Fitness on the Road

You might be taking a break from it all, but ask yourself if your fitness program can afford to take a break when you on the road. Richard Thurmann from Fitcorp Asia has some advice for the business and leisure traveler in 2010.


So you have just set out on a one-week journey for business, three-day weekend getaway with the family, or a two-week beach holiday and the last thing you’re thinking about is exercise. You have two choices, one of which is to let all those gains you’ve achieved over the previous months go to waste. The other choice is to take steps to maintain your fitness, but the question is how? Well here are a few steps you can take the next time you go on vacation.

The first requirement for the Fit Traveler is that you maintain some level of activity. At Fitcorp Asia we usually prescribe a morning metabolic booster. This is a series of exercises designed to activate muscles throughout the body in just 15 to 20 minutes. Using a combination of exercises in series such as squats, pushups and jumping jacks a 20 minute fat burning workout can be achieved. In just a one hour session with one of our trainers at Fitcorp Asia you can learn how to maximize your 15 or 20 minutes in order to achieve maximum results. It’s quite convenient for the person who is short on time and just needs to get moving.

For the weekend getaway traveler, simply get active. If you’re at the beach go for a swim, go for a walk, and take the stairs instead of the escalator or elevator. Go for a walk after meals. Be sure to give your stomach a little time to digest before you head out however. During our weekend beach boot camps we do various simple exercises that you can do on your own like walking lunges in the sand, which provide a different challenge to stabilizer muscles than the very same exercise done on solid ground. If lunges are a little tough try squats or squat jumps. A good old game of tag or Frisbee will do just fine if you’re hanging out with the family.

If you’re traveling for a couple of weeks, make sure you combine a few of the strategies previously mentioned. I personally like to take my TRX with me wherever I go. A TRX is a great tool, a bodyweight trainer that is no heavier than a yoga strap. It can be wedged in a doorway and provide you with numerous different exercises to help get you toned and increase core strength. Next time you’re on holiday or a business trip you should have one of these handy tools. Just a one-hour session with a trainer and a TRX is all it takes to give you a year supply of exercises to do when on the road.

Your nutrition is also going to be an essential component of remaining a Fit Traveler. Many people go on vacation and binge on foods that they wouldn’t normally consume. Many times it’s tough to find a place that serves quality, low fat meals. For the business traveler this can be a nightmare. Often you may find yourself sitting in meeting after meeting without food and if there is food, it’s usually some pastry or high fat food that is presented. So what do you do? Pack! That’s right, pack a healthy lunch or snack to hold you over. Bring raw, unsalted nuts, vegetables and or dried fruits to keep your tummy happy and your metabolism on fire. Think of it as brain fuel that will enhance your mind as well as your physical fitness.

For the weekend or vacation traveler, I often recommend that you find a grocer near the location in which you will reside. This way you can buy healthy items and store them. This not only helps you to eat right, maintain or even lose weight, but you will save loads of cash by not paying for overpriced, unhealthy dishes. There is no reason why traveling should equal eating out all the time. Indulge in the local cuisine, but remember your fitness goals and don’t let these take a vacation too. Trust me, you wont feel the better for it afterwards no matter how brief or long the lapse in fitness is, and you probably don’t deserve the ensuing guilt trip either. Flip it around and you will feel so much better for having kept to your goals and returning home feeling fit as well as relaxed.

So it all comes down to making small adjustments in our lifestyles that can give us major gains and help us maintain our goals and strive to be our best. For more information on healthy eating, diet and exercise, TRX trainers or general inquiries for fitness at home or away, contact Fitcorp Asia at info@fitcorpasia.com

By Richard Thurman, B.Sc, MA, CSCS, CPT

Rich is the Fitness Development Manager and a Fitness Coach at Fitcorp Asia. Thailand's leading personal training, sports performance and corporate wellness organization. With a Bachelors degree in Physiological Science from UCLA a Masters in Sports Management from The University of San Francisco, Rich has over 10 years of experience in Fitness, Sports Performance, Injury Prevention and Rehabilitation.

Whether it’s fat loss or toning, personal training or group exercise Fitcorp Asia, Thailand’s leading sports experts has something for everyone. If you are in Bangkok or traveling through, drop in for a training session or try our morning or evening bootcamp training in the park at these times:

MWF 6am
T Th 530pm

I Just Started Working Out; Why am I gaining weight?

