It’s three weeks into the New Year, and by now, many of your are no doubt having second thoughts on your ability to exceed the challenges ahead of you. If fitness, health or weight loss are on your agenda, here are some helpful tips to keep you moving forward.

1. Eliminate junk food. Most fast food restaurants, along with most pastries and processed foods, contain high amounts of fat, sodium and sugar (usually simple sugars). The consumption of these foods will do little for your energy, except promote a high then a low in your blood sugar levels. In addition they offer high levels of fat, usually of the saturated type. And they quite often contain large amounts of water-retaining sodium. None of these qualities are beneficial to any type of athlete or individual.
2. Drink eight to ten glasses of water each day, or more (I personally drink a LOT more – over 3 gallons per day). This will ensure you are replacing fluids lost during exercise. You need not wait until you are thirsty. By then, you are in a depleted state. Drink these glasses of water throughout a day’s time, not all at once.
3. Determine your daily protein requirements. Proteins that include the essential amino acids (those that your body does not manufacture) are of utmost importance. Protein powder provides a great means to obtaining additional quality protein. And remember, proteins are best assimilated when accompanied by some carbohydrates. Where do you start? Try 1 gram per pound of body weight.
4. Consume high fiber foods. Not only does high fiber in your diet help in the reduction of cholesterol, it also makes fats less likely to be absorbed into your body.
5. Exercise to increase your lean body weight. The more lean weight you have, the more efficient your body moves and the higher your metabolism, even at rest. By increasing your lean body weight, your bones become more dense and your muscles, tendons and ligaments become stronger. The great side effect of all this is that it’s easier to avoid getting fat. Remember, bigger muscles burn more calories than little ones. You DO NOT want to lose lean body mass!

If you aren’t already, whether your goal is to lose fat or gain muscle, you should be eating smaller meals every 2-3 hours! Eating at regular increments:

• Increases metabolism
• Gives your body a constant supply of nutrients
• Keeps your blood sugar stable and alleviates the post-meal “crashes” (ever feel lethargic after lunch?) since you’re not spiking your insulin
• Keeps you relatively saturated and stops you from eating a huge amount at one time, which is an easy way to cause your body to store fat
• Gives encouragement! When you get hungry, you know that you’re going to be eating again in a very short time! No more waiting 6-7 hours between meals!

You should always eat at least five meals a day. Two or three meals simply isn’t often enough. If your muscles don’t get the calories they need, how are they going to keep going? By CANNIBALIZING (eating) muscle tissue! That’s the same muscle tissue you spent hours training to get.

On the other hand, overeating even one meal a day keeps the fat-building enzymes in your body more numerous to turn the excess food into body fat. Always ask yourself, “What will I be doing over the next 3 hours?” and eat based around your activities. If you’re going to be busting your tail in the gym, you’d eat more than you would if you were going to sleep.

Remember, when you overeat at a meal, the excess calories get stored as fat. So, if you skip a meal, do not eat to make up for it, eat for what you are going to be doing.

Good luck and hang in there! If you “fall off the wagon,” you have 11 more months ahead of you to reach your fitness goals. It’s a marathon, not a sprint.

Multivitamin, by definition, means a grouping of vitamins and minerals compacted into a single pill.  Statistically, about 70 percent of Americans take a daily multivitamin, but how do you know the multivitamin you are taking is actually working for you, or healthy for you?

Unfortunately, not all multivitamins are created equal.  In fact, they are constructed in five different ways:  Natural, meaning the nutrients are obtained from vegetable, mineral, or animal sources with limited to no processing.  Natural source, meaning they are like the above but the good is processed.  Natural identical, meaning the nutrients are lab manufactured and identical in molecular structure and absorb similarly to natural nutrients.  Synthetic, meaning the nutrients are lab manufactured but are not identical, and are usually the multivitamins that are inexpensive and found in grocery stores.  Last but not at all least is whole food, meaning that these multivitamins are formed with raw materials and are extremely usable and available to the body.

The multivitamins to avoid are the synthetically made, which try to imitate natural nutrients but do not succeed because the body is not designed to process artificial and unnatural ingredients such as synthetic vitamins.  Now, the next question is how do you figure out if the multivitamin you are taking is made of synthetic nutrients? First of all, you need to be aware of the label on the back of bottle.  Read the fine print and ingredients first.  If any where it says natural and artificial flavors, sucralose (splenda), coloring, or anything starting with dl, it is synthetic.  The prefix dl (dl-alpha tocopheryl) means that the nutrient is a synthetic version of vitamin E instead of the natural vitamin E.  The natural nutrient in its scientific name starts with a d.  Also, if the label lists vitamins in its chemical name, it is synthetic.

The dirty little secret that most individuals do not know is that synthetic vitamins are 50 to 70 percent less likely to absorb in the body as opposed to natural vitamins which absorb at almost 95 percent.  Why throw away money on multivitamins that don’t even absorb…to have fluorescent urine?  You can pay a bit more for whole food vitamins and get the results you strive for; whether that is increased energy, to support an already good diet, or prevent disease, or shell out cash for vitamins that don’t work.

Consuming a high-quality, whole food multivitamin can help contribute to muscle growth, proper fat burning, and overall good health.  Think about it this way.  If you are exercising and taking a synthetic multivitamin or none at all, you are ultimately harming your body more because as you work out your body needs certain nutrients to maintain your metabolism, feed muscles, maintain naturally occurring processes, and the list goes on.  This can contribute to people wondering why their bodies have taken so long to transform into what they are striving for; and more often that not, they do not have the correct nutrition to support their activity.

So now the question is what are some names of whole food multivitamins and where can you find them?  Well, here in San Antonio there are several options of stores to purchase whole food vitamins such as Whole Foods, Sun Harvest, and Cost Plus.  In all honesty, Cost Plus is the place to go.  They sell products at whole sale; so there is no tax included and they have a very, very knowledgeable staff that works there.  That being said you should still be able to find, at all three stores, Garden of Life products which are all whole food goods and are very affordable.  If that does not fit your budget or you want something different, just ask the staff and remember the rules above.  There are also online stores that sell whole food products and supplements such as Clayton Naturals.

Remember vitamins do not replace all natural fruits and vegetables which the body loves and needs; however if you do not get the recommended daily servings, multivitamins are a necessity.  Above all, always remember to do your own research to find what works best for you and fits your life style. 

Resources: Body For Life by Bill Phillips