If you want your fitness endeavor to be successful the following virtues must be practiced:

1.) Desire

2.) Commitment

3.) Goal orientedness

4.) Intensity

5.) Persistence and Perseverance.

Virtues For Success

Desire is the underlying force which has impelled you to seek change. It is a powerful thing when a person who has long desired to change their body, finally becomes so fed up, that in their their mind there is no alternative but to begin taking the steps to create change. In short, a person has to want to change, and to truly create radical physical change takes total commitment.

Commitment is a dirty word to many in our culture today, but with respect to creating physical change total commitment is necessary. What is total commitment; it is being willing to do whatever it takes to achieve your goal, no matter what. Re-creating your body necessitates a 24/7 commitment. Your food intake must be strictly regulated every meal and snack, every day. You cannot miss workouts just because you are not feeling one hundred percent that day. You cannot miss workouts because you had a bad day or your boss or your spouse is angry with you. Success necessitates that a person overcomes all adversity and sticks to the workout program and eating plan no matter what, without any excuses.

Goal orientedness is having, at the very least, a mental picture of how you want the outcome of your training to be. I strongly advise each and every client of mine to obtain a picture which represents how they want to look. I require that it be a person of similar physical structure who has optimized their physical condition. Constantly meditating on that image keeps a goal visually present and helps immeasurably in fueling the desire to go on to total success

Intensity, if you want to get results from your training, you must train with sufficient intensity. What does this mean? It means pitty-pat workouts will not do the job. I, as a personal trainer have seen people who are wasting time in the gym with low intensity workouts. They go through workouts which do not create results for months, even years, but results will never come unless they put in the sweat and elbow grease it takes to reshape a body. Proper intensity is training as hard as you are capable during the entire length of the workout. Workouts without a burn will not create significant change. In my opinion, if you feel no need to grunt and groan at all in your workouts, you are training without sufficient intensity. Sweating is good thing, it is the body’s response to vigorous exercise. No sweat in this trainer’s book equals insufficient intensity.

Persistence and perseverance. Do you want to succeed? Dogged determination to create results must be practiced for a successful training program. What is persistence? It is doing what needs to be done to create physical change each and every scheduled training day without exception. Intense weight training sessions done as scheduled without calling off and never missing your cardio sessions, this will create change Perseverance is gutting it out, sticking to the program even when your mind tells you that you are wasting your time. There will be times when you think that you are not changing quickly enough and it is at these times that you will be tempted to throw in the towel and quit. Perseverance is what causes a person to stay the course, do what needs to be done for a long enough time to attain desirable results.

Fort Lauderdale Personal Trainer Joe Kozma is a master trainer who has been practicing for over twenty years. Joe is a former national bodybuilding champion and college football player. Joe’s fitness and weight loss service provides body makeovers, body sculpting, strength gain, and more. See his clients at his fitness website.

Many times in my over twenty years as a personal trainer, I have seen clients make awesome progress with regard to following the customized eating plan I give them only to become complacent and slip back into the unhealthy dietary habits (which I refer to as diet doldrums ) that brought them to the point of desperation. The question is how do we maintain the mindset that created success with regard to weight loss. The answer is that we must unswervingly focus on the end goal we established when we began on the program. Let’s say a client comes to me who weighs two-hundred and fifty pounds and he desires to take his weight down to two hundred pounds. The client, in order to remain motivated, must constantly, reaffirm the commitment he originally made to drop his weight to two hundred pounds.

How to fight diet doldrums

I firmly believe in using weight loss related mantras in order to stay motivated. The question is what is a mantra? A mantra is a constantly repeated saying which will affirm the client’s goals until the mantra becomes a part of the client’s belief system. Is this brainwashing? Maybe, but for thousands of years this has been a method which has been used in religion and in education to form belief systems and ingrain powerful and useful truths. In their spare time, I instruct my clients to constantly repeat the success mantra until it becomes such a part of them that nothing could stop them from achieving their weight loss goal.

Another power technique involves obtaining a picture of a body which is representative of what the client’s end goal is regarding appearance. Every day that picture should be looked at, and I instruct the client to spend one half hour creating a mental picture of themselves with this goal body. This technique is called visualization and if practiced with regularity will never fail to aid in the quest to remain motivated.

In order achieve success in their fitness program it is necessary for the client to dedicate themselves in totality in achieving their goals. Success only comes when a person dedicates themselves unreservedly in the pursuit of their goal. No failure self talk can be tolerated; examples of this would be “I have never been able to go more than two weeks on a weight loss diet,” or “I will always be fat,” statements such as these are the exact opposite of the success mantra described previously in this article. The reason why the success mantra is so important is that if diligently practiced will drown out negative self talk. Negative self talk is the number one enemy of program success and must be overcome by diligent practice of the techniques mentioned previously in this article.

