Geelong's Gym

GYM STICKS… What the??  Yes, they have been around for a while now but they originated in Finland and only migrated to us Aussies in 2005.  These unique, extremely versatile training tools allow you to train anywhere, at any time and reward you with a whole range of fitness results.

The Gym Stick is just shy of 2 metres long with a resistance band at each end that drops down to a foot attachment on the base of the band.  There are 5 levels of resistance, which allows both newcomers and the hardcores to get the complete benefits from a Gym Stick workout.  Workouts tend to range from 30 minutes for the beginners all the way through to a full body hour session for those a little further ahead.

Get this… It’s not abnormal to burn up to 700 calories in a 60 minute Gym Stick workout!

Adding the Gym Stick to your regime can provide you with many different health and fitness benefits.  They include: coordination, strength, power, balance and sensory response and, of course, weight loss.

We recently had experienced Gym Stick trainer, Dale Ringin, volunteer his time to introduce our members to a Gym Stick group fitness class.  Check out the video and learn a little more about the Gym Stick.

How well do you know yourself?  Below are 6 Exercise Types – have a read through and see what your relationship with exercise is really like and how you can improve that relationship.

1. Exercise Free Zone – you’re the kind of person who has never really participated in regular exercise before.  Beofre you’re going to exercise, you probably need to understand the health benefits to you and you’re going to need to see some fun in it.
2. Yeah But… – consistency is your biggest problem and you always have a good excuse why you haven’t exercised.  Finding someone to exercise with would help you immensely with your consistency and you need to set realistic goals which you can actually reach.
3. Hard Slog – you’ve got a whole lot of willpower because you know exercise is good for you, but you don’t really enjoy it.  You probably need to switch to a more interesting exercise regime, perhaps with more of a social element, and then you’ll actually enjoy staying fit and healthy.
4. Exercise Evangelist – most of us wish we were like you, because you love to exercise and you stick to your routine without fail.  Your problem is you need variety, otherwise you might get bored and potentially stop exercising altogether.  Try to add some new activities into your routine to keep it interesting.
5. Yesterday’s Hero – you used to exercise regularly, but now you do nothing.  Don’t expect too much from yourself straight away; start out slowly with some gentle exercise and before you know it you’ll be enthusiastic about it all over again.
6. Never Again – uh oh, you’ve had an injury or a bad experience with exercise and you swore you’d never go there again.  You need to look at what caused your bad experience and get your injury looked at.  Maybe you need to lower your expectations and start out with some gentle exercise to help rehabilitate your injury.

Information in this blog has been sourced from “The Sugar Daddy“ by Dr Adam Fraser and Christine Armarego.

Maybe you don't need to go quite this far...

If you’re an employer, have you thought lately about the overall health of your employees and how it’s effecting their performance at work?

If you’re an employee, have you taken into account the state of your health when struggling to get through a day of work and meet your targets, dealines or goals?

You might think that as the owner of Geelong’s Gym all of my staff would be physically active… you’d be right, but they didn’t all come to me that way. 

Obviously all our Personal Trainers and Group Fitness Instructors are highly motivated people who have a passion for exercise, health and fitness.  But what about my Reception, Membership and Admin Teams?  Many of them, when they first started at Geelong’s Gym, included very little, if any, regular exercise in their day to day life.  But not anymore.

... or this...

If you work for me, I expect you to exercise regularly.  (And let’s face it, you don’t have much of an excuse when you work in a gym!!!)  Why?  Because I understand the value of exercise in creating and maintaining good health.  And I know if my team is healthy, fit and well they’re going to perform much better than someone who isn’t.

...but wouldn't you love all your employees to look this happy, engaged and energetic?

Recently, Right Management did a study called “Ready, get set… change“, where they surveyed 28,000 employees in 15 countries on the link between health and organisational performance.  Here are some of the things they found out:

• Organisations that promote employee health and wellbeing are 3.5 times more likely to encourage creativity and innovation.
• In companies where health and wellness was managed well, organisational performance increased more than 2.5 times compared with rival companies.
• When health and wellness were properly managed, the number of engaged employees increased nearly eight times.

(* Soure: MT Magazine)

So there you have it… overall health and wellness of employees is essential to high performance in the workplace.

In a previous post I talked about what a big issue Diabetes is in the world today.  Today, I want to follow on from that and talk about how you can manage and prevent diabetes (as well as many other health conditions).  And, drum roll please… EXERCISE is one of the best ways you can do it.

Manage your diabetes with regular walking.

Why?  Because, exercise improves the insulin sensitivity of your cells and, as a result, improves your blood glucose levels.  In a nut shell, everything runs much more smoothly when you exercise.

So here are some key exercise principles for managing and preventing diabetes:

• Make sure you move during the day – any opportunity you get to move should be grasped eagerly.
• Increase your lung fitness – how?  Get a little bit out of breath every day.
• Get rid of the glucose in your muscles and liver – combine interval training and resistance training to drain out the excess glucose.
• Build muscle – no, you don’t have to be The Incredible Hulk, but a little bit of muscle goes a long way.
• Stop before you get too sore – some soreness is good but don’t go overboard on your first go; try and build up gradually.
• Exercise regularly – short, daily bouts of exercise are much better for you than one long session a week.

