30 Minute fitness is for busy men who want to get in shape and feel better about themselves without it taking over their life.

 

I am not, and never have been, a natural gym goer. I only got into my health and fitness when my dad got ill at 52 and passed away ten years later. It made me look at my lifestyle, realise I had to stop 'playing' at being healthy (the odd gym burst and 'I'm on a health kick' shout now and then) and make positive, consistent changes to my fitness and nutrition.

 

Long story short, a year later I had quit my job as a chef and retrained as a personal trainer. Now I work with men like my dad and me, men who have busy lives, but who want to ensure they are looking after themselves for their partners, kids, careers etc and ensure they are about for a long time to come (as well as for a bit of vanity too of course, looking half decent in a t-shirt and on the beach!)

 

Now at nearly 50 I am leaner, stronger, healthier and more body confident than I was in my 20s and 30s. Over the past 15 years of doing this I learned what worked and that was:

 

I stopped trying to be perfect and concentrated on being better. Life doesn’t slow down, the perfect time to start will never arrive. Fitness has to fit round your job, family, life in general, not the other way round.

 

In my training, I cut my sessions to 30 minutes long, meaning the chances of being too busy to train were less. I simplified my sessions, stopped trying different fads, just doing the moves that get the biggest results and actually changed my shape while making me stronger. I do what works. I started trying to build my body as opposed to breaking it, like most people are doing in the gym.

 

I ate better. Not perfect, I still love pizza, chocolate and beer, but I made the other meals better, allowing me the flexibility to have these other foods when I wanted them, never needing to overly curtail my social life or holidays . I simplified my eating, took away the overthinking and stress of it, made it ‘doable’ and able to fit into my lifestyle.

 

I enjoy my weekends without ruining all my hard work and go again each Monday, each week, each month, each year. I enjoy my holidays, then back to it, crack on. Resume not restart. Consistency is what gets results.

 

Getting in shape isn’t about becoming more obsessed with fitness and nutrition it’s about making both easier to fit into the already busy life you have.