Success is a certainty if motivation is maintained and I hope the motivational techniques mentioned in this article will enable you to achieve success in your weight loss endeavor.

More client results here!

Written By: Personal Trainer Fort Lauderdale Joe Kozma

If there’s one thing that’s impossible not to notice when you walk into a gym for the first time, it’s the division along gender lines between the cardio area and the weights. Why this separation? Perhaps it’s because social expectations for men and women to look a certain way extend into the fitness arena: While men typically think that to be fitter is to be bigger and buffer, women feel significant pressure to be thin. And when you compare the apparent benefits of strength training to those of a cardio workout, the obvious choice for most women is to focus on the cardio and, in some cases, to avoid strength training altogether.  Here are the weight training benefits for women:

Weight training increases resting metabolic rate

While it’s true that you can burn more calories during a high-intensity cardio workout lasting 45 minutes or more than you can during a strength workout of the same duration, women who ignore the benefits of resistance training do so at their peril. Women with a weight-loss goal need to bear in mind that most calories are not burned through exercise; they’re burned in order to power everyday activities as simple as breathing, using your brain and sitting upright in a chair. Regular strength training helps to preserve lean tissue (which includes bone, muscle and everything except fat), and the more lean tissue you have, the higher your resting metabolic rate will be and the more calories you will burn outside of the time you spend at the gym or on your yoga mat.  And weight training for women doesn’t usually result in bulky muscles, since muscle size is more closely linked to testosterone levels than the amount of weight training you do.

Weight training = injury prevention and treatment

Another major consideration is the potential for injury. Most cardio exercises, no matter how efficient they may be for burning calories and helping to shed pounds, simply do not provide a balanced workout in terms of muscle groups worked. To use running as an example, many people who run all the time but never lift weights or cross-train find themselves plagued by injury due to strength imbalances between the hamstrings, which do most of the work of propelling the body forward, and the quads, which contribute very little to forward movement. Over time, this weakness in the quads can cause the kneecap to start slipping out of place and pinching the cartilage that covers the end of the femur. This painful “runner’s knee” condition can turn into arthritis if it is not properly treated by – you guessed it – strength training to whip the quads into shape.

Simply put, there’s more to fitness and looking good than how many calories you burn per workout. If you live in the Fort Lauderdale area, local personal trainer Joe Kozma is here to help you carry out a strength training program that will help you meet your fitness goals. For more information, contact us today.

Let today be the day you change your life! Regardless of your age, or previous experience, physical activity is an important part of healthy living. In fact, as age increases, the benefits of exercise become even more vital!

Your goal might be to feel more healthy. It might be to keep up with your grandkids, who are always on-the-go. Your goal might be to participate in an event like the Race for the Cure. Or it might be to reverse some negative health patterns. Just as there are many reasons to become physically active, there are many benefits!

Being strong and healthy allows you to do both necessary and voluntary activities. Activities of daily living include things like cleaning the house, taking out the garbage, shopping, and others. As you age, it is important to maintain strength, flexibility, and endurance to ensure independent living. Activities like hiking, golf, swimming, and many more are ways you can enjoy the extended benefits of being healthy!

Living in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, provides many opportunities for outdoor exercise. Due to its natural appeal, there are large populations of adults of all ages in Fort Lauderdale, and there are many avenues to find social groups that enjoy the activities you do.

A great first step is to start a nutrition plan that will help you meet your goals. Aging adults have specific nutrition needs, including daily caloric intake and increased mineral amounts (such as calcium). Meeting with Joe Kozma can help you discover the best nutrition plan for you! The next step is to beginning an exercise program. Many individuals without previous exercise experience feel intimidated by gym equipment and the terminology used in the fitness world. In these cases, a certified personal trainer can help you understande your options and safely learn how to exercise.

Your workout program should include a variety of activities, including strength training and cardiovascular endurance exercise. Strength training will increase muscle mass and flexibility, and improve joint health and bone density. “Cardio,” as it is commonly known, includes activities like walking, jogging, swimming, and biking. These activities improve heart health and provide many other benefits to your overall health. It is important to choose activities you enjoy, because if you are bored or uninterested in a certain activity you will not be motivated to continue. Talking with a professional can help you understand your options and get started today.

Contact us to learn more how Joe Kozma, a top personal trainer in Fort Lauderdale, can help you begin your fitness and nutrition plan for healthy living at any age.

