If you’re often sleepless or find yourself exhausted during the day, the causes could be deeper than scrolling through your Instagram feed at night. Here are some less commonly discussed reasons you might not be getting in your full night’s sleep.

1. Ignooring your circadian rhythms. Humans are wired to a biological clock that tells us when we need to sleep and when we need to be awake, set to a 24 hour cycle. That cycle is affected by melatonin, physical activity, social interactions, and most importantly, light. However, working in offices full of artificial light, can set that cycle slightly off kilter. But according to a sleep scientist at SleepScore Labs, we can start preparing for a good night’s sleep at lunchtime. An outdoor walk at lunch serves both fitness and sleep; the sun will tell your body it’s midday and makes sure the body clock keeps ticking in alignment with the day- night cycle.
2. Working out too close to bedtime. Exercising earlier in the day can help you sleep better at night time. However, exercising too close to bedtime can artificially raise your body temperature which makes it harder to fall asleep.
3.  Eating certain foods (especially before bed). Diets low in fibre and high in saturated fat and sugar leads to less restorative sleep and more instances of waking up in the night, especially when consumed later in the day.
4. Procrastinating at bedtime. A quick doze on the couch after a busy day, before the business of getting to bed could seem like just the thing. But that catnap could actually be keeping you up. Schedule around 8 hours and 45 minutes of shut- eye time to reach those 8 hours of sleep.
5. Worrying with your eyes closed. Many insomniacs have become accustomed to worrying when they lay down and have a hard time turning off their minds. One key to improving sleep is avoiding the bed until you actually feel sleepy.
6. Binge- watching TV. The TV we’re watching actually affects the shut- eye we’re getting in the bedroom. Around 1 hour before bedtime, dim the lights and engage only in relaxing activities, no emails, no games or Netflix. Try stick to a routine like use the bathroom, brush your teeth and wash and moisturise your face.
7. Tossing and turning. The most important advice for quality sleep is trying not to panic and remembering to take care of yourself. Waking up in the middle of the night and doing quick maths to see how much sleep you can still get if you fall back asleep right this second isn’t doing you any favours, anxiety around sleeping actually causes you to lose sleep so it might actually be better to get out of bed for a bit to calm down and feel sleepy again.

Bunny Hop Workout!

X 50 Jumping Jacks

X 50 Side Crunches

X 40 Sumo Squat Pulse

X 30 Bunny Jumps (frog jumps)

X 20 Push Ups

X 10 Side Plank Dips (each side)

You can complete this in an AMRAP for 10 min! Have fun 🙂

You can still enjoy chocolate without the Easter break ending in sugar crashes, temper tantrums and tighter jeans. Follow our tips to enjoy Easter without feeling like you’ve overdone it.

1. Don’t eat chocolate eggs before Easter

Just when the last of the Christmas treats have left the supermarket shelves, out come the Easter eggs! Even though it’s difficult to walk into your local grocery store without a brightly-coloured foil-wrapped bunny catching your eye, be strong and walk on. Easter Sunday is one day of indulgence, not three months. Make a rule with yourself that you won’t eat a single Easter treat until the Easter Sunday, and stick to it.

2. Choose smaller eggs

Instead of choosing the biggest egg, try buying just a few individually wrapped little ones. To give you an idea, a 200 gram Lindt Milk Chocolate Bunny contains 1088 calories, or 4552kJ, which is over two thirds of your recommended daily energy intake! Once you take a nibble from an ear it can be difficult to stop. So opt for smaller individually wrapped treats so you won’t be tempted to finish a whole egg.

3. Go for quality not quantity

Make the decision to pay more and purchase a smaller amount of artisan chocolate rather than the mass produced variety. The better the chocolate, the more you’ll savour every mouthful. When you take time to really enjoy the flavours and textures, it slows down the rate at which you eat, meaning you eat less and consume far fewer kilojoules.

