Death by Burpees!

The holidays are here again and we’re all going to behave ourselves this year and only indulge a little bit. Great theory but pretty unrealistic no matter what. Self-control is one of the hardest things to develop and quite frankly our society has done a crappy job at it. With all the jumbo sizing of everything few people understand what it means to restrain from over indulgence and the holidays are notorious for excess. Thanksgiving alone has a general caloric intake of 4500 calories from that day, and considering that it only take 3500 calories to gain a pound the excess from one day of feasting is well on your way to ruining to important physique gains you’ve made over the past few months. So unless you’re a serious metabolic freak who burns about 4000 calories a day just by sitting around I suggest you avoid the extra piece of pie.
However, I understand that it is the holidays and you want to enjoy at least something. Whether it is your aunt’s famous pumpkin pie or grandma’s homemade stuffing just realize what normal thanksgiving entails: for arguments sake let’s say a piece of pumpkin pie contain 350 calories, according to the American College of Sports Medicine doing 10 burpees a minute equals out to about 10 calories for someone around 150 lbs. In other words it would take you 350 burpees over the course of 35 minutes to create enough of a metabolic burn to work off that one piece of pie. Now granted if you weigh less or more there is a difference in number of calories burned in the process (weigh less burn less). From that same standpoint let’s say you were to intake all 4500 calories of that thanksgiving feast and still burning 10 calories a minute for 10 burpees, it would take 7 and a half hours of non-stop burpee fantastic-ness to burn off all those calories. Now I know how much everyone at ChrisFit loves burpees, and you all know that the trainers are crazy enough to make you do all 7 and a half hours’ worth of burpees, save yourself the aggravation of death by burpees.
Instead think smart and do your best to stay fairly close to your diet throughout the holidays. We all love to indulge, it’s only human, but you haven’t put in all this effort to get where you are, just to set yourself back. It’s a waste of your and your trainer’s time. So now that that’s all said and done here our my tips for keeping off the holiday excess:
• Practice portion control. Just because grandma makes the greatest mash potatoes ever doesn’t mean you need all of them.
• If you know what’s coming for the big meal eat light for the rest of the day that way it’s possible to keep your intake a bit more in check.
• Stay active. Even washing the dishes or walking around and talking is better than just sitting around eating.
• Know your limits, eat slow and controlled that way when you truly are full you’ll know it.
• Chris, Steve, Chris, and myself know all of you very well and are very capable of making you regret over eating…keep that in mind.
Happy Thanksgiving!!! And Remember….Seven and a Half Hours of Burpees =)

-Jack Lazarus, Certified Burpee Instructor