So you’ve just signed up for a membership at your local gym, or you just began working with a trainer, but after the first two weeks you get on the scale and realize that you’re a kilo heavier. What’s going on? Well first of all, if you have a trainer I’m sure he or she has told you to stay off the scale. Time and time again as fitness professionals we find ourselves locked in battle with the treacherous scale as people obsess over weight instead of the stuff that really matters i.e., body fat, girth measurements and how your clothes fit. So first things first, throw that scale out the window. Whether you gain weight or not has a significant amount to do with many factors, including body type and nutrition.





At Fitcorp Asia the fitness trainers begin an assessment with a body stat test, which is used to measure body fat versus lean mass, resting metabolism (# of calories needed to sustain your current muscle mass without moving) and average metabolic rate (# of calories that should be consumed by your body on average during an active day. When you begin to lift weights, your body which is now stimulated by heavier loads establishes new links between your brain and muscle. Your body begins to recruit more muscle and this increases its demands for energy.

It is this increase in demand that makes you feel hungrier than normal and it represents a change in your metabolism. This is a very critical time for you as you must now make better choices on what to consume and when to consume it, in order to meet the demands of increased muscle activity. The problem that many personal trainers find is that their clients will begin to use this newly revved up metabolism as a sort of credit card which affords them the luxury of eating junk food. This is however counterproductive to your goals of fat and weight loss and most people will experience weight gain if this is not monitored carefully. This is a time where you have a chance to combine your training with low calorie, high nutritional value foods and get the most out of your metabolism. At Fitcorp Asia, we encourage our clients to eat often, but to make sure that you’re eating quality foods.

Not only is nutrition a key reason for why you may be gaining weight, but consider this:

• Muscle is about 70% water and when you work out more; your body’s response places a higher demand for consumption of more water. Also in response to weight training your body needs to prepare itself for heavier loads. One of the ways it does this is to increase surface area by hydrating the muscle fibers in order to increase surface area and provide higher power outputs.





• Your lean mass includes muscle, bone and organs. Weight bearing activity stimulates muscle growth and stimulates an increase in bone density. These two things can easily cause significant weight gain within the first couple of months. This is where it is important to have a look at girth measurements and body fat. Muscle is heavier and denser than fat and as more muscle is stimulated, the body’s ability to burn fat increases, which sometimes results in a loss of inches with an overall gain of weight.

Similar to the old saying, “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people”. Exercise doesn’t make you fat, the choices a person makes, makes that person fat.

At Fitcorp Asia we believe it’s about changing your lifestyle and by lifestyle we mean changing the way your body moves, the amount of movement that it does and changing the fuel that you run on.

The take home messages are clear. Throw out the scale and focus on getting stronger and increasing your metabolism by moving more and eating right. The rest will fall into place over time. Rome was not built in a day and your body took years to get this far; sometimes 10, 20 or 30+. The process of reprogramming your body is not an overnight miracle, but a life-long commitment to change.

From an excerpt of Maya Angelou, “If you don’t like something, change it.





If you can’t change it, change your attitude”. Realize that your trainer or fitness coach is there to assist you in reaching your goals, as well as support you along your journey to change. We give you the tools to succeed, but it just may be your attitude towards food, nutrition and exercise are the only thing holding you back from a better you.

By Rich Thurman, B.Sc., MA, CSCS, CPT.
Rich is the Fitness Development Manager and a Fitness Coach at Fitcorp Asia. Thailand's leading personal training, sports performance and corporate wellness organization. With a Bachelors degree in Physiological Science from UCLA a Masters in Sports Management from The University of San Francisco, Rich has over 10 years of experience in Fitness, Sports Performance, Injury Prevention and Rehabilitation. Whether it’s fat loss or toning, personal training or group exercise Fitcorp Asia, Thailand’s leading sports experts has something for everyone. For more information check out our website at www.fitcorpasia.com or drop Rich a line at Richard@fitcorpasia.com

5 Simple Ways to Burn More Fat NOW!

1. Nutrition
Your nutrition is going to be the number one step for burning more body fat and getting the fat loss you desire! We as Personal Trainers can’t stress this enough; eating regular meals is important in keeping the body’s metabolism revved. Starving is not the answer because it puts the body in a protective state where it will naturally begin to store fat. By eating small frequent meals every 2 to 3 hours you can prevent the body from doing this and give your body a metabolic boost. Remember the word Breakfast means to Break Fast so start with a nice healthy breakfast full of protein and fiber. At Fitcorp Asia we give every client a food map that gives guidelines and direction for your successful path.

