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When I think back to when I was at school, my worst nightmare was running. I hated it, even more than football and rugy which I don’t like even today. So I never thought that I’d be any good at running… until I found out the trick that I’m about to share with you now.

I realised that running was an important part of my cardio-vascular exercise, and that I needed to find a way to make it a little bit easier for me. When I used the treadmill, I was getting way out of breath way too quickly (less than 10 minutes, and that included 3 minutes fast walk to warm up). And yet I could go on the rowing machine for 20 minutes and hardly even notice it.

So something was wrong with my running technique.

Not knowing what to try, I just varied everything I could: speed, incline, the length of my stride, the height of my stride, and so on.

And these are the three tricks to running that made the difference for me:

1. Don’t be afraid to INCREASE your speed!

I realised that I was actually running too slow! I’ve naturally got a long stride (I’m just over 6 foot tall), but when on the treadmill I was taking tiny little strides. Why? Because if I’d run at my normal stride, I would have run into the front of the machine.

By increasing the speed of the machine, I was able to stretch my stride out to a better length for me, which made my whole running style much more fluid, and therefore easier on me.

2. Don’t be afraid to INCREASE your incline!

If you aren’t using an incline when running, then you are effectively running downhill. This is because the tread itself is helping your legs’ motion, rather than you actually pushing yourself forward. Similarly, if you run downhill, it’s much easier because you don’t have to push yourself up in the air as much to gain the forward distance you need.

So add a little incline to you run - not much, just enough that you can feel the extra push. Not only does this simulate running on flat ground, it also makes your motion more natural. Running downhill and running on the flat produce variations in your stride that make you more or less efficient. So by increasing your incline, you induce a more natural style to you movements.

3. Remember to focus on your breathing.

The final key is related to the other two. As my stride increased, and my effort increased, I found that my rate and depth of breathing changed so that I took one full breath cycle for every 3 steps. And that felt more natural than previously.

Sorry that’s not a very scientific explanation, but “feeling natural” is about as best as it gets

So there you go. Three keys to more efficient running, which you can experiment with. Some of this advice might sound odd (if you’re running out of breath quickly, why make the running harder?). But with the principle of finding a more efficient pace for your body, it makes sense.

And by the way, almost overnight I doubled my running from 10 minutes to 20, with no real problem, and over time I increased to 45 minutes with a couple of 1 minute breaks to stretch and drink water. I can go more, but I start to get bored and also run out of time at the gym!

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Success came to me at an early age. However, it did not come without a price. Bodybuilding found me; I did not go looking for it. At seventeen I knew nothing about weights, eating right, let alone having any sort of discipline. Here are a few things I learned along the way that I believe it takes to make a champion in your own heart.

Hope:

Deep in side you only need a small amount of HOPE to get you to the next day. In the beginning of my career that’s all I had.

Belief:

Confidence can grow inside. If you don’t have it, take your ego out of it and sooner or later bodybuilding will give it to you. Whether it comes from you or someone else, you really have to belief. For me, I had two friends that believed in my first, then after a while they began to rub off on me.

Pure Motives:

Have pure motives of being healthy verses just looking good. If you have desires to truly feel better health wise and about your self, then you will have more motivation in the down times. Early on, I started to feel the benefits both physically and emotionally of what bodybuilding was doing to me.

Here are some common mistakes people make that keep them from being Champions!

1. Egos: In many ways most people allow their egos to defeat them and get in the way of the full potential. You might not get this but, bodybuilding is NOT about you! Lose it, or keep on losing in life.

2. Afraid of Change: Most thinks their way works best. Wrong! Bodybuilding is an art. Art is subjective. Each person is different. The minute you think you know everything is the time you should give it up.

3. Ashamed to ask for help: The smartest thing I did when I was first started bodybuilding and competing was to ask for help. Knowledge is power when you adapt it to your personality. You are not living up to your potential if your pride is in the way.

4. No goal of mission. If you are just going to the gym to go, you are not being smart in your training. Map out your training one year in advance. Having purpose promotes focus.

