That's Fit

Here are some "kick butt" tips for keeping fit, active and regret free on the Fourth of July from KickYourButtIntoGear.com. As KickYourButtIntoGear.com is owned and managed by a fellow expert in the field of fitness, Exercise Physiologist, Tracy Benham ... the tips are awesome advice for you and you family to adhere to!

• Sports and summertime go together. Plan an activity early in the day. Play baseball, touch football; go to the local pool or beach.
• Get outside early and see if you can think of and do more than four activities before four o'clock to celebrate the Fourth.
• Eat a bowl of fruit before you head for the barbecue goodies. Tons of fruits are in season. Make a Fourth of July fruit cocktail. Blueberries, raspberries, strawberries...
• Use a plate. You will be less tempted to mindlessly snack.
• Skip the cheese and the Mayo on your burger and load up on lettuce tomatoes, pickles, onions and relish.
• Alternate cocktails and other caloric beverages with a glass of water. Or ... just avoid the high calorie beverages all together!

Have fitness questions? Fitz has your answer. Our ThatsFit.com fitness expert -- and now your own virtual personal trainer -- will help you get fit, increase your overall health and do it in a fun way. Drop your questions here in the Comments section below and we'll choose one per week to publish on That's Fit! Learn more about Fitz here.

Q. Dear Fitz, I love the summer weather, and really want to use the large outdoor pool at my gym. I do water walking and swim a couple of laps, but then I get so bored! Swimming 20 laps in a row is not fun for me. I'm pretty sure swimming burns a lot of calories, which is my goal. Help! Deanna

A. Hi Deanna, I'm so excited to help you, cause I too love the benefits of training in the water. We always hear that it's a terrific workout for those who want to avoid trauma from high impact activities. It also happens to be a fantastic workout for those who want to burn a massive amount of calories! Quick personal story. About eight years ago, while in the midst of a competitive kickboxing career, I tore my right hamstring. This made it impossible for me to do almost any sort of activity that involved any sort of impact. I also happened to be about 5% body fat at the time. I thought there was no way in the world that I could lose another pound. At 5'6" and 114 pounds, I was sitting on my bones. Having said that ... after swimming most nights for three weeks I actually lost three pounds. I was sold! Swimming is awesome exercise!

On a regular basis, I make a habit of informing both my personal training clients and lecture guests of exactly when calories count. For some reason, this topic often seems more complicated than it is, so let me lay it out for you clearly.

When Calories Count:

• They count on Friday night.
• They count on your birthday.
• They count when you are out drinking.
• They count on Thanksgiving.

Ever overwhelmed in the drugstore aisles when faced with all the lotions and potions that line the shelves? I am. I'm never quite sure what product to pick up and toss in my cart -- the easy-to-use face cleanser or the easy-on-the skin all-over body wash, the lipstick that won't wash away or the gloss that shines from here to Timbuktu. An advisor is what I need.

I'm in luck.

Prevention magazine asked a few dermatologists about their favorite drugstore finds and what they got were a bunch of great recommendations. Here they are -- 10 tried-and-true beauty bargains under $20.

• Dove Daily Hydrating Cleansing Cloths
• Cetaphil Daily Facial Cleanser
• RoC Retinol Correxion Deep Wrinkle Daily Moisturizer
• Almay Kinetin Rejuvenating Eye Treatment
• Olay Regenerist Enhancing Lotion with UV Protection
• Aveeno Skin Relief Body Wash
• Jergens Ultra Healing Lotion
• Aquaphor Healing Ointment
• Lac-Hydrin Five
• Sea & Ski All Day Sport UVA/UVB Sunscreen Foam, SPF 30

Hooray! Fellow blogger,Jacki Donaldson just brought up a great subject. Using your phone to help you stay motivated works! I use text messages to harass my personal training clients, and I always receive feedback that they've inspired and kept the recipients in line when tempted to go to the dark (not-so-healthy) side.

Having said that, my brilliant colleague, Tracy Benham, is the mastermind behind TxtVox's Get Fit text messages. The girl is a sharp exercise physiologist and fitness trainer (we met getting our Master's Degrees in Exercise and Sports Sciences). Let her in your mind a couple of times a week ... and sooner rather than later ... your body will rockin'! The texts come twice a week, on Mondays and Thursdays, and are really just there to motivate, educate, and harass you like a personal trainer would.

Go to TxtVox.com. Find the All About Me section, and then check off the box Get Fit! And did I mention that it's free? Oh yes! It is. If you're someone who could use a bit of consistent motivation from a REAL-DEAL professional ... TxtVox.com Get Fit messages are the way to go.

You're probably doing your best to squeeze healthy eating choices and exercise into your work day, but are you doing it for all the right reasons? The majority of people are motivated to exercise and eat better by the desires to look better, feel better, and live longer, but did you know that adopting a fit lifestyle can actually help your career? Yep, hitting the gym can improve your work performance right along with your bench press stats.

Have fitness questions? Fitz has your answer. Our ThatsFit.com fitness expert -- and now your own virtual personal trainer -- will help you get fit, increase your overall health and do it in a fun way. Drop your questions here in the Comments section below and we'll choose one per week to publish on That's Fit! Learn more about Fitz here.

