I’ve been bowled over by this compliment…..

March 7th, 2012

One of my clients just wrote this about me, I’m blown away:

“I have been a Golf Professional for over 25 years now, and during that time I have had the privilege of playing at the highest levels, I have competed in The British Open, played in over 38 countries Worldwide, and so you could say I have been around!

 

Last year I decided to play more competitive golf again with some success, winning two tournaments and competing in all, so I was pleased I could still mix it with the younger, slimmer and fitter golfers.  But I realised to get back to where I used to be would take hard work and a complete change in lifestyle, that’s when I had the pleasure of meeting Paul Butler, and thank God I did meet him at that time because my weight was increasing and I had no self motivation, but that has now changed thanks to Paul, I am dedicated to the long term goal, which is to get fitter and lose weight.

 

Like a lot of overweight people I have been on diets and counted calories, but not anymore!

 

Paul has given me the advice that I needed to help give me a balanced, nutritious diet, well I say “diet” but I do not see it as a diet, I see it as a lifetime change in my eating habits, and for once in my life I am losing weight without feeling hungry and asking myself, can I eat that or not, I have made the change thanks to Paul.  I have regular one-on-one sessions with Paul at Hilden Park and he continues to give me the right advice and encouragement that I need.

 

Paul has also given me a personal workout programme that is designed for golf, it targets the key area muscles for my golf swing, and it’s helping me build my core strength and giving me greater flexibility that is required to play golf at a Professional level.

 

I have seen my weight come down by 19 pounds in 7 weeks, I feel 100% better all round, my sleeping has improved, I have a ton of energy and most importantly for me I can work harder on my golf.  I am 44 years old and when I reach 50 I will be playing on The European Seniors Tour, and you know what… I can’t wait.

 I would highly recommend Paul Butler to anyone who is looking to change their life for the better! “

 

Wow 😉

Training Week Day 5

February 18th, 2012

Day 5

Last Day of my training schedule today.  Ben joined me for a steady 2.5 hours.

I woke up in the best mood I’ve been in all week. 
I wondered:
Was it because the sun was shining?
Or perhaps it was becuase Ben and I had agreed the night before that we were not going to push hard?
Or maybe it was because I had planned the flattest route of the week?
No, it was because in 2 and a half hours this would all be over!!

Before I had even met Ben it became apparent that the gale force winds weren’t going to let me get away with an easy day and to make things worse for Ben he came off before arriving at the meet – luckily he was ok and soldiered on 🙂  We also took a wrong turning around Cowden and found the hilliest, rather than the flattest, road ever, again that damn route planner!

It was great to ride with someone who a) Had also been training all week and therefore knew what it felt like to be tired and b) Had the same goals of the session i.e. this was an aerobic ride – this was the first day this week that my heart rate actually spent some time in my aerobic zone.  It’s fascinating how the body works, I was notably less hungry today, my body using fat as its primary fuel, not glycogen.  Mind you, as fit as he is and weighing in at 60kg, I doubt Ben had even got into his aerobic zone waiting for me on Ide Hill!  That said, we had a great chat and it was very enjoyable, thanks Ben.

It is so rewarding to set yourself a big goal and then reach it – 13 hours of structured training in 5 days.  Initially all I wanted was to find at least one person per day to ride with so I didn’t have to do it on my own.  I got a lot more than that though.  I got to ride with some really really top blokes (and nearly Nicky – if only I had been more organised – sorry Nicky!) despite that fact that all bar one of them rode with me on a weekday when everyone was at work!  If I had met any one of you for the first time I can hand on heart say that you all make fantastic Ambassadors for your clubs – cheers chaps it has been a pleasure.

As much as I would like to have won all the climbs and felt great about myself I didn’t in fact lead over a single climb, instead I had to push myself harder than I ever imagined – isn’t that what training’s all about?!

After leaving Ben today I was about 10 minutes from home and I encountered that elusive thing that so many of us dream about.  It only lasted about 30 seconds but after 12 hours and 50 minutes I found it – a tailwind!!

Now to the Hell Of The Ashdown.

 

Training Week Day 4

February 17th, 2012

Yesterday – Day 3 (rest day) made me feel worse than before – half an hour on the rollers followed by 45 minutes of stretching left me with a pain in my hamstring that Deep Heat couldn’t get rid of so I started today worse than I ended Wednesday!

So onto today, Day 4.  Four of us turned out today in increasingly warm temperatures:

Me
Brother-in-law Rob
Nick from Southborough
Mark McCullagh from Dulwich

5 climbs today, 5 big efforts with rest periods between them;  Mark turned out to be way stronger than us hats off to you but at least you left me and Nick to battle it out – great fun, huge efforts – I sneakily threw a couple of shorter climbs to suit me and it paid off 😉

2 and a half hours of riding today instead of 2, that route planner really has a lot to answer for!

Ben Wimpory has just told me he’s going to join me for a couple of hours tomorrow and he’s promised that we’re riding at an aerobic pace – my body will enjoy that although it won’t recognise it!  There was me thinking I was getting a lie-in.  With 2.5 hours tomorrow that will bring my total to 13 hours in 5 days, my intial target.  I’m sure for some of you (Messieurs Moss and Wimpory) this is far from impressive but I haven’t done more than 8 hours in a week for over a year and never in the UK and definitely not this fast up the hills so I’m going to be either very very fit or very very tired at the start of the racing season!!

One day to go then…….

Oh one more thing – Mark’s crank come off! Yes that did mean we beat him up the last climb and we did have to push him home but at one point he still nearly dropped us with one leg!!

