Your Health

Health and vitality is achieved by staying active and eating a healthy, balanced diet. Please use the calculators on the drop down above under the ‘Your Health’ tab for an estimate of your body composition, weight loss requirements and training zone targets.

Training Diary

If you have not done so already we highly recommend starting and maintaining a training diary. As with all goal setting exercises make sure you keep your training plan achievable, progressive, and adaptable. There are many online examples of training diaries you can download, but if you’re anything like the Surfgym crew, a hardcover A5 day-per-page diary, or Outlook calendar synchronized with a smartphone, are the preferred methods.

Balanced Diet

The key to a healthy balanced diet is not to ban or omit any foods or food groups but to balance what you eat by consuming a variety of foods from each food group in the right proportions for good health.

The Food Standards Agency’s eight tips for eating well are:

  1. Base meals on starchy foods
  2. Eat lots of fruit and vegetables
  3. Eat more fish
  4. Cut down on saturated fat and sugar
  5. Try to eat less salt – no more than 6g a day
  6. Get active and try to be a healthy weight
  7. Drink plenty of water
  8. Don’t skip breakfast

Energy Balance

A balance of nutrients is important, but so is our total energy in relation to our energy expenditure. If our energy intake exceeds our requirements the result is weight gain. If our intake is less than our requirements the result is weight loss. If our intake and expenditure are balanced the result is weight maintenance.

Energy in  >  Energy out  =  Weight gain

Energy in  <  Energy out  =  Weight loss

Energy in  =  Energy out  =  Weight maintenance

Changing Body Shape

There is very little we can do to change our basic body shape. The body we have can look bigger or smaller, it can be fitter and healthier, but it will still be proportioned the same and look the same shape overall. Unless you are a serious body builder, it is advisable to have a realistic expectation when it comes to changing your body shape. Our overall shape, or somatotype, is genetically determined and falls into one of three main patterns:

1. Ectomorphs have long limbs relative to their bodies. They are usually tall and thin.

2. Mesomorphs have limb length relative to the body. They are lean and athletic.

3. Endomorphs are rounded with relatively short limbs compared to the rest of their body.