Question: I have a question that may or may not pertain to diet. I started working out again at a local gym in January I try and go 2 to 3 times a week and spend 45 minutes doing cardio and an hour doing the workout room but by the time I'm done I'm so tired and sleepy I have to fight sleep driving home. Is there something that I can do before working out that will keep me awake?

Thanks,

-Jill

Answer: No wonder you’re so sleepy when you finish your workout you’re in the gym for almost two hours. I bet you can come up with hundreds of better things to do than spent nearly two hours in a gym... and if you can can’t, it’s time to start thinking about getting a life.

The short answer here is that you are spending too much time working out and you’re doing everything backwards. I have a big announcement to make, so listen up folks…AEROBICS ARE DEAD! 45 minutes of aerobics before you even think about lifting a weight makes me sleepy just thinking about it. Let’s work out a little smarter today. By smarter I mean shortening up your workouts to be more efficient and burn fat faster. No one has to be in the gym for two hours…no one! Start your workout by warming up for 6 minutes, get the blood going. Hit the weights with no more than two exercises per body part for a maximum of two sets. Start with the largest muscles and work your way up to the smallest. Your largest muscle is your glutes (hips), and it’s not just big because you have a fat ass, it is actually the largest muscle in the body and your smallest muscles are your arms. Finish your weight training off with a couple of sets of abs. This workout should take you no longer than 35 minutes. If it does you’re slacking.

Your aerobic workout should be no more than twenty minutes and even that is too long. The fastest way to burn fat is to create chaos in the body and by “chaos” I mean “interval” training. You can switch it up however you want but a basic interval training looks like this: 2 minutes walking, 2 minutes running at full speed, 2 minutes walking, 2 minutes running…I think you get the picture. You can perform any combination; 1 minute walking, 3 minutes running, and so on. Change it up every workout by using different aerobic machines and mix up the timing and you see that you can stay awake through your workout and get to your fitness goals much faster.