The Easter long weekend may well be the second most challenging time of the year where a diet blowout almost feels inevitable.

Just like its Christmas counterpart, the Easter break can be a MASSIVE threat to your diet and fitness goals as we struggle to say no to the abundance of chocolatey, carb loaded goodness.

And who could blame you?

The first step is always the hardest. Fact.

Whether it's joining your first gym, rocking up for your first group fitness class, or even dusting off your old runners and smashing a run for the first time in yonks, it's seriously intimidating stuff. Especially as dudes, even the idea of this isn't fun at all. 

There's nothing worse than sizing yourself up against the other guys in the gym, worrying you're not going to make it through the boot camp class or even overcoming the mental barrier of not being able to run as fast, as far, or for as long as you used to. But do you know what everyone has in common? We were all beginners once! We're not going to lie. It isn't easy. But do you know what it is? Humbling and rewarding.

Anything in life worth having takes work, and fitness is one of the best examples. Here's 5 tips to help you take the first step on your fitness journey.

1. Start Small

If it's been a few years since your last gym session, or you haven't done any cardio since footy in high school, it's probably not the wisest thing to jump straight into your buddy's gruelling power-lifting program.



Okay - it's definitely not the wisest thing.

The human body is a fickle thing, and while it adapts well to change, these changes need to be introduced gradually and sustainably. Thinking about joining the gym for the first time? Start with a 30 minute walk every day.  Looking at getting started with resistance training? Get into the routine of doing some push ups, squats and sit ups at home for a week beforehand. Take everything as it comes, keep moving forward and ease your body into training. It'll thank you later!

2. Compare Yourself To Yourself

One of the most important things to realise is that you will never look like anyone else. Everyone's body proportions are unique, and no matter how much training you do on any specific muscle groups, you'll never be able to emulate the fitness models you follow on Instagram, or Zac Effron in Bay Watch.

What you will be able to become is the best possible version of yourself.



Take regular progress photos and measurements to hold yourself accountable and so that you can start to see the results. Although they might not be visible in the mirror for a little while at first, they'll be visible on the scales and measuring tape.

Or, you might find that while your weight remains the same, the reflection staring back at you is leaner and healthier. This is because your body weight isn't the deciding factor of your fitness! With each workout aim to one up yourself from last time, whether it's an extra rep, an extra 100m on your run, or a better sense of wellbeing at the end of the session.

3. Nutrition Is Key

If there's one thing that's going to put a road block up in front of your results, it's poor nutrition.



Processed foods, too many/too little calories (depending on your goals), inconsistency and nutritional deficiencies will stall your weightless, put a stop to your gains and will sniffle your motivation fast. Your body is a machine and you need to fill it up with the right fuel for the best performance! You can still enjoy burgers, but opt for a fresh, wholesome lean beef patty on a fresh wholemeal bun instead of a Big Mac. Enjoy your fish and chips, but go for the grill'd option and a few less chips. Satisfy your sweet tooth with a chocolate protein shake instead of a Mars bar! There are plenty of ways to enjoy your favourite foods while staying accountable to your goals and not getting off track!




 

4. Audit Your Health

As long as we're still alive at the end of the day, we're healthy, right?! Blokes are notorious for not going to see a doctor until the problem becomes serious, so it's not uncommon to see guys let their health fall by the wayside and then find committing to the gym to be just too difficult.



And when it's just too difficult, we're inclined to throw in the towel rather than risk failing, aren't we?

Make it easy for yourself. Get 8 hours of sleep a night, try to eliminate as much stress as possible, walk as much as possible, drink plenty of water and eat plenty of lean meats and unprocessed food. Oh, and look after your mental health as well!

5. Drink Less Beer

The easiest and most instantly actionable out of all these tips, drink less beer!



A pint of full strength beer has 200 calories on average. That means going out for a few beers with the lads after work quickly stacks up to a whopping 600 calories - and they're not good calories either. Alcohol is one of the worst things for lean muscle gain and fat loss, so while avoidance is the best option, we don't expect you to completely give up alcohol! Try switching to whisky neat or mixed with diet cola. There's nothing more manly than whisky. Or for the ultimate low calorie alcoholic drink, vodka, fresh lime and soda water. But if you cop any flack from the boys, don't come crying to us!

