This transcript is AI-generated and [lightly] edited by a human.

Karina Inkster:

You're listening to the No Bullshit Vegan Podcast, episode 174. K.I. Team member Izzy Katz is here to talk about long-term strength training goals and how she stayed consistent with her training for almost a decade.

Hey, welcome to the show. I'm Karina, your go-to, no-BS Vegan fitness and nutrition Coach. Thanks so much for joining me. You may have noticed that for the first time in this show's six year history, I skipped an episode. So they're supposed to come out every two weeks. But two weeks ago I missed publishing an episode, which is entirely my bad. I missed planning ahead and was completely immersed in directing my city's annual accordion fest, which you can check out by the way@accordionfest.com. It's an annual event that celebrates the versatility of the squeeze box, which I play in case you're new here and didn't know that. And it features all sorts of musical genres, including jazz, classical, tango, film score, and a whole bunch more. 

So I direct this fest with my performance partner, Walter Martella, who's the director of the Powell River Academy of Music, which is where I teach accordion and didjeridoo when I'm not running my coaching business.

So we had two main concerts featuring us and various guest artists and a full day of workshops and presentations. So it was pretty full on there for a while, but it all went very well. My performance anxiety is decreasing slowly but surely, so I'll take that as a huge win. And of course, we learned a lot to make next year's fest even better. 

So as I mentioned, music is what I'm involved in when I'm not working. My main gig, which is kicking people's butts, I mean working with fitness and nutrition clients. And you can check out and apply for our programs at karinainkster.com/coaching. 

Today, I'm excited to welcome back to the show, Izzy Katz. She's been on the podcast before with a different last name by the way, before she got married. Izzy's been on the K team for a number of years, keeping the podcast running smoothly and getting guests prepped for their interviews and sharing with our online audience useful vegan content every week.

Izzy is a Main Street Vegan Academy certified master vegan lifestyle coach and educator. She works with clients worldwide at all stages of their vegan journey. Growing up vegetarian, Izzy became vegan in 2012 following her move from Manchester, England to Vancouver, Canada. Izzy has a law degree from Manchester Metropolitan University. She works for Fraser Health as an executive assistant, the United Players of Vancouver Theater Company as reservations manager, and she's the Communications Head Honcho at my company, KI Health and Fitness. In her free time, she strength trains, plays the piano, loves to travel, and is an assistant foster coordinator for Vancouver based cat rescue organization, VOKRA. She's also a past assistant organizer of Vancouver Meatless Meetup and past director of volunteers for Earth Save Canada. Izzy lives in beautiful White Rock BC with her vegan husband, Carl and Sassy Rescue Kitty Buttercup. Izzy's favorite meal is vegan butter chicken pasta bake, which sounds like an excellent combo of ingredients and basically all my favorite things in one place. Here's our conversation.

Hey Izzy, welcome back to the show. Thanks for speaking with me today.

Izzy Katz:

Hi, Karina, thanks for having me on again.

Karina Inkster:

You know what I realized is I completely forgot what episode it was, what number it was that you were on before, so we'll have to find that and put it in the show notes. But this is Izzy's second appearance on the podcast, so I'm excited about that. It was way back in the early days, I'm pretty sure.

Izzy Katz:

Yeah, it's like 30 something I think from memory. It's around there.

Karina Inkster:

I think so now we're in the one seventies, so yeah, that was a while ago. Anyways, thanks for coming on. We're going to talk about a whole bunch of different things, but what's been happening in Izzy's world? It's been a while since we've caught up. What's new and exciting?

Izzy Katz:

Yeah, it's been a while, so no longer fostering cats. We have a resident cat called Buttercup, very sassy little madam that she is, but she's awesome and we love her so much. And I guess recent news is I got married in August. Just seven-ish months ago, I guess. So yeah, just enjoying married life and just keep doing all my awesome vegan things. So yeah, life is good.

Karina Inkster:

As one does. Was Buttercup a foster fail? Do you call her that?

Izzy Katz:

She was, so we got her, so originally she came into Foster and she was in another foster home and she had her kitten. She was pregnant when she got surrendered. So she had I think five kittens in another foster home in North Vancouver. And then in true buttercup fashion, buttercup is not a sharing cat, so Buttercup did not like the resident cat in the house. Hilarious. So after she'd weaned all her kittens, we got asked if we would take her in. So one Saturday in early January of 2021 I think it was, we got in our car and we drove the hour-ish to North Vancouver to pick her up and brought her home. 

And yeah, it was literally a case of she just needed to kind of be spayed and then she would go up for adoption. And long story short, we ended up keeping her mainly because I think my husband Carl, when we first started fostering, he was a little bit apprehensive about having a cat and he was like, oh, this is a good way for us to get to see how we managed, basically.