5. The more is better trap. The more you do the bigger and leaner you will be. NOT! Work smart and efficient rather than long and hard. The smartest thing I ever did was set a time frame to my workouts.

6. Off season blues. People slack off after an event of competition. You should be in it for life. You should be sold out to exercise. If you are not, and only train when you are getting ready to compete, you are in the sport for the wrong reasons. Forget it; you will never be a champion. Champions are sold out!

What ever your goals are or level you are at, remember what bodybuilding truly is about. What is truly is about are not what you see, but what you feel. Yes, being a Champion comes with a price. But what price would you pay for the freedom to live your life with confidence.

Greg Ryan is a high profile fitness expert and former employee of Kathy Smiths. Body building champion, public speaker and personal trainer to the stars. He is a best selling author of the Changing from the INSIDE OUT through real behavior change, smart eating and effective exercising. Start getting in better shape today!

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Fat Loss Tip #4) Eat More Protein

Yes, it’s important to keep your protein intake high when dieting to make sure that you don’t burn off any muscle tissue in your quest to get ripped. But that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about taking in protein in order to boost your metabolism and burn more fat, in addition to helping preserve and build your lean muscle tissue.

In a study published in the American Journal of Physiology, one group was fed a high protein diet (just over one gram per pound of bodyweight per day) while the second group consumed a protein diet near equal to that of the RDA.

The group eating the high protein diet burned more fat than the group consuming protein near equal to the RDA.

One reason for this could be an increased thermic effect. The thermic effect of the RDA group was elevated 16% after eating.

However, in the high protein group the thermic effect increased 42% after eating, almost 3 times that of the RDA group.

This thermic effect of digesting your food peaks approximately one hour after eating. Spreading your daily caloric intake over 6 meals a day, eating every 2 to 3 hours, helps to take advantage of the increased metabolic rate that accompanies eating.

In other words, the more often you eat, the higher your metabolic rate, i.e. the number of calories your body burns each day.

In addition, by adding more protein to each meal, you also increase your metabolism. Your body requires more energy (i.e. calories) to process protein than it does to digest carbohydrates.

Do you understand what that means? Think about it. Think about all those people and so called experts that have continually said that a calorie is a calorie. This is simply not true. Your body’s metabolic rate is affected by the number of meals you eat, the frequency of those meals (how much time passes between each meal consumed) and the macro nutrient composition of those meals.

A calorie is not simply a calorie and they are not equal.

Depending on the number of meals, frequency of meals, and macro nutrient composition of meals, the same person’s metabolism will be different on two very different meals plans, even if the total number of calorie’s is the same.

Let’s review some simple changes you can make right now in your nutrition program to rapidly increase your body’s ability to not only build muscle but burn fat also.

1) Eat 6 smaller meals per day, as opposed to 2 or 3 larger ones. This will ensure that you supply your body with the nutrients necessary to build muscle and burn fat, as well as increase your resting metabolic rate.

It will also prevent your body from kicking into starvation mode, which can happen when you go too long between meals.

If this happens, your body will start burning muscle for energy and increase your body fat stores, as well as slowing down your metabolism. All of these are things you want to avoid. As a matter of fact, they are the exact opposite of what you are trying to achieve.

2) Eat a high protein diet consisting of at least one gram of protein per pound of lean body mass. This helps ensure that your body has the protein available to maintain a positive nitrogen balance, which can lead to an increase in your muscles mass.

It will also increase your metabolic rate, allowing you to burn more body fat than a low protein diet, without as large a decrease in your daily caloric intake, which will also help avoid the starvation mode discussed in the previous paragraph.

Try these simple changes in your nutrition program to help you rapidly increase your muscle mass, burn off unwanted body fat and achieve the ripped muscular body that you’ve always wanted. Or, for you women, the long, lean, sculpted, sexy body you’ve always wanted.

Gregg Gillies

Gregg Gillies is the founder of http://www.buildleanmuscle.com and the author of Get Fit Fast. He articles have appeared in Ironman Magazine and he is a regular contributor to Body Talk magazine. Check out his site on building muscle and losing fat

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