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| Sunday, 28 December 2003 |
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| News Business Features Editorial
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See the muscles? Sense the strength? He's Sri Lanka's David Hassehdoff, of Panadura-Hemal Tirimanne. Nutritionist, consultant and personal trainer in health related fitness, for Hemal, fitness is as important as life itself. It's his job, passion and day-to-day living.
Hemal's love of fitness, began in his early days, ever since he got his hands on fitness and nutrition books. The contents of what he read, soon became a passion. Being an active child, he took part in sports and even played cricket for his school, Panadura Sumangala College. Doing Bio-science for his A'levels, Hemal went on to do a diploma course in fitness and nutrition and then went to India for his advanced diploma in nutrition and dietetics.
There are two aspects which define a professional fitness consultant. Knowledge and Experience. One should have the correct education on nutrition and physical exercises, plus more importantly practice the two oneself. It's important to be a role model and motivator on the subject. Says Hemal "I basically practice what I preach and preach what I practice". In fitness, itself their are two areas in it. Health Related Fitness and Performance Related Fitness. While Health Related Fitness, deals with developing fitness to your sub maximum level, Performance Related Fitness, as trained for sportsman, pushes it beyond your maximum. "It is important for everyone to have general fitness" says Hemal. For this it is essential to have proper nutrition and dietary habits as well as a comprehensive exercise programme which should include aerobic and weight training.
One should meanwhile also have a daily healthy diet consisting of body builders such as fruits, vegetables, greens, grains, eggs and milk. "It is important to be conscious of your fibre intake for it goes a long way in improving your health" says Hem. The ultimate result of all this-good shape, good health and good self esteem. Being a mode of stress management it gives you self esteem, keeping you in good health it lowers risks of diseases, and keeping you in good shape it retards the aging process, retaining fitness though your body age. Tirimanne is a pioneer in this new industry of fitness. "I'm the one who introduced this way of life in the Kalutara district," he says. Having collected books on nutrition and fitness from small days, Hemal houses a library of such books in his gym, which can be referred by the people. Other than the physical exercises of keeping fit, eating healthily and reading health related books he has a love of experimenting with gym equipment, coming up with his own designs and exercises. Hemal has also contributed articles on keeping fit and proper nutrition to newspapers ever since 1999, and is planning to write a book on slimming, proper nutrition and aerobics. Born on March 7th 1971, this vegetarian is a lover of nature and animals. His biggest influence in life are his parents, who have been behind him, pushed him when necessary and encouraged him to follow his own dreams. Lastly of the future Hemal says "I just want to keep pursuing in exploring and developing my knowledge in this field, which is so vast and keeps evolving through the years". by Farah Macan Markar |
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Director of the "Healthway Fitness Company" in Panadura, his
own gymnasium and training centre, which was opened in 1996, Hemal has
around 300 people coming there for keep fit programmes. With instructors
personally trained by him, the programmes help in strength training,
maintaining general fitness and optimum weight, slimming, figure shaping
and stress management.
"Nutrition is a science" says Hemal "As your dealing
with the human body" Another important aspect in it, according to the
expert is that nutrition and health go side by side.
While aerobics like running, swimming, skipping, walking exercise all
parts of the body, weight training, which is also called anaerobic
training develops your muscles with a resilience, keeping them lean. These
exercises should be undertaken in workouts of an hour, three times a week.