 



 

The Dad-Bod epidemic is on the rise.

And while the temptation to embrace the belly and live the couch potato life may feel overwhelming at times, summer is just around the corner and this is the year to stop procrastinating and start making some headway on your fitness dreams. Fortunately, we're here to help. The world of fitness, nutrition, training and health may be daunting and a tad overwhelming at first, but we can assure you, it's definitely worth it in the long run!

We've put together our Top 6 Tips to help you get started, to make small, positive changes to your diet and lifestyle, reducing your risk of contracting the dreaded dad-bod-itis, and put you well on your way to both looking and feeling great.

1. Audit Your Nutrition

Does your diet suck?

If you're maintaining at least a moderate level of physical activity and the beer gut is growing, or if you're trying to put on some muscle and things just aren't going in your favour, your nutrition is most likely the culprit.



For a few days, input everything you consume into a calorie tracking app, such as MyFitnessPal. It may feel a bit strange at first, but give it a go. And when we say everything, we mean everything. Snacks, drinks, coffees, you name it. If you're consuming it, input it. What this will do, is give you an insight into where you might be going wrong. If you're consuming way too many calories for your activity level, or your macro nutritional ratios are way out of whack, this is going to make things clear and put you onto the right path.

Now that you know where the problem lies, move onto Tip 2...

2. Create Consistency In Your Diet

Sorry lads, but the "whatever I damn feel-like" dinners are out, and portion-controlled, planned meals are here to stay.



Nutrition is a battle for a lot of us, and it's hard to even know where to start. The easiest and quickest solution is to eliminate variables. Start by pre-planning your meals (or even preparing on a Sunday) for the week. A source of lean protein is a must, such as chicken breast or lean beef, combined with a carbohydrate source such as whole grain pasta or sweet potato, and some greens is a great starting point.

Diversify your protein sources to prevent things from getting old fast, and invest in some low sodium seasonings and low sugar sauces to make bland meals a thing of the past.

3. Sleep More

Wait, what?! You heard us. Get more ZZZ's every night to lose weight. And no, that is NOT a permission slip to skip the early morning workout in favour of a snooze fest. It means hit the hay earlier every night and get (at least) a full, restful 8 hours. Sleep is one of, if not the most crucial lifestyle components to a healthy body, healthy mind and staying in shape.



Once you dip into the 5-7 hour range which a lot of blokes do, your body starts to go haywire. Not only is your mental clarity going to suffer, but your recovery is going to hit a dead-end before you know it. If you're hitting the gym hard, you need to recover just as hard, and sleep is the most important time for your body to do so. Turn Netflix off, get to bed early and wake up feeling fantastic.

4. Drink More Water

And less soft drinks. You'd be surprised how many problems can be solved just by drinking more H2O.  Seriously, it's an incredibly simple solution that reaps some fantastic results. Blokes need to drink at least 3 litres of fluids per day. And that's before exercise. 



All fluids count towards this goal, but when you start introducing soft drinks, excessive amounts of fruit juices or other flavoured beverages, calories (in particular, sugar) start adding up fast. Hydration is absolutely vital to human health, and being sufficiently hydrated can quell hunger, provide energy, improve cognitive function and even improve fat metabolism.

 5. Strength Training

There's lost of awesome ways to exercise and kick start your fitness journey. However, the most efficient, enjoyable and effective form of exercise for getting in shape is strength training. Most particularly, compound lifts. Focus your training on compound exercises - multi-joint movements which activate more than one muscle group at a time (as opposed to isolation exercises).



The best, go to "staple exercises" to construct your gym sessions around are the Squat, Deadlift, Bench Press and Overhead Press. Other fantastic additions include Chin-Ups/Pull-Ups (or Lat Pulldowns to work up to these), Leg Press, Incline Chest Press and Bent Over Rows. Train smart, and if you can't get to the gym as often as you like, focus on full-body training sessions as opposed to body-part splits, blasting your entire body at least twice per week.