Training Week Day 2

February 15th, 2012

Day 2

4 and a half hours today.  With the 3 hours yesterday my planned 6 hours has now totalled 7 and a half – sack the route planner!

A great turnout for midweek (doesn’t anyone work any more?!):

Me, Rob Thatcher, Dave Twin, Jack from Sydenham
My brother-in-law Rob Slee
Nick Young from Southborough Wheelers

No James Moss today but our average speed seemed to be higher, no weak links I guess James 😉

Everyone suffered after yesterday and although today was billed as an aerobic session the six of us pushed a bit too hard on the hills and into the wind leaving nothing on the road….great ride everyone…in particular Rob Slee looking v strong indeed I’ve no doubt you’ll demolish Wayne in your Iron Man !

My legs hurt, my back hurts, my neck hurts………..bring on the racing season I need a rest from training!

I’ve gotta mention the weather – sunny and warm – awesome 🙂

Rest Day, Day 3, tomorrow i.e. half an hour on the rollers or put it another way, more exercise than most of the members of my local gym do in a week!!!

For Day 4 I’ve got 5 new climbs to work on our 5 to 10 minute efforts, got a good group lined up so that should be very exciting. 

Keep riding

Paul

 

Training Week

February 14th, 2012

Due to being ill over Christmas I decided to take 5 days off work this week and ride my bike to catch up with my training.

Well, I say ride my bike, if Day 1 (today) was anything to go by it is more “punishing myself for 3 hours” than “enjoying the countryside by bike!”

4 of us set off today; Me, Rob and Jack from our cycle club and then we were lucky to have Pro Cyclist James Moss from Node-4-Giordana (the old Motorpoint squas).  Have spent the last 2 years with Endura Racing and competing against Bradley Wiggins and Lance Armstrong to name just two more than mediocre opponents, James was keen to put the 1000 miles he has just clocked up in Lanzarote to the test.  What have I got myself into?!

Our goal today was to race up 5 climbs and recover between them, meaning we could really focus on the 10 minute efforts required each time we watched a 68kg James disappear up the road……

The 3 of us mere mortals had a great battle all day with me and Jack even have a sprint finish for the top of Baileys Hill (which Jack kindly gave me after discussion) but on the whole we all looked strong and the weather was warmer than it had been in ages; I think at one point it went above zero!

I’m just trying to get my heart rate back down this evening before tomorrow’s ride, a ‘steady’ 4 hours!

Email to a (dear) client

January 21st, 2012
Good to see some of you chaps yesterday at our circuit class.
 
The second reason I’m sitting here doing this on a Saturday is because late last night I was on the way home from the nightclub I mean pub I mean kebab house ahem ahem I mean off licence no no no the gym that was it and I felt a little bit guilty for being so hard on our dear John yesterday!!!
 
John, aka “The Grazer” is trying really hard to be healthy to keep his greek adonis style physique from heading south and I just wanted to say well done for trying John – there’s nothing worse than smoking and eating chocolate and then some jumped up Personal Trainer who’s never been an ounce overweight in his life and has never as much as looked at a cigarette coming along and suggesting you could be healthier!  I do however have a friend who has been 6 stone overweight, has smoked a quarter of a million Marlboro Lights and may have even been out late to nightclubs, pubs, kebab houses and he tells me that chocolate, cigarettes and honeycomb are not on his list an more.  I suspect that poor old Mr C thinks he’s eating Honeycomb but is actually eating Honeycomb toffee or sponge toffee which is a sugary toffee with a light, rigid, sponge-like texture. Its main ingredients are typically brown sugar, corn syrup (or molasses or golden syrup in the Commonwealth) and baking soda, sometimes with an acid such as vinegar. The baking soda and acid react to form carbon dioxide which is trapped in the highly viscous mixture. When acid is not used, thermal decomposition of the baking soda releases carbon dioxide. The lattice structure is formed while the sugar is liquid, then the toffee sets hard.
 
If poor old John was eating honeycomb then I stand to be corrected and therefore he should indeed carry on as Bees, like ants, are a specialized form of wasp. The ancestors of bees were wasps in the family Crabronidae, and therefore predators of other insects. The switch from insect prey to pollen may have resulted from the consumption of prey insects which were flower visitors and were partially covered with pollen when they were fed to the wasp larvae. This same evolutionary scenario has also occurred within the vespoid wasps, where the group known as “pollen wasps” also evolved from predatory ancestors. Up until recently, the oldest non-compression bee fossil had been Cretotrigona prisca in New Jersey amber and of Cretaceous age, a meliponine. A recently reported bee fossil, of the genus Melittosphex, is considered “an extinct lineage of pollen-collecting Apoidea sister to the modern bees”, and dates from the early Cretaceous (~100 mya).[14]
 
Good old Wikipedia 😉

Suffering…..

January 9th, 2012

…..hopefully making everyone else suffer too though:

http://aephotos.co.uk/hill-imperial-30oct2011/h2BA16CF3#h35448718

 

Training Elite Cyclists, somebody’s gotta do it!!

January 6th, 2012

More mentions in the cycling press…..http://www.veloveritas.co.uk/2012/01/04/james-moss-interview/

Thanks for the mention James

December 20th, 2011

Always nice to get a mention from your clients, take a look…..

http://www.velouk.net/2011/12/18/talkingshop-winter-training-for-enduras-james-moss/

Is your gym looking after you?

November 15th, 2011

Just want to check:  Does your gym sell beer?  How about burgers?  Chips? Chocolate? Phew I’m glad they’re looking after you 😉