4. Choose dark chocolate

Numerous studies have proven dark chocolate varieties to be packed full of health promoting flavanoids and antioxidants, giving them the dietitian’s nod of approval over their milky counterparts. But there’s another reason to opt for dark this Easter: it could suppress your appetite. In a Dutch study published in a 2010 issue of medical journal, Regulatory Peptides, it was found that young women who ate or even smelled dark chocolate had a decreased appetite. So make the wiser choice this Easter and choose dark over milk.

5. Opt for a homemade Easter

What’s more fun than gorging on store bought Easter eggs? Making them yourself! This year, why not have a homemade rule, where all Easter treats in the house must come from the kitchen. Buy chocolate bunny moulds and make your own couverture critters and fire up the oven to make fresh hot-cross buns – what a treat! You’ll be able to control what goes into each recipe and won’t have loads of sub-par confectionary lying around the house.

6. Balance your kilojoule intake in other meals

If you’re going to indulge in a bit of chocolate, try to balance out your kilojoule consumption by having smaller and lighter meals throughout the day. Either cut portion sizes, substitute one meal for another (eg. swap a sandwich for a salad), or go without something you would normally eat (eg. your regular morning latte).

7. Keep leftover eggs out of sight and out of mind

Even though they look pretty, if you place a big bowl of brightly coloured chocolate treats on the coffee table, you will struggle to resist them! Keep them in the top shelf of the cupboard, behind the flour and out of sight, and you will soon forget about them. Try it and see!

8. Eat real eggs

Instead of gobbling down on foil-wrapped eggs, celebrate Easter morning by making real eggs for breakfast. In a study from the Rochester Centre for Obesity in the US, 30 overweight women ate either two eggs or a bagel-based breakfast, containing the same amount of kilojoules. Researchers found that the women who’d eaten eggs felt less hungry and consumed 1788 kilojoules less than the bagel-eating group over the next 36 hours. So in essence, starting the day with real chicken eggs may prevent you from munching on the chocolate variety later in the day!

9. Return to normal eating by Tuesday

The Easter weekend is four days long, so keep your festivities to just those four days and return to normal eating by Tuesday. Make a rule that you will not consume another Easter egg once the public holidays have finished, and stick to it. Take leftover treats to friends, family or (even better) to work – they won’t last for long in the communal kitchen!

10. Make Easter healthy for the whole family

One of the joys of having small children is to be able to hide Easter eggs throughout the garden for your little ones to find. But there’s nothing that says all of these eggs need to be chocolate. Why not hide Easter themed toys or hand painted wooden eggs you’ve prepared with your kids earlier in the holidays? You could take the focus off chocolate by talking about the Easter bunny and the food he enjoys eating – carrots, celery, etc. – and prepare a healthy ‘bunny’ snack for your kids to enjoy. Move the focus to fun egg-based activities like an egg and spoon race or egg blowing and decorating. As long as you’re spending time together and having fun, they won’t feel like they’re missing out.

VO2 max, or maximal oxygen uptake, is a common measurement linked to aerobic endurance that many athletes use to determine their overall fitness. VO2 max is the measurement of the maximum amount of oxygen that an individual can utilise during intense, or maximal exercise. It is measured as millilitres of oxygen used in one minute per kilogram of body weight (ml/kg/min). It is one factor that may help determine an athlete’s capacity to perform sustained exercise.

An athlete’s VO2 max score is generally considered by exercise physiologists as one of the best indicators of the athlete’s cardiovascular durance and aerobic endurance Theoretically, the more oxygen you can use during high-level exercise, the more adenosine triphosphate (ATP) energy you can produce in your cells. This is often the case with elite endurance athletes, who typically have very high VO2 max values.

What factors affect VO2max?

Age, fatigue, anaerobic threshold and familiarity with the rowing stroke can all affect VO2max. For example, an athlete with a high anaerobic threshold may perform better than another, despite having a lower VO2max. It’s possible that this comes into play with untrained individuals: since they lack training, they may depend more heavily on their natural anaerobic capability.

How much can I improve my VO2max?

VO2max can be improved with training, but there are limits to how much one can improve. Generally the untrained individual may be able to achieve greater improvement (up to around 20%) than the already well-trained person (perhaps only 3–5%).

