Current Newsletter

The Houston Hot Sheet vol 6 - March 2006

What's New this Month

Spring keeps popping up and letting us know it is just around the corner…but we’re not there yet (as evidenced by our ZERO degree morning Saturday!)! But, as we tend to do, we offer our Hot Chile Pepper Eating Contest at the Milford Ice Carnival this month, Saturday February 25th at high noon! It is going to be right in the middle of the Milford Chile Cook Off, and we will do our best to keep things smoking right along! Prizes include a few months subscription to our Gourmet Salsa of the Month Club! The big Salsa of the Month Kickoff will be this spring, and it promises to be a lot of fun…Check the newsletter and the website for updates on our events, including our traveling Salsa Tastings! They are fun and FREE!

Ask the Trainer

When Can I start My Child on a Weight Lifting Program? I Want Him to Be the Fastest, Strongest Kid in his class. We hear this question almost daily, and there is a lot of misinformation regarding children and exercise. We believe, as long as it is supervised, children can start working with weights as young as 8 or 9 (there are variables.). It is important to remember that it is around this age that the child starts to really develop physically. The agility and strength the children develop at this age have an enormous influence on the eventual potential of the child. The problem, as we see it, is that a lot of parents push their children entirely too hard when they first get them started. This is not the way to get them the best results, too much exercise and too high of intensity can be worse than NO exercise! Poor form, lack of understanding as to WHY the exercises are to be done a specific way, and imbalanced joint structures are the beginning of long term problems. If proper nutrition is not brought into the equation, even more problems can be created. This includes body image issues, eating issues, misinformation on metabolism and calories, and more. If the children are properly instructed (and by that, we mean designing a properly balanced, progressive workout plan, nutrition plan, and recovery plan), their musculature can benefit at an early age. Remember, “weights” are just a way of increasing leverage against a muscle (see our website for archived info on this), you can make a muscle work harder via numerous pathways, including body weight, body position, resistance bands, weights, machines, even water resistance. Exercise is effective when it makes the muscles believe they have to get stronger. This can be done effectively at an early age…but work with a professional if you can to get the program off to a good start! Healthy kids are the future!

Exercise Tip of the Month

Still following your New Year’s resolutions? If so, good for you! Did you know that 60% off fitness resolutions are done and over by Valentine’s Day? If you need motivation, remember WHY you started exercising in the first place. Ideally, you sat down and thought long and hard about what you REALLY wanted out of your exercise program. Whether it is weight loss, feeling better, reducing health risks, taking up a new sport, whatever, it is important to step back and re-evaluate your goals. We recommend people do exactly that every six to eight weeks. It does not mean that you abandon your long term goals, but maybe it is time to think about a different direction to try to get you there: change up your cardio routine, try some new machines, try renting a few home exercise videos (a good way to break up long winter days if you do not like to be outside), buy a jump rope, start a workout journal (if you have not done that already!), visit a new gym, challenge yourself with a workout partner…but keep your body moving, and keep it challenged! Sit down, think about something new you want to do, and work it into your plan.

Recipe of the Month

With all of the great recipes we have come across this month, we could not decide on just one good one for the newsletter! Look for two next newsletter, we have had a lot of great suggestions, we are anxious to share them with you. We Love Food!!

Worth a Look

Our Health Fair in Clarkston at the Deer Lake Banquet Center on March 18th is coming along full steam, and it may be a very good idea to call to reserve a spot…specialty tests are limited to the first 200 participants, and the tests include glucose, blood pressure, bone density, body composition, BMI, hearing tests, vision screening and glaucoma tests, cholesterol, spinal screening, and more. Cherie has done an awesome job making all the connections and making the event happen, she has been working NON-STOP! We both have a goal of helping people learn what they can do to make a better quality of life for themselves. Learning about where you are at, health-wise, is the best start! These tests will also include consultations with medical professionals, along with 3-times-per-hour seminars to help you fully understand the value of the numbers (seminars performed by me, Dan Houston, my wife and partner Cherie Houston, and Dr Lisa Guyot. The information from these seminars alone is worth hundreds of dollars, the entire event only costs $25.00, and that includes lunch from Brioni’s Café and Deer Lake Athletic Club’s Back Court Restaurant, which now features a new lighter, spa menu for lunch and dinner(they recently added free wireless internet access as well!) We are in the planning stages to conduct a similar (maybe even better!) event in the Highland/Milford/White Lake area in April; check the site for more info as it happens.

Book Excerpt

I just finished our chapter for “Breaking down the Barriers”! It goes to print this month, and the book should be highly motivating and empowering to people who want to learn from experts in various fields. We should be seeing our copies in early March, here is a short excerpt:

“The exercise approach and philosophy is the same; it’s about balance—personal balance, physical balance, balance between expended effort and effort rewarded, balance between recovery and stimulus, getting the strength and health benefits based on how hard you can work safely and balance between how much food you eat and how much food you need. It’s also about balance between goals and lifestyle and family and free time—trying to make the exercise fit into that balance so that it becomes part of someone’s daily routine rather than a chore they have to convince themselves to do. When someone finds this balance, they find themselves healthier, happier, and more rested with less stress. Since we know that day-to-day stress is different for everyone, we do our best to help people identify their unique situation, and how to make effective lifestyle changes that can fit into their lifestyles.”

Chile Pepper Tip of the Month

The good peppers are starting to show up in the stores again, and if you are like me, that means lots of homemade salsas! We are constantly experimenting with different blends for our salsas, and we think we are getting it close. Here is the tip: If you are new to hot peppers, remember this key point: Wear rubber gloves when you cut up the peppers! The capsaicin in the oil of the pepper is the blisteringly hot ingredient found in pepper spray, Zostrix and Capzaicin arthritis creams. It can stay on your skin for hours, and gets deep in the ridges of the fingers…trust me, you do NOT want to be greeted by a burning sensation when you rub your eye, or, worse, go to the bathroom…Ouch!!

Upcoming Events

Milford High School kickoff seminar for the Weight Loss Challenge, we will be speaking to the staff and participants about exercise, metabolism, and recovery. This is a free seminar and will be a great way to get the six week challenge underway! The dates and times are Feb 27th at 3 pm and 4 pm. We are working with the Milford High School Fieldhouse to help make Milford and Highland a healthier place to be! We also have our next series of classes starting up in late March, these are an excellent value for people who may not be able to get to a trainer on a regular basis; class topics are: Designing Effective Exercise Programs and Body Composition and Weight Management. We even lowered the price to try to give more people a chance to get in.

Contact us. You can contact us at our studio located at 2624 S Milford Rd, Highland, MI 48357, or by phone at 248-676-2882, or via email at www.houstonfc.com. We look forward to your comments and ideas for our future newsletters.

03/01/2006