Above all, remember what your purpose for exercising is… getting fit is far more important than getting thin, so don’t measure your success by how much weight you’ve lost!

Information in this blog has been sourced from “The Sugar Daddy“ by Dr Adam Fraser and Christine Armarego.

Do you want to get fit, fast?  That’s a stupid question really, isn’t it?  Because who wouldn’t want to get fit fast?!  One of the best ways to do it is with high intensity workouts the good old fashioned way, i.e. sweat, sweat, sweat… in other words, boxing!

Give your body a pre-Christmas blitz with some high intensity boxing classes!

Why is boxing so good?  Not only does it improve balance, coordination, core strength, speed, power, fat burning potential, aerobic and anaerobic fitness, it also is a fantastic way to boost confidence, develop discipline and relieve stress!  Whew, what a list!

An average sized athlete, roughly around 85 kilos, who does a one hour circuit style boxing workout will burn around 800 – 1000 calories per hour.

Convinced yet?  At Geelong’s Gym we’ve got a number of fantastic Cardio Box classes at various times during the week or you can check out our new Punch ‘n’ Crunch four week Personal Training course as a pre-Christmas body blitz.

Stair climbing burns 1.6 calories to every calorie burned on flat ground! WHY? Your legs carry your body weight almost vertically up the stairwell as your upper body assists by pulling up on the handrails simultaneously.

This movement involves a large number of different muscle groups working together, all of which require considerable amounts of oxygen rich blood to perform. As you can imagine, this places a significant amount of stress on the cardiovascular system, resulting in rapid breathing, high heart rate and massive calorie expenditure.

The movement of stair climbing is actually very functional; this means many muscles have to work together in order to perform full body movement efficiently. Thus, taking the stairs over the elevator at any opportunity can build the strength in your arms and legs, increase your aerobic capacity, and burn five times the calories than standing in a lift, staring at the levels as you go up to your destination.

87% of the population take the elevator. You may be one of them, but you can also change that statistic and start taking a few stairs…

Would you believe that climbing stairs can be taken to the next level? It’s not just about simply getting to your destination, but getting there as fast as possible.

Stair racing is one of the most brutal of fitness challenges out there! Athletes line up at the base of the building and are let off by the starter to then enter the emergency stairwell and climb their way to the top as fast as they can. There are no specific rules in a stair race but most elite runners will take two steps at a time and never let go of the handrail. The heart rate usually peaks at 190+ BPM and is sustained for the duration of the race!

Some races are in excess of 100 floors and take over 15 minutes for the fastest climbers to complete. Now that hurts!

So the challenge is out there… Australia’s longest stair climb is the annual Eureka Tower run up in Melbourne, Victoria. The exhilarating climb consists of 88 floors, 1642 steps and 300m of vertical climbing. Ultra marathon runner, Stuart Gibson, holds the current record at 8 minutes 56 seconds. AMAZING!

Have a look at the video below of the recent Adelaide Stair Race where myself (Adam Ryan, Manager of Geelong’s Gym) and Geelong’s Gym members, Chris Price and James Carroll, took out the top three places.

I’m sure everyone’s heard of diabetes and then probably dismissed it from their mind, thinking it’s not really a serious issue for them.

But, did you know, in 2006 1.4 million Australians had diabetes?  In fact, it has been rated as the fifth leading cause of death in the world.  Now that’s serious.  And, guess what?  Those figures are rising dramatically and, before you get too complacent, a recent study has found 1 in 4 Australians over 25 have some sort of glucose control problem.  1 in 4!!!!

So, what is the result of excess glucose?  It puts you at greater risk of:

• Heart attack, heart disease and stroke
• Amputation of limbs, particularly lower limbs
• Blindness
• Kidney disease
• High blood pressure
• Loss of nerve sensation and feeling in feet and hands
• Obesity
• Impotence
• Depression
• Decreased life expectancy of up to 15 years

Wow!  So what can you do about it?  In a way, it’s simple – it’s all about lifestyle changes.  Increasing physical activity and improving what you eat has shown massive improvements in insulin sensitivity and glucose control.

I know what you’re thinking – it’s expensive to join a gym.  However, an Italian study has found that simply walking every day has SAVED people with diabetes a whole swag of money:

• A person with diabetes who doesn’t change their lifestyle has to spend $828 a year in direct medical and social costs
• Walking 30 minutes a day reduces their costs by $386 a year
• Walking 45 minutes a day reduces their costs by $1452 a year
• Walking 1 hour a day reduces their costs by $2000!!!

There are a number of ways Type II Diabetes can be prevented and controlled and I’m going to look at a few of those ways in future blogs… so stay posted.