6. H.I.I.T.

Say goodbye to hour-long gruelling jogs, and hello to High-Intensity Interval Training. H.I.I.T. revolves around short, intense bursts of exercise, followed by a resting or low-intensity recovery period.



H.I.I.T. has some amazing benefits on fat burning and cardiovascular conditioning, and the best part is that you can slog out a H.I.I.T. session in under 15 minutes, with more benefit than an hour of steady-state cardio training.

Try heading down to the park and doing some sprints, or jumping on the spin bike next time you're at the gym and working with 30 seconds hard, 60 seconds recovery to get started. Perform 4-5 intervals for your first session (don't forget to give 110% during your sprints!) and aim to increase the amount of intervals you perform each session, up to 8-10. You'll feel and look great before you know it!

 

 

For some, weight lifting is synonymous with masculinity.

The idea of a gym paints a horribly unappealing mental image of a pack of jacked-up alpha dudes, dominating the weights floor, marking their territory akin to a sign of dominance.

While this stereotype unfortunately does ring true in some cases, it is now few and far between. Gender ratios in gym's have never been more balanced, and it's because the truth is out;

 

Weight lifting is good.

The benefits of resistance training are truly staggering. With ladies often opting for routines consisting solely of cardio, yoga and the odd HIIT class, it isn't common to see frustration arise when despite exercising day in and day out, your body just isn't looking the way you want it to.

 

If you've never tried resistance training, there's never been a better time to hit the weights.

 

And guess what the missing link is? Believe it or not, it's lifting weights. Read on for our Top 6 Reasons why you should ditch the joggers and hit the iron:

 

1: Fat Loss

The facts are in ladies, resistance training is an incredibly effective method of losing body fat.

Depending on your style of training and the intensity of your session, an average lifting session might burn approximately the same amount of calories as your cardio of choice. However, it's actually after you rack the bar and leave the gym that the benefits of resistance training shines.

After finishing a weight lifting session, especially when focusing on developing strength by moving heavy weight, your body's metabolic rate stays heightened for hours, and sometimes, even days. This increased intake of oxygen as part of your training recovery actually increases the amount of calories burnt in your day to day life, and therefore is an incredibly efficient and effective weight loss tool!

 

Learn how Mel went from CORPORATELY STRESSED TO FITNESS OBSESSED, dropping 11.5kg and 12% body fat over the course of last year's 10 Week Body Transformation Challenge.

 

2: It Doesn't Stop There

While building and developing lean muscle mass is a fanastic way to blast calories and get into shape, once the muscle is there, it continues to improve fat loss.

How? Your body's resting metabolic rate determines how many calories are expended doing day to day activities. Anything from scrolling through Instagram in bed to driving to work, as long as you're living and breathing, your body is burning calories. However, the more lean muscle your body is comprised of, the higher your metabolic rate is, and the more calories you burn. Win win!

 



 

3: Brain Gains

You won't just become physically stronger, but you'll become mentally stronger too.

Especially if you're someone who has shied away from the weights previously, or if pummelling iron is something that you could never see yourself doing in your wildest dreams, the strength your muscles will gain will translate into other areas of your life too. You can expect your self confidence and mental strength to grow as you continue to train and master your craft, as the only thing you're competing with every time you step into the gym is, you guessed it; you.

 

6 Fitness Hacks All Mums Need To Know

 

4: You'll Drop A Dress Size. Or Two.

Worried that lifting weights is going to turn you into a bulky, ripped body builder? Think again.

For starters, women produce a fraction of the testosterone men do, only about 5-10%. This drastically limits women's potential to build and gain muscle mass, meaning the more time you spend training and sculpting your physique, the leaner and more trim your appearance will become, rather than bulking on size.

 

You'd need a lot more than a few weights sessions a week to end up like the ladies on the left....