Strength training does not equal bodybuilding; strength training is a way to build and maintain lean muscle mass. As people age, they lose muscle mass, which can lead to weight gain and a reduction in bone density. This is why senior fitness is so important. Both men and women can stay strong and fit well into their golden years by incorporating a fitness plan into their daily lives.

A personal trainer can help seniors who want to stay fit and incorporate physical fitness into their daily routine. A trainer can instruct seniors on what exercises to perform, and how to perform them safely. With the help of a personal trainer, anyone of any age can begin and continue a fitness plan that can be life changing.

People do not have to gain weight as they age, if they maintain their lean muscle mass, which burns calories around the clock– even when a person is at rest! Seniors can get fit and stay fit. Fit people have more energy and are able to go out and enjoy life.

A well-designed fitness plan can help a person slow down the aging process, help protect the bones and maintain muscle tone. A personal trainer can create a personalized plan based on the individual, his or her fitness level and needs.

When people choose a fitness trainer, like Joe, who has a lifetime of experience in fitness, they know their health and fitness is in skilled hands.

Feel free to contact us today and find out how a fitness plan get make you feel years younger.

Personal Trainer in Fort Lauderdale

Fort Lauderdale personal trainers are a service that many people who are interesting in improving their fitness enjoy using.  Anyone can exercise on his or her own; however, having a personal trainer provides motivation, feedback, and expertise to your fitness workout.  Some individuals wonder what they need to look at when determining if the personal trainer is trustworthy.  Look for the tips below when shopping for personal training services in Fort Lauderdale.

Education

A personal trainer does not need to have a college degree in sports medicine in order to be good at his or her job; however, the trainer should be certified.  Also, the more education the trainer has, the better he will be able to serve you, so look for evidence that he is continuing to keep up with the latest trends in training and fitness.

Experience

A good personal trainer should have experience.  It’s true that new personal trainers need to gain experience by having clients; however, the trainer should possess some experience in relation to fitness.  Did he help with training programs in college?  Did he work with the sports team in high school or college?  These items can count toward experience when looking at someone who is relatively new to the personal training field.

Interest in Medical History

Personal trainers should be interested in your medical history.  For example, if you have had some type of cardiac event and are looking for a personal trainer to increase your fitness, the trainer needs to be aware of this so the program can be tailored to your needs.  If you have a history of back ailments, the trainer needs to know that because there are ways to strengthen the back muscles.

Individualized Fitness Programs

A good personal trainer will individualize the fitness program to meet your needs.  In reference to the above statement regarding back ailments, the trainer would perform strength and fitness tests to evaluate the strength of your back and work to strength those muscles by having a tailored fitness program for that need.  If you sit at your job for most of the day, the trainer would realize the muscle groups that would weaken as a result and tailor the fitness program to strengthen those areas.

Check References

Think of the personal trainer as a service which is being provided to you.  As with any service, you need to check references.  If a trainer is hesitant to provide references, this could be a red flag that something is not quite right.

Personal trainers can be effective at increasing weight loss achievements and fitness results.  The only caution is to make sure that the personal trainer meets the qualifications above so that you can achieve safe, healthy results.  Contact us today to see how we can help with your program.

Fort Lauderdale Strength Training bulletin:

If you’re an up-and-coming high school athlete, you’ve by now noticed that the guys around you are getting bigger and running faster than they have in years past.  It’s not that they’re doing anything shady or cutting corners.  These athletes are making the most of the weight room and feeding their body correctly.  But getting bigger and faster doesn’t happen overnight, that’s why you need a strength and conditioning coach to guide you through the process.

Being a naturally gifted athlete nowadays is only half of the objective.  Not only must you know the game you’re playing but you must fit the profile of what coaches want.  Coaches want speed, coaches want size, coaches want tall.  A recent article in the lead up to the SEC Championship highlighted the reason Alabama and Georgia are dominating other teams-they don’t recruit offensive or defensive lineman shorter than six feet taller or weigh less than 250 lbs.  These linemen are strong too, putting in as many hours in the weight room as they do on the practice field.

If you’re looking to move to the next level in your sport, be it football, baseball, basketball or soccer, invest in a strength training program with Joe Kozma.  Building strength and muscle is much more than lifting weights and drinking protein shakes.  Strength training with Joe Kozma involves understanding how your body reacts to a work out, when it’s appropriate to increase weight and how to maximize your diet to preserve muscle.  Joe Kozma’s strength and conditioning program is tailored to the individual, what they hope to achieve and seeing that work pay off on the field.