Cardiovascular Fitness Calculations Based on VO2max (mL*kg-1*min-1)

These aerobic fitness classifications are based on relative VO2 (ml/(kg*min)) and
are taken from Essentials of Exercise Physiology, 3rd ed.

How was this tool created?

This tool is based on thousands of real data points collected by Dr. Fritz Hagerman of Ohio University. Over the years, Dr. Hagerman performed VO2max tests using gas analysis on many subjects. He also had the same subjects row a max 2000m test piece on the indoor rower. He then correlated the two tests to create the formulae used in this prediction tool.

Don’t restrict these quesadillas to breakfast, they are delicious any time of day – for brunch, lunch or a light evening meal. You can replace the canned beans with 1½ cups cooked black beans if you like to prepare your own. The white corn tortillas we have tested have a low GI (52).

Preparation time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 10 minutes
Serves: 4

• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 200g (7oz) button mushrooms, wiped clean and sliced
• 1 garlic clove, crushed
• 400g (14oz) can black beans, drained and rinsed
• 1 vine-ripened tomato, diced
• 4 large wholegrain tortillas
• ½ cup grated cheddar cheese
• 1 cup firmly packed baby English spinach leaves
• Hot chilli sauce, to taste
• Olive oil spray, for toasting
• ⅓ cup natural yoghurt
• Coriander (cilantro) leaves, to garnish

Method
1. Heat the olive oil in a large non-stick frying pan over medium–high heat.
2. Add the mushrooms and cook, stirring, for 3–4 minutes or until golden.
3. Add the garlic and cook for 30 seconds or until fragrant.
4. Add the beans and tomato and cook for 1 minute or until heated through.
5. Season to taste with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper. Set aside.
6. Preheat a sandwich press.
7. Spread a quarter of the mushroom mixture over half of a tortilla. Top with a quarter of the cheese, a quarter of the spinach leaves, and chilli sauce to taste. Fold the tortilla over to enclose the filling. Repeat with the remaining tortillas and fillings.
8. Spray the quesadillas on both sides with oil. Cook in batches in the sandwich press for 3 minutes or until the quesadillas are crisp and the cheese has melted. (Alternatively cook the quesadillas in a large non-stick frying pan for 2 minutes each side.)
9. Serve with a dollop of yoghurt, garnished with coriander.

The simple fact is, a good running program should be developed around your own running goals and preferences. For example, a beginner runner to trains to lose weight will have a much different running approach than an elite athlete training for their next personal best. Your personalised running program should take into account:

1. Fitness level
2. Personality
3. Personal preferences
4. Training background and history
5. Schedule
6. Short- term running goals
7. Long- term running goals
8. Ultimate fitness objective

STEP 1 – Assess Your Fitness and Health

You need to address your fitness levels, needs and personal needs. You would also need to know what you are good at and what needs improving. Since you are doing this for you – YOU can sit yourself down and ask yourself if you are out of shape, have chronic injuries, aches or pains, high blood pressure and within a healthy weight range? If you do have any of these then you should ALWAYS check with a certified physician before getting started, never ignore it. If you are completely OK with all of these then great – onto the next step.

STEP 2 – Assess Your Time/ Schedule 

You will need to assess your schedule, calendar and time. Pull out your calendar and answer these questions and assess the weeks and months ahead of you. How many days a week do you want to exercise? How may hours per week you’re willing to exercise? Which specific days of the week work best? When can you start? Where will you run? Schedule your runs choosing the 3-5 days per week in which you’ll train, and on the off days try doing other (cross training) activities such as walking, yoga, foam rolling etc. Keep in mind consistency is key in creating a successful running program.

STEP 3 – Set The Right Goals 

Set clear and well defined goals and everything will fall into it’s place. The specific elements of your training program depend on your ultimate training purpose. Some questions to consider are – What are your ultimate fitness goal/goals? Why do you want to start running? What do you want from running? What are long/ short term running and fitness goals? As a rule of thumb your goals must be SMART (specific, measurable, set within a time limit, challenging yet, realistic). It can even be as simple as setting a goal such as , “be able to run for 45 minutes non stop”.