Information in this blog has been sourced from “Sugar Daddy“ by Dr Adam Fraser and Christine Armarego.

I’m sure we all know by now how special our frienships are, but did you know they are the key to greater health and wellness?

Yes, it’s true.  Studies show that having a positve support system around you when you’re pursuing optimum health and wellness actually increases your likelihood of sticking to new healthy habits and behaviours.  PLUS, it reduces stress, increases energy and improves your relationship!

Don't panic - exercising with friends doesn't mean you have to wear matching workout outfits!

Why is this?  Well, it’s largely because to make a significant change in our lives we need to change our mindset, attitude and behaviour first and a positive, strong support system can be a hugely helpful tool in making that happen.  And chances are, that what you’re struggling with is something they’re struggling with too, or have struggled with in the past, so you can actually support each other.  It doesn’t have to be a one way deal.

Friendship is such a powerful tool and it can be a negative influence just as much as a postive one.  For example, in 2003, Nicholas Christakis, a social scientist, and James Fowler, a political scientist, researched how relaitonships directly influence behaviour and therefore health and happiness.

Their study found that behaviours, either positive or negative, are highly influenced by the people around you.  For example, when they looked at the growing rate of obseity, this is what they found:

• Obesity radiates outwards from clusters of overweight people
• Having an obese spouse raises the risk of becoming obese by 37%; but, if a friend becomes obese the risk skyrockets by a shocking 171%!!!  Yikes!
• Lean individuals surrounded by obesity were rare.

Don’t worry though, there were also some positive findings.  Christakis and Fowler found that happy people have happy friends and each happy friend increased a person’s probability of being happy by 9%!

The simple conclusions is, people need people!  So if you’re trying to make some positive changes in your fitness, health and wellbeing (or even some other area of your life), gather your friends around you as a support team and I’m sure you will reach your goals much more easily than if you try to go it alone.

Sometimes (in fact quite a lot of the time) when people get older they do less exercise and less strength work because they think their bodies can’t handle as much any more.

Unfortunately, in making this decision they basically allow their bodies to deteriorate.  What do you mean?! I can hear you crying out.

Let me explain a bit more fully.

Firstly, all forms of aerobic/cardio exercise are beneficial for overall fitness and great for the heart and lungs and should definitely be maintained.  However, aerobic activity doesn’t seem to be able to stop the muscle shriveling that accompanies aging.

If you want a life full of strength and vitality, it's time to start a weights program!

In fact, a Danish study carried out in the 90s provided some startling results.  Male athletes with an average age of 69 who had been training for at least a dozen years were found, unsurprisingly, to be extremely fit.  But, and here’s the scary bit… they had no more muscle mass or strength than their peers who did no exercise at all!  Worse, they were steadily losing muscle.  Yikes!

An additional group of men were looked at who did weight lifting.  And here’s where the results get really interesting… Men in their late sixties who had been training with fairly heavy weights for a decade or more were not only stronger than swimmers or runners of the same age, they were actually stronger than the average 28 year old man.

Biopsies of the weight lifters’ muscles showed the mix of muscle fibres was essentially like that of younger men, a blend of both slow twitch and fast twitch fibres.  The other group of men, despite their fitness, had significantly reduced fast twitch fibres, i.e. the instant strength which allows you to dodge cars.

Please hear me in this, aerobic exercise is definitely important for a variety of health and fitness reasons.  But, top physiologists believe that by middle age weight training is at least as important as aerobic exercise.  And for the elderly it’s even more important as it deters the kind of injuries which most often cause an old body to fail.

So, if you’re in your middle or twilight years and aren’t doing any kind of weight or strength training, I can’t emphasise strongly enough how vital it is for you to start doing some NOW!  And if you’re not sure where to start, why not come on in to Geelong’s Gym and book an appointment with one of our qualified Personal Trainers who will put together a weights program suitable to your particular needs.

Ever wonder what we get up to at Geelong’s Gym on the odd occasion we’re not motivating everyone to improve their health, fitness and well-being?  A few of our members got a bit more than they bargained for this week when they found some of the familiar faces around the gym looking a little different than usual…

Germain Spriet and Gerard Spriet (Head Coach at Geelong's Gym) get in character

We love to mess around with new ideas and find different ways to connect and communicate with our members and those who we’ve had an association with in the past.

As you can imagine, due to changes in work and personal circumstances, from time to time our members have to leave us, sometimes for a short while and sometimes permanently, because they’ve moved away and the like.

We got to thinking about this and how we’d like to acknowledge those people leaving in a fun and cheeky way, so that they remember us and if they ever decide to join a gym again, it will be us they’ll think of.

The team express their sadness when a member leaves Geelong's Gym

So with a bit of face painting help from The Party Girl and some wonderful photography from Nitch Photography, we put together a fun, tongue in cheek card letting those people know we were sad they were leaving and they’d be missed.

We had such a good time on this project that we thought we’d share some of the photos with you.  Enjoy!!!

Heart breaking, isn't it?!