How to Wine, Dine and Stay Fit: Special Guest Post by Tim Liu
I spend my life working with professionals who are constantly surrounded by food and drink. I know very well the difficulties of trying to not only get in shape, but to stay in shape. It’s too easy to let fitness fall to the wayside and get out of shape quickly.
Although the uphill battle of staying in shape as a wine professional seems daunting, it’s not impossible.
How do you maintain your fitness while immersed in food, drink, and travel? Plan ahead and utilize the right strategies for success. That’s your game plan. If you don’t go in with one, then chances are you won’t be able to stick with healthy habits.
Let’s break down what to do on both the nutrition and exercise front:
Nutrition
In order for you to avoid the weight gain and losing lean muscle mass during your travels and events, you need to dial in your nutrition. This means prioritizing a high protein intake while minimizing your calories throughout the day.
If you’re traveling, you can either eat a healthy high protein meal before you head out, or fast until you reach your destination. Eating a high protein meal makes you feel full, so you won’t overeat on low quality airport food or experience cravings.
The best high protein foods are eggs, low fat Greek yogurt, lean cuts of meat, and jerky.
During fasting, you’re obviously not taking in any calories, which allows you to have a bit of a buffer for the rest of the day. The only thing you should be consuming is water or black coffee. When it comes to maintaining your weight, total daily calories is what matters the most.
If you don’t eat until you get to your destination or event, you’ll be able to maintain your waistline better.
When dining out, it’s easy to overeat when you’re at a restaurant, especially when you’re with others. You’ve got appetizers, drinks, shared plates, and big entrées. Let’s not forget about dessert as well. Before you know it, if you taste everything that’s on the table then your calorie intake has skyrocketed.
Try looking up the menu ahead of time to determine your healthiest options. Set your own game plan. Keep it simple and pick a dish that has a serving of lean protein and vegetables. If it has a sauce, ask for it on the side.
If you do want an indulgence of some sort, whether it’s a glass of wine, a piece of dessert, or bread, pick one and stick with that one.
Alcohol
You’re a wine professional. You’re surrounded by wine, and chances are you have a chance to consume quite a bit over the course of a day.
Set a drink limit, and pace yourself. In between each drink, be sure to have at least a glass of water. If you track your daily calories, log in all of your food then allocate the remaining calories for how many drinks you’re going to have.
For example, if you have 450 calories left, that’s approximately four glasses of wine or three cocktails. If you’re doing a tasting and having multiple flights, ask for a smaller pour.
Exercise
To continue burning fat and building muscle, you need to stay as active as possible. Although conventional wisdom is to do cardio as your main form of exercise, resistance training is actually the better choice.
This is especially true if you’re short on workout time. Although there are many benefits to aerobic and cardio exercise, it doesn’t burn as many calories compared to strength training.
A great strength training workout incorporates exercises that work multiple muscle groups at once. I have my clients perform circuit training style workouts when short on time. Here’s an example:
A1. Dumbbell Squat –10-15 repetitions
A2. Dumbbell Row –12 repetitions each arm
A3. Pushups – 10-12 repetitions
A4. Side Plank – 30 seconds each side
Perform each exercise back to back with no rest. Aim for 3-4 sets of the circuit.
Getting fit and staying fit is challenging enough, especially as a wine professional. However, implementing these strategies will help you manage both your career and your health. Cheers!
About Tim:
Tim Liu is an online fitness and nutrition coach that helps busy professionals achieve their goals in a long term, sustainable way so their results lasts for life. You can connect with Tim at TimLiuFitness.com
What We're Reading:
There's no shortage of wine stories and media inundating our IN Boxes. Here's what has piqued our interest this week.
A Balanced Glass: Keeping Alcohol and Health on the Level in the Workplace, by Cristina Bell
"It’s foolish to think we are going to change things tomorrow. Culturally we cannot do that,” Hopkins said, adding that this is just the beginning of a worldwide awareness of wellness and health in alcohol industries.
One Thing to Change: Embrace Mindfulness - Harvardedu.com
Researcher Ellen Langer talks about using mindfulness techniques in order to see the world as it actually is.
Meet the Tribe!
Our community is only as strong as the company we keep, and here we meet some of the folks who make our profession so dynamic.
Erin Kirschenmann, Managing Editor, Wine Business Monthly (USA)
Years in the Industry:
I’ve been an editor at Wine Business Monthly for 7 years, following some time as a reporter for a local news website and an insurance trade publication. It’s always been a dream of mine to work at a magazine, but a wine magazine was an incredible (and lucky) surprise! In addition to editing articles for WBM and winebusiness.com, I cover business, technology, sales and marketing, and oversee and create content for our company’s nine conferences/tradeshows.
My Biggest Challenge to Wellness:
Juggling the demands of a media company is a definite challenge. One minute I’m editing articles on phenolics, then creating a DTC-minded session description the next; all the while managing other’s deadlines, writing my own articles and attending events, meetings, etc. on a regular basis. With so many projects running at once, it’s never a dull job but that fast-paced and full routine has the potential to spill over after office hours. It can feel difficult to be present and have enough energy for family, friends and fun.
How I Keep It Together to Stay Well:
Learning to say no! Whether it’s delegating a task, turning down a dinner invitation, or just admitting that I don’t have the time to do the project fully and properly, finding the courage to say “no” has been a true challenge and one of the greatest lessons of my career.
It’s so easy to move from one deadline or task to the next without taking a second to recognize it’s complete; so I recently set a reminder on my phone to just breathe, to take a long inhale and a longer exhale. The Breathing App has been immensely helpful in guiding that practice and pulling my mind off all the chaos.
Outside of work, softball has been my saving grace. For two hours on Mondays and Thursdays, there is no work, no wine, no responsibility—just a good time with friends. Working with a team toward something that, quite frankly, doesn’t matter is incredibly freeing. If we lose, there’s always next week.
You can connect with Erin on Instagram and through the WBM website.
Let's Meet Up!
As work life has it, we are traveling over the next few months and would love to see you.
Attendee at TEXSOM Sommelier Conference in Dallas, August 18 to 20 (Beck)
Speaker at Dream Big Darling in Paso Robles, September 15 to 17 (Cathy)
Emcee at Australia Decanted in Lake Tahoe, Oct. 6 to 9 (Cathy)
Presenter at the Vancouver International Wine Festival, February 25 to 29 (Cathy)
Presenter at the Future Wine Expo in Santa Rosa, May 12 and 13 (Cathy)
Drop a line to rebecca@abalancedglass.com or cathy@enolytics.com if you are interested in getting together for practice, a chat or a great glass together.
