about experiences. The reason we eat healthy and workout is to experience life to the fullest, feel optimal and get the most out of life that we can. To fully experience Britain you definitely have to indulge in Fish N'Chips, the kind you get from the "Chippy" and eat out of a newspaper while walking down the street drenched in sauce, British Chocolate which is out of this world, Crisps in flavors such as Roasted Chicken and Steak and Onion, square sausage on a roll with brown sauce(Alwyn's fav), a Traditional British Breakfast which includes Eggs, Bacon, Sausage, mushrooms, Beans and fried bread and the assortment of Pies, Pasties and other cooked goods that you can only find in Britain. It is true that at a traditional British restaurant their idea of vegetables is a few green peas on the side of your plate. And then of course...the beer- I am usually a one glass of red wine kind of girl(ok, maybe two) but not in Britain- Yes, I do enjoy a Guiness or a Newcastle or my new favorite was one called Organic Honey Dew. We drank a lot of Shandies which are half Beer and half Sprite. They have lots of different beer and being married to a man from Scotland I have accumulated an appreciation for good beer.

Yes, I usually do put on a few pounds and feel less than optimal and am anxious to get back to my normal routine when I get home and within a week lose the British Bloat. It is usually a good boost for my fitness and nutrition when we get back and it is amazing that within a day or two the bloat comes off. If you follow a healthy lifestyle most of the time you can take a week completely off without too much damage at all and give yourself a break. As long as you get back to it after a week, you'll lose the bloat within a day or two.

Our damage control- We did keep up our exercise despite all of the food we indulged in and tried to drink enough water. We hiked up to a Castle which was a pretty tough hike along with squeezing in a couple workouts a week at the local gym and I got a run in along with walking what we figured to be about 5 miles a day while in London. I actually like to run when I am in a new place to explore the area and Alwyn and I usually walk around the city quite a bit.

Anyway, I just thought it was funny that my hairdresser thought that I actually eat super healthy while in Britain...because honestly I don't even try. I remember when I first met Alwyn and we went to a British Pub and I tried to order a salad and some wilted lettuce came out while he chowed down on some yummy fish and chips I swore I would never order a salad at a British Pub again. From now on when we go to a British Pub it has to be part of my 10% so when we have a week full of British Pubs...that 10% goes out the window and I enjoy myself!

BUT- I will say, because of this question I did pay more attention to IF you could eat healthy if you really wanted to and yes, of course, if you made the effort you can find healthy choices. Not at the chippy and maybe not at the British pubs but I was surprised that most of the British Pubs did have Vegetarian Options and many had a section of Healthy Choices on their menu. I did also notice a number of health conscious restaurants including- Pret A Manger and a place called LEON. Plus of course you can find grocery stores and get whatever you need. But when we sat down at our first British Pub of the trip and ordered our Shandies I was not about to order from the healthy options and miss out on a good steak and mushroom pie and chips with vinegar to go with my beer to get the full experience. And when Alwyn's dad cooked up a full British Breakfast for me I couldn't turn it down.

In all I gained 4 pounds while in Britain for 10 days and it took me one day to lose the 4 pounds. It was all just British Bloat that went along with the amazing trip we had, with fabulous experiences, good British food and of course beer!

And a renewed motivation to get back to my normal lifestyle!

Cheers!

Me and Nygel Lythgoe

2009-05-17T08:17:00.000-07:00

Friday I spoke at an event for the Local Ladies in Business and it was a huge success. The keynote speaker was Nigel Lythgoe and he was great.

Also on the stage before me was Susan Beavers who is one of the writers for Two and Half Men and she was fantastic as well. They had a great lineup and I was honored to be among them.

Women need help!

2009-05-13T07:17:00.000-07:00

Alwyn and I are in Vegas at a meeting with one of our business coaches. Our meeting starts at 8am so I got up early to head down to the gym to workout knowing that the day would probably be a lot of sitting. Gym opened at 6am. I arrived at about 6:10am and the treadmills were all taken(not that I wanted one but it goes with my story). This gym is very well equipped for a hotel gym. Every possible fixed machine you could imagine PLUS a full set of free weights up to 75 pounds(plenty) and a smith machine, swiss balls, medicine balls, a nice pulley station- lots of good stuff to get a good work out in. Yet, everyone was trudging along on the treadmills doing the treadmill shuffle.

I went over to the weight training area did a warm up of lunges, stretches and movement prep and then grabbed the 30 pound dumbbells and started with a set of lunges. During my workout only one woman ventured over to the free weights after she finished her hour on the treadmill and she grabbed the 10’s and this was her routine-

bicep curls, then some strange thing where she put the weights behind her and pulsed for 20 reps, then overhead presses, then shoulder rolls, then lateral raises, then bicep curls AGAIN but this time hammer curls and then finished with her arms behind her again but this time bending her elbows(probably thought she was working her triceps).

She proceeded to set the 10 pounders down and hit the locker room for a shower. That was it- that was her strength training. An hour on the treadmill and then that.

Sometimes, it is good for me to get out of my bubble at our gym where all of our female clients lift weights, challenge themselves and the priority workout for them is their strength training. They all do "bang for your buck" exercises and no woman at our gym spends more than 20 minutes on a treadmill and most don't spend any time on a treadmill. We have two treadmills that are empty most of the time.

Women need help when it comes to their fitness. This confirmed to me that women do need my book when it comes out- The Fit Chick Body and my website, www.fitchickcoach.com where I will be coaching and helping them to figure out what they should be doing in the gym. I just hope they are ready for it!

Go to the website now and sign up for updates if you aren't already on my list- www.fitchickcoach.com.

10,000 hours = Expert

2009-05-05T06:12:00.001-07:00

One of my clients gave me the book- Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell.

It is a great book, I am about half way through. She wrote in the front of it- "To Rachel, My outlier and inspiration..." I thought- wow, "one of her outliers..." and had to dig in to the book just to figure out what she meant by that. The book is all about how to become successful and an expert at what you do.

That same week someone asked my husband, "How did Rachel set herself up to become the expert training women?" Interesting that I had become known as the expert, at least to this person. And I couldn't really pinpoint what I did to "become the expert." I knew I had worked my way to the point of getting in the magazines and getting my first book published this year but how did I get to this point?

This all came together for me when I started the book. In Outliers he talks about how it takes 10,000 hours to become an expert at something and that is usually about 10 years for most people. It all clicked that I had put in my 10,000 hours and very well could be an expert at what I do. I love what I do and everyday work with women and learn more with every client about how to help them become the best they can be. I didn't start with my first client thinking- how do I become known as the expert? Instead I just kept my nose to the ground stone and did what I did the best I could do and continued to learn and apply what I learn. I listened to my clients and learned from them with every session.

It all started with my very first client in 1997(12 years ago). Her name was Mary Sue. Mary if you are out there- hello and thank you for being my first client! She was a fantastic client, a writer for a Soap Opera and I trained her in New York where I moved right after college. She was my client for a couple years. I would take her around the circuit of machines at the gym I worked at, Manhattan Plaza Athletic Club in midtown New York, and talk to her about her day and she saw improvements. In fact, after we had worked together for awhile she started riding horses again. But I think back now and I think how far I have come since 1997 when I started training that very first woman I ever trained. I gave her the best I knew how but from there have continued to learn with every client I have trained, every book I have read, every seminar I have attended, every experience, every conference I have been to and my philosophies and ideas have been shaped and formed and at this point I have definitely put in 10,000 hours training women. It wasn't until just a few years ago I did consciously say to myself- "I want to be the best at training women and know everything there is to know about it."

The more I think about it, I think this 10,000 hour rule is pretty accurate. You have to put the time in. We also see this with our business. We are going into our tenth year of having our business open and are now becoming known as experts in the fitness business. It has taken us 10 years to become experts running our business, making mistakes, reading business books, attending business seminars. But now after 10 years are becoming known as experts and have new fitness business entrepreneurs coming to us to learn from us. We have put the time in.

Another example is the coaches who work at our gym who get really good, really fast because they train a LOT of people. More than they would ever train working at another gym. They are all full time so work with clients 30-40 hours a week and see up to 3 people each hour. I have always noticed that this accelerates how good they get because of the mere number of clients they are training and learning from.

Decide what you want to be the best at in life, what you want to be an expert in and put your time in. Every hour you spend doing it, get everything out of that hour. There is no quick fix to becoming an expert or the best at what you do. You have to put the time and work in.

Although, people see me as an expert at what I do now, I will never stop learning, getting better and giving my best every day.

What will that make me 10 years from now when I look back?

Thank you Micaela for giving me the book, Outliers and for inspiring me to write this post. You are a pleasure to work with and to have in the gym.

7 Ways to shake up your workout!

2009-04-29T14:33:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I was interviewed by Katherine Hobson from U.S. News & World Report on 7 ways to shake up your workout. Check it out-

http://health.usnews.com/blogs/on-fitness/2009/04/29/your-strength-routine-7-tips-to-shake-it-up.html

My Big Fat Ass

2009-04-24T12:23:00.000-07:00

My Big Fat Ass
By Rachel Cosgrove

At the gym yesterday, sitting in my office and I hear “I can’t get my big fat ass up there.” I immediately throw open my office door and look to see if who I think said what I think she said and by the look on her face (as if she had just been caught in the cookie jar) she did. And then she said- “I just got busted! I didn’t know you were here!”

This is one of my clients who has been working her butt off to get the body she wants. She has struggled for years and is ready once and for all to do this. She has been training hard, eating clean and her body is changing. She fits into a pair of jeans she couldn’t before and she has been steadily dropping body fat.

Over her journey my biggest goal has been to get her to change the way she talks to herself because I know that even if she manages to get to where she wants to be, she won’t be able to stay there with this kind of internal dialogue going on. When she started she constantly would say things like, “I am just destined to be fat.” “I am frustrated; I’ll never get a handle on my food.” I knew that in order for her to succeed we had to change this Stinkin’ Thinkin’, a term I heard weight loss expert Kara Mohr use, and get her focusing on positive thoughts. I don’t tolerate this kind of negative talk in my gym- it does nothing for you and it does absolutely nothing for those around you. I will not tolerate it and yes she did get busted!

The crazy thing is most women talk to themselves negatively all the time. Constantly putting themselves down and finding every flaw they have but they never recognize their own strengths. If anyone else were to talk to them the way they talk to themselves they most likely would not be friends with that person for long. Isn’t it interesting that as women we think it is ok to talk to ourselves in a way that we would not tolerate anyone else talking to us? Bottom line: You don’t deserve to be talked to that way! Don’t let anyone tell you that you are fat, that you have no willpower, that you are frumpy…not even yourself!!!! Got it?

I am a huge believer in your mind being very closely connected to your body. I believe our bodies listen to everything we say. Every thought, every word, everything and after planting them in our subconscious, our bodies take each of these as a command for what it needs to do. We have about 50,000 thoughts a day. If the majority of these are negative, your body and life will reflect that. If you keep saying- I am fat when you are trying to lose weight, you will not succeed. If you say out loud that you have a big fat ass…guess what…your body thinks it is a command. You must start to visualize where you want to go, what you want to look like and how you want to feel and focus on that.

You may be thinking…this is fine and all until you head outside of the gym into the real world where you get surrounded by people who are constantly bombarding you with negative thoughts. “You’re lifting weights? You’re just going to get big and bulky and never going to lose the weight.” “Why don’t you just have a glass of wine and some bread…don’t deprive yourself! It isn’t working anyway and you’re no fun these days!”

Alright girls, here is what you need to do in these situations- You are Wonder Woman! Remember Wonder Women’s wrist bands? Your wrist bands deflect any negative comment. So, next time someone says something to you to try to bring you down and sap your motivation deflect the comment with your super power wrist band and don’t even let it get to you.