Getting "huge" and having a body builder physique is definitely not something that will happen by accident, and is a massive misconception which couldn't be further from the truth. You would have to spend all day, every day smashing the weights, and eating an absolutely insane volume of food for this to even be a possibility. Don't worry about it!

 

Related: See how love bird's Lana & Jason dropped 9 & 14.5 kilos respectively in last year's ASN 10 Week Body Transformation Challenge

 

5: Your Cardio Will Improve

We're not saying to completely ditch cardio exercise in exchange for weights training, infact, they go perfectly hand in hand for sculpting the physique of your dreams!

 

Stronger legs won't slow you down, they'll send your endurance through the roof!

Better yet, working to strengthen the muscles involved in physical activity, such as increasing the strength in your leg muscles to boost your running performance, will carry massive benefits to both your speed, stamina and endurance. Even better, resistance training actually increases the muscle fibres that burn calories during exercises, therefore, the stronger you are, the more calories you will burn while doing cardio!

 

6: Increased Vitality

While exercise is renowned for making you "feel good", weights specifically will make you feel great.

It's not common to feel completely drained and wiped out after an intense cardio session. However, after a session in the gym (maybe give it a couple of weeks for your body to get used to it first), you'll walk out feeling refreshed, revitalised and on top of the world.

The increased psychological sense of wellbeing and boosted vitality is a result of increased plasma beta-endorphin concentration in the brain as a result of heavy weights training, resulting in a better mood and more positive outlook.

And that's before you even notice the physical changes!

 

WANT TO SUMMON YOUR INNER FEMALE STRENGTH?

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“For me life is continuously being hungry. The meaning of life is not simply to exist, to survive, but to move ahead, to go up, to achieve, to conquer.” - Arnold Schwarzenegger

 

Arnie is a man who needs no introduction. From his on-screen stardom, catalogue of bodybuilding titles, as well as just casually being the governor of California, he is well beyond what most would consider a "household" name.

 

"Hasta La Vista, Baby"

 

From incredibly humble beginnings, Arnie's presence in the bodybuilding community is virtually unparalleled. His 800 page best selling book "The New Encyclopedia Of Bodybuilding" is a gospel of iron, and features knowledge and insight from one of the world's most groundbreaking bodybuilders. Originally published over 30 years ago, the knowledge and practices of the Austrian athlete have stood the test of time, and we have compiled and summarised our Top 11 Lifting Hacks straight from Arnie himself, to give you the most out of your training.

 

1. Focus on Multi-joint Movements

Arnold has always been renowned for his appreciation of multi-joint, compound lifts. Building his workouts around the bench press, dead lifts, rows, presses and squats, The Governator considers these a staple in any bodybuilder's routine, due to the sheer weight and overloading potential possible.

Beginners to bodybuilding should focus on learning and understanding these movements, to allow for an increase in both strength and size.

 

2. Warm Up, Then Train Every Set To Failure

Arnold has always been as strong advocate of training every set to failure. In reaching complete muscle failure with every set, being the inability to complete another rep due to muscle fatigue, Arnold was able to continue to challenge himself, reach new heights, and most importantly; grow.

 

"I'll be back."

Arnie recommends starting with multiple warm up sets, before pyramiding up with each working set, meaning increasing weight and decreasing reps, taking each set until you physically can't perform another repetition. Arnold also favoured keeping his sets within the 6-12 rep range, to increase pump and hypertrophic growth.

 

3. Don't Overtrain

While Arnie increased training frequency and volume to bring up his lagging calves, he is quick to warn that sometimes, the aforementioned technique can be counter productive.

"There will be times when a body part lags behind because you are overtraining it, hitting it so hard, so often, and so intensely that it never has a chance to rest, recuperate and grow" he wrote in The New Encyclopedia of Bodybuilding.

His answer? Listen to your body, and never be afraid to try a different approach.

 

4. Attack From Different Angles

While different variations of an exercise will utilize the same muscle groups, they will place different emphasis and focus on particular muscles. Arnold was a major fan of using slightly different angles or approaches, to keep his body guessing, push past plateaus and to challenge himself with every session.

