I was finally able to get back into training this week after a nearly week-long layoff due to the weather and power outages in Western Washington. I had been back in a couple of weeks and making good progress, but when the storms hit, my training in the pool had to take a backseat and wait it out. I kept up on dryland, but that just isn’t the same as being in the pool! As I write this I’m just about to head out for my fourth water workout this week, and all I can say, is I’m incredibly sore. Coupled with getting up a two or three times in the night for our son, I’m even more tired than normal. My husband gets up with our son at night, too, but on nights like last night when he’s gone at the fire station, it’s a little more tricky. When I got up this morning I wondered if I had slept at all!

Of course, being tired and sore doesn’t benefit training at all, but when it’s due to our son, it’s totally worth it. Other parents keep telling me that in a couple of years I’ll miss getting up in the middle of the night with him. When it’s 3am and he’s hungry, I think about that and tell myself no way, but then, during the day–even day’s like today–I think about it and tell myself, I’m definitely going to miss him being this small!

USA Swimming Article: http://www.usaswimming.org/ViewNewsArticle.aspx?TabId=0&Alias=Rainbow&Lang=en&ItemId=4113&mid=9874

I have to say, I love snow and a good storm is always kind of enjoyable. But after spending all of yesterday without power and not being able to swim in the last five days, I’m a little ready for the sun to come back. Or, even if the sun doesn’t come back, I just need enough warm weather to melt the ice so the pools open!

The thing about the Seattle area that people don’t understand is that we’re not exactly a “flat” part of the country. We have hills. Everywhere. Big, small, curvy, narrow, on and on. And when there’s even a semblance of “good snow,” roads close and things shut down. The two pools I train at are tied to school schedules, so when schools are shut down, the pools are too. And, then, no training. This snow we have now is so bad that the pools are even closed tomorrow (Saturday).

So, I love the snow, but I’m ready to swim.

My husband wrote over on his blog about how to build a platform to get your first book deal. You can read it here: http://nathanjendrick.com/?p=142 and check out his other stuff as well, or below.

Building a Platform
www.nathanjendrick.com

A lot of people tell us, “I have a great idea for a sports/fitness/health book! It’s about [insert awesome idea]! How do I get it published?” Well, it takes more than an idea. It takes a platform. You have to ask yourself the question: What would make people want to take my word for it? Further, why are you the person people should listen to on that topic? To give yourself a worthwhile answer, you have to build a platform. You also have to dispell the notion that books sell themselves. It just doesn’t happen. And with the decline of bookstores, midlist titles are falling out of favor due to a lesser and lesser amount of foot traffic. You have to sell yourself before and after the deal. Let’s great this down piece by piece.

First the question becomes, how do I build a platform so I can get a book published?

There are multiple answers to this:

1. Be a celebrity of some sort.

2. Earn a degree in the field and put it to successful use.

3. Build a history of success pertaining to your topic.

For a lot of people, options 1 and 2 aren’t really feasible. You can’t just up and become a movie star and degrees take time. But you want your book deal now, right? Remember that now is relative. Even after the deal, you’re looking at a year before it hits shelves (virtual, physical or otherwise). In any case, you want it as quickly as possible. So if we use our real life example of wanting to get a health/fitness/sports title published, how can you build that platform that can enable you to get the deal?

The easiest way is to pitch articles to publications about the topic. Newspapers, magazines, trade journals, it all depends on your subject matter, but there are numerous options out there. Find a bunch, craft a query, and pitch it time and time again. The barrier for entry into writing an article for a magazine isn’t necessarily that high, depending on where you go. For example, I read a study a dozen years ago about the effect of women in the gym on a man’s testosterone level. I tracked down a magazine (American Health & Fitness), then contacted the lead researcher and asked if I were to write an article, if he would speak to me about it. He said of course (they love the publicity) and then I pitched it. Two weeks later (that’s a fast response) I had a deal and one week after that, the magazine had it’s article. Of course, it took about four months after that for me to get paid, but that’s another story.

So what’s the moral of that little tale? Go out and find your platform. Start small and build it up. Piggy-back on people (like researchers, study authors, etc.) and form relationships. You’re doing something mutually beneficial if you’re promoting the work of someone else while earning yourself work. It’s win-win.

You can also try and find work doing interviews for a magazine, photos, anything that earns you a by-line. It helps when you pitch a book and can say, “I’ve written over 30 articles for nine publications,” or whatever the case may be.

Another avenue is doing presentations. Find clubs or groups or even a library where you can do a presentation or something in conjunction with your topic. Let’s say you’re a baseball coach and want to write a book about a better way to train athletes. Obviously that’s pretty niche, so you may be thinking small publisher. But they still need to know why you’re the guy. So let’s say you started coaching T-ball, then softball, now you’re a D-II coach. Very good progression. Add in that you’ve written technique articles for magazines, interviewed rising stars at the D-I level for your local paper, done presentations to high school teams, etc. and you have yourself a much better pitch on your own name than just saying, “I can write a technique book because I coach.”

You also need to think outside of the box. In the baseball coach example I just gave, what else could he do? He could, for instance, earn a personal training certification and a certificate from a community college in strength training. Suddenly he’s an authority on physical training now, and now he can couple his technique advice with a new facet. It all builds. Little by little, it builds. It gets your name out there, and it gets your the deal.

Now, at the beginning I mentioned having to sell yourself after the deal. Why would you have to do that, you ask? Well, because the book, as I said, won’t sell itself. Once the publication date comes around you need to be out there working even harder to sell copies. One bad book can put your career in the gutter, so you want to hustle and get your name out there to create buzz and make people want to read your work.

