WARNING: The following piece while mostly true is purely for entertainment purposes (and I make no guarantees.) It has absolutely no relevance to your health or fitness. It is purely a rant and has no real redeeming qualities.  It is not for the faint of heart- you have been warned.

This last weekend I turned 36.  Time to take stock in my life and reflect on what I have blah blah blah. I got plenty and I’m doing just fine, that’s not what this is about.

For a mini celebration my wife and I (no kids) took a weekend cruise to Mexico. The cruise left out of Long Beach, Ca. which is about 40 mins away from where we live so we did not have to worry about airfare or any of that. You might recall that we all went to Hawaii last month to celebrate our 10 year anniversary.  As I said then, then irony of that trip is that I did not spend any real time with my wife since the kids were with us.  The irony of this trip was that I spent much of my time missing my kids. I can’t win.

Saying goodbye to the kids as we sail out of Long Beach

All in all the weekend was great- weather was nice, Ensenada was Ensenada and I ate my bodyweight in food daily.  We bought a fair amount of crap at the open air market.  If you have not been to Mexico you might not know that everything is VERY cheap - in every sense of the word.  But you can still get some cool stuff.  We bought some silver wedding ring replacements (ones we can wear to the gym etc.) and we bought the kids some toys like Mexican jumping beans (yes, they are real).

About every 100 feet or so there is a Mexican pharmacy.  Pharmacies are the Starbucks of Mexico - at least in the tourist towns.  The rules down there are quite different, they sell everything from Viagra to Oxycontin over the counter. They also sell steroids.

I actually took this picture

Fast forward to the conclusion of the weekend… We packed our stuff and headed off the ship. My compliments to Carnival Cruise who made debarkation a relatively painless endeavor.  Once back on US land we waited in a short line at US Customs. Within moments we were standing in front of the Customs Agent.

“Are you carrying any fruits or vegetables with you?” He asked looking over our passports.

“Nope.” we said.

“Welcome back to the US.” he said as he handed back our passports.

Welcome back? That’s it?  WTF? Fruits and vegetables?  Are you f’ing kidding me? Did he even look at me?  I’m 6′2″ (almost) and 250 lbs of rock hard muscle baby!  These guns are 19 inches. Where the hell is my interrogation? Where is my cavity search?  What is wrong with my cavities?

  
Me with the Customs Agent (ok, not really)

He should not be asking me IF I am smuggling steroids- he should be asking me HOW MUCH I am smuggling. I tell you it was absolutely infuriating.  15+ years of busting my ass in the gym and not so much as a double take. How rude.

All those vials of steroids hidden in my rectum for nothing. I could have just put them in my suitcase.

“Welcome back to the US” - f*** you.

Joshua Carter
The Body Transformation Expert
Carter Fitness
http://carterfitness.com
818-337-6175

PS:  To be clear, that part about the steroids in my rectum was a joke. I made Denyse to do it.

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As trite and cliche as it might sound, consistency is the greatest determinant of success in fitness, and probably life too.  Out of all the clients I have trained, the ones that have been the most successful are not the ones who worked out the hardest, or even the ones that were genetically gifted.  It is always the ones that were the most consistent. 

I have clients come to me and say they have tried this program or that program, or this diet or that diet. But when I ask how long they stuck to the program it is generally around 2 weeks.  How can you judge the efficacy of a program in 2 weeks? Our programs at Carter Fitness can definitely let you see results in 2 weeks, but that is only the tip of the iceberg. There is much more beneath the surface.

Then, of course, I hear about the supplements and vitamins that they took for a whole week. The best fat-burning-miracle-pill ever will do no good sitting on your shelf. Some supplements are crap for sure, but there are good ones too. For the good ones to work they need to be taken- and taken  on a regular basis.

There is a price to pay for inconsistency, and my wife Denyse is a good example.  If you follow my blog and/or newsletter, you know we have 2 kids- Gabe who is almost 5, and Nate who is 18 months old.  As many parents do, Denyse puts taking care of us kids (yes me too) above taking care of herself. She has prioritized our needs over those of her own, and that includes taking time to work out. She got workouts in here and there, but the sporadic nature of the workouts was beginning to take its toll.  She said she wanted to work out more, but timing was always an issue.

The good news for her is that she is genetically well off, and does not have an issue with bodyfat (I know, pisses me off too.)  But still, taking care of two kids (and a 245lb kid) requires a lot of energy.  Strength and stamina are essential.

So even though I own 2 gyms, and have one in my garage it was tough for Denyse to find the time workout. So a few weeks ago Gabe started kindergarten (another interesting story).  This freed up some time.  I suggested that while Nate took his morning nap we schedule a training session for her at Carter Fitness in West Hills.  I could easily work from home to keep an eye on the little one while Denyse trained. 

It worked out that she could train at the same time as her friend Mary who happens to be the mother of Gabe’s best friend Brandon.  Mary had been training with Casey, who had been kicking the crap out of her for a couple of months. She has made excellent progress already and I thought adding Denyse to the session would be great for everyone.