Don’t rely on coaches to develop and oversee your strength and conditioning program.  Go to the professionals in Ft. Lauderdale for strength and conditioning, go to Joe Kozma and get the edge you need to take it to the next level.

Spring and early summer in Fort Lauderdale offer some great opportunities to get in shape and show off the shape you’re in! Personal trainer Joe Kozma likes to keep an eye on the 5K runs that are coming up in the area. Although he can’t personally endorse them, he has a lot of friends who enjoy them. A few of these upcoming events are:

April 4, 2013: Mercedes-Benz Corporate Run 5K in Huizenga Plaza / Bubier Park, Fort Lauderdale. It’s the 28th year of the “First Step Toward Fitness” 5K.

May 5, 2013: The Color Run™ 5K hosted by Riverwalk Fort Lauderdale. Food and festivities will greet the “colorized” runners at the finish line.

May 18, 2013: The 4^th annual Covenant House Florida 5K on A1A, benefiting homeless, runaway, and at-risk youth.

Runs like these are fun, healthy exercise and bonding—but you have to train for them! And the way to train is not to jump up from behind a desk and start running. You can injure yourself that way! You need to train with a professional right from the start.

Joe Kozma has training programs suitable for any sport. He even offers paramilitary, fire, rescue and special forces training. His techniques can be personalized to your physique and abilities to arrive at your peak physical condition far faster than you ever thought possible.

As a matter of fact, Joe is so confident of his ability to help you, he’s ready to offer you a free consultation in the Fort Lauderdale area. Just fill out this short form so that Joe will know what you’re after.

Before those 5K runs get any closer, are you ready to get up from behind that desk and start working on a new, healthier you? Then contact Joe today.

Exercise and nutrition for weight loss go hand in hand when working towards your fitness and nutritional goals. You can exercise all you want, but if you do not change your eating habits you will not see a change in body fat reduction. On the other side, crash dieting, eliminating food groups, skipping meals or severely restricting caloric intake will cause you to drop weight very quickly but gain it back once you start to eat normally again. The key to reaching your goal and maintaining your new healthy body weight is to learn proper nutrition.

It has been proven that starving yourself or denying yourself food will only cause you to binge later. Fad diets do not work in the long term. You may reach your weight goal, but you will not be able to maintain that goal as you have not taught yourself proper eating and nutrition.

Your body requries fuel to run properly. You need protein, complex carbs, fiber and healthy fats for healthy weight loss. Eliminate, or greatly reduce intake of white sugar, white flour, fast food and large portions and stick to lean proteins, whole grains, vegetables and fruits.

Trying to create a healthy nutritional plan on your own can be daunting. Every day you are inundated with infomercials, talk shows, commercials and internet all yelling at you that this is the diet that works or this is the pill that works! All these products and diets are quick fixes and many people find themselves on the hamster wheel of yo-yo dieting. Obtaining your weight loss goals will take time and work. You did not gain weight overnight, you will not lose the weight overnight.

Contact us the best personal trainer in Ft. Lauderdale to once and for all stop the yo-yo dieting and learn how to lose weight through proper nutrition and exercise!

With more and more high school girls becoming actively involved in sports, doctors are seeing more sports related injuries from girls than in the past.  The most significant injury that occurs is knee trauma, specifically a torn ACL or anterior cruciate ligament.

Girls have a higher incidence of torn ACL than boys in high school and college sports.  If you were to compare the number of ACL injuries sport by sport-baseball vs. softball, girl’s basketball vs. boy’s basketball, girl’s soccer vs. boy’s soccer, girl’s lacrosse vs. boy’s lacrosse, you will find that the injury rate is higher for girls by nearly 30%.  Orthopedists and physical therapists understand this is a result of the biological differences in the bone structure of the knee.  The gap on the femur at the knee (where the ACL is located) is narrower for girls and any lateral force that occurs at the knee can result in a tear.

But there is a way of improving those odds.  By engaging in a dedicated strength training program to improve quad strength, hamstring strength and lower leg strength.  Strengthening these muscles for girls helps to protect the knee from bending in odd directions and increasing the odds of a tear.  But don’t be fooled by in house strength and conditioning programs offered by schools.  The amount of direct supervision, or lack thereof, could lead to injury and not provide you with the strength needed.

If you want to develop your own strength training program and improve your odds of not sustaining a season ending injury, contact contact us at Ft. Lauderdale Personal Training.  Joe Kozma is a former collegiate football and baseball player who will develop a program specifically for you to get the results you want.

An ACL tear is season-ending with months of rehabilitation.  Prevent that from happening to you by starting your strength and conditioning program now with Joe Kozma.