How to Start your Day

How do you start your day? How should you start your day?!!

I worked with a client whose main goal was to improve overall energy levels but he also wanted to lose weight. We decided to work together and set a date for the initial consultation in about a week’s time. But then he asked me if there was anything he should start doing right now.

Without knowing too much about him yet, I told him there was. I asked him if he could add something to his first thing in the morning routine. He promised me he could, as long as it wasn’t too time consuming. Like most of us, he doesn’t have much time in the morning.

He followed my suggestion every morning… And by the time we met for our initial consultation he already felt better and was a few pounds lighter!

What did he do? I asked my client to start his day by pouring himself a large glass of filtered water, preferably room temperature or warmed. And then add the juice of a freshly squeezed lemon to the water. To drink 2 cups of lemon water. This is how I start my day every morning. This is how you might want to try starting your day too 🙂

Why? Three reasons. First, it helps to detoxify our bodies from the day before. You’ll run stronger when you start cleaner. Second, it helps with weight loss. You’ll run faster at your optimal body composition. And third, it helps to bring your body back into a proper acid/alkaline balance. You’ll run longer and stronger with balanced cardiovascular and skeletal systems and strong bones.

Detox

We need water, our bodies are about 70% water. Water is what clears our system of toxins. We expose ourselves daily, knowingly or not, to so many toxins in our environment, such as car exhaust, and in our food, such as processed, fatty fast foods, caffeine and alcohol. Luckily we have livers and kidneys, which work hard to detoxify us. But water is required to flush the toxins through these organs, and when there’s not enough water or our organs get overloaded, we experience weight gain, fatigue, muscle pains, food intolerances, heartburn… The list goes on. Not drinking enough water even makes us age faster, causing our skin to wrinkle and sag faster 🙁

So we need water, hands down that’s a requirement, but lemon juice is also helpful in the detoxifying process. It is known to be cleansing to the body, supporting your liver and stimulating your bile to help with elimination of toxins. Lemon juice also helps your body to absorb the water you’re drinking, due to its mineral content, which can be beneficial as often when you simply up your water intake, it seems to just go right through you!

Weight Loss

Yes, lemon juice is known to aid in weight loss. My husband came home a few months ago to announce that his boss was now drinking lemon juice in an attempt to drop a few pounds. I asked him to ensure his boss was using fresh lemon juice, not the bottled kind. The reason for this recommendation was because lemon juice aides in weight loss two ways. The first is that people who get adequate amounts of vitamin C lose twice as much weight when exercising – because adequate vitamin C is required to produce enough carnitine – a non-essential amino acid that helps our body burn fat well. Fresh lemons provide between 60 to 100mg of vitamin C, but bottled has lost over half it’s vitamin C and it usually contains carcinogenic preservatives. The second reason lemon juice is known to aid in weight loss is because it contains acids and pectin that slow the absorption of sugar from meals which in turn slows the rise in blood sugar, thereby preventing low blood sugar dips which can trigger overeating.

Acid/Alkaline Balance

Lemon juice is alkalizing, meaning it helps with the acid/alkaline balance in our bodies. We usually attribute aches pains and problems to getting older, but it could be more accurate to attribute them to an overly acidic body (when our body must work harder to maintain its pH level of 7.4, in part by pulling minerals out of our bones to alkalize our blood). Problems occur when we eat too much meat, eggs, dairy, grains, legumes, most nuts… And while it’s no fun to take away the foods we love to eat, the first thing to try is always to add in more of the good stuff to see if a balance can be reached. And lemons, although you might think them acidic, once metabolized, lemons are alkaline – meaning they help the mineral content of the lemons and any food you eat with or just after them, to be metabolized by the body – helping to bring the body back into balance.

For its detoxifying qualities, help with weight loss, and contribution to a balanced body… Which overall leads to stronger, faster and healthier running, this is how you need to start your day – a large glass of filtered water with the juice of one lemon fresh squeezed into it. Are you up for the challenge?

Happy running 🙂