There’s plenty more out there, but this blog post is already quite long, so I’ll cover more in the future. Good luck!

Just a quick entry today. Over on his blog, Joe Konrath published his Kindle sales number. If you haven’t marveled at them yet, go ahead: http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/2012/01/100000.html

That’s just on Amazon. I wonder what he’s selling on BN.com?

Nathan and I were still feeling the Christmas spirit, so we thought we’d go ahead and make our Christmas novel free on Amazon for a day. If you have a Kindle, a smartphone with a Kindle app or the Kindle reader on your PC (it’s free!) head on over to Amazon and get CHRISTMAS IS COMING! Please leave a review when you’re finished – we plan a follow-up next year and would love thoughts on the 2011 story!

I admit that I do enjoy the occasional “reality” show. I’ve been known to watch things like Deadliest Catch, Ice Road Truckers, Flying Wild Alaska, Gold Rush, even Moonshiners among others (do I dare admit American Choppers?) But in some cases, there are just shows that need to be avoided entirely. Specifically, if you’re trying to lose weight and get healthy, by all means avoid shows like “The Biggest Loser.”

Shows that have to do with weight loss are big business. They draw in sponsors who want to reach the huge audiences they achieve and they present an image of what, supposedly, it takes to get in shape if you’re overweight. Unfortunately, they’re a horrible representation of both diet and exercise.

Why? Because the show presents an unrealistic program that “normal” people just can’t follow. The contestants on the show have chefs preparing their meals. Very few people in the world have that luxury. The people on the show don’t work while they’re participating. Again, a luxury few people have. So ask yourself, can you dedicate the time, money and resources it takes to recreate the nutrition shown on the show?

Next, the exercise programs the contestants are put through are ridiculous. The amount of weight they lose in such a short period of time can hardly be considered healthy. Rapid weight loss doesn’t lend itself to long-term weight control. But if they do it slowly, it doesn’t make for good television, and that’s the main concern of the show. And when certain shows pit contestants against one another on teams, thus making it one “trainer” against another with the winner determined by total pounds lost, all concern and logic seems to go out the window.

Further on the note of their exercises, contestants talk of working out for hours and hours a day. How many people have the free time to do what they do? The majority of people find themselves becoming overweight because work, family and other life commitments take over and eating right and working out take a backseat. So how realistic is it to think you can suddenly start working out four, six or eight hours daily?

The sheer volume of incidents where the medical staff of the show has to check on contestants should show you something is wrong with what they’re doing. Most of the time, contestants on these shows are miserable. Becoming healthy shouldn’t invoke misery.

Being mentally sound and having a positive attitude is the number one factor in realizing you can take control of your life. Reality television convinces people that there is one way to get fit—their way—and it couldn’t be more wrong. So do yourself a favor and when these shows come on, click them off. Let them be your queue that it’s time to train, go for a walk, spend time with the family or even just read a book. All are options that will surely be time better spent.

A lot of swimmers march out for finals with mp3 players rocking. Some use little tiny ear bugs, others like the big, ear muff style headphones. For me, I can’t remember the last time I walked out to a race listening to music. I don’t think, personally, it does anything for my performance. I prefer focusing on my heart rate, my goals, my stroke and what’s about to happen. But, I did read a nice study recently that talks about music.

A study from Brunel University said that someone listening to the “right music” can improve their athletic performance by as much as 20%. In swimming, that would be ridiculous, so I imagine it’s pretty relative to activity, but it’s still pretty impressive. Now, of course, the “right” music is different for everyone, and I think in my case, the “right” music is no music a lot of the time. But, for you, maybe it can help. If you haven’t tried listening to your favorite songs before a race or during your weight training, you might want to give it a shot!

For those of you who do already include music in your routine, what are your favorite songs?

So here’s New Year’s and I’ve been getting a lot of messages on Facebook and through e-mail from people telling me about what their resolutions are. I support them, I wish them luck, but I encourage them to set goals instead of make resolutions. People are all familiar with the stigma that follows resolutions, especially when they have to do with fitness! Any gym in the country is a telling story about it! You go on January 2 and the offices have lines out the door to sign up. Every day in January is stuffed full, so bad you can’t use any of the equipment you want, when you want to use it. But then come the latter part of February, it’s often a ghost town. I just don’t think people put the emphasis on resolutions that they should. But, if they set goals, and spell out the steps they need to accomplish in order to reach those goals, there’s a much greater chance of success!

For 2012, I encourage you not to make a resolution, but to set goals. And aim high! And don’t just say what you want, but make a plan to get it. If you say you want to qualify for Senior Sectionals, that’s awesome! Now make a meet schedule and talk with your coach and set times you need to be at with each of those meets to show your progress. Then break it down into what your stroke needs to race those times. Then, work hard and have fun! It’s the same thing if you want to lose weight. Set a goal for how much and by when; then write out the steps you need. Buy a fitness book to help, maybe hire a trainer, get a gym membership if you don’t have one, set aside a space to work out at home… whatever you need, whatever fits your schedule, do it and enjoy the ride.

Best wishes to you and yours in 2012! Happy New Year!

- Megan

My husband’s very-well-received book Gym-Free and Ripped is still doing well, five months after publication. So well, in fact, the publisher requested a follow-up, aimed at women, called Gym-Free and Toned. I’m happy to announce the deal was recently signed and it will come out later in 2012. Very cool! In the meantime, feel free to give Gym-Free and Ripped a read!