STEP 4 – Choose The Workouts 

In general aim for 3-4 hours of total running time per week, ideally at least 3-4 separate sessions. This will of course, will vary depending on your running goals and fitness levels. On the off days you can choose to cross train or rest. Incorporate in plenty of different types of runs of different distances and training paces. Variety will help you reach your full running potential. Different running workouts include: easy runs, recovery run, interval repeats, ladder runs, pyramid runs, progression runs, tempo runs, fartlek runs, hill reps, strides and long runs.

For Cross training days pick 3 days of active recovery. During these rest or cross training days keeping your body moving without putting too much pressure on it can help build the habit of daily exercises in your life while further improving your aerobic conditioning and muscular strength. Some examples of cross training sessions are: walking, swimming, spinning, yoga, rowing, Pilates and foam rolling.

STEP 5 – Choose A Weekly Workout Template

Intermediate training template (ONLY EXAMPLE)

Monday: 45 – 60 min asy effort running

Tuesday: 45-60 min Cross training

Wednesday: 8 X 400m @ 85% max effort

Thursday: 30-45 min Cross training

Friday: 30-45 min Fartlek running

Saturday: 75-90 min long run at a conversational pace

Sunday: Rest day

Create your own according to your schedule and think harder runs such as intervals, hill reps, and long runs with easy paced recovery workouts that are neither intense nor long. A written plan may hold your accountable ad help you stay on track. Grab a journal and jot down the days of the week along the side, then decide on what to do each day: run, cross train or rest. Write down everything running and exercise related so that you can compare yourself against a previous benchmark. Any questions ask your RIM PT!

This super delicious healthy cake recipe will take 15 minutes to prepare, ready in 55 minutes so if you have a spare Sunday to do nothing at all, treat yourself to some yummy chocolate cake with 0 guilt!

INGREDIENTS

Zucchini Cake

• 3/4 cup Olive oil or Canola oil
• 1 cup Honey
• 2 tsp Vanilla extract
• 2 large eggs
• 3/4 cup Greek yoghurt
• 2 cups Whole wheat flour
• 1 1/4 tsp Baking soda
• 1/2 tsp Baking powder
• 1/2 tsp Salt
• 3/4 cup Dutch- process cocoa powder
• 3 cups grated, peeled Zucchini
• 1 cup semi- sweet Chocolate chips

Ganache

• 1/4 cup Honey
• 3 1/2 tbsp Coconut oil
• 1/2 tsp Vanilla
• 1/4 cup Dutch- process cocoa powder
• 2-4 tbsp Greek yoghurt

METHOD 

1. Grease a 12 cup bundt pan or 6 cup if you want to make half. Preheat your oven to 350°F / 176°C. For the cake, combine the honey, oil, and vanilla in a large bowl. At first it’ll be difficult to get the honey incorporated, but it’ll work. Stir in the eggs and then the Greek yogurt. Set this bowl aside.
2. In another large bowl, combine all the dry ingredients. Sift the cocoa powder into the bowl if it’s lumpy, or just use a fork to get rid of the lumps. Add the wet mix to the dry mix and stir, just until combined. Fold in the zucchini and the chocolate chips.
3. Bake the full recipe for 40 minutes, or if using half, bake for 30 minutes. When you insert a toothpick in the middle, the toothpick will not come out dry, or even with crumbs, but it’ll come out covered in sticky batter. If you insert it, and it’s just normal batter, it’s not ready. Sticky batter is what we’re looking for! It’ll continue to cook once it’s out of the oven.
4. Let cool in the pan for 10 minutes and then flip out onto a wire rack to cool. Cool completely before putting on the ganache. If using the following ganache recipe, store cake covered in the fridge. Otherwise, room temperature is fine.
5. For the ganache: Over low heat, melt the honey and coconut oil and in a medium saucepan or pot. When melted, add the vanilla and then the cocoa powder. Stir until thoroughly combined. It might look weird, like it isn’t combining.
6. Place in the fridge for 5 minutes. Take out and add a tablespoon of Greek yogurt at a time, stirring after every one. It should be pourable at this point. Not too hot and not too cold. Pour over the cake and store any leftovers in the fridge.