Arnold would often substitute barbels for dumbbells on movements such as the bench press and overhead press, to allow for a longer range of motion, and greater stretch, or would slightly adjust the angle of the bench to shift the focus of the exercise.

 

5. Utilise Cheat Curls Effectively

While the "cheat curl" certainly gets a bad wrap in most gyms, Arnold was a major supporter. However, he would utilize the cheat curl in his bicep routine to push past muscle failure, and allow him to overload his biceps with a heavier weight, after fatiguing using stricter form and a full range of motion.

 

"Do it. DO IT NOW!"

Just like a bigger chest is grown from overloading with heavy weight on the bench press, Arnold applied the same principal to his staple bicep exercise, the standing barbell curl, and would strive to overload his biceps with as much weight as possible.

 

Related: 6 Quick Tips To Help You Lose Your Dad Bod

 

6. Vary Rep Ranges

Although Arnold favoured the 6-8 rep range for multi joint movements, he would often follow these exercises with single joint or "isolation" exercises, within the 8-12 rep range.

While performing these higher reps on an exercise such as the dumbbell bicep curl, Arnold would hold and squeeze the peak contraction at the top of every rep. The combination of this squeeze, with a muscle-mind connection and higher rep range allowed for the best pump possible.

 



 

7. Understand Your Muscles

Simply going through the motions didn't cut it for Arnie when he was building his iconic physique, and he believed it was of prime importance to not understand which muscle group you were recruiting, but specifically which head of the muscle, and how it was working.

The best way to do this? Arnold learnt from the legendary Vince Gironda "Do 20 sets of a particular movement, then nothing else from that part".

There's no doubt that tomorrow morning you will understand exactly which part of the muscle group was used.

 

 

8. Superset for a Killer Pump

When focusing on small muscle groups, such as arms or delts, Arnold would often superset complementary muscle groups such as biceps and triceps by performing back to back exercises, to maximise the pump.

This would increase the volume of blood carried to the muscles in the arms, carrying oxygen and nutrients for growth, and result in an inflated look and fuller feeling. Although larger muscle groups such as legs or back were more demanding, Arnold would utilize super sets for isolation exercises in these larger muscle groups prior to competing to maximise results.

 

 

9. Turn Weaknesses Into Strengths

It's easy to hide under developed calves and hamstrings under trackies, or neglect your back in favour of the "mirror muscles", such as chest, biceps and abs.

 

"Come with me if you want to live"

 

Arnie however, didn't believe in this, and did the polar opposite. He was renowned for cutting the bottoms off pants to constantly be reminded of his lagging calves, and used that as motivation to train his calves more frequently, sometimes even during rest periods for other multi joint movements.

While it's easy to focus on your strengths and pump them up to make them even more eye catching, Arnold promotes a well rounded and balanced physique.

 

 

10. Build Abs Indirectly

Arnie's core and mid section was always one of his major strengths. His training secret? Utilise them indirectly by performing heavy, multi-joint movements.

Arnold's ab routine consisted of high rep go to movements such as the crunch, but he used ab isolation exercises to enhance and chisel his already strong and powerful midsection. As he trained legs and back three times weekly, his core was getting a major workout day in and day out, so much so, that direct ab training was a luxury, rather than a necessity.

 

 

11. Focus on Reps As Well As Well As Sets

While working towards a desired number of sets, Arnold also placed importance on working towards a total number of reps, and performing however many sets necessary to get there.

Arnie favoured this approach for improving bodyweight exercises such as pull ups and chin ups, setting the goal of 50 reps, and using as many sets as required to achieve this goal, even when the final sets only consisted of 1-2 reps.

 

 

WANT TO SUMMON YOUR INNER ARNOLD?

WE ARE JUST ABOUT TO LAUNCH OUR

2018 BODY TRANSFORMATION

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE ABOUT THE TRAINING, SUPPLEMENTS, NUTRITION & MASSIVE PRIZES UP FOR GRABS IN WHAT WILL BE OUR BIGGEST NATION WIDE FITNESS TRANSFORMATION TO DATE.