Now you would expect a personal trainer to be demanding that you don’t eat this and you must eat that, but the most important thing in life is to enjoy it, without going to excess (but of course – Beeble). This means that for everyone this Christmas nothing reasonable should be forbidden, but an awareness of quantity should always be at the forefront of your mind. So how do we start your Christmas awareness?

Alcohol

Alcohol is by far the biggest problem with regards to excess weight gain and health related problems over the Christmas period. There is nothing wrong with the odd drink but to drink to the point of inebriation is not a pretty sight for your friends, family and certainly not for the “Scooby Doo” moments of clarity the next day when those embarrassing memories come back to haunt you. Alcohol is easily one of the worse items you can consume this Christmas for your health and body fat percentage. If you ever get the chance (and you are seriously bored – Beeble) have a look at the calorie content of alcohol and you may understand why you can’t shift those extra few pounds. Here are a few for you to study:

•    Wine: 1 Glass 118ml (4 fl oz) 100 calories (very) approx.
•    Wine: 1 Bottle 750ml (25 fl oz) 635 calories (very) approx.
•    Beer: 1 Bottle 250ml (8.5 fl oz) 102 calories approx.
•    Beer: 1 Large Glass (pint) 180 calories approx.
•    Beer: 1 Glass 354ml (12 fl oz) 145 calories approx.

Ouch! That is a lot of calories, especially when you think the average person should be only taking in around 1800 calories in a day from food, you can see how easy it will be to increase that to a total of 2400 calories. If there are any of you who don’t think that is much, it may also be worth considering that the body can do very little good with the calories from alcohol, so it generally just stores it as body fat and the alcohol wrecks your liver and kidneys on route. If you want to learn more about the effects of alcohol you can read about it here

Food

The food over Christmas is traditionally very rich, sweet and cooked in large amounts of fat (not all together though – Beeble). Saturated fats are very high in many of the dishes and a problem at Christmas time with roasts at the forefront of many Christmas celebrating families. Now I am not going to be so cruel as to suggest that you don’t have a roast but you should again be careful about quantities. To keep yourself from pigging out at the table, consider providing a starter of soup before the main course. Not only will you be providing your family and guests with part of their daily vegetable intake but you will be filling their expanding tummies with the soup’s goodness. This should hopefully mean that your guests will reduce the amount they eat of the roast and all the trimmings and so limiting those extra calories from the saturated fats.

Exercise

I know I am not going to be popular for even suggesting that you should start an exercise routine over the Christmas holidays. There is nothing wrong with having time off from exercise over Christmas. However I am noticing that people’s holidays from their exercise routine seem to be starting earlier and earlier. Gyms are now virtually empty in December but I have noticed over the years that the jumping ship of the gym world is starting in November. Now when I talk about taking time off from your exercise I don’t mean a hiatus of that long. The longer the break the more muscle you will lose, the more muscle you lose the lower your metabolic rate becomes and the lower your metabolic rate becomes the more excess body fat you will store over the Christmas period.

The trick is a simple one and that is to maintain your workout routine up till the very last day before your Christmas break. Then by all means put your feet up and enjoy your well deserved rest. Do not however glue yourself to your favourite chair and not move for the next fortnight. Keep active over the Christmas break, keep moving and naturally using up those excess calories. Enjoy a walk with your family and visit the park or go to the countryside. Then once your holiday is over do not waste any time getting back to the gym or your workout routine.

We wrote a post on the Christmas season before with some other useful tips which you can read here

I don’t need to tell you to enjoy your Christmas holiday but I am going to ask everyone who wants to avoid putting on the extra pounds this year the celebrate in moderation.

Merry Christmas to you all.

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This entry was Posted on Thursday, December 11th, 2008 at 9:56 pm and is filed under Diet, Top Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.