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Guest blog entry: Samantha Votaw's 100% Commitment to herself!

After almost 20 blog entries of my own over the last 4 months (with over 3,600 views!!! Thanks everyone!) I have decided to bring in guest bloggers in order to bring in new ideas and topics and also to keep thing on my page fresh and interesting!

For this entry, I have asked my beautiful friend and spin instructor Sam, (who royally kicks my butt every Friday morning) to give her opinions on health and exercise from a fitness instructor's point of view:

It Comes Down to 100%


My name is Samantha Votaw, and I’ve been a group fitness instructor for over 18 years.  I’ve taught many different things throughout the years, but currently I teach three Spin classes per week.  Spin is an interval style group cycling class.  If you haven’t tried it, what are you waiting for???

This may come as a surprise, but being the teacher does not make it easier to look fit or to be fit.  Oh, how I wish it were the case!  Doing something on a regular basis actually makes you VERY efficient, so you get fewer results over time if you don’t push yourself, and change it up!  In addition to my classes, I lift weights 4-5 days a week (depending on my current split), and I do some limited cardio outside of teaching.  One would think that working out 10 hours per week, with a high level of intensity, would have you in amazing shape, right?  Not necessarily…at least in my case.

It comes down to the fact that you can’t out train a bad diet!  I can say that from experience.  Over the last year, I’ve had some health challenges.  I still worked out most days, but not always at the level my body was used to.  You’d think that would have at least kept me in maintenance mode, but on the contrary.  I gained about 20 pounds over that year.  Since I wasn’t feeling that great, I didn’t plan and prepare my food like I usually do, plus I did some emotional eating.  (Doritos always seem like your friend when you’re eating them – but clearly they are my enemy!!!)  I didn’t even always eat too many calories.  I just didn’t really care as much as I had in the past.


Fast forward a little, and I’m back on track!  I’m feeling amazing!  I’ve been back to tracking all of my stuff for 5 weeks, and I’m making progress with my fat loss goals.  I saw a post the other day that said it’s 20% workouts and 80% clean eating that gets you results…then someone scratched both of those out and rewrote the following:  It’s 100% workouts, 100% clean eating, AND 100% commitment to your goals.  I think that about sums it up!  Never give up, give it 100% in ALL areas, and you WILL reach your fitness goals!

 

 

 

 

Comments

  1. mansour ansariSeptember 29, 2013 at 10:59 AM

    Oh this is my formula... 60% diet and 60% how you are training, it takes 120% effort for physique transformation. That means fat loss and muscle gain at the same time.
    It is working for me... oh by the way it also takes about a year to show....
    I saw you at the gym and you look great Sam...

    ReplyDelete

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