But yeah, I think he grew accustomed to having a little buddy during the day. So when we were looking at putting her up for adoption, he was like, I think I want to keep her. And we were like, okay, we'll give it a few days. We'll give it a few days and then sort of make a decision. And then we're like, no, no, no, let's keep fostering. Let's put her up for adoption. And then he was like, but no, I want to keep her. So she became our resident kitty, and I think in some ways, so we're only allowed because we rent, we're only allowed one animal, so we unfortunately can't foster, and I don't think she would share our time with other people anyway or other cats. So it's probably a good thing.

She's wonderful and funny, and yeah, she's not a cuddling cat. She just likes her own space, but she's really sweet. She'll come up and brush against you and flop on the floor and let you pet her belly and stuff like that. And she's very chatty, so it's just having another human in the house, honestly, because yeah, she's just like, yeah, remember me all the time.

Karina Inkster:

That's adorable. Yeah. You like how I went for the cat topic before the 

wedding topic? I'm like, oh my god, cats.

Izzy Katz:

Nothing wrong with the cat talk.

Karina Inkster:

Oh man. But just so our listeners know, I have seen Izzy in real life relatively recently in White Rock actually when I was there for one of my friend's weddings. So we have met up, it's not like I'm just glossing over the wedding fact, although I kind of did and I went straight for the cats. But yeah, also for listeners who don't know who Izzy is, she is our Communications Head Honcho. So that means dealing with all of our podcast guests, getting them ready for their interviews, sending the podcast intake forms, scheduling things, communicating with them, often communicating with PR teams that are booking guests on their behalf. So Communication Head Honcho at KI Health and Fitness, and also client at KI Health and Fitness for how long now? Nine years. Did we just have our trainaversary recently?

Izzy Katz:

It'll be a decade in December. This December it'll be a whole decade.

Karina Inkster:

We have to do something crazy.

Izzy Katz:

Do have to do something crazy for that because in my head, that's just insane. It's just insane that that's been almost 10 years.

Karina Inkster:

Oh my goodness. Yeah. So when we started, what gym were we at? Was that APT?

Izzy Katz:

The one next to the Safeway. On Arbutus.

Karina Inkster:

Yeah. Yes. Okay. So that was the first gym that I ever trained clients at, and I started there in 2011, so that was a while back. So we met there, but then I moved, of course they closed it to knock it down and create condos like most buildings in Vancouver at this point. And so we moved to a different gym. I was at one on Broadway for a long time, and then in 2017 I went completely online. In 2018 I moved to Powell River. So yeah, you've been part of the team in various for almost a decade. How awesome is that?

Izzy Katz:

I know, it's crazy. And it's funny when I think back and just how I knew nothing about fitness when I first joined to start training with you, and I remember I saw you, you gave me a program, we went through it, and then I was training out of the YMCA in downtown Vancouver. It was like a 10 minute walk to my job, and I was like, oh, that's handy. 

But the YMCA in Vancouver is so busy. I used to go to the gym at six o'clock in the morning. I would be there. But yeah, looking back and just when I would go into the gym when I first started training on my own, just do my own workouts, I used to just feel so intimidated walking into a gym space and now I can walk into a gym space and I'm just like, yeah, know exactly what I'm doing and I can tell this is a good gym or not, just by looking at it, which is I just think is really fun. It's just cool that it's gone from one extreme to the other.

Karina Inkster:

That's fricking awesome. Seriously, I mean, we're going to talk about some of that strength training, craziness and awesomeness, but I did just look it up. So this is actually your third appearance on the podcast. So episode 23, way back in the day was recovering from major surgery back when you had abdominal surgery with nine incisions and about how you got back into strength training and daily life.

Izzy Katz:

And that'll be eight years actually in a couple of week and a bit, I think April 7th. So probably about the time this has aired. Yeah, that'll be eight years in April.

Karina Inkster:

Yeah, for sure. That's incredible. Yeah. So back then we were talking about how if you hadn't been strength training regularly, how your recovery might've looked different.

Izzy Katz:

Yeah, definitely. And what I think's interesting is, and I was talking to my husband about this the other day, I could have come up with every excuse under the sun not to keep training after that surgery. I was like, they cut my freaking core open and that was, I had to learn to walk again because of just how invasive it is. 

And I am super grateful that I trained with you because I would've been in worse shape and it would've been so much harder to get better. And there's still things now when I train, I feel certain things and I'm like, yeah, I know that's from surgery. Just certain moves I can feel aggravated, but like I said, I could have come up with every excuse under the sun not to actually train anymore. And what I think is cool is now I'm doing chin up, so oh my God, I just think that's just really awesome. I remember trying chin up in person when we were training and I was just like, there is no way I'm ever going to be able to do that. It's just even with the band, it's just way too hard. And I'm definitely no expert now, but I can at least do one unassisted. And I just think considering what I've been through, I think that's just really awesome and I'm so proud of myself for that.