Denyse came back from the session saying that it was a lot of fun, but not as hard as she thought. 

“Oh yeah?” I said, “Say that tomorrow”.  I knew there was no way Casey would let her off easy.  Her muscles would be singing a different tune in 24 hours or so.

When I got home from the gym the next night I asked “So how are you feeling?”

“I can’t f****ing move - and it’s NOT funny!” she replied.

I smugly smiled, and told her she would be fine.  She was not mad at me, of course, but she hated that I was right. Even though she was no stranger to working out, and working out hard - the fact she had not been consistent had a consequence.  In this instance: Pain.

Pain is a good example of a short term consequence.  Lack or results would be an example of a long term consequence.

The lesson here is my wife should listen to me more often (I’m not holding my breath).  But a “bigger picture” lesson would be that consistency counts, and it counts big time.

You could get better results from mediocre program you perform consistently than the best program in the world performed inconsistently. So why not do both? Meaning - a great program performed consistently. 

Contact me any time for a free consultation, and we can get you rolling on a successful and consistent program.

Joshua Carter
The Body Transformation Expert
Carter Fitness
http://carterfitness.com
818-337-6175

Visit http://CarterFitness.com for free fitness tips and ask questions via our Contact Page.

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This little tidbit really ties into the previous topic: Not enough time. The vast majority of people simply do not have enough “spare” time.  And pretty much everyone needs to make fitness & health a priority. So what we are left with is a need to workout and yet seemingly not enough time to do it properly. So how can one reconcile the two? I’ll tell you - treat your training like an investment.

Let’s have some fun. This is an example I use every time I consult a prospective client which I think I got from Alwyn Cosgrove. Let’s say you had a million dollars in cash- what would you do with it? Would you go a bury it out in your back yard or stick it under your mattress?  HELL NO! You’d go to a bank and stick it in some rich person’s high yield account or fund or something. You’d want a return on your investment.   Don’t just let that million sit there, let is work for you and pay you back.

That is exactly the way to look at training.   You do not have multiple hours to workout everyday. You have a 2-3 hours per week. So what do you do?  Do you want to choose a program that burns calories while you do it yet does nothing the other 23 hours? HELL NO! You want a program that will keep your metabolic fires burning for 24-48 hours AFTER you are done working out. You want a return on you workout investment.

Burning calories during an event is all well and good, but elevating your metabolic rate for extended periods of time is where it is at.  Steady state cardio and low intensity weight training off little to no metabolic increase post workout. On the other hand high intensity weight training and interval  training have proven to elevate metabolism for 24-48 post workout.  THATS HUGE! If you workout correctly on Monday morning, you could be burring calories at an elevated rate all the way until Wednesday!  

Choose your exercises carefully and choose your fitness program wisely and you will see increased returns on your sweat investment.

Got questions.  Visit http://CarterFitness.com for free fitness tips and ask questions via out Contact Page.

Joshua Carter
The Body Transformation Expert
Carter Fitness
http://carterfitness.com
818-337-6175

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We are all pressed for time. No matter what it always seems like there is never enough time in the day to get down what needs to get done. Yes we all feel a time crunch.

When a prospective client comes to me and says they don’t have time to workout but still want to get in shape, I know they are full of crap. I can almost see the crap in their eyes. They want to justify why they are in the shape they are in. Ok, I can understand that.

No one wants being out of shape to be their fault. If a person can say it is due to a hectic work or home schedule then it is not really their fault. The good news is I set them straight. I help re-organize their priorities and we figure out a training schedule that will work with their lifestyle.

This last week I had a woman come to me who had a really busy schedule - 7 kids. You read that right 7. I have 2 kids, and I could not imagine what it would be like to have 5 more. I would have to be sedated. Anyway, she wanted a fat loss program that she could do at home but was worried she would not have time to get the results she was looking for. I told her nothing could be further from the truth.

She owns a treadmill, a swiss ball and a set of 8lb dumbbells. She had the tools, I had the talent. More importantly she had the drive to succeed.

I had her come to my place and took her through a circuit I created with her specific needs in mind. I wanted it to be simple because she is a beginner and needed to be easily duplicated at her home, not take long because she is short on time, and effective because she obviously wants results. I also needed to use only tools she had available. No problem.

The circuit I created for her you can download below and follow yourself. As I told her, it should only take 20-30 minutes 3 x week. As she progresses I will increase the difficulty of the moves and probably introduce some intervals. I told her to start off on the treadmill or walk outside as a warm-up, then hit each exercise in order for the given number of reps with as little rest as possible between exercises. Try to complete the circuit 2-3 times in the first week, then add another circuit whenever possible up to 6 total circuits.

For more free fitness tips and info visit http://carterfitness.com/

Joshua Carter
The Body Transformation Expert
Carter Fitness
http://carterfitness.com/
818-337-6175

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