Q. Hi Fitz. I would like to start teaching my family good eating habits. I'm overweight and my children are too. Where should I start? Thanks. Charlene

A. Hello Miss Charlene. Thanks for the great question. Raising fit and healthy children is my soap box, and actually one of my favorite lecture topics. Why? It's so important! Parents literally have the capability to set their children up with terrific habits which will greatly increase their chances of living a long healthy life. What a wonderful gift! The opposite is true as well. Moms and Dads who do not insist upon healthy foods and exercise can doom their children with awful diseases, ailments and even worse ... premature death. Junk food is no fun in the long run, and we as parents, owe it to our beautiful babies to provide a healthy start.

I love multitasking! Any opportunity I get to kill two or more birds with one stone gets me giddy. I'm a busy woman with far too much to do, and when things get done in an efficient and pleasing way...I feel elated. Where am I going with this, you ask? Women's Health recently published this Park Workout and I thought you may need to see it as well.

If you have kids, I'm guessing there is a 99.9% chance that they like to run around and play at the playground. If this is true, then I'm talking to you. Let your kids and their buddies have their fun while you get a workout. No use sitting on that park bench anymore....use it for a glute training! Utilize the swings, monkey bars, and more.

Jamie Lee Curtis is turning 50 and reports that she feels better than she ever has. Perhaps it's the lessons she's gathered through her ups and downs that have primed her for this prized place in life. Here are some thoughts regarding her half-a century milestone.

• Turning 50 used to mean being put out to pasture, says Curtis. Not anymore. This leading lady feels more vibrant and is more active than ever.

• With age comes wisdom, and Curtis has wised up the the fact that she no longer needs to worry about how perfect her figure is. She encourages women to accept their bodies and the beauty of aging naturally.

• Baring her soul helps her come clean, and the now-sober Curtis says, "When you gain sobriety in the middle of your life, you're really reborn."
  
  

• As her big birthday approaches, Curtis, also an author of children's books, says she is happy to have "dropped the rock -- the rock of addiction, of family, of comparisons with other people." It's about being fit and focused and furious, she says.
  
  

Well said. And happy birthday to you.

Heroes star Ali Larter likes to eat. Dumplings, scallops with ravioli, a burger, fries, ketchup, and mayo are some of her likely indulgences. Just as quick as she scarfs down her favorite foods, though, she gets off her butt and starts working out.

It's part of the business, says Larter, of the need to look a certain way. And having been embarrassed in the past about her not-so-fit self, she's passionate about staying in shape -- for one photo shoot, she had to duct-tape her thighs because they were a little too round.

"What I do for a living puts me in the spotlight," she says. "They pay me for it."

For more on Larter and her heroic life, pick up the July issue of Allure magazine.

Instead of spending the summer lying like a frying fish next to the pool ... jump in! Cool off, get moving, and earn yourself a body worthy of that hot bathing suit you've been dreaming of. If you're a parent, get your butt in pool and get your kids involved as well. Family fitness should be fun and Women's Health has a great series of exercises you can do alone or all together. Don't forget your sunblock!

As I've been leading you through the paces of enjoying the best Walt Disney World has to offer, without trashing your health and fitness habits, this is one of the easiest days to master. On our second day of vacation we headed to the holy land of wholesome family fun, The Magic Kingdom. Ahhh yes! This is the place where children squeal, Mommies well up with tears of joy on a regular basis, and Daddies shout like kids themselves on the roller coasters. It's also a place where every last visitor is likely to do a ton of physical work. In fact ... read on and you'll learn exactly how many calories we burned during this day. It's insane!

So! Our day consisted of pushing the kids in the double stroller, then watching the castle show. Did I mention each of my children weigh almost 40 pounds? Then we pushed the kids in the double stroller some more, and rode some rides in Fantasyland. In fact, before we even stopped for lunch, we pushed the double stroller again and rode rides in: Fantasyland, Tommorowland, back to Fantastyland, Mickey's Toontown Fair, Adventureland, back to Tommorowland and finally landed back in Adventureland for lunch. Then we ran circles in the water squirters at both Ariel's Grotto and Pooh's Corner to cool off for about an hour. The latter half of the day resembled the first half, except it seemed even busier.

Today I bring to you the first day of our recent family vacation at the happiest healthiest place on earth, Walt Disney World in Lake Buena Vista, Florida. To catch up with this feature, click here. As your online Fitzness Trainer, I'm eager to share with you the simple ways my family and I maintained and enjoyed our healthy lifestyle while on vacation. Disney has really made strides with their efforts to embrace healthy food and entertainment options. They've done a bang up job at it as well.

You'll see in this photo gallery that we started our day off at Typhoon Lagoon. Those energetic hours were followed by a ridiculously healthy dinner, scootering around our resort, and dancing our tushies off all night. It was both high-energy and a blast. Can you say "Quality Time"?

Next time you head to the gym, plan to cozy up next to some unfit folks on the weight machines. Chances are you'll work harder and longer if your exercise partners are frumpier than you.

When researchers from the University of California, San Diego, secretly timed women on a weight machine, they found than if a fit woman in tight gym clothes was on the next machine, the exercisers stopped in just under three minutes. But when their neighbor looked unfit and was sporting baggy sweat pants, the women kept going for more than five minutes. Questionnaires the participants later completed revealed the unfit folks didn't make them feel better about themselves, but the hot bods did make them feel worse than when no one was on the next machine.

This news brief, found in the June 2008 issue of Good Housekeeping, has me wondering where I'll place myself next time I hit the gym. How about you?