The key to optimal health is a big question but here at Club One Hundred in Leigh on Sea we feel like we have created the right programs for our members to help create a lifestyle that is healthy and easy to implement.
Do you struggle to lose weight?
Do you feel like that you are sapped of energy however much sleep you have?
Do your moods change from one day to the next or even from hour to hour?
Do you feel burnt out and just don’t feel yourself?
If like many of the population you answered yes to one or more of the above questions you may be struggling with a hormonal imbalance. And one of the most common symptoms of hormonal imbalance is excess body fat.
Hormones cause things to happen in the body. They are the chemical messengers that control and co ordinate activities throughout your entire body. There are hormones that tell you when you are hungry and when you are full up and one’s that tell you when you are tired and when you should wake up. Basically, they control and have an effect on every single bodily process, 24hrs a day.
The body works really hard at keeping your hormones in homeostasis (or balance) but with our lives that are now full of stress, deadlines, processed foods, lack of sleep and minimal exercise it is easy for your hormones to become out of sync with each other and start creating problems.
In this blog I am going to discuss three hormones that affect your metabolism and how you can rebalance them to help change your body shape forever. These three hormones are insulin, ghrelin and growth hormone.
Insulin
When you hear the word insulin, most people think of diabetes as it plays a major role in the management of this disease, but insulin is a major player in the game of weight gain and loss. Let’s take a closer look.
What does it do?
Insulin’s job is to remove sugar from the blood and store it for the body to use as energy. The two main areas for storage are the liver and the muscle cells.
What problems occur?
Due to a sedentary lifestyle and a diet made up of too many carbohydrates and processed foods there are simply too many carbs/sugars for the body to use up. This becomes a problem as the insulin tries to store the excess sugars in the liver and muscle cells but they are still full up from your previous meal. The only thing for it to is to store them as body fat, and predominantly storing them around your middle (love handles). The next problem is that because of the large amounts of insulin floating around in the bloodstream your body won’t be able to tap into your fat stores for fuel, so you won’t burn any fat either.
What can I do to help?
Removing starchy carbohydrates like bread, pasta, wheat, flour and legumes will dramatically help to regulate your insulin levels. Your body doesn’t need as many carbohydrates as you might think so choose vegetable sources like broccoli, cauliflower, kale, spinach and peppers. Fruits are another source of carbohydrates and full of healthy vitamins and minerals.
Here at Club One Hundred, we have developed a way of eating that has been very successful in changing our client’s body shapes. It is called ‘The Ancestral Solution’ and we have had some amazing results. For more information please don’t hesitate to contact us.
Growth Hormone (GH)
What does it do?
Growth hormone could really be called the fountain of youth. It is something that we all should want more of, as it builds muscle, burns fat, helps you resist heart disease, protects your bones and increases your overall health. People with higher levels of GH live longer and live a healthier life.
What problems occur?
Our GH levels start to decline from age of thirty but some of our lifestyle choices are only accelerating this decline. One of the worst things we can do is deprive ourselves of good quality sleep. In adults GH is released in an average of 5 pulses throughout the day, the largest of which is about one hour from when we go to sleep. Studies have proven that even small disturbances in our sleep can reduce our GH levels by 23 per cent. 8hrs sleep between 10pm – 6am will cause a greater release than sleep between midnight and 8am.
Another way we suppress our GH levels is by eating too many low quality carbs (processed foods/starchy carbs) which keep our blood sugar and insulin levels high. Protein on the other hand can help release GH and promote a lean body, so if your diet at the moment is high in carbs and low in protein you are short changing yourself in one of the most powerful hormones in the quest to burn fat.
What can I do to help?
Not eating carbs before bed is great way to improve your GH levels whilst asleep as the release of GH is higher when you are in a semi fasting state. Eating carbs close to bedtime will elevate insulin levels and interfere with the GH release.
Intense exercise is one of the best ways to increase your GH levels. During intense exercise, especially with interval training, GH shuns glucose and instead encourages the body to use fat as its fuel. So instead of running at the same level for 20mins, try 60 secs of your normal speed interspersed with 30-40 secs of sprints.It is going to be tough but trust me your love handles will thank you. Intensity is the key!!
Club One Hundred’s 30:30 System training is a perfect example of interval training and the results prove the point. We have had clients lose up to 16lbs in 5 weeks and their fitness levels and body shapes have changed dramatically.
Ghrelin
What does it do?
Ghrelin, pronounced ‘Gre-lin’, is the hormone that tells you when you are full up. When you are hungry, about to eat or even just thinking about eating something your body releases ghrelin. Messages are sent to the brain to increase your appetite and tell your body that you are hungry.
It is down to ghrelin that you get that rumble in your stomach at certain times of the day, set to your body’s internal clock. Ghrelin levels will stay elevated until you have eaten enough food to feel satisfied, which can sometimes take a few minutes so eating slowly can help if you are looking to lose a few pounds.
What problems occur?
High levels of Ghrelin can create many problems and new research has shown that it can cause triggers in the brain to tempt us towards certain foods even when you don’t really want to eat them. Ever wondered why those chocolate bars keep asking you to eat them?
Low calorie diets are a big problem as they keep ghrelin levels high, making you hungry but this is nature’s way of making sure we eat regularly and consume the nutrients that we require.
What can I do to help?
A full night’s sleep is an absolute necessity. I have explained the impact on growth hormone levels but a night short of 7 hours sleep will cause severe disruption to your ghrelin levels. In fact just two nights of bad sleep can reduce your satiety hormone leptin by 20% and increase your hunger hormone ghrelin by 30%. This double whammy is a recipe for over eating high sugar snacks which again play havoc with your insulin levels leading to weight gain!
Eating a diet high in protein and low in starchy carbs is one of the best ways of curbing food cravings and keeping ghrelin levels low. As I said earlier, this helps to promote a leaner physique by allowing the body to use its own fat stores and keep insulin levels under control.
If you have any questions regarding our programs and/or improving your health and fitness please email us at info@clubonehundred.com
The Team at Club One Hundred