There is no magic formula to acquiring sponsorship, and mostly it is luck of the draw or being in the right place at the right time. I have never actively gone out to seek sponsorship, the sponsors have found me, as happened by talking to Abi on the Margarita stand at a comp I was backstage helper at or, in Next Generation Supplement’s case, Michelle Nazaroff put in a good word for me as we work so well as a team together and she knew we would have so much fun working the stands together.

My first piece of advice would be to get out there and enjoy your sport and let your performance and passion speak for itself. You don’t need to be a world class athlete (just look at me for example), but you do need to be a good quality athlete who is a great ambassador for your particular sport, especially if you are passionate about it.

Do some research on the company, just like you would any other job application. Some of the requirements you may be expected to deliver are:

• Promoting your sponsor’s company and products through personal referrals and retail encouragement.
• Having a passion for the products with extensive personal experience and results using them.
• Talking to other athletes and people about the products, this will entail being knowledgabel about them.
• Training or racing in logo branded clothing OR at least have a logo prