I won’t beat around the bush, tease you for a handfull of paragraphs and keep you hanging around waiting with bated breath for the answer to the question everyone wants to know, how do I create a workout program? I’ll tell you upfront.

The very best way to create a workout program is from the bottom up.

This means starting with a small amount of high-quality exercise then, slowly adding more after you have measured the results of the work you’ve already done. Some might find this to be tedious and too slow of a method for discovering what is ideal. However the time spent during this process is well worth it over the long-run as you gain a better sense and understanding of what you need to do to realize future success. The most difficult aspect of this process for those with limited exercise experience or who never received proper exercise instruction (i.e. 98 percent of those who work out on their own) will be determining whether the exercise being performed is truly high in quality (see last blog entry: How to Perform Your Exercise).

Immediate success does not come except by chance. And even then continued success will be hard to come by because you will be unaware or get a false sense of the cause for your immediate success. If you are someone with two or more years of training under your belt reflect for a moment on all the different training programs you’ve tried that have been unsuccessful in delivering the results promised. Most of them were likely routines plucked right out of a magazine or book designed by someone who knows nothing about you yet still prescribed specific rep ranges, number of sets or workout splits to perform each week.

What every one of these “canned” exercise programs or workouts has in common is that they each have you performing arbitrary amounts of exercise, after which, you still have no idea why or how the program did or did not work. As with all “canned” routines your outcome is a roll of the dice.

If over that same span of years you had endeavored to work from the bottom up as opposed to searching for the “magic workout” and jumping from one set of training criteria to a completely different set, you would today have a better understanding of what works best for you. Your chances for continual progress would be much improved because you could now predict with some certainty what will transpire if you chose to take your training in one direction versus another based upon the information you gathered and your understanding of past experience. Instead you are probably just as confused today as you were back when you first started, about what to do and how to do it.

We live in a society that wants immediate results. Just watch some of the fitness infomercials or read the ads in fitness magazines and you’ll notice a common thread. Each product promises to deliver results fast. Rarely do they live up to their hype. Although the “bottom up” approach may not be as enticing, it assures you of a better understanding of what works best for you and how you can make informed decisions in the future to make or maintain your progress.

While everyone else will be plodding through their workouts hoping to stumble upon something that works, you will already be in possession of your key to success…information.

At PURE PHYSIQUE our annual Fitness Challenge is in full effect. Whether you’re a member of ours competing in the contest or you workout on your own competing against yourself, how you go about “winning” is exactly the same.

I know that not everyone will actually follow through on my advice which is why I don’t hesitate to spell it out for anyone who wants to know. Those that do employ the strategies I’m about to layout will certainly hold a huge advantage over those that don’t. In fact 8 out of the last 10 place winners of our contests have applied these strategies and I’ve used them myself and with those I’ve coached for bodybuilding and figure contests to achieve their all-time best condition and earn top placing.

The best approach is often times the simplest. For some reason we try to make things harder or more complex than they need to be. Perhaps it’s because the simple approach requires us to do things that are tedious or calls for more sweat equity and attention to detail. It’s just not fun!

Winners don’t concern themselves with “fun” they concern themselves with winning. As it relates to your fitness pursuits winning is not necessarily tied to making the top three in this, or any contest. Winning is taking yourself from where you currently are to where you want to be or at least making significant strides in that direction. So even if you don’t make the top three, or even the top ten for that matter, but lose the 5 lbs that you’ve struggled with for the last four
months then you won.

The strategy that time and time again works without fail is tracking your food intake. I’m not just talking about writing down what you eat, but actually weighing and measuring your food so you know precisely how many grams of carbs, proteins, fats and calories you are consuming. It doesn’t matter that you eat healthy, don’t have treats, or don’t drink alcohol. At the end of the day it takes going just 1 calorie over what your body actually needs for you to store that extra calorie as fat. I know most of you are probably going more than just one calorie over which is why it’s that much more important to start tracking. When you know specifically how much you’re taking in it becomes much easier to determine how much needs to come out in order to start burning body-fat.

Reinforcing this point’ last year’s winner of The PP Fitness Challenge, as well as my girlfriend and myself in preparation for our last bodybuilding and figure competition, performed no cardio. All of us achieved our all-time best condition by tracking our caloric and macronutrient intake and consistently performing 2-4 weight training sessions each week.

Next, you can’t miss workouts. If you need to move to a different time, a different day, fine, but you can’t miss. There is a certain degree of consistency that is necessary in order to keep your metabolism working at its highest rate and your strength and muscle development at its peak.

Lastly, you must approach each workout being 100% focused and work to your greatest capability. There cannot be any holding back, no whining, no complaining, NO EXCUSES, just hard work all the time.

There is certainly nothing sexy about the above strategies but they are tried and true. I will not attempt to fool you into thinking that any of them will be easy to apply because they won’t be. But I will tell you this…if you make a truly valiant effort and apply all of these strategies you will find yourself achieving success beyond your wildest dreams

Nutrition plays a big role in your ability to engage in an intense and productive workout. How and what you eat in the hours leading up to your workout can determine whether or not your energy, focus, and performance is at its peak.

Here are some simple guidelines to eating right before your workout:
•Eat 1-2 hours before your workout. Eating too close to your workout could cause you to feel sick or feel sluggish while having your last meal too far in advance could leave you with few nutrients to fuel the workout.

•Consume a moderate amount of low-glycemic carbohydrates and protein as well as a very small amount of fat. (If you are currently eating low-carb then at least 25-30% of your days carbohydrates should be consumed during this meal).

•Examples of low-glycemic carbohydrates that will provide a slow release of glycogen (sugar) to the muscle during your intense workout are brown rice, sweet potatoes, sprouted grain bread, rice cakes, oatmeal, and fruit.

•Good sources of protein include egg whites, chicken breast, turkey, Greek yogurt, cottage cheese and protein shakes.

•Good sources of fat include almonds, nuts, natural peanut butter, or almond butter. However your carbohydrate and protein foods may contain enough fat making the addition of these fats unnecessary.

•Be sure to drink 16-32 oz. of water so that you are well hydrated. Being the slightest bit dehydrated will result in you feeling fatigued, lethargic, and your muscles (which are 70-75% water) functioning below par.