Blog Posts by SHAPE magazine

It really is all mental!You may have the best intentions when it comes to working out, but sometimes your mind just gets in the way. Have you ever said "I'll start tomorrow?" or given up after one really tough workout , convincing yourself you just don't have the time anyway? You're not alone.

"Women are constantly overshadowed by obstacles they cannot shake!" says Carla Lundblade, a licensed clinical therapist who works with some of the country's top professional sports stars and celebrities from her practice in Beverly Hills. "They will most likely not achieve their workout goals because they are not preparing themselves enough mentally for the many challenges ahead."


If you focus on coaching yourself psychologically rather than just physically, you'll get better results, Lundblade says. "Sports psychologists and therapists have studied MRI scans which show how important emotions and mental imagery are to the physical gift of an athlete ," she explains. "Women can incorporate brain training

The foods on this list may seem harmless, but if a nutritionist won't touch them, you know they're bad! We asked our resident Diet Doctor Mike Roussell, PhD, to list the top foods he wouldn't eat if his life depended on it--and he delivered! Here's what he had to say:

Skip the fat-free salad dressing and make your own.1. Fat-Free Salad Dressing
Fat-free salad dressings are a perfect example of good food gone bad. Salad dressing is the perfect combination of vinegar (which helps control blood sugar) and plant oils (full of essential fatty acids and sometimes antioxidants). However, an irrational fear of dietary fats has forced food companies to mess around with this perfect blend. The resulting fat-free salad dressings have introduced sugar and high fructose corn syrup, un-pronounceable emulsifying agents, and other food science secrets used to make the unnatural seem natural. It's too easy to make your own healthy salad dressing to ever let this science experiment in a bottle pass your lips. Click here to watch a

By Elizabeth Goodman Artis

When you hear the expression "triple threat," a person exceptionally good at three separate things (dancing, acting and, say, piano playing) comes to mind. Not so with these foods, which exemplify the expression quite literally. Each possesses such high quantities of saturated fat, calories (often from processed carbs), and sodium that, if eaten in excess, they can raise your risk of heart disease, diabetes, and of course an expanding waistline.

We talked to Susan Weiner, RD, CDE, a New York based nutritionist and Karyn Capazzo, an RD in private practice in Florida for five "triple threat" foods to eat in serious moderation-or just skip all together.

Chicken salad sandwich on a croissant1. Chicken salad sandwich on a croissant: Somewhere along the line This buttery, flaky pastry, typically eaten on its own with a cup of café,' became a sandwich bread substitute. Then, inexplicably, the sandwich filling of choice became chicken salad, creating a triple threat lunch of epic

If your workout doesn't include these six attributes, ditch it and find another!How do you know if your current workout plan is the one for you? We went to the experts to spot the signs of a great fitness routine. If your workout doesn't include all six of these attributes, it's time to ditch it and find another!

1. A specific purpose: "Great workouts have a specific purpose," says Rick Richey, a master instructor for the National Academy of Sports Medicine and owner of R2Fitness in New York City. Whether the goal is to help you burn more calories , gain strength, or just shimmy into your skinny jeans with confidence, the program you choose should clearly define what it's going to do for you, and those end results should align with your personal goals.

"You will need to know where you're going before you show up," Richey says. "Too often people arrive aimlessly at the gym and without a clear picture of what they want or why they are there."

RELATED: 12 Ways to Spice Up Your Squats for Better Results

The best workouts should help you define your goal,

By Nora Tobin for SHAPE.com

What foods should I eat before or after my workout?When it comes to fitness, there are certain universal questions that experts hear almost every day: How can I get the most out of my workouts ? How can I lose weight faster, burn the most calories, and feel energized enough to power through every training session? While there are other elements that may affect your unique situation, there's one simple answer that applies to all of these questions: Eat! More specifically, eat the right foods at the right time.

Like many women, I used to think the best way to lose weight was to work out hard and wait until mealtime to eat. I now know that the key to getting and maintaining a knockout body is a combination of regular exercise and eating the right foods at the right times. Feeding your body before and after every workout is essential for burning the most calories, staying energized, building lean muscle, losing weight, and speeding up recovery.

RELATED: The Best and Worst Foods for a Bikini Body

The Importance

It's like a trusty friend that's waiting for you every time you walk out the door. You shove it into tight spaces like lockers, jam-pack it with water bottles, towels, protein bars, and tampons, and yet it's still there waiting for you the next time you're ready to sweat. It may even occasionally house your smelly sneakers-and it never complains. We're talking about your gym bag, and the kind you choose says a lot about you! We break it down.

Classic duffel1. Classic Duffel Loved by: Gym rats, exercise fanatics, and serious athletes who have 'stuff' to carry, like, um, kettlebells.

Usually toted with: The aforementioned 'stuff,' or as much as can be stuffed into it. A big ol' bottle of fat burners and a protein shake. Bonus if beads of sweat are evident on the nylon.

Workout of choice: MMA, kickboxing, weight lifting, and the occasional ass whooping.

Price: $30-$50

RELATED: Get in Gear! Colorful Fitness Fashion For Spring and Summer

Yoga bag2. Yoga

Should large, sugary drinks be banned?By Cynthia Sass, MPH, RD for SHAPE.com

You may have heard about a proposal from New York City Mayor Bloomberg making national and international headlines, which aims to ban sugary drinks larger than 16 ounces from nearly all dining establishments, including restaurants, movie theaters, and street carts. The sanction is aimed at curbing obesity and improving residents' health, but is legislating food and drinks going too far?

When I posted this question on my Facebook fan page I received more comments than I have on any other topic, with opinions going in both directions. Here's where I stand: I do not recommend drinking either regular or diet soda . But while I believe that Mayor Bloomberg's intentions are good, it's been my experience as a health professional that becoming a food cop typically backfires, as I wrote about in a recent post and this goes for someone policing his or her significant other or government-imposed regulation.

RELATED: 8 Sugar-Free Summer

The best race training tips--that aren't about running!You've officially registered for your first half marathon! You're sweating it out at the gym every night and running faithfully every morning. You've cleaned up your diet and are in tip-top shape so that you can fly across that finish line! But what else could you be doing to maximize your training? We wanted to know, so we went to our resident celebrity trainer, Joe Dowdell, to get his best non-running race tips! Here are the four tips you need to know before you hit that pavement on race day:

To help prevent injury and potentially improve your performance on race day, there are a four primary things that you should be doing in conjunction with your running:

1. Regular total-body strength training. Make time in your training schedule for two to three total-body strength sessions per week. For the lower body, incorporate at least one unilateral (single leg) movement into each workout--split squats, reverse lunges, or lateral slide board lunges are all great examples. This will