Karina Inkster:

Well, you really should be. How many chin ups the average female can do? Any guesses?

Izzy Katz:

I'd say without training for it, probably none. I don't know anyone that can do them that hasn't trained for it.

Karina Inkster:

Correct. Yes. It's zero. It's because of the training piece. It's not that women can't do chin up, it's mostly either someone jumps up to a bar and attempts to do a chin up and realizes they can't, and then they're like, well, I guess I can't do chin up, end of story. Or they just don't have a program that is progressive and makes sense for a major strength goal like that. 

So I mean, you've been strength training consistently for a decade almost, and this is a relatively new strength achievement. It's a huge milestone. It's something I think a lot of people have either in the back of their minds like, oh, wouldn't it be cool? Or they have as a legit current strength goal, do an unassisted pull up or chin up. But a lot of folks don't really know what it takes to get there, how long it might take, what's reasonable in that timeframe, what kind of exercises to do that aren't even chin up related.

You mentioned doing chin up with bands, for example. A lot of people think about that or the assisted chin up machine in the gym, which is not the greatest, honestly. So what has it looked like for you? It's been a long-term goal. I mean, I think it's extra, extra impressive, and it's an extra major achievement given what you've gone through, given the surgery, given the recovery, you still nailed an unassisted chin up with, by the way. Perfect form. We've seen it. I've seen it with my own eyeballs, and I can tell you it's not one of those bro chin ups. It's like three inch range of motion. This is a full dead hang all the way to the top, all the way back down, legit. So what has your training looked like? What has that been like for you over I think it was about 18 months?

Izzy Katz:

Yeah, so I would say when I first began training way back in the day with you, I know we would do assisted ones and it was just so hard. I was like, there's, I don't often say there's no way I'm ever going to be eligible to do something, because what I like about myself is I always set myself challenges, which usually are completely out of my comfort zone and I manage to get to them somehow. It's just an Izzy thing.

Karina Inkster:

So awesome.

Izzy Katz:

So way back in the day, I was just like, I'm just going to table that because that seems really hard. But maybe one day. And then I would say probably about two years ago I started thinking about it. I would've got engaged around that time as well, and I'd sort of with the pandemic and everything, we'd created our own little mini home gym and I'd got a chin bar. I was like, oh, I actually want to actually start doing something to kind of get towards this ball. I feel like I'm in relatively decent shape. So yeah, first thing really was get the chin up bar. I'm lucky that at work we only for the pandemic, my work gym actually didn't close too much. I think we were closed for a couple of months. So I'm super lucky that at work we actually have a Chinup bar that I can use.

It's a little bit slippy, but it gets the job done. The first things was kind of just getting a bar and starting to use the bar at the gym at work, and I know we chatted about stuff and I was like, okay, how do I get started on this? And you were like, okay, let's get you some Chinup bags basic. I remember the first time I tried an assisted chin up with the band, the band that makes it the easiest at the work gym. I was just like, holy shit, this is so hard. I'm just like, this is just like, what am I doing? Literally, what am I doing?

Karina Inkster:

What the heck am I getting myself into? What did I sign up for?

Izzy Katz:

I was just like, there's just no way. I was like, this is not possible. So yeah, just starting with that, I think I could maybe get two reps in with an assistance band and I was like, I'm done now. I'm done now. So started with the resistance band type thing and also just doing Dead Hangs and stuff. I know you and Zoe were really good about programming stuff that would help me get to that goal. The thing that I found, I'd say the most difficult was negatives. I was like, I used to detest negatives so much because, so the way the setup is at the gym at work is that I have to jump up to get to the top of the bar, and that is really hard on your arms.

Karina Inkster:

Can you explain to our listeners who might not know what a negative is, what a negative is?

Izzy Katz:

Yeah, so a negative basically is you start at the top of the bar. So basically you're gripped to the bar, you're at the top of the bar and you lower yourself down and you try and do it as slow as possible. Really the best way to build strength negatives are really hard. That's all I have to say.

Karina Inkster:

Yes, they are.

Izzy Katz:

Especially, they're not really hard now, my body's used to it, but I remember the first, I'd say maybe month, two months of doing negatives, I would just be like maybe could do one set a week because I would just feel that sore after negatives. It works your whole arm, so your grip is your grip strength and just your whole arm, and it's just kind of insane. So I would go for massages to try and help, but I literally would feel like I had those little T-Rex arms

Just because it's so difficult. But I found once you kind of get over that it really hurts and your body gets used to it. I found negatives really helped with actually building the strength up to be able to pull myself up more using the band basically. I'd say every so often I would get a little bit, so I have issues with my shoulder, my left shoulder sometimes, so I just sleep weird. I know I do. I'm one of these people that just moves around a lot in their sleep. Even my eye mask is the other side of the room when I wake up in the morning. So sometimes I'll accidentally pull my shoulder muscle and my sleep, and that kind of takes me out for a week. And I can't really do anything upper body related just because it's so painful. But I found, actually just side note on that, I found that actually now that I can do chin ups, that happens a lot less interesting.