Another scenario us girls come up against is when we are hanging with our girlfriends and one of them starts in on the body bashing comments- “I hate my pooch…” Your first instinct is to join in and say, “I have a pooch too, mine is worse than yours…” Do not do it! Do not join in with the body bashing. Again, your body is listening. Instead, tell your friend you think she looks fabulous and change the subject!

Take a moment to yourself and think about why you go to the gym everyday. Think about why you keep an eye on what you eat. Think about what it is you want from this lifestyle and what motivates you to stick to it? If you have been struggling with getting the results you want then start to listen to that voice in your head and tell it to shut up and change those thoughts to focus on where you want to go and how you will feel.

Next time you catch yourself saying, “I can’t get my big fat ass up there.” Or “I look fat in this outfit.” Immediately catch yourself and cancel that thought with something positive and motivating!

Train hard and stay focused on what you want from all of your hard work. You deserve to feel empowered, confident and have nothing but compliments and positive thoughts! You’ll find that with this new attitude you’ll inspire others!

Mission Miami

2009-04-17T06:48:00.000-07:00

One of my clients is training for Ms. Figure and Ms. Bikini Fitness America Competition in Miami, Florida. She lives in the UK. She and I started working together for this competition in February after I met her at our mentorship last year and she is now 10 weeks in to her training and has put on 6 pounds of muscle. She is doing great and I am excited to see her dial it in these last 8 weeks for her competition on June 15th.

She has decided to give her training meaning and to make a difference she is raising money for a charity. Go to her blog to read about her, her training, see pictures and to make a donation- http://blog.alexandra-wilson.co.uk/

Keep up the good work Alexandra!

Article in Women's Health

2009-04-13T20:50:00.000-07:00

Check out this article in Women's Health- great article! And not just because I was featured in it.
http://www.womenshealthmag.com/weight-loss/weight-training-tips

Finally the word is getting out there that women need to lift weights and stop being scared of bulking up.

My vision is that one day you will walk into any commercial gym and it will be packed with women lifting weights because they have finally learned all of the benefits including increased metabolism, decreased risk of osteoporosis, decreased risk of injury, anti-aging and a beautiful body and are no longer scared and intimidated. It would look like any beauty salon, because women will have learned that lifting weights is just as important to their looks. That is how our gym looks-

To get a copy of my lecture on how females should workout,
Training Jill not Jack, Click here for more information.

Trainer Spotlight: Rachel Cosgrove - Men's Fitness

2009-03-23T04:00:00.000-07:00

Trainer Spotlight: Rachel Cosgrove - Men's Fitness

Posted using ShareThis

Training Jill, Not Jack at the NSCA PT Conference

2009-03-19T17:48:00.000-07:00

This past weekend I spoke at the NSCA Personal Trainers Conference. My talk was called Training Jill, Not Jack. I had a great time meeting some of you. If you missed the talk you can purchase it on DVD and not even leave your home! It is available in my store- Click Here.

Here is the workout I did at the Practical Session-

Warm Up- Movement Prep/Corrective
Squat to Stand, Lunge w/ reach, YTWL
Core
A1- Plank 1 x 60s 30s
A2- Bridge Marching- 10ea mod 30s
Strength
B1- Front Squat 2 x 8ea mod 30s
B2- 2 Point DB Row 2 x 8ea mod 60s
B3- Partial Co Cont Lunge 2 x 8ea mod 30s
B4- Push Up 2 x 8ea mod 30s
D1- One Legged Romanian Deadlift 2 x 8ea mod 30s
D2- Rotational OH Press 2 x 8ea 30s
Finisher-
Squat Thrusts/BW Squats or BW squat jumps
Pyramid- 1,2,3,4,5,4,3,2,1

My Photo Shoot

2009-03-03T17:35:00.001-08:00

What a week I am having! I had my photo shoot for my book last week and it went so great! My model was awesome- beautiful, fit and could do all of my exercises! I got to get my make up and hair done too and get some shots done for my author photos- it is all very exciting! After seeing all of the pictures it really makes this seem real that I have a book coming out. The pictures really brought the vision to life. I am so excited how my book is all coming together- it is going to be great!

I also got brought in a few days early to help out with a Men's Health book and then was asked to stay for another week to help out. I definitley know my way around a photo shoot now. I have learned so much. It has been a lot of fun!

In the mean time my profile is up on precision nutrition. You can read about me on their site at-
http://www.precisionnutrition.com/expert-profile-rachel-cosgrove

Hope everyone is having a great week!

Congrats to our powerlifting team!

2009-02-22T22:12:00.000-08:00

Congratulations to our Results Fitness Powerlifting Team who competed for the second time this weekend and all came home with medals! Every one of them set a PR this weekend!

Congrats girls! I am so proud of you!

Read about their first competition in my article on Figure Athlete.

They are so inspiring!

Lost 2 pounds...now for a rant!

2009-02-15T15:05:00.000-08:00

Alright, I have to use this opportunity to have a rant...

I am working with a group of women at the gym who have 12 weeks to get into their skinny jeans. I told them I would be measuring them every two weeks and then they would try on their skinny jeans every 3-4 weeks but I would only take the time to measure them if they bring their journal filled out 90% compliant to the nutrition rules I gave them. You see I have consistantly seen with my clients that if they are not 90% compliant their body will not change. Also if they are not following a plan at least 90% of the time then I don't know what is working and what isn't. So there is no point in measuring.

It is time. Tuesday is when we will check in and see how they did the first 2 weeks of their challenge. I am sure I will see the majority of these clients losing 2-4 pounds of fat after following the nutrition advice 90% of the time and writing down what they are doing and getting all of their workouts done. They are commited and focused and will see results.

Now for the rant...I have already heard that some of these women were at the gym last week(after 1 week) discussing how- "I haven't lost anything...nothing is happening...I need to just start starving myself. This isn't working to eat more..." This sounds like negative talk from people who have not fully bought in to my advice and are probably not following it from the beginning. They are looking for an excuse or something to blame for why they are not seeing results. If you want to lose fat, do what I tell you and it will work- guaranteed! But you have to commit.

I know for a fact that if they have not changed at all then they are not following what I told them to do 90% of the time. How do I know this? Because I have worked with enough clients and I have seen over and over again on then and on myself and KNOW that their bodies WILL CHANGE if they are following what I tell them to.

Proof- This week I started "dialing it in" myself because I have my photo shoot next week for my book. Now I am already working out regularly, eating probably 80-85% of the time compliant to my nutrition rules but this last week I stepped it up and added in some extra workouts and stuck to my nutrition 90% of the time and GUESS WHAT- AMAZING! I dropped 2 pounds! Now this wasn't a bloated 2 pounds, this was me already feeling pretty good and lean, probably about 19% body fat and dropping another 2 pounds to get closer to 18% body fat.

What did my week look like?

2 Strength Training workouts
2 Metabolic Workouts
1 Stairmill interval session(20 minutes)
1 Run around the block(30 minutes)
1 Day Off

90% compliant- my splurges included 1 night of Shepard's pie, 2 glasses of wine and dessert for my Grandma's Birthday and then another night with 2 glasses of wine for a friend's birthday. Yes, I enjoyed these splurges AND lost 2 pounds. Otherwise, my days were made up of - Eggs/Egg Whites and Spinach, Yoghurt & blueberries, Chicken breast, lettuce, oil and vinegar, Tuna and apples or a shake at the gym(usually Peanut Butter Peal) and for dinner Mahi Mahi, Steak or chicken and veggies and ofcourse one of our shakes at the gym after every workout- Hawaiian Harvest is my fav!

Now, I had heard about some of these clients complaining about not changing and I had already thought to myself- they are not following what I told them to do, maybe unconciously, and are looking for something to blame. I am looking forward to seeing their journals- Maybe they skipped a meal here or there or they rationalized that having wheat thins for their snack was allowed or trail mix maybe. Or they forgot about the potatoes or bread they decided to have with dinner this week. They may have thought they were 90% but were actually 70-80%.Whatever it was if they did not change this week, they were not 90% on the plan guaranteed.

Checking in with myself at the one week point of my "dial it in phase" after a couple splurges this week was evidence once again that there is no reason their bodies should not be changing.

Be honest with yourself, are you doing what it takes to change your body? If so stay positive, stay focused and watch out for any negative chit chat you have going on in your head. The mind and body are VERY connected and if you are thinking that- "This doesn't work. I am destined to be fat forever. I will never lose fat...." Guess what you are right!

Whether you think you can or think you can't- you are absolutley right!

55 Fitness Business Strategies for Success

2009-02-05T05:03:00.000-08:00

Our new business book - "55 Fitness Business Strategies for Success" launched last weekend at the Perform Better Seminar in Los Angeles.We only had 50 copies available -- and we sold out.

The good news is that the book is available now and is on sale for the next seven days for $19.99.Pick it up here => 55 Fitness Business Strategies

Here is an excerpt from the book:
Strategy 31
Have a separate program design department.

Every program needs to be designed according to the same systemized philosophy.

You shouldn’t have one trainer who does functional training with her clients, and another trainer who does Olympic lifts and another trainer who does all power lifting or bodybuilding.

Decide on one philosophy and create a system to design all of the programs through that philosophy so every trainer is using a program that follows the same philosophy.

Every client should get the best that you have to offer- you decide what that is.

Initially as the owner, you may be designing all of the programs and as you hire trainers, you will design the programs that they will implement. You should have a standard evaluation that any of your trainers can take them through and then they turn this evaluation into the Program designer. We use The Functional Movement Screen developed by Gray Cook, along with a health history, goal assessment, range of motion test and flexibility test. This evaluation can be easily taught to a new fitness coach. The program designer should work off of a template - The key is to have a system.

Benefits:
* Allows you to hire trainers who may not know how to write a good program initially. Remember in the staffing chapter when we discussed hiring the people with the lowest skill? This is exactly what we are talking about. Hire someone who loves fitness, has good training skills and a great personality but may not know how to periodize a 16 week program to get 20-30 pounds of body fat off of somebody safely and effectively. Leave that to the Program Design Team.

* Again you have a business because what you do with your clients is successful- why would you want your clients to do anything different from what you would do with them?

* It creates a great environment for teamwork. The client knows they have someone writing their program and someone teaching it to them. They have a whole team working to get them the best results possible.

* If a trainer leaves or a program designer leaves, the client is not affected. Someone else takes over the same system and the client’s training does not miss a beat.

Pick up the newest book here => 55 Fitness Business Strategies On sale this week for only $19.99, this book will give you an insight into how we run Results Fitness.

"I just finished the new book. Great guide! Seriously, you two are making it so much easier for people to succeed, achieve results faster and feel less frustrations"--Rob Pilger

=> 55 Fitness Business Strategies

Today everything changes in Sports Camp World!

2009-02-04T00:03:00.000-08:00

I don't normally do plugs on my blog, I usually keep it more of a journal to practice my writing but I have to tell you about this opportunity incase any of you are getting into sports training camps which are a great way to make money in this industry!

If you have every thought of doing a sports camp- Today is the day everything changes in the sports camp world!

At noon today, Eastern Standard Time (Boston, MA) Pat Beith unleashes what is, quite honestly, the most comprehensive sports camp and speed clinic 'business in a box' that this industry has ever seen.

SPORTS CAMP BUSINESS IN A BOX

The experience and success of the teachers in this program is unparalleled.

Starting at noon today, there can be no more excuses for not turning record breaking profits running speed clinics and sports camps.

You'd have to try *not* to make money and it still wouldn't work. There's just too much good 'stuff' in this package to not succeed.

So go order the Sports Camp Empire program and completely change the way you do business.

SPORTS CAMP BUSINESS IN A BOX

Trust me - you haven't seen anything when compared to this program.

--
Rachel

P.S. Pat is also giving away 6 sweet 'Fast Action' Bonuses to the first *75* serious entrepreneurs who order the Sports Camp Empire Program.

So if you're serious about growing your business, it's worth your while to jump on this offer right at noon because from the buzz these videos have created, those first 75 programs will be gone very quickly.

SPORTS CAMP BUSINESS IN A BOX

P.P.S Pat is also offering a "more than your money back" guarantee. Definitely worth checking out

Perform Better One Day in Los Angeles

2009-01-26T06:26:00.000-08:00

This weekend I went to the Perform Better One Day Learn by Doing in Los Angeles. My husband was speaking but the real reason I went was to learn and network. I always learn something at these events or have an "Aha" moment talking to someone I meet. Todd Durkin, Mike Boyle, Gray Cook, Anthony Deluglio and of course my husband, Alwyn Cosgrove all spoke at the seminar.

Perform Better puts on a great event, they are the top in the industry when it comes to continuing education. It was close to sold out, if not sold out(I think every seat was taken but don't know if they actually turned anybody away). I am surprised that I did not see EVERY single trainer I know in attendance there, why anyone would miss a Perform Better event???? I know a lot of trainers in Los Angeles who weren't there- it baffles me. Heck, the audience was almost more impressive- I saw Sean Skahan, strength coach for the Anaheim Ducks, and trainer to the stars Gunnar Peterson was in attendance sitting in the audience learning and this was the first one Valerie Waters, trainer to Jennifer Garner and Cindy Crawford among other beautiful celebrity clients has missed in years(only because she had a previous commitment). Any trainer who is a professional and who takes their career seriously was there learning and getting even better.

What did I learn?

Todd Durkin- Todd's talk was motivational and reminded me of the daily actions I need to take to continue being successful in our business. His energy is contagious! He had a list of Lessons learned from the Trenches, here are a few of them -

Focus on delivering the Customer Experience!
Don't live in FEAR- "Fear" is False Expectations Appearing Real
"If you're tired, you're not inspired"
"Do what you do best and hire the rest"
Focus on the process, not the product. (The Journey)
Don't spread yourself too thin- learn to say No!
Protect against burnout by investing in yourself, staying hungry and leveraging your time.
Attention to detail is critical
Adversity is God's way of teaching you a lesson to be used at a different time in your life.
Mo-mentum means Mo Money!!!
The Power of Success lies within you!

His hands on was intense! He did some great stuff to use in boot camps or group classes, partner stuff and games. Again his energy is insane!!!

Alwyn Cosgrove- My husband was hilarious as usual. He makes me laugh everyday and he made the audience laugh outloud on Saturday along with provide some of the real strategies we have learned running our business for the last 9 years. We almost sold out our April mentorship, I think we have 2 spots left. If you are interested, download the brochure here and send in your resume and a paragraph about why you should be accepted to info@results-fitness.com. You can also check out our site at http://www.resultsfitnessbiz.com/.

Alwyn's hands on used kettlebells, bands, sand bags, val slides, swiss balls and body weight to give everybody an awesome workout.

Gray Cook- Gray discussed the primitive patterns of squatting, lungingm stepping, reaching, leg raising, push up and rotary stability. Most of all the walk away piece of information that everyone grasped was that we need to stop doing crunches with our clients and use all Core stabilization exercises in place for core work. Crunches = Low back injuries. If you are lost on what I mean by core stabilization exercises check out our brand new Ultimate Core DVD that has a TON of exercises on it. His FMS certification course is coming up in February and is one not to miss if you want to be at the top of the field in this industry. If you aren't doing some kind of screen with your clients, you are missing a huge piece of the puzzle. You must assess for success!

Mike Boyle- Mike talked about the difference between training a "fat" client and an athlete. He talked about stuff like the fact that you can't have a "fat" person roll around on a foam roller or do a bunch of core activation or one legged exercises- all stuff that he makes the number one priority with his athletes. A funny visual was him describing trying to get a "fat" person to do a plank and how basically what happened was the person was on his elbows and feet but his stomach, his boobs and everything else was also on the ground and there was no way that guy could "feel" if his abdominal was engaged, he hadn't felt or seen his abdominal muscle in years. This talk was stuff that all of us who train fat people know already but I thought it was good for Mike to cover it because I think sometimes trainers come back from these conferences with all kinds of crazy stuff when the basics will work with the average fat client who most of us train on a daily basis.

Anthony Deluglio- Anthony is one of the most innovative people I know and is always coming up with new ideas and new inventions. Anthony had a line up of 7 different exercises, each one correlating to one of the tests on the functional movement screen. He is recommending using these exercises for your screen which would get the client feeling the exercise, getting a bit of a workout and realizing they can do this but also give you the feedback you need to write their program. The exercises included a get up sit up, a swing using a rope with the kettlebell, a double clean, a front squat, lunge with a twist and a few other basic exercises to see how the client moves and give them a workout. Anthony is always excellent!

So, there is a scraping of what was taught on Saturday. If you missed out you should definitely look up on the Perform Better site when the next event is in your area. The three day summit Perform Better puts on is definitely one not to miss- there are 4 speakers going every hour for three days so you can totally immerse yourself in professional development for the weekend. http://www.performbetter.com/

Learn more to earn more. Be the best at what you do and you will never be short of income!

Drinking Water from a fire hose!

2009-01-22T05:55:00.000-08:00

A guest blog from my hubby, AC:

Tom Oberhue of Impact Performance Training said the Results Fitness Mentorship was like:

"Drinking Water from a Fire Hose!! " and "Contained a Mind-Blowing Amount of Information""I just finished an amazing four days in LA doing a business mentorship at Results Fitness with Alwyn and Rachel Cosgrove. We covered so much material ... the A to Z of the fitness business. It has taken my understanding and thinking to a whole new level."--Tom OberhuePortland, OR

Been getting a lot of emails asking me about our resultsfitnessbiz.com membership site, our platinum business coaching program and our mentorship course.Well, it all starts with the mentorship course - you can't get into any of the coaching programs unless you attend a mentorship first. In fact we don't even answer business emails or inquiries to non-coaching group members anymore.So this years remaining mentorships are as follows (we just finished another group last week):April has only 3 spaces leftJune has 4 spots leftSeptember is sold outNovember has 4 spaces open currently.If you are at all interested then email donna@results-fitness.com and she'll give you all the details.Basically it's 4 long days where we take your current business apart piece by piece and rebuild from the ground up.We cover lead generation, lead conversion, client fulfillment and retention, marketing, sales, program design systems, and other service centers within your training business.We also open up our business and share with you every single system that we use, and implement daily in our facility and we go over everything that we monitor and track.It's all business for 4 days and is aimed at small gym owners, trainers and studio owners,Just wanted a reminder (for the few who have asked) that I can't (won't) take business coaching clients on who haven't been through the mentorship events. Plus you get as much Q&A time with Rachel and I as you'll ever want! Results Fitness was voted one of America’s Top 30 Gyms by Men’s Health Magazine in 2008 - this is your chance to find out first hand why!

"This was truly a transforming experience! I now see what is possible and how there are no limits! Rachel and Alwyn and their entire Results Fitness staff are simply amazing and their openness and willingness to help others is WONDERFUL! These four days are going to change everything for me. I am inspired, excited, motivated and realize the only limits that exist are the ones i put on myself. Thank you somuch!!"- Sarah Scozzaro (Germany)"

Alwyn and Rachel create a learning environment unparalleled to anything I've ever experienced. the small group environment allowed us to direct the flow of conversation. they were an open book and went above and beyond the call of duty. Best Investment Ever!!!"- Ryan Patrick (USA)

"if you only get to meet Alwyn and Rachel Cosgrove once, this once in a lifetime experience could change your life, business, program design and so much more. this experience was so valuable. Personally I wouldn't want to miss out! If you don't go, your competition will!"- Joe Hanney (UK)

"If you're serious about personal development, learning and accelerating your business forward, I would highly recommend you attend a Results Fitness mentorship. it's well worth the investment."- Alexandria Wilson (UK)

"if you would like a better life, more money and to be a better coach then you NEED to go to this mentorship. It will completely revolutionize your thought process and thus everything else."- Josef Brandenberg (USA)

You can download the mentorship brochure HERE

“Results Fitness is quite possibly the most profitable gym per square foot in the country” – Thomas Plummer (Fitness industry consultant)

The investment for the mentorship is $1500.

--AC

Keep up...

2009-01-19T06:12:00.000-08:00

We just had our first Results Fitness Biz mentorship of 2009 last week. 9 trainers in this industry just took a HUGE jump up the ladder of success in this field. What has taken Alwyn and I 9 years to figure out through mistakes and experiences, we shared with this group of people to save them from making the same mistakes and they sucked it in like sponges. This group was full of questions and got every answer. They each left with an action plan that they will start to implement this week. It was such a pleasure to work with a group of people in this industry who are looking to be the best at what they do. And they will quickly pass everyone else up.

"The Results Fitness mentorship has been one of the most inspiring and enlightening educational experiences I have ever had. I flew from the UK to attend the course and high expectations, but I am blown away with everything I have learnt from Rachel, Alwyn and their incredible team." Charlotte Ord

They each received our Trainer to Business Owner manual which is exclusive to those who attend our mentorship along with a computer disc with our program templates, budgets, spreadsheets, forms we use...EVERYTHING we have to offer right on a disc to use immediatley in their own businesses. They sat in my office with me as I opened my hard drive and shared every form and document I use on a daily basis to run our business. They also worked out with Alwyn and I and had some fun!

They "get" it

The people who "get" it come to our Results Fitness Biz Mentorship and hear about all of our experiences and fast track where they are in their fitness business so they don't have to make the same mistakes we did. They know that the time and money invested for this 4 days will pay them back double, triple...or whatever they decide. Attending this mentorship will save them a ton of time and money as their businesses grow. I wish Alwyn and I had an opportunity like this when we first started out!

To learn more about it go to http://www.resultsfitnessbiz.com/. This is our membership site that is exclusive to our coaching group and is only open to those who have attended our mentorship. Alwyn and I only want to work with people in this industry who are serious about their career and want to be the best. You can only be accepted to the mentorship by application. To learn more about it Click Here- Click Here to download our brochure.

Email your resume and a brief paragraph to info@results-fitness.com to apply for our next mentorship.

Resolutions

2009-01-11T11:54:00.001-08:00

Have you set New Years Resoultions, done challenges, set goals for yourself and not hit them? So by now you have given up and think it is hopeless?

Only about 45% of us actually write out New Year's resolutions? According to a survey, that's down from 88%. The reported reason was that only about 8% of us achieve our resolutions, so most people don't believe they work. The problem is most people don’t follow through.

Well, I have exciting news for you! If you have tried and failed in the past- there is hope! You may be that much more likely to change your body, your habits, your lifestyle and make it stick this time around. Recent research suggests that it often takes a number of attempts before people are able to change a habit for good. The National Weight Control Registry is conducting an ongoing study of more than 5000 men and women who have succeeded in maintaining an average weight loss of 66 pounds for more than five years- among them 91 percent had tried and failed in the past.

Consider your past attempts part of your journey and make this time the time you do it for good! Decide what you want this year, committ to yourself that you will follow through and do it no matter what obstacles creep in your way, you will stay focused. 2009 is your year to be in the best shape of your life! Don't ever give up on what you want for yourself!

My Book is done!

2008-12-31T08:05:00.000-08:00

2008 I signed a contract with Rodale to write my first book. The due date for my final manuscript is January 1st, 2009. I sent it in yesterday and am very excited to have completed it! As of right now the title will be- Fit Chick Challenge and it is due to be released October 2009. It will be a Women's Health Branded Book and the target market is 20-40 year old women looking to get into phenomenol shape and become a fit chick. My goal in the book is to convince women to start lifting weights, stop starving themselves and start feeling confident about their bodies. I had so much fun writing it! I trained a group of women every morning who inspired me and I hung out in the gym talking to women who were changing their bodies with the very principles I describe in the book. It is real world information that has been tested in our gym for the last 9 years. Everything in the book is used daily with clients in our gym. So, you can look forward to the release of my first book in 2009!

2008-11-20T12:35:00.000-08:00

Our Juice bar is almost done! Here is a pick of the latest! We are getting there! It is so exciting to see a vision you had come to life and become a reality. Having a juice bar in our gym has always been on my "someday" list and now I can cross it off!

Yesterday, when I finished training the group of women I train at 5:30am every morning(they are my fit chicks who are inspiring me while I write my book)we had a little sample of our post workout Strawberry Surge Shake- Yum! They are 12 weeks in to their fit chick challenge and are looking hot! Good job girls!

Results Fitness Women's Powerlifting Team kicked butt!

2008-11-16T18:16:00.001-08:00

Our gym had our first powerlifting team compete yesterday! It was awesome! We had five women who all kicked butt! They lifted up to 259 pounds! They are all clients of our gym who have all been working out with us for awhile, have great little bodies, are strong and all decided to challenge themselves to this goal. They had a blast and it was so much fun to watch! Congratulations ladies! I am so proud of you guys! It was so much fun and inspiring to watch!

My neighbours think I am crazy...

2008-08-22T11:07:00.000-07:00

I just got done doing my workout today in my backyard. Don't know if any neighbours saw me cause I was in my own little world swinging a kettlebell around, listening to my Ipod and dancing and singing between rounds. Had a great workout even if my neighbours do think I am crazy :). The lightest kettlebell we have at our house is 24kg(50 pds) kettlebell because we took all of the other ones to the gym for our kettlebell classes we just started. So, I made do with it...

BTW, If you are looking for some great kettlebell workouts you have to check out Art of Strength. www.artofstrength.com. The DVDs are awesome to follow along with.

This is the workout I did-

I did Round 1-3 around 3 times all with the 24kg bell. It was a tough workout!

Between rounds I took 1-2 minutes and grooved out to my Ipod as my active rest.

Round 1-
Repeat the following 3x each round
Dead swings 5x
Sumo Deadlifts 5x
Swings 10x

Round 2
Repeat the following 3x each round
Clean Ladders 1x2x3x L,R
5 one arm swings L,R

Round 3
Repeat the following 3x each round
Front Squat 10x
Single Leg Deadlift 5x R,L

Now I am drinking my postworkout shake, gonna hit the shower and head to work! Have a great day!

Coming Soon new DVD!!!!!

2008-08-05T04:57:00.000-07:00

Coming Soon!!!This past weekend I shot my first DVD on my own! Alwyn and I have shot a couple of different ones together such as our body weight training DVD but this is the first one I have done on my own. This DVD is a workout with me while I explain the concepts I use when training females and how I think women need to approach exercise. I thought taking you along on a workout with me would be the best way to show you what I mean when I say women need to push themselves beyond their comfort zone to get their body to change. A few still shots from the DVD shoot-

Stay tuned for the release!!!

Have a fabulous day!

Train hard and stay focused!

Congratulations Hillary!

2008-07-21T05:59:00.000-07:00

One of my clients, Hillary Skahan, completed her first Figure competition this past weekend and took home 2nd place! She was so great to work with, worked hard and it all paid off. She looked amazing on stage! Congratulations! I think she is hooked so we'll probably be seeing more of her on the Figure stage soon. Congratulations Hillary!

Getting my "Figure" back...

2008-07-13T08:45:00.000-07:00

So, after I went to the Triathlon World Championships and represented Team USA in Vancouver, Canada I knew when I got back I wanted to get back to lifting weights. My body had started to look more and more like an endurance athlete. I had no definition, had lost my abs and no matter how clean I ate my body looked soft.

I first noticed this when I did my Ironman. The first clue was when I was absolutley not going to wear a sports bra top at my Ironman because I did not like the way my midsection was looking. Here I was in what you would think would be the best shape of my life, ready to become an Ironman yet I wanted my abs covered up. After my Ironman and looking at the pics of me in the race

I knew my body needed a break from all of this endurance and I missed my abs and my defined arms but when I qualified for the World Championships I decided I needed to stick with the endurance a little longer to have the experience of going to the World Championships so I kept running, biking and swimming and looking more and more like an endurance athlete.

Now that World Championships are over and I had an amazing experience I am ready to get my "figure" back. When I say "figure" what I mean is looking like a figure competitor. I don't necessarily want to compete but I do want to look like I could compete.

So, since the World Championships(5 weeks ago)I have done ZERO cardio, aerobics, or anything endurance related. I have instead been doing 5 days a week of strength training and interval style cardio using burpees, jumping jacks, etc. My body quickly dropped a couple pounds and above all looks more defined and I am getting my "figure" back!

I love manipulating my training to make my body look different. It is so amazing!

Anyway, today I decided I wanted to go out for a run. It has been 5 weeks. I would do the short 2.5 mile loop that I was doing leading up to the World Championships. I was doing it once a week and timing myself and each week getting faster until I had a personal best the week before I left for Vancouver. I headed out today and felt pretty good. Amazingly after not running for 5 weeks I was able to match the time I did the loop in 2 weeks before Worlds. So, I didn't set a personal best but I haven't lost too much over the 5 weeks.

And I am getting my abs back! Go "figure"!

Goal setting is for couch potatoes

2008-07-03T07:56:00.000-07:00

Just finished a CD by Dr. John Eliot called The Maverick Mindset. Interesting stuff.

His big idea is that goal setting is for couch potatoes but once you are off the couch and accomplishing something you need to think about more getting into the mindset of working on the process and not what the actual goal is. Decide who you want to be, what you want to become and then get into the mindset every single day to become that person. But don't focus on a specific date when you will accomplish a specific goal. You might limit yourself.

In other words, goal setting is great for getting you focused on something like losing 10 pounds or saving $25,000 in the bank. These are very specific goals that you can focus on but once you have got that down and you are doing the things that successful people do should you continue to try to set goals or should you work everyday to be the best you can be at what you do and who you are? And not limit yourself to a specific goal on a specific day? What can you contribute today?

It was a great CD and made sense to me. I think it goes along with my whole "What's next?" blog post that right now I am just continuing the process at becoming the best I can be without a specific goal to focus on. It is a different feeling for me being so goal oriented and always looking for What's next....Instead I am focusing on what do I have to do today to be better tomorrow in every aspect of my life and who knows where it will take me...

The Station

2008-06-29T07:15:00.000-07:00

In 9th grade I was given this poem and to this day I have kept it. It's one of my favorites-

The Station
By Robert J. Hastings

Tucked away in our subconscious is an idyliic vision. We see ourselves on a long trip spanning the continent. We are traveling by train. Out the windows we drink in the passing scene of cars on nearby highways, of children waving at a crossing, of cattle grazing on a distant hillside, of smoke pouring from a power plant, of flatlands and valleys, of mountains and rolling hillsides.

But uppermost in our minds is the final destination. On a certain day at a certain hour we will pull into the station. Bands will be playing and flags waving. Once we get there so many wonderful dreams will come true and the places of our lives will fit together like a completed jigsaw puzzle. How restlessly we pace the aisles, damning the minutes for loitering-waiting, waiting, waiting for the station.

"When we reach the station, that will be it!" we cry. "When I'm 18." "When I have my dream job!" "When I save a million dollars!" "When I get married!"

Sooner or later we must realize there is no station, no one place to arrive at once and for all. The true joy of life is the trip. The station is only a dream. It constantly outdistances us.

"Relish the moment" is a good motto especially when coupled with Psalm 118:24: "This is the day the lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it." It isn't the burdens of today that drive men mad. It is the regrets over yesterday and the fear of tomorrow.

So, stop pacing the aisles and counting the miles. Instead, climb more mountains, eat more ice cream, go barefoot more often, have more late nights, watch more sunsets, laugh more, cry less. Life must be lived as we go along. The station will come soon enough.

Congratulations to Kim LePage- You are an IRONMAN!

2008-06-25T06:41:00.000-07:00

My client who I have been working with the last 6 months completed her first Ironman this past weekend! I am so proud of her! Congratulations Kim!

She took this goal head on. She followed everything I told her and worked hard spending hours and hours running, biking, swimming and in the gym to reach her goal of becoming an IRONMAN! Her training was not without obstacles which she overcame like a true athlete and stayed focused on her goal.

She competed at Ironman Cour de'laine where the water was a chilly 57 degrees Farenheit. She had a great swim and a pretty good bike. Her only obstacle during the race was some stomach pain on her run where she found herself having to walk more than she would have liked to but she didn't let it get her down mentally but stayed focused on finishing the day and crossing the finish line to be an IRONMAN!

Great job Kim! You are on an IRONMAN!

Pictured: Kim doing Wildflower Long Course as one of her training races leading up to her Ironman.

What's Next?

2008-06-24T06:25:00.000-07:00

"What's Next?" I have been asked this question hundreds of times. I am an extremely goal oriented person and am always putting goals out for myself and my clients to reach so I guess people get used to me working toward - "what's next?" So they are always asking me this. The funny thing is I am way more focused on the process and experience of reaching that goal than I am on the actual outcome of the goal. Putting that goal out there give's me something to work toward to continue the process of pushing myself physically and mentally.

I completed my Ironman last year, a huge goal for me that took 6 months of focused training to close in on and successfully accomplish and then the question came- "What's next?"

My next goal was my first Powerlifting competition where I set a National Record and won 1st place which was way more than I ever expected to do. Wow! The Youtube video of me was passed around and I showed off my medal and then the question came again-"What's next?"

In the mean time I had received an email that I qualified for the triathlon world championships in Vancouver, Canada and had earned a spot on Team USA. I couldn't pass up this opportunity so I had an answer to "what's next?" I went and represented Team USA at the World Championships, had a great experience and had a personal best and now once again am getting the question- "What's next?"

At this point, I have not come up with a "What's next?" but instead am focusing on doing something everyday to better myself physically along with working towards goals for my business. I am continuing the process without having a "what's next?" Is it possible to push yourself as hard without a "what's next?"

Who knows- maybe I'll decide to do powerlifting again, or another triathlon or maybe I'll get back into the Figure competition world. But in the mean time I will wake up and train everyday to continue the process of pushing myself physically whether I have a "What's next" or not.

I challenge all of you to also focus on the process and not the outcome. Everyday wake up and do what you need to do to continue the process of working toward your goal. The process of becoming who you have to become to accomplish the goal is the rewarding part. The outcome, accomplishing the goal, is the cherry on the top!

I'll keep you posted when I figure out "what's next..." :)

Perform Better 2008- Take action!

2008-06-18T07:04:00.000-07:00

I was so honored and excited to be a part of the Perform Better Seminar this year. I spoke at 2 events- in Rhode Island and in Long Beach. Perform Better puts on the best fitness conference I have ever been to with practical, useful information and excellent speakers. The best part was that I spoke on Friday at both events so I was able to relax and enjoy the rest of the conference as an attendee and learn from the other speakers. My talks seemed well received with a lot of good feedback. I really enjoyed speaking and being able to share what I have learned over the ten plus years I have been training people.

My entire staff attended the Long Beach conference and came back with a ton of useful information. We are going to be meeting this week to discuss all of the changes we will be making. The key after a weekend like that is taking action implementing your new ideas. It doesn't do you any good to learn new stuff if you don't take action and use it. I have asked my staff to each write down ten things they learned, want to implement or took away from the conference. I do this at every conference or seminar I attend- I leave with 10 "to do's" that I am going to put into action immediatley.

We also had Martin Rooney and Bill Parisi do a staff training before the conference at our gym and John Berardi do one after the conference. Our staff got a huge education this weekend and took a giant step ahead of most trainers in the industry to being the best and now we need to take action!

World Championships 2008

2008-06-09T07:15:00.000-07:00

Wow! What an amazing experience! That is the closest I'll probably ever be to being in the olympics and it was amazing!

I accomplished my goals with the race- to hold my own in that group of amazing athletes from around the world, not to be last and to have a personal best. I actually did 2:40 which is about 15 minutes off my personal best at Olympic distance. It is amazing when you are competing among the best there is, how much you step your game up. I can't believe I did 2:40. I actually ran under an 8 minute mile which is the fastest 10K I have ever done but again when you have the fastest people in the world running by you you tend to step it up.

They did change the swim to an 1100m swim but it was freezing cold with tough currents and waves and they actually canceled it shortly after my wave went for the rest of the competitors. I couldn't believe they canceled the swim at the world championships but I guess the conditions were that bad so I was that much prouder that I finished the swim. It was the hardest swim I have ever done. None of the men got to swim. Crazy! So, I decided that I get credit for doing full olympic since it was such a tough swim. I think I ended up swimming 1500m anyway.

It was so amazing to be in the race wearing Team USA and have people from all over the world. There were a lot of Great Britain people and Australians, Brazilians, South Africans, Ireland, and I am sure more. Go USA! At the finish line they handed me an American flag to carry across the finish line which was such a great feeling.

What an amazing experience! I am so glad I went!

Opportunity of a lifetime!

2008-06-04T06:28:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow I leave for Vancouver, Canada for the Triathlon World Championships. I am so excited and honored to have been chosen for Team USA to represent our country in the sport of triathlon at the world championships.

I am sure this will be an exciting weekend. I am going into it for the experience and ofcourse all of the Team USA gear :) and to be a part of Team USA. This is especially exciting on an Olympic year. I don't have any expectations for the actual race. I had a really good race at Wildflower

so I am feeling good about it but the level of competition is a little beyond my comfort zone so I am just going into it to enjoy the experience and hold my own against everyone else.

I will give you a recap when I get back!

Perform Better in Rhode Island

2008-06-03T08:28:00.000-07:00

I just got back from doing my first presentation with Perform Better. If you haven't heard of Perform Better they have become the #1 conference in the industry for trainers to learn and get continuing education from so I was extremely honored to be on the agenda this year among other names in the industry such as Mike Boyle, Gray Cook, Juan Carlos Santana, Martin Rooney, Diane Vives, Anthony Diluligio and ofcourse my husband Alwyn Cosgrove.

My topic was strength training for women and it seemed to be well received. I have to say I was nervous being in that line up of well known speakers in this industry. I think women in this industry and men working with women are looking for guidance and I was able to offer some advice after coaching women for so many years and from a woman's perspective. So I had a good turnout in my room and lots of great feedback.

The last Perform Better conference takes place in Long Beach on June 13th,14th and 15th. If you are on the west coast, don't miss it! The information packed in to these three days is something you can't miss if you are a trainer or someone who wants to get into the fitness industry. Check out their website for more info at www.performbetter.com.

Our entire Results Fitness team of fitness coaches will be in attendance!

Kona Bound! Congrats Erika!

2008-03-31T08:05:00.000-07:00

Erika Lilley(above at Ironman Wisconsin) who has been my training partner, a fitness coach at my gym and a friend of mine qualified for Kona this past weekend! She is also co author with me on our book, So You Want To Train For Your First Triathlon. She raced at the California Half Ironman and came in second place and got a Kona slot! When I met Erika about a year and a half ago she first contacted me to help her with her training and told me her eventual goal was to go to Kona. I started training with her as a training partner and helping her plan out her training and have watched her grow as an athlete and push herself day in and day out to achieve this goal. I am so excited for her, what an amazing accomplishment! She set this goal and has accomplished it!

SHe is a talented athlete but more than that she works extremely hard to bring out the best in herself. Going in to this race she was not without obstacles. For one she has been busier than ever at work as a fitness coach training more clients than she has ever trained before so her time was limited and her energy was being used up...but this was not an excuse for her...also about 2 weeks before the event she crashed on her bike and it completely cracked and she had bumps and bruises and could have easily bowed out at that point...but that didn't stop her, luckily a local bike shop hooked her up with a new frame and put it together for her so she had a bike to ride.

She stayed focused no matter what and had a great race and now is going to Kona!!!!

Congratulations Erika! I am so proud of you!

First Powerlifting Competition

2008-03-10T06:08:00.001-07:00

I am always looking to challenge myself and get the best out of myself and joining one my employees at a powerlifting meet seemed like just the thing to push myself beyond my normal limits. Last weekend I participated in my first powerlifting competition. I competed in deadlift only since it transferred over to triathlon the most of any of the lifts. I still have a Half Ironman I am training for on March 29th. Check out the video of me below lifting 297.6 pounds and setting an American record winning a gold medal at the competition!(The video is squashed a bit so I appear shorter and wider than I really am but the lifting is what your watching anyway :))

What a great experienceI had! Never would have thought. If you never try, you never know...

12 Week Challenge

2008-02-19T07:03:00.000-08:00

The 12 Week Challenge is off and running at our gym and clients are buzzing around motivated with goals in mind to accomplish over the 12 weeks. The motivation is contagious and you can't help but join in!

Our staff also join in and have our own challenge where each of us set goals and push ourselves to new levels over the 12 weeks with our clients. We each put money in and the winner gets the whole pot at the end.

So, what's in store for me over the 12 weeks?

Ever since my Ironman I would say I have been slacking(that is compared to doing 20 hours a week of exercise). Since my Ironman I have been to Scotland twice for 2 weeks at a time(not the best for preventing post Ironman weight gain) and ofcourse the holidays and whatever other excuse I can come up with...I gained some bodyfat and haven't been as consistant as I usually like to be with my nutrition and training....YES, Rachel Cosgrove loses focus sometimes too... :) I am only human.

I think some of my clients think I don't have to work at it BUT for me if I am not consistant I have the genetic potential to gain body fat quite easily so a few months without keeping myself focused and consistant and I have gained a few pounds.

Our bodies are always fluctuating. It is hard to ever truly "maintain," you are usually either gaining bodyfat or losing bodyfat. I always tell my clients to have an upper limit that they will let themselves get to before they will take action and and get back down closer to their target weight and bodyfat. There are times of the year when everyone will edge up on that upper limit and then times to step up your training and peak at an all new fitness level.

Now is a time to step it up and peak. I have twelve weeks and over that twelve weeks I will-
1. Lose 8 pounds of body fat(to be at a lower bodyfat than when I did my Ironman).
2. Compete in the California Half Ironman at the half way point(in 6 weeks).
3. Compete at Wildflower Olympic distance at the end of the 12 weeks with a personal best at an Olympic Distance race leading to the World Championships that I will be attending in June in Vancouver, Canada.

Join me on my challenge. Check my blog regularly for updates over the next 12 weeks! Gotta go pack my lunch and train :)

Just do it!

2008-02-17T13:00:00.000-08:00

So, I have been struggling with the fact that I have not been able to put 100% in to my training and will be repeating a race I did last year in 7 weeks time. Last year I was training for my Ironman and nothing got in the way of my training. This year is a different story. I have my business and career coming first(after my husband and family which are always #1) and then my obligation to Team in Training who I coach for while the 50 participants on my team raise money for The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. So, my own training has taken a back seat being third on my priority list. So, I know going in to Ironman California 70.3 that it will be hard to improve on the performance I gave last year and this bothers me.

So, I had to decide by Feb. 15th if I was going to pull out to get a refund and I was struggling with this decision....So, I emailed my good friend Alison who is also a coach with me for Team in Training for advice and she said,

"It sounds like you really do want to do the race but you know you won't be 100% ready for it. I say if you can do the race without injuring yourself because of being unprepared then go for it. If nothing else it would be a really good training day. You have to be ok with however you perform that day and just enjoy it for what it is. I think you will feel better if you just do it. :)"

So, decision made- I will just do it and enjoy myself no matter how I end up doing. I will put what I can in to my training these next 7 weeks and give the race everything I can that day.

I will Just do it! Thanks for the help Alison!

Pendulum of goal setting

2008-02-04T05:13:00.000-08:00

I read a book recently, Confessions of a Self Made Millionaire, that discussed the difference between having too many goals and going after one single goal. The book talked about, among a ton of other stuff, how if you pick one single goal and go after it day and night you will undoubtedly reach that goal. But when you start adding in other goals to try to "balance" out your life you are actually decreasing your chances of reaching the first goal because now your energy is divided up.

Last year my focus was on completing an Ironman, I made my training my priority and I never missed a training session. I gave everything I had to every training session whether I would have anything left at the end to go to work or not. I completed my goal of finishing my first Ironman and crossed the finish line in a decent time. I gave it everything I had. That was my one goal last year and I undoubtedly completed it.

I had someone else running my gym for me last year while I trained for my Ironman and it's true what they say- nobody cares about your business as much as you do. As it turned out that somebody was not focused on my business at all and unfortunatley the business suffered while I was focusing on training for my Ironman.

I told myself going into 2008 that my priority is my career and business this year. So, one month into the year and we have had a record month at the gym, signing up more new members than we ever have before. We are also expanding and taking over next door. I have been hired to be on the Perform Better Tour with the best speakers in the fitness industry. I am making a ton of progress on my career and business goals and I want to keep going full force ahead reaching our potential at our gym this year and in my career. I want to undoubtedly reach my potential as a business owner and fitness professional in 2008.

The question is can I still compete in triathlons with the same performances I gave last year? Or am I Ok with my performances dropping from what they were last year? I am still signed up for a few races this year, one of which is in 8 weeks, the Ca Half Ironman, and my training has been lacking. I get in like 4 workouts a week which seems like nothing compared to what I was doing last year leading up to this same race. I am debating on if I should even be doing the race. I don't like to do anything if I am not doing it the best I possibly can and I know I will not be going into this race the best I can because my training time is limited.

Will I enjoy myself and get something out of completing the race a third time even if my time is not as good as last year? Or will it take away from my focus this year of running my business? We should be getting the keys to expand in 4 weeks so I will absolutley not be focused on this race at all because my focus will be on the expansion. But will having this race keep me in "balance"? Or will it take away from the one goal I undoubtedly want to hit this year, of growing and expanding our business to reach it's potential?

If you undoubtedly want to hit a goal- go after that one single goal with everything you have and do not get distracted with anything else. To reach a goal it almost has to become an obsession day and night. Focus on what you want!

World Championships

2008-01-28T06:09:00.000-08:00

I qualified for the short course world championships to be on Team USA! This takes place in Vancouver, Canada in June and the level of competitor will be like nothing I have ever experienced. The winners will be going to the olympics this year filling any spots left on our olympic team.

I am just excited to have qualified and to get to go and experience being on Team USA and ofcourse get all of the cool Team USA gear :) I really have to train my butt off for it though so that I am not the very last one to finish. I looked up the results and with my last olympic distance race time I would be 78th out 81 in my age group so I need to work on getting faster than that! This will be a really good goal for me to do well at this race(well for me).

In the mean time I have my annual half Ironman in 9 weeks, the California Half in Oceanside that I have done the last 2 years. I have to beat my time last year which will be tough since I was training for an Ironman last year.

I'll start keeping you updated on my training on this blog. Train hard and stay focused!

Thinking about doing your first triathlon?

2008-01-24T05:31:00.000-08:00

Very Exciting! My new book is done and available for purchase as an Ebook!

Click here to purchase NOW

Last year my training partner and I, Erika Lilley, started writing a book about training for a triathlon. We wanted to include EVERYTHING we knew as triathletes ourselves and coaches. Through our own experience as triathletes, coaching other triathletes and attending courses and certifications on training for triathlon we have figured out the most effective training programs to have your best performance and stay injury free throughout your training. We included it all in this book!

Click Here to Purchase Now!

If 2008 is the year you will do your first triathlon, you cannot start training without getting this book. Included in this book is-

Planning your season and setting your goals

A complete 24 week Triathlon Training Program- exactly what to do every day to complete your tri

24 weeks of endurance specific strength training workouts complete with pictures and descriptions

Flexibility for triathletes, what to include and what not to include

Getting the right gear- what not to forget

Nutrition and hydration- both the basics and what to do to ensure optimal performance

Preventing and treating injuries

How to have optimal recovery and get the most out of your training

What to expect on race day

Currently available as an Ebook, Click here to start reading immediatley and start training for your first triathlon!

My niece, my inspiration

2007-11-19T06:43:00.000-08:00

My niece, Marie, was born with cerebral palsy. She was born 3 months premature and came into this world determined. When she was diagnosed, the doctor said - "See how she doesn't move one leg and then the other." Well, within the week she was moving one leg and then the other. Then it was that she couldn't go from kneeling to up on her knees and once again she was kneeling no problem within the week. It was like she just needed to hear what she couldn't do and she was determined to prove them wrong. After being told she would never be able to get around on her own she now, using a walker and with braces on, gets around with no problem.

Marie is 5 years old and after having some doctors say she'll never walk on her own without a walker, we as her family know Marie better than that. She is now in an intensive physical therapy to learn to walk on her own and it is amazing. I went to watch her and she is determined to walk. She works with the therapist for 3 hours at a time. She does squats and leg lifts and wears a suit that provides just enough support so she can walk around in it and then they release the support a little at a time until she'll be walking on her own. At the end of a physical therapy session her little legs are shaking and she is exhausted. We have already seen her progress in such a short period of time. It is amazing how the human body responds and adapts to the demands placed on it- just goes to show anything is possible!

Nothing will stop my niece as she grows up and overcomes the obstacles she has been faced with at such a young age. She is always asking me to go exercise and I take her up to our home gym where she has a circuit of exercises she goes through and she loves it! So next time you think about skipping a workout or you just don't feel like training, think about my 5 year old niece who works out 3 hours at a time until her legs shake to one day be able to walk, something most of us take for granted. Get out and move!

She inspires me everyday!

Cable Tv or Fitness?

2007-11-15T21:32:00.000-08:00

Why is it that cable TV, luxury car payments and Starbucks have become necessities in the households of most Americans but a gym membership and especially a personal trainer has not made it into that list of necessities yet? A personal trainer is still considered by most a “luxury” item.

Basic cable is currently $50.00/month, average car payment is $500/month and a daily Starbucks runs someone at $120.00/month ($4 a day) and most households manage to fit these in their budget as if they were a necessity.

Let’s face it if we were talking necessity we would all be driving a compact economical car which would get us from point A to point B for under $200 a month. Instead when you drive around my town you see every luxury vehicle there is and most with a monthly payment of well over $500 a month. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t have a problem with driving a nice car with a steep price tag at all. A nice car makes you feel good and I am all about feeling good but don’t say this $500 plus payment is a necessity and then tell me you can’t afford a personal trainer.

The average personal trainer charges $50.00 an hour. Meet them once a month and you’ll have someone designing a fitness program for you, providing accountability, and helping you to completely change your life. What price do you put on that? It amazes me that people will prioritize their cable TV or their luxury vehicle over their health and fitness.

I have seen people drive up to our gym in their Mercedes(again nothing against driving a Mercedes) and come in to get information and tell me it is too expensive at $219.00/ month which includes 4 fitness coaching sessions, an individualized program and a gym membership. I have to hold back from asking them how much that nice car in the parking lot costs them per month…

The idea for this article came from a client, who has lost 60 pounds and feels great, who said, “I have been a member now for 5 years working out consistently, you guys are in my monthly budget like my car payment or my electric bill. Paying you is just as much a necessity. I’ll get rid of our cable TV before I would give this up.”

This got me thinking that more people need to have that attitude. The national weight loss registry just came out with the statistic that 62% of people successful at weight loss watch less than 10 hours of TV a week and 90% exercise regularly.

Hmmm...Is it any mystery that most of America is obese watching over 10 hours a week of TV and can't find time or money to hire a personal trainer for 3 hours a week? When will fitness be in everyone's monthly budget as a neccessity?

What a weekend!

2007-11-05T06:33:00.000-08:00

This past weekend was a great weekend for the clients I work with. I had a client compete in her first figure competition and place 4th! She looked great and I was so proud of her. Congratulations Twyla!

It was so great to see her get on stage and accomplish her goal. I met her in March of this year when she told me her goal was to get in shape to get on stage and do a Figure Competition and fit in on stage.

She not only did that but she placed 4th in her class! She looked amazing!

I am so proud of her!

Also this weekend we had our first Results Fitness 5K team complete their first 5K! There were 16 people who all did really great! We had a great time watching each of them accomplish their goal on Sunday! Congratulations guys! You did great!

My Ironman will be on TV on Sunday!

2007-10-26T19:47:00.000-07:00

They are showing footage of the Ironman I did in July this Sunday. Maybe I'll have a cameo... Watch for me in this outfit-

Tune in on Sunday on television on Versus at 1pm Pacific.

Check your local listings for times.

Have a great weekend!

On adrenal holiday...

2007-10-22T06:40:00.000-07:00

I am addicited to caffeine. Yes, I, Rachel Cosgrove am a caffeine addict. I have been working on an elimination plan for my clients at the gym to follow and I have always said that having 1-2 cups of coffee with protein is allowed. Well, after discussing this with various people in the industry and reading the research I have come to the conclusion that for most people eliminating caffeine for a period of time to give your adrenals a break is beneficial and is something my clients and myself should do every once in awhile.

No big deal- I'll eliminate caffeine, I can't be that addicted to it...I woke up and didn't know what to do with myself since I usually sit and sip my coffee while reading emails. Instead I decided I would go for a run to wake myself up. The headache hit and got worse and worse as the day went on. I ended up napping for a few hours- I was having major withdrawals! It was bad. Didn't know I was so addicted but I suppose that means I should definitley come off of it for a period of time.

Hope my adrenals are enjoying their holiday!!

Luck = Hard Work + Opportunity

2007-10-08T07:09:00.000-07:00

10 Weeks post Ironman and a trip to Scotland, a trip to Paris and a trip to the Virgin Islands later... In the last 10 weeks since my Ironman I have been travelling quite a bit and haven't really stopped.

Scotland and Paris were both vacation and some networking with people in the industry. Infact, I'll be doing a seminar in the UK on December 8th in the NewCastle area speaking about Strength Training for Women. If you are in the UK I'll keep you posted on my newsletter but keep December 8th clear.

The Virgin Islands, believe it or not, was all work :)
Seriously, I have a client who lives there who flys me out to work with her a couple times a year. She is training for a figure competition in November. I'll have pics of her after her November show when she takes the stage for the first time. In the mean time I lucked out that she lives in The Virgin Islands so I get to enjoy the surroundings while I am there.

Another trainer said to me- "Wow! Your lucky! How do you get a client like that?" To be honest I have been working as a trainer now for 10 years and at least 6-7 of those years I worked split shifts seeing 5am clients through to 7pm clients. I trained as many people as I could, read every training book I could and went to every seminar I could attend. I still continue to read and learn and I have worked very hard to become good at what I do. Opportunities will come to you if you work hard and stay focused on becoming the best in your field. Have you ever heard the saying, "Luck is hard work meeting up with opportunity." You could say I was "lucky" that she found me, but I believe I worked hard to get to this point in my career and was ready for the opportunity.

It takes 1 day for every mile you ran to recover

2007-09-01T11:54:00.000-07:00

I was at the lake this morning doing an open water swim with my sister and met a lifeguard who saw my Ironman Finisher Hat and was asking me questions about my race and my recovery. He said, "Are you still recovering since it takes one day for every mile you ran in the race to recover?"

I forgot about this rule. I had heard it before- If you run a 5K, you should take 3 days to recover, if you run a 10K, you should take 6 days to recover. And if you run a marathon, take 26 days to recover. This seems a bit excessive to me. What does this rule mean by recovery? Does it mean do nothing for that period of time or just take it easy and don't race again in that time? Or just that you'll still feel the effects of the race for this long.

And what about an Ironman, with this thought process an Ironman would take 140 days to recover from or does this rule work the same with a triathlon?

I have also heard the rule to take 1 day off for every hour it takes you to do the race. This seems a little more realistic and might be a good rule of thumb. For a Half Ironman you'll end up taking under a week off, an Ironman about 2 weeks off.

My body felt pretty good a couple days after my race. I didn't have too much soreness and felt pretty good. I did take that week after completely off and then I lifted weights and did a run about one week after the race and felt fine. Then my husband and I went on vacation so my training was sporadic but I did get a few weight training workouts in and a couple runs in. Overall, my volume was much lower than it had been. Now over a month after my body feels good, I have been lifting weights three times a week and doing intervals twice a week along with one long bike ride a week.

I think recovery is very individual and it also depends on how your training was before the race. If your body was ready for the race, the damage should be less than if you aren't ready.

I think I'll stick with the 1 day off per hour the race took rule which makes the most sense to me when it comes to advising my athletes and my future races. This is a good starting point but then can be changed according to the athlete.

I have an Olympic distance race next weekend, 6 weeks after my Ironman, we'll see how it goes....

Women and exercise

2007-08-15T09:23:00.000-07:00

I just had a conversation with someone who one year ago was 4% body fat(according to her) and is now over 30% body fat. She showed me a picture of her one year ago and she was extremely thin. She is convinced that cardio is the key to losing fat because when she got down to that size she did 2 hours of cardio a day 7 days a week and ate nothing but salads. She and I were having a conversation about whether weight training or cardio was the answer to losing fat and if she were to do it all over again what would she do.

2 Hours of cardio a day and salads is not a life! Hence she was unable to maintain her weight loss and a year later has gained it back. It is obvious to me that whatever she did, did not work because she was not able to maintain it. Also she had probably screwed up her metabolism pretty bad making it impossible to not put body fat back on setting her up for failure.

But in her head 14 hours of cardio a week and salads is the only way to get back down to that size. She has a hard time believing she could look like that again or better with half as much time spent exercising and eating more. And instead of rebounding back up she would be able to stay there long term.

I think many women think that this is what is necessary to get the body of their dreams or like her they have done something like this in the past and have screwed up their metabolism and have rebounded. And think they are just not meant to be fit.

I have news for you ladies! The last thing you should do to get the body of your dreams is 2 hours of cardio a day and eat salads. The goal is to get the metabolism revving by eating more healthy foods and increasing lean tissue and taking advantage of the afterburn effect you get after a weight training routine or an interval session. No workout should last longer than an hour to get this afterburn effect.

That's right- do less, eat more and get the body you always wanted!

If you need a program to follow that will give you this afterburn effect and achieve the body you want purchase Afterburn Training written by my husband which has the programs we use to get results with our clients.

Ironman USA recap

2007-07-29T19:11:00.000-07:00

One year ago on July 24, 2007 registration opened for Ironman USA in Lake Placid, NY. I had told my friends, who all did their first Ironman the year before in Brazil, that whichever race they were all doing I would join them. They said Ironman USA was the one. I read about the race, looked good to me! I love New York and the scenery is supposed to be beautiful. Should I sign up? Should I commit to training for an Ironman? My husband said, “You’re nuts, but go for it!” So that morning at 6am the phone rang at my house from one of my friends calling to see if I was going to go through with it and sign up. Peer pressure always works with me. He had already signed up so I got right on it, went to the computer and signed myself up. Within ten minutes of signing up, the race was sold out completely. I can’t believe there are 2000 other people who want to do this that bad- crazy!