2. Get More Active
Get your bodies moving! When you sit you burn more calories than lying; when you stand you burn more calories than sitting; walking burns more than sitting and running more than walking. Take the stairs instead of the elevator or walk instead of taking a motorbike. These are simple alternatives that will result in higher calorie expenditure per day and an overall loss of excess fat.

It’s a good habit to start your exercise regime in the morning before the excuses begin to pile on over the course of the day.



3. Resistance Training
At Fitcorp Asia we stress resistance training is essential to burning more body fat. Your muscles are the furnace for fat molecules. When your body releases fat into the blood stream it is shuttled to the muscle and used for energy. The more muscle or lean mass the body has, the more fuel is necessary for activity.

For building muscle it is important to stimulate and challenge the muscle fibers. Typically your weight training should be done before any cardio training and before your glycogen stores have been depleted. In this way the body works in an anaerobic realm and is able to bear the heavier loads necessary for muscle gain.

4. Cardio Training


It usually takes the body about 15 minutes of activity before it begins to burn fat. For this reason, it is a good idea to start your cardio training with either a dynamic exercise routine/warm up or do 15 minutes of interval style weight training before your cardio. Unfortunately for all of us adipose or fat is the last energy source that your body reaches for. High intensity training is usually most affective, mixing both anaerobic (load bearing) and aerobic intervals. The load bearing portions will discourage the body from using muscle as a fuel source as it is necessary for the work and the aerobic phase will continue the process of energy consumption. Over time watch the fat melt away.

5. Variation
Finally, you must provide your body with variation. Your body quickly adapts to the stimulus provided to it and will find ways to slow down or stop the use of fat as the predominant source of energy. Remember that fat is a means of storage for a rainy day so your body does not want to relinquish its reserves if at all possible. Constantly varying your weight training routine intensities by increasing loads, varying repetitions and mixing up your cardio workouts to include variations of intervals (fast, slow and the duration of the intervals) will result in significant amounts of fat loss.

By Rich Thurman, B.Sc., MA, CSCS, CPT.

Rich is the Fitness Development Manager and a Fitness Coach at Fitcorp Asia, Thailand's leading personal training, sports performance and corporate wellness organization. With a Bachelors degree in Physiological Science from UCLA and a Masters in Sports Management from The University of San Francisco, Rich has over 10 years of experience in Fitness, Sports Performance, Injury Prevention and Rehabilitation. Rich and other coaches from Fitcorp Asia can be contacted via email at info@fitcorpasia.com.

Hua Hin Boot Camp

Hua Hin Beach Boot Camp Weekend

The Beach Boot Camp is back! Once again we’re heading to Hua Hin for another awesome weekend at the Beach.

The Beach Boot Camp is the ultimate fitness escape from Bangkok with probably the best fitness coaches and personal trainers in Bangkok and Thailand.

So pack your bags and lace up those tennis shoes as we head to the Marriott Resort & Spa for some weekend fun in the sun. Our personal trainers and fitness coaches are sure to show you a great time and get you in great shape.

Spaces are filling fast so sign up NOW!

5,000 Nett Includes:

Room (Shared basis)
4 x Healthy Meals (Lunch x 2, Dinner X 1, Breakfast) for EACH Person
2 x Kicking Beach Boot Camp Sessions

Want to see photo's from the last beach boot camp in Hua Hin, Thailand?

Visit the Fitcorp Asia Facebook Page

RSVP by September 20th, 2009 info@fitcorpasia.com or 0818 044 335

Bangkok Boot Camp testimonials from Singapore with Love!

A couple of guests dropped into Bangkok boot Camp to check out what the fuss was about... now they know Fitcorp Asia's Boot Camp is the ultimate boot camp in Asia... Rock on Jonathan and Michelle! See you next time! Fitcorp Asia are the leading fitness, personal training, golf fitness and fat loss experts in Thailand. http://www.fitcorpasia.com & http://www.personaltrainingbangkok.com

Bangkok Boot Camp Testimonials

Glenn King on why he has been addicted for boot camp for the last 18 months, shed 8 kilograms and IS in the best shape of his life. proving once again the leading Bangkok personal trainers and boot camp trainers are in fact, Fitcorp Asia!

Another Happy Boot Camper in Bangkok

Mike has been doing Boot camp with Fitcorp Asia in addition to regular strength training. Mike initially came for rehab on a calf injury and has since become one of the most consistent boot campers in the city!