I definitely have more strength in my back, so that's really cool. Yeah, the more negatives I would do, the more I'd actually be able to pull myself up more with the band. So assisted chin ups, every so often I would just try and just be like, okay, can I pull anything from a dead hang or halfway up or something like that? I would just try. And usually the answer was no. So I'd just be like, okay, just going to forget. Just going to keep going, keep going. So I would basically work on increasing how many reps I could do either negatives or just assisted and just try and build those numbers up. And I want to say, so I did that for about 12 ish months, and then we got married around that time, and after the wedding I was like, you know what? I'm just going to try.

I'm just going to try and do a chin up. I'm just going to stand on the floor. I did it at the home with the bar we have at home. I said, I'm just going to try from standing. Can I pull myself anywhere over this bar? And I did one, and I was like, what has happened? That's literally the first thing that went through my head. I was like, I cannot believe that there was any movement, but B, I just got my chin up, chin over that bar and okay, it's not from a dead hand, but it's from something. And then my arms were done for about two days. They were like, I was sat in the couch, I could feel like my biceps just shaking. I was like, oh my God. And then the next time I was like, okay, Carl, my husband. I was like, you've got to film this.

I said, I want to send this to Karina and just show her that look what's going on here. So I remember him filming, and I think it was around the time you were visiting for your friend's wedding as well, kind of all coincided. And I was like, look what I can do, which was super amazing. So from there, it was just a case of just, I managed one of those basically from being stuck on the floor. And then I started increasing that, still doing the negatives, still doing assisted chin ups, but just maybe taking a break of a minute between sets and just saying, okay, can I do another one from the floor? And for the first couple of weeks, the answer was no, but I kept building it. So now I'd say I can probably get, if I'm stood on the floor and I take a little break between sets, I can probably do five to six, which is I think pretty good.

 

And I'm like, what the hell? But I know it was either back end of the year, so late 2023 or very early 20, 24, it might've been very early 20, 24. I remember you saying to me, you were just try it. Just hang and see if you can pull yourself. And you were like, it's probably, don't worry about it if it doesn't happen, but just see if there's any movement. And I was at the work gym and I was like, okay, I'm just going to try this. I remember literally gripping the bar and just being so afraid to take my feet off the supports. I was like, I'm going to go nowhere, and there's just a fear inside. And then I was like, okay, Izzy, just do it. And then I pulled and I moved and I got up over that bar and I was just like, holy hell. I just did my stood from a dead hang. So yeah, so we left it a few days and then I video recorded it. I was like, I want to make sure I'm actually doing this properly. And I remember sending it to you and you were like, dude, that is super amazing.

Karina Inkster:

I probably said that exact sentence, dude, that's super amazing.

Izzy Katz:

I saw someone yesterday who'd been on vacation. They were super Irish. They're like, dude. And I was like, oh my God, I'm channeling my inner career. But, and since then, it's just been a case of I can't do more than one from a dead hang if I take, I can't do more than one consecutive from a dead hang. That's not happening right now, but I can do one from a dead hang, take a break for maybe a minute and then do another one from a dead hang. So that's huge. There's progress and it's little. I think that's the thing to keep in mind. It's not a goal that you're going to get straight away. It's going to take time. It's going to take time. And there are days where you're going to feel like, this is really hard and I don't want to keep going, but you can do it. 

And I guess that's what I would say to people, just believe in yourself. If you work hard enough, I'm long, I've had it. If I can do it, and I've had stomach surgery and I was the least athletic child in school, I literally would get picked last for everything. And now it makes me laugh. If we had a work Olympics or something, I'd probably be team captain.

Karina Inkster:

Oh, a hundred percent.

Izzy Katz:

But just keep going and just keep trying. Get a good coach or at least get a good program where it's going to enable you to make those progressions, because otherwise it's kind of hard if you don't know what you're doing, it's really hard to get there. It's not like we're male and we're built differently and it's easier. It's like you got to put the book in. That's the only thing I can say. You really have to put the work in.

Karina Inkster:

Well, you're an absolute inspiration because one of the things I'm thinking here is, okay, this is an 18 month project, and really if you think about it, it's more like a decade in the works, right? Because you had all of your strength training background before you officially started training for Chin-ups, but you mentioned a couple times that there were instances where you're hanging from a bar, you try to chin up, nothing happened, but you just kept going. You're like, well, okay, moving on. Stuck to the plan. What gets you through that? Because a lot of folks would do that. Like I mentioned at the very beginning of our conversation, I've actually spoken to a lot of females specifically who walk up to a bar, try a chin up. Of course they can't do one because they haven't trained for one. And that's it. End of the story. How did Izzy keep going for 18 months until that first chin up happened?

Izzy Katz:

I think part of it is in a stubbornness because I'm just like, I really want to do this, and I'm just, I'm going to try. And also just looking back at the stuff that I have done since I started training and before I met you, I'd never lifted weights in my life, period. And now I look at what I can lift, and none of that came in the first session.

Karina Inkster:

Good point.

Izzy Katz:

Everything I've had to build up to every single thing that I do, I've had to build up to. And there's things that I can't stand like, Hey, I detest cardio. I just hate it. There's nothing worse for me than being an elliptical, or maybe the rower actually think is evil, but if I don't practice it, and if I don't try, it's always going to be that way. It's like, I'm never going to be able to row for five minutes unless I just can't row for five minutes. I don't know why, but unless I work in it, it's never going to change. So I think for me, it's just knowing that A, I have great coaches that really help me and that I trust and I know or building things into my program to help me get there. And also just my personality is just like, I'm just going to keep going.

And you know what? If it doesn't happen, I can just do assisted ones. I can do more of those. Have I ever, just literally the other week I went down a band because I started on the thickest band and I'm on the second to thickest band because in my head I was like with myself, I said to myself, okay, you've got to get two sets of 10 out of this green band. Before you drop down a band, Izzy, you have to do two sets of 10, and then you can go down a band. And I think it was maybe last week or the week before I finally got to that, and I was like, okay, going down a band. And even the other day when I tried it with the band that's got less resistance, I was like, I got a set of six and a set of five. And I was like, I should pretty proud of that. And once I get to two sets of 10 with that, I go down a band and I know all of that is helping me in the long run. It'll all play together and work.

Karina Inkster:

That's brilliant. And it's so applicable to anything people want to work on. I mean, I remember very clearly when I was 19, hanging from a bar at a playground with one of my friends. We were on a walk around science world in Vancouver, the False Creek area. There's a little playground there, I think right outside science world. Anyways, I have this image of my brain that that's where it was just swings and monkey bars and whatever, and we were just playing around and I'm like, oh my God, I want to try a chin up. So I'm hanging there. I think I even have either a photo or a video from an old school camcorder that I used to use back in the day that was my grandma's. Anyways, I remember hanging from this bar, and I was a tiny person by, at that point, I think I weighed probably 20 pounds at least less than I do now.

And I'm hanging from this bar not moving at all. I'm trying to do at least an inch of movement. Nothing's happening. I'm just like, how is this physically possible? But I think that day was when I started thinking about chin ups. Like, Hey, this is actually something you need to have a plan for. And this is already a couple years into my strength training journey, if that's what you want to call it. I started when I was 16, so I'd already been lifting reasonably. I mean, I didn't have coaches, I didn't have a decent plan. I was just kind of getting into it myself. But the chin up thing just seemed impossible to me at that point. And I remember it very clearly hanging from that bar with my friend just being like, yeah, that's hilarious. You can't move. I'm like, yeah. So how do I get to the point where I can? and thus began the chin up journey.

Izzy Katz:

And now you do weighted ones, which I just look at. I'm just like, oh my gosh, how do you do that? Which is just so badass.

Karina Inkster:

Yeah, but it's almost 20 years down the line though. I mean, I'm going to turn 38 in June. So two decades of being obsessed with chin ups. Well get to the point where you're chaining accordions to yourself and doing chin ups just for shits and giggles. That's in your future though, Izzy, based on where you're going now.

Izzy Katz:

Yeah, definitely. But one thing I really like is I was, so I work out at lunchtime, at the gym, at work, and for some reason the bulk of the people that I see at the gym, at work, at lunchtime or female, and I dunno why there's not an equal representation of people there, but it's usually females and there's one or two of us that use the weight section, and most others do cardio. But what I find cool is that the people that I do see at the gym, they've all asked me about it. They're like, wow, you can do those. How long did it take you? And it's nice to start talking to them and get them interested in it too. I always throw in that I'm vegan just because I'm like, I'm so good

Karina Inkster:

That of course it's a superpower.

Izzy Katz:

But yeah, it's nice to see other people look at it and be like, oh, maybe I can do it too. I literally couldn't move. Similar to you, it's like I'm not going nowhere and I cannot really go very far with a band. So it's kind of nice to give other people, I don't want to say inspiration, but just change their perceptions and look at it and just be like, oh, maybe if I train for it. One of the girls, I go to the gym, she does kickboxing fights and stuff, and I'm like, you should try. She's like, oh, there's a bar at my condo gym. And I was like, hello. Just give some fans and stop. Yeah. So it's nice just to see other people just be a little bit more like, oh, maybe I could do it if I tried.

Karina Inkster:

You brought up veganism as I was going to. I saw the parallels there because people know we're vegan and we don't need to necessarily shout it from the rooftops, although we like doing that in a positive way, of course, but it's kind of the same. People notice you doing your thing, people ask you questions. You can just be an awesome vegan, and people will know that you're a person to go to ask about recipes or, Hey, I need to make dinner for my son's girlfriend and she's vegan. What do I do? So you become a go-to person just by doing your thing and having it out there that this is what you do. And I think it's the same with strength training where people are clueing in, I mean, not in a creepy watching your every move kind of way, but just like, oh, that Izzy, I see her at the gym. She's badass. She does chin ups.

Izzy Katz:

Yeah, and it's like I don't shove that I'm vegan down people's throats. I mean, people that know me,

Karina Inkster:

Right? Me neither. They

Izzy Katz:

Know that I'm vegan. I've been vegan for over a decade too now. It's a long time, but I like that it's just challenging people's perceptions. It's like a, most people think women can't do chin-ups, and then there's no way a vegan could do them. So I'm like, yeah, actually I can. And one of my friends at work, she is pregnant now, so she can't really go to, well, she can go to the gym, but she doesn't feel comfortable going to the gym because she's pregnant. Fair enough. But anyway, one of my work friends, she calls me the Beast,

Karina Inkster:

Which I love. Oh, I love that.

Izzy Katz:

I said, I'm going to get it put on my nameplate on my dad's. She's like, don't go to the gym with Izzy. She's a beast.

Karina Inkster:

I love that.

Izzy Katz:

It makes me laugh and I'm like, well, please do go to the gym. The thing I find challenging with that is though, I'm like, please do go to the gym with me. Because A, I don't want you to feel bad. I just want you to look at me and just be like, oh, if I work, I can be like that too. It's not about showing off at all. I'm all for people doing whatever they can in any way related to fitness. It's not like I want to be the best person there, not I don't, and I just do my own thing. And I like feeling strong.

Karina Inkster:

That's what it's all about. Well, okay. So in terms of long-term strength training, then what has kept you going in that department? I know Izzy is a stubborn human, like me. Sometimes people say like, oh, they ask me how old I was when I started accordion, and they assume that it was like five, but it was 27. I started in 2013, and they're like, oh, well, how come you're playing concerts and all this stuff? And I'm like, because I'm stubborn. That's literally the only answer. I have a very routinized practice schedule and I'm stubborn about it. That's the answer. 

So I feel like that's part of the answer here, but how for you, have you maintained, I don't want to use the term motivation because from our discussions and listeners know from this show that we don't rely on motivation for long-term goals because it's very fleeting. Sometimes we're motivated, sometimes we're not. We have to teach ourselves to operate without motivation. But what keeps you going? What keeps you long-term consistent, let's say?

Izzy Katz:

The biggest thing for me is it's built into my day period. Okay. It's built into my day, my workouts for, so I'm extremely fortunate that I just go down two floors at work and there's a gym there that I can access 24 7. So that is huge for me. I know I could probably move to another job, but I'm like, there's no gym at that site. So no, I'm good here because the fact that it's there is, I know we have stuff at home, which is great off work for Easter now, and it's like, okay, I can just do stuff at home and worst case scenario, I'll just go to the gym. It's just 10 minute bus right away. But I know having an actual gym where I work, so basically access to what I need, that's the main thing. And then just building it into my day.

So we do weekly check-ins like myself, you and Zoe. We have a weekly check-in on a Sunday, just like, what have I done this week? Basically? And usually on a Sunday, I will go through my calendar and look at my week ahead and be like, okay, what days can I work out? That's the main thing is what days can I work out? And then I sort of work that around. Sometimes I'm in meetings, although lunchtime, so it doesn't always work, but I try and aim for get to the gym three times a week at work. That's it. That's all I need to do. And then just go for walks. Outside of that, I just find walking is really beneficial for me. My real hack is just build it into your day. If you know that between 12 and one, that's your workout time, once you get into the routine of doing that, it's so much easier.

And there's days where I don't feel up to it. There was a day, I think it was last week, and I just felt like garbage. And I was like, okay, I don't think I can do workout number one today because it's a bit out of my comfort zone on a good day. So maybe let's go do the TRX workout that I've got in my app. That's another thing. Look at how you feel and adjust your workouts, what you have available to how you're feeling that day. Yeah, there's some days where I don't feel like I have it in me to do something really, really strenuous. I'll do something a little bit easier, but I'm still working out. So yeah, I think the main thing for me is just having it built into my day and just being consistent around sticking to that schedule rather than just being like, oh, I'm motivated to go to the gym because Thursdays where I'm not, but it's like, okay, it's gym day today, going to the gym. I'll see you all at one o'clock. And I just go down and see what I can do.

Karina Inkster:

This whole idea of trying to operate without motivation is exactly what you just said around, it's built into your day. It is baked into what Izzy does in a week, and you're also still planning ahead. So on a Sunday, just for folks who are listening with all of our clients, regardless of what program they're in on a Sunday in their own time, they're sending us a quick check in, what was a win and a challenge from the past week and what's something you're planning for the coming week? And it doesn't have to be a full breakdown of Monday, I'm going to do this, Tuesday, I'm going to do this. But just something you're planning, something you want accountability around. For Izzy, it's usually I've planned out the days I'm going to work out. I might do some food prep on this date, like the basic building blocks of staying consistent. So there's a little bit of planning ahead and there's a little bit of this is just Izzy's normal something. It would feel weirder for you to miss a workout than it does to do a workout, right?

Izzy Katz:

Yeah. And I definitely on vacations of when I'm away from work, it's definitely harder to stick to that routine because there's so much going on at home and there's other competing priorities. But for me to skip it, and I don't even feel good when I skip stuff because A, mentally I beat myself up. But then B, I'm so used to that movement that I don't feel as good either. And I find as well, I know a lot of people are into meditation and things and yoga, and I used to do a lot of yoga, pre stomach surgery. I find some of the downward dog is not a great move for me. It's just not just too much pressure from different things. So I can't really do as much yoga as I used to do. And meditation, I try when I can, I try and do meditation, but I find going to the gym is kind of therapy for me. I'm very in the zone and I'm focused on what I'm doing. And a lot of the mind chatter sort of stuff is gone because I'm just trying to focus on lifting heavy stuff. So I find it's not just good for me physically, but it's also really beneficial for me mentally as well.

Karina Inkster:

And that's a benefit that I think a lot of folks have to experience for themselves. It's well known that working out specifically strength training actually, but any type of exercise is related to positive mental health outcomes. But I think with something like lifting, there's a specific focus required sometimes with cardio for people who do cardio. And by the way, the only form of cardio I is swimming well and jump rope, but any other form of cardio, nope. You can kind of zone out a little more. You're not worried about dropping a 50 pound weight on your head, for example. And so for a lot of people, the mental benefit of something repetitive running or swimming comes from that aspect, which I can appreciate. But with lifting, it's different. You have to focus on different moves. You have to set up for things. You're counting reps, you're thinking about the mind muscle connection. You're making sure your form is good if you're doing it at an appropriate intensity. There's not a lot of room for other things in our brains at that time.

Izzy Katz:

And I like doing things that stretch me for myself. I really like doing things that stretch me. So some of the moves that I can tell, sometimes Zoe's thrown something in just so she's like, let's see if Izzy can manage this. And I'm like, hundred, I'm not quite sure, but let's try. And sometimes I look at some of the workout stuff and I'm just like, I don't know if I can do that, but I'm going to give it a go anyway. And it's kind of nice to be like, oh, I can actually, I can't maybe do 10 reps of it, but I can do six or something. And it's kind of nice to build up on that and be like, look what I can achieve if I try, especially with what I've been through, I always look at that and just think, wow, you're doing, I think it was pushups the other week we were doing pushups with one foot, and I just looked at that and I was like, I don't think I can do those, but let's try.

And I got six out. I was like, check me out. I can do one foot in pushups. So it's really, for me, I just really just achieving sort of overcoming what I don't think is possible and just being like, okay, let's just try it. It's be open-minded. Worst case scenario, you can't do it, but you can keep working at it until you can. And I don't, for myself, I don't have the greatest mobility in my hips. I know I don't. So I do struggle with some of the lower body stuff, whereas I feel like I'm stronger in upper body moves just because of that. I can't get my squat as perfect as I'd like, but I'm like, just whatever. It's fine. It's still a squat and we're limited at work. We don't have a bench press and a squat racket and things like that at the work gym. So there is limits with what I can do, but I think I make the best use of the equipment that we do have, and I think it's just amazing that we have a good gym that I can use, and I don't necessarily have to go and share stuff with all the bros at the fitness place up the street.

Karina Inkster:

Isn't that a bonus? A hundred percent. Yes, absolutely. Plus you have your own setup at home, and this just goes to show that you can get insanely strong without barbells and without plates. I mean, you just work with whatever equipment you have. It could be kettlebells, it could be resistance bands. If you're going to do chin ups, you need some kind of a bar. So getting your home set up, like the doorway bar, that was huge. But you don't need an insane amount of weights, you don't need barbells if you don't have access to those. It's just whatever's available. TRX has been huge for us in our programming just at home and also in the drawer in your work desk that you can just take to your gym.

Izzy Katz:

And it comes on vacation too. I know for a honeymoon, it didn't really work out because the setup up in the Airbnb that we were staying at just didn't kind of work for it. And I'm kind of fussy about floors as well, and I'm just like, ah, it's been vacuumed properly, and I just get a bit paranoid about stuff like that. Anyway, so although I did find a chin up bar in this park that we went to for lunch, so I did a couple of chin ups when I was away. Love it. But TRX is so easy to throw in your suitcase or to keep it work. And I know you bought that TRX for me years ago. It was like a birthday present or something. And people ask me all the time, they're like, where did you get this TRX from? And I'm like, well, I think it came from Amazon, but it didn't buy it. And they don't exist that company anymore.

Karina Inkster:

No, it's too bad. I remember that company because I think I still have mine. It's the same one. It just lasts forever. And I took it to Australia because Murray, my husband and I went for three weeks back in 2017 with only carryon, and a big portion of my carryon luggage was my travel dijeridoo, because of course I'm going to bring a dig if I'm going to Australia. I also bought diges when I was there. But anyway, so I didn't have a ton of space for the food that I have to pack. Being someone with food allergies and a vegan, like half my shit is food and the dig redo doesn't leave a ton of room for other things. But I did bring the TRX and just hooked it up to a tree or found a goalpost in a park or whatever. And that was basically my gym for three weeks. It was amazing.

Izzy Katz:

And if we're staying at hotels, which we do occasionally, if we go to Whistler or something like that, the hotel room doors are really strong, so you can generally just loop it over and shut the door. Even though it opens inwards, it's not going to give you too much problems just because of how strong the door is on a house door. I wouldn't do that, but on a hotel door, I'm like, I'm okay with that. So I think that TRX is just a lifesaver, honestly. It's such a good little piece of equipment. And then resistance spans as well. I've got resistance bands that I can hook through the door and things like that, and just, we have adjustable dumbbells and my husband uses them quite a lot. So it's just nice to have little things at home that help, like you said, you don't need a whole bunch of equipment and you don't necessarily need squat rack or a deadlift thing or anything like that. Just you can build quite a lot of strength with the basics.

Karina Inkster:

Well, and you're living proof of that. You're like the poster child of making use of what you have, being stubbornly consistent, nailing long-term goals. I mean, that's just super inspiring. We should all aim to be a little more like Izzy is the moral of today's story.

Izzy Katz:

I give credit to Karina for making me more like this.

Karina Inkster:

Oh, well, thank you. I appreciate that. But you're the one putting in all the work and being consistent and going through surgery, coming back from that, not giving up. I think that's super amazing. So if folks want to listen to Izzy on other episodes, we have episode 23 talking about said surgery and recovery and what that meant. And episode 90, which came out during the pandemic where you're talking about working in a hospital setting during covid, what that means for your fitness, what that means for health, just kind of generally what was happening at that time. So if folks want to listen to 23 and 90, those are the other easy appearances on the show. So I'm super grateful that you came back. We had another chat we could catch up. Anything you want to leave our listeners with as we're finishing up?

Izzy Katz:

I'd say just don't get disheartened. If you are finding that you're not able to do something in the moment, it doesn't mean that you won't be able to down the line. So just keep going and believe in yourself. And one day you'll be doing chin ups too, so yeah, just keep going.

Karina Inkster:

I love that. Absolutely. That's what I'm getting out of our discussion is there will be times where things don't work, or you try something and you're like, oh, man, I still can't do that. Yeah, sure. Disappointment is all part of the deal. That's fine. You can accept that. But it doesn't mean quitting. It doesn't mean you're never going to be able to do it. It means you need to keep going with some kind of a consistent plan. And also, it's not the end of the world if you never do a chin up or whatever goal you have set for yourself. You're still gaining strength, you're getting mental health benefits, you're increasing your bone density, you're building muscle. All of these things are happening. Whether or not you achieve that end goal, it's nice to achieve that. And yeah, but look at all these other potential positive things that are happening along the way.

Izzy Katz:

And I would've been okay if I never got to that, even if I just kept going and it's like, Nope, you're never going to be able to do that. I would've been like, well, at least I tried. If I've never tried, I wouldn't have known. So, yeah. Yeah. But I believe that if people put the work in at some point, they'll at least have more movement than they did when they started.

Karina Inkster:

Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Well, Izzy, it's always great to chat. Thank you so much for coming back on the show. Fantastic to speak with you.

Izzy Katz:

Thanks so much for having me, Karina.

Karina Inkster:

Izzy, thanks again for joining me on the podcast. Access our show notes at nobullshitvegan.com/174 to connect with Izzy and to check out her previous episodes. Thanks for tuning in.