So, there I was, knowing what race I would be doing in one year. I have never planned anything in my life that far in advance, not even my wedding. How would I prepare myself? What would I do? What training program would I follow? I started reading every Ironman training book I could get my hands on and figure this out. I was excited to write a year long program for myself, follow it and get my body to the point where I could complete an Ironman. And I had an entire year to do it.

I wrote out my plan starting with a corrective exercise phase, then two Half Ironman’s and a Century Ride. I had my volume build for 3 weeks and then a recovery week. My plan was to taper for 3 weeks so my biggest longest workout was Saturday, 3 weeks out from the race and I followed it very closely. I kept track of everything, my miles, my hours, my weight, calories eaten.

My final week of tapering was here. We flew out on Wednesday and I would be an Ironman on Sunday. I couldn’t believe I had been consumed by this for a full year and now here it was. I was about to be an Ironman. I had done everything right, followed my training program and followed all of the advice in the books and from all of my friends. I had to be ready.

We got to Lake Placid on Wednesday night and I tried to get to bed as early as I could with the time difference to try to get on the time zone. Woke up on Thursday and went for a 40 minute run around the lake. I felt good, legs felt pretty fresh. I was ready to do this. Following my run I joined my husband in the hotel gym while he worked out I stretched and did some range of motion work.

Time to go register! I went and registered Thursday afternoon and it started to rain and get really windy. All day Thursday ended up being torrential rain and wind- Oh No! What if this is what we have on race day? I got my bike and registered and went back to the hotel. My number was 2121- good number! The forecast was for clear skies over the weekend so we’ll see. I know this race has been in this kind of weather in the past and with the way it was coming down it was hard to believe it would clear up by Sunday. I started to think I needed to prepare myself for a windy, rainy day.

Friday I woke up and there was a patch of no rain so I took my bike out for a spin to see how it was working. I was having trouble getting air in one of my tires so stopped by the bike shop where they were very helpful and helped me open the valve on my tire which seemed to be stuck. My bike was riding great, I did about 6 miles. Then I went back to the hotel, put my wetsuit on and headed out for a 20 minute swim in the lake. That was it for workouts, if you even call those workouts. Compared to what I had been doing these didn’t feel like I had worked out. More just mentally getting ready and getting some blood flowing in my muscles. I didn’t do anything that should cause any muscular damage that I will have to recover from. I felt good and was ready to go.

I was amazed at all of the competitors that were training all week and not just an easy run. I’d see people way out from town like they must have ran there up and down the hills 10-15 miles two days before the race. At any moment you could look out at the lake and see at least 50-100 people swimming and most of them seemed to be at least swimming one whole loop of the course. We also saw people cycling way out of town which again is not a flat ride back in to town. Crazy! These poor people didn’t know that they can only do damage at this point, there bodies would not recover from these last minute workouts by Sunday. What were they thinking? I felt bad for them that they thought it would be beneficial to get one last 10 mile run in before the race- it’s too late, go rest! Your poor body has to travel 140.6 miles on Sunday! Give it a break! While everyone else was getting one last swim or bike ride in I went and had a 90 minute massage which felt great and I was done with workouts until Sunday when I would be an IRONMAN. The rain continued to poor all day Friday with no end in sight except that the forecast still said clear over the weekend. I went back to the hotel and put my numbers on everything and taped 12 GU’s onto my bike. I put together my transition bags and special needs bags and everything was ready to go!

Saturday I woke up to blue skies! Yay! I had to drop off my bike and transition bags at transition. This was an exciting moment. Putting my bike on the rack and seeing where everything would be. Everything was ready to go. I relaxed most of the day except for a few hours when my husband and I went to the Olympic Ski Jumping Complex where we watched skiers in a competition fly off of the ski jumps- amazing! This definitely helped take my mind off of what I would be doing tomorrow. These guys were nuts! What a crazy sport! Watching it on TV doesn’t do justice to seeing it in person. Then we watched guys do jumps into a pool of water where they would flip and twist in the air 3-4 times. Amazing! I drank water and Gatorade all day long making sure I was fully hydrated and tried to sit and stay out of the sun as much as possible.

Saturday night I ate pasta with grilled chicken around 6pm. I stretched, foam rolled and used the stick on my muscles and climbed in to bed at about 9pm after drinking a Surge to top off my glycogen stores before going to sleep.

My alarm went off at 4am and I was up and ready to go. Today was the Day! I felt so ready for this day that I don’t think I got really nervous. I felt pretty calm and excited to do this. I had planned my race and it was time to race my plan. I ate some oatmeal and a banana and had some coffee. At about 5:15am I headed to transition and my husband came with me. I went in and put my Clif bars in my bento box on my bike, and my drinks in the drink holders after they had been in the fridge all night, nice and cold. I pumped up my tires one more time and I was ready to go. Of course, I went back and double checked it once or twice before heading to the start line. It was time to say goodbye to my bike, I’d see it in a few hours. I was on my way over to the lake where the swim start was but first stop was to get body marked and second stop was to drop off my special needs bags. And third stop was one last bathroom stop before the race started where I waited in a long line and cut it a little too close to the race start for comfort. Everyone was getting in the water so I had my husband get my wetsuit ready and when I came out of the porta potty I put my wetsuit on and ran to the race start.

As I was walking in to the water the National Anthem started. Soon after, I was floating among 2500 people trying to find the best spot. I asked the guy next to me if I was in the middle or if I was up to close with all of the fast people. He said that he thinks all of the animals were up in front of us and that I was in a good spot just behind the animals.

Helicopters were flying over head, thousands of spectators surrounded the lake, the sun was shining, it was very exciting! The gun went off and we started swimming. The day had begun. The swim was definitely crowded and you had to watch out for yourself. Swimming is usually a relaxing sport but this was a contact sport, a very different swim experience. I would be swimming in a nice open space getting into my stroke- “one, two, three, breathe, one, two, three, look up, one, two, three…” and then all the sudden chaos- there would be people on all sides of me kicking, arms flying and so I would look up find another open space close by and move to it and continue moving forward. I got hit once or twice but no biggie. I was nervous about getting kicked hard so whenever I’d see feet in front or on the side of me I steered clear of them. The key was staying calm and keep moving forward. The sun was blinding me when I would breathe on that side I’d see stars for the next couple of breathes so I had to change my talk in my head to- “one, two, three, close eyes, one, two, three, look up.” I only brought clear goggles and wished I had tinted ones. I thought it would be overcast in the morning. After swimming about 900 meters we had to turn left around a buoy, swim 100 meters and make another left at a buoy making a rectangle heading back to the beach. These turns were what you would call a clusterf***. And I don’t usually cuss(I leave that to my husband, he does it better then I do) but this is the best word to describe these turns. Everyone cut in close to the buoys and were on top of each other. This was the worst of the contact sport and I just wanted out of it. I made it out OK and took the next buoy a little wider. Then I was headed back to the beach. First loop in 39 minutes- right on track for my 1:20 swim time I wanted. The second loop I was able to swim out on the rope that held the buoys together using it as a lane line so I didn’t have to sight as often. Sighting is when you look up to see where you are. Before I knew it I was at the buoys to turn again and this time I took them both wide but ended up off course a bit as I was coming back in. It was great because I had nice open water all by myself but I was swimming way outside of the buoys and needed to make my way back in closer which I did. I never did see any scuba divers which they said we would see. They had scuba divers in the water watching us swim over I guess incase anyone gets pulled under or drowns they would see them.

When I got back to the beach, stood up and looked at the clock it said 1:20- yay! I was very happy with that time! And the people cheering- thousands of people were there cheering- it was overwhelming as you came out of the swim. I couldn’t believe all of the people, there was no way I would see my husband. I started feeling emotional with all of these thousands of people cheering for ME as I came out of the water. I couldn’t get emotional all ready, I had a long day ahead of me but it was pretty overwhelming having thousands of people cheering for you. Do you think they were there for someone else? I thought they were all there for me! Volunteers were standing there to help us pull our wetsuits off which was great and then I ran ¼ mile to transition which was actually a lot of fun because of the crowds cheering for me and I did see my husband just before I entered transition. In transition, the volunteers were great helping with everything. In no time I had my helmet and bike shoes on and was heading out to get my bike.

I had a great time on the bike. My legs felt great. I passed 780 people on the bike! I didn’t count, a friend of mine pointed it out to me after the race was over when she looked at the results online. I knew I passed a lot of people but I didn’t realize that many. I did the first loop in 2:56 and was feeling great except that I would need to make a pit stop at a restroom probably on this second loop. I really wanted to wait until I was back at transition but couldn’t wait and had to stop at mile 80 where these kids were volunteering and held my bike for me filling up all of my drinks. It was better than Valet parking- what service! I felt much better and was off for another 32 miles until my marathon! Oh my god I was going to run my first marathon today! Was I insane?

I finished strong on the bike, passing all of the people I had already passed earlier before my pit stop. I came in strong right to the finish, felt great. My nutrition on the bike was a GU every 10 miles, 3 Clif Bars which I ate between mile 20 and mile 80 and 20 ounces of fluid every hour. I also took 2 salt tablets every hour. This seemed to work pretty good. I had no problems with cramping.

I came into transition after 6:09 on my bike. As we came around the final corner the volunteers were all yelling at us to “Slow Down!!!” and “Yellow Line!!!” You felt like you were in trouble the way they were yelling but they just wanted to make sure you dismounted at the yellow line and didn’t crash into transition. A volunteer took my bike from me and I ran into transition to get ready to run my marathon! I made another stop at the porta potties on my way in, then went to the tent, changed my socks and shoes, put my hat on and grabbed my GU’s and salt tabets for the run. I was off to run a marathon!

I couldn’t believe how fresh my legs felt running out of transition. I felt great! I just hoped it would last! I had 10 Gu’s packed into my pockets and 10 salt tablets. It was a lot of stuff in my pockets while running so I started to spread it out and put some Gu’s in my shorts pockets. As I ran out of transition, I heard the announcer say my name- “Here comes Rachel Cosgrove out on the run course!” I saw my husband right when I ran out which made me smile and I was off to run the first 13 mile loop. I had planned to get 4-6 ounces of fluid at very aid station, take a Gu every 30 minutes and 2 salt tablets every hour. That was the plan. So, I ran until I came to the first aid station where I quickly walked through while grabbing a cup of water and a cup of Gatorade chugged them down and picked up my pace again. I was keeping a 10min/mile pace perfectly because when I hit mile 6 it had been exactly an hour so I was right on track. I felt great all the way to the turnaround and then headed back toward town where on your way in you have to run up a steep climb and then down a hill and then another steep climb, two more small climbs and then one last little hill that really hurts. The crowds were great on these hills though cheering for you. I ran up them all and felt pretty strong. I couldn’t believe how good I felt. I did my first loop in 2:15 putting me on track for a 4:30 marathon if I could keep that pace. Second loop I still felt good running, I think my aid station walks were probably getting a little slower then they were on the first loop and I am sure my pace had slowed down a little even though it felt like I was holding a pretty good pace. I also had to stop 3-4 times at the porta potties, sometimes false alarms but I didn’t want to risk it. So my overall pace on the second loop I was noticing I was about 15 minutes behind at about mile 18 to hit 4:30. 18 miles was the longest I had every run but I felt fine going into mile 19. I started to grab the chicken broth which seemed to keep me feeling good and I was still eating my Gu’s and taking my salt. So from mile 18 to the end it was water, Gatorade, chicken broth, Gu and salt tabs. I knew those hills were coming up again ahead and my goal with this race had always been to finish strong so as I got to the hills I just kept saying to myself, “Finish Strong” And I ran up all of the hills while the crowds cheered for me, one hill, two hills and then the couple of smaller hills running strong out to the turnaround where I would be heading into the finish line soon.

As I was running into the Olympic Oval where the finish line was I lifted my sunglasses off my eyes but with all of the thousands of people cheering at me and I was about to finish something that I had worked very hard for, I got emotional again and started to get tears welling up. I put my sunglasses back down on my eyes because I didn’t want to start bawling and have my picture crossing the finish line of me bawling.

I ran across the finish line. I think I put my arms up and heard the announcer say, “Rachel Cosgrove, YOU are an Ironman!”

After I crossed the volunteers were there to hold me up, one on each side. I felt fine, really. They asked me how I was. And when I said I was fine they kept saying- “Are you sure? What do you need?” I started to second guess myself, was I really Ok? But yes, I felt good. I just wanted to see my husband and I had no idea how I would find him in the thousands of people. Another volunteer came up to check me out and she said, “Wow, you look like you just got out of the salon! You look great!” With that comment, I went and posed for a professional picture. Soon after I found my husband wearing his Ironmate shirt.

I am an IRONMAN

2007-07-27T08:09:00.000-07:00

What an Awesome day! It was everything I anticipated and more in a good way. I had a great race and I felt fantastic. I hit all of my numbers close to what I expected and above all felt great and finished strong.

I wanted under 1:30 on the swim, I hit 1:20
I wanted under 6 hours on the bike, I hit 6:09.
I wanted under 5 hours on the run, I hit 5 hours.
For a total time of 12:45!

I am very happy with that time and I was amazed at how good I felt. And I felt fine after I was done. It hasn't even been a week and I have no residual soreness, I didn't get any blisters at all, I can't believe how good I feel. Ready to do it again! I owe that to all of the hours of training I put in!

I'll post my race recap tomorrow.

Thank you for all of your support! I am an Ironman!

Last week before the big race!

2007-07-16T11:49:00.000-07:00

It is now the week of my race! How this year has flown by yet I am so ready to do this race. I feel like I have been preparing, training and thinking about it for long enough and am ready. I have been reading everything on what to put in my bags and what the day of and day before will be like. I feel good. Have had an easy week of training and had a massage yesterday. I fly out Wednesday! For those of you who want to follow my race you can log on to www.ironmanlive.com and see how I am doing. My predictions are-

Swim under 1:30, hopefully 1:20
Bike under 6 hours, hopefully 5:45
Run under 5 hours, hopefully 4:30
with transitions at a total of 12:00 min

So that is 12:42 on the high end and 11:47 if all goes the best it could which would have put me 14th last year. It's a competitive race and I am in a competitive age group. I would be ecstatic with 11:47 or anything under 12 hours for that matter but I'll be excited with anything under 13 hours and I'll be happy that I finish no matter what! So that was-
Ecstatic- Under 12 hours
Excited- Under 13 hours
Happy and completely satisfied- To Finish!

I have planned my race and will race my plan and will cross that finish line with a smile on my face no matter how the day goes!

Thank you for your support!

10 Days until I am an Ironman!

2007-07-12T12:51:00.000-07:00

Well, it is almost here. 10 more days until I race in my first Ironman. I have been tapering and it is such a wierd thing because you feel like you should be doing something. My training peaked at about 19-20 hours a week and this week I will do about 12-14 hours of training and next week I'll do about 8-10 hours before the race. I have been making lists of everything- my schedule this week before we get there, what will be in all of my bags- T1,T2, special needs bags, what I will eat the day before and the day of the race.

I dropped my bike off with Tri Transport on Tuesday and that was when reality really hit me that I am doing this next week. I have done everything I can to be ready for this so there is no turning back now, I must be ready.

My goals this week are to start getting to bed early, eat healthy, drink lots of fluids, foam roll and stretch everyday.

Ironman here I come!

Lake Placid Training Camp

2007-07-05T07:33:00.000-07:00

This picture tells you what Lake Placid is like. Athletes everywhere. The whole town is centered around athletics since the Olympics were there twice, once in 1932 and again 1980. There is an Olympic training center there complete with ski jumps, bobsledding, the hockey rink where the US beat Russia in 1980, ice skating rinks, etc. While we were there the women's hockey team was trying out for the Olympics for next year, we watched ski jumpers practice their jumps into a pool of water and we toured the Olympic training center.

As if all of the Olympic stuff isn't enough athletics, Lake Placid has now hosted Ironman USA for 7 years. There are Ironman athletes everywhere training on the course. I couldn't believe how many people were there training. I was so glad I went. This sign was on the run course making sure cars knew to watch out for us runners- where else do you see a sign like that?

I invited my mom to come with me since she can't come to my actual Ironman. This was great as she got to see the course, see me training on the course and experience Lake Placid and probably spend more time with me than she would have if she came the actual weekend of. She was great support during the weekend- thanks mom!

To start off, my biggest fear is this whole traveling with my bike which I have never done before. And ofcourse my first time traveling with my bike, I got to Lake Placid and my bike didn't. We arrived Thursday night in Albany New York after being delayed and missing our flight to Lake Placid(a whole other story) and my bike did not come off the plane. Ofcourse, the airline employee was less than helpful with no real compassion for someone losing their bike- he looked at me like- "It's a bike, calm down." No, it isn't just a bike!!! I freaked out a little bit, alright a lot. And we ended up renting a car and driving to Lake Placid(about a 2 hour drive) with no bike and checking in to our hotel at about 2am Thursday night. Woke up Friday and immediatley called the airline to find out where my bike was. Long story short, I ended up driving back to Albany to get my bike and by the time I got back to the hotel no bike shops were open so I put it together myself and rode 112 miles on it first thing Saturday morning. I got to know my bike quite well this weekend. Moral of the story- know how to take apart and put together your bike just in case.

I have decided to use Tribike transport for my race and not deal with the headaches of traveling with my bike. Airlines don't really care. Tri bike transport will drive my bike to the race and have it waiting for me when I get there all put together and ready to go. One less thing to worry about.

Anyway, I got everything I could have out of the training weekend.

Saturday- 112 mile bike on the actual course, 4 mile run. So I did the course and it wasn't too bad, definitely challenging with some good climbing but a great downhill too!

Sunday- 2.4 mile swim(the course) in beautiful Mirror Lake, 18 mile run on the race course.
It is so beautiful there! The scenery is amazing!

Monday- 1 loop of bike course- 56 miles and 2 loops of swim course again 2.4 miles. Felt good.

Tuesday- I finished with one last 8 mile run on the run course.

I had a great weekend of training and feel ready to go for the race!

Balance

2007-07-03T06:58:00.000-07:00

Training for this Ironman has definitely gotten my life out of balance. Everything I do, talk about, read about has to do with the Ironman. It was almost one year ago I signed up for this race and every single day for the last year I have either thought about the race, talked about the race, read about training for the race, planned my training schedule or been training for the race. Every single day for a year and now it is almost here! I am ready and getting anxious! Three weeks of taper first though.

These last two weeks have been my peak volume weeks and are my excuse why I haven't blogged. I have been training a lot. I have been training 20 hours a week. That is training time and then you add in going to the bike shop, buying Gu's, working on my bike, recovery(stretching, foam rolling, massage,ART) and this is definitely a full time job. Sorry guys but I put my blog and newsletters on the back burner:)

I also was lucky enough to go to a training camp in Lake Placid and actually train on the course last week which was awesome. I flew there last Thursday and stayed for the weekend until Tuesday. Tomorrow I will fill you in on the camp and how it went. And how my first experience traveling with my bike went....

Back to balance...When I get involved in something I have a hard time maintaining balance and it has been especially hard with this Ironman. It is all consuming. Triathlon, for me, is a hobby. I enjoy training, I enjoy racing, it pushes me athletically and I do it for fun. My goal is not to become a professional triathlete. My goal is to train, race and improve while having great experiences. I feel like training for this Ironman I have gone beyond just a hobby. It is a full time job.

But, part of it is my own own fault. I can't just finish the Ironman, I have to do the best I am capable of doing. I have done everything I know how to get the best performance out of myself. I expect the same from myself as I would expect out of one of my clients whose goal is to qualify for Kona. If I expect it out of my athletes than why wouldn't I expect it out of myself.

I guess I am my own learning experience because I wrote my training schedule, followed it to a "T" and will see and feel how it works before I give a similar training schedule to one of my athletes. So, I guess training for this Ironman is in essence part of my job and not just a hobby. Now I am justifying spending 30 hours a week on Ironman stuff and only 10-15 hours working. Training for this Ironman IS my job, yeah, that's it....

My career is as a coach and fitness professional. My goal is to coach a professional triathlete, not be one. The thing is, is that, my goal is not to win this race or qualify for Kona. My goal is to finish the race and have a great experience. Yet, I have still let it consume all of my time, my thoughts and my conversations. Like I said, the majority of my time is spent on Ironman stuff and my time spent actually working has shrunk to maybe 10-15 hours a week. I have been able to keep my time with my husband as a priority so the one thing that has suffered in my life is my work. By the way, my husband has been awesome at supporting me through my training and has put up with all of this Ironman stuff for almost a year now without a single complaint.

Because this is my first Ironman, I may be going overboard with my training and have done more than was necessary. I would much rather be over prepared and get to the race and feel like I am more than ready and the actual Ironman it isn't too bad compared to all of the training I have done than be under prepared and wish I had trained harder.

I wonder if it is possible to train for an ironman doing less than I have done and keeping more balance in your life. I don't know if it is. I read articles and books by guys who say- "Ironman in 10 hours a week." I don't see how that is possible when the race will take me at least 12 hours in one day. How could I possibly prepare my body for a 12 hour race in 10 hours a week.

I am sure it is not as consuming when you have already done one because it is not so unknown. Being my first one, it has taken over my thoughts, time, conversations and life.

Many people have asked me if I will do another one and right now my focus is on getting through this one. I am looking forward to having my time free up again to get my life back in balance and make my career and work a priority for awhile. This is probably the wrong time to ask me when I am in the middle of my biggest weeks of training too. The week after the race when I am on a high, ask me and I will most likely say yes!

Gotta go! Back to training...I have a 40 mile ride and 4 mile run today. I plan to update this blog everyday this week now that I am tapering, I have some time to write about the Ironman :)

Movement Prep

2007-06-06T06:55:00.000-07:00

This past weekend I attended the Perform Better Summit in Long Beach where my husband was one of the speakers. Also among the speakers were two people talking about strength training for endurance- Gary Lavin and Mark Verstegan. Both of them discussed how important it is to do some form of movement prep before you head out the door for a workout. Mark said that your performance will improve by 18% by spending 2-5 minutes switching on the right muscles and actively stretching the tight muscles. Instead of warming up on your first 2 miles of running, get everything warm and ready to go first and you'll get more out of your first two miles of running because the quality of movement will be better.

This movement prep focused on switching on the glutes which tend not to fire on most endurance athletes and lengthening the hip flexors. If the hip flexors are tight, the glutes can't work- it's a compensatory relationship. One can't be more dominant than the other or the less dominant one will shut down. Most endurance athletes are very quad dominant. Doing some exericises to switch on your derriere before starting your run or bike will improve your performance, decrease your risk of injury and you'll get more out of the time spent running or biking.

Good stuff and I had heard it before but I still have not been doing a good job of doing it before I run or bike. I do it before my weight training. So, I am going to start incorporating it in every single time I am working out.

Overall it was an awesome seminar! Some excellent speakers!

And I got all of my training in...Saturday morning I got up and ran along the beach on the bike path for 11 miles in Long Beach and Sunday after attending the morning seminars I met up with a friend of mine and we rode to Oceanside, 115 miles total round trip.

This weekend coming up I am headed to Vegas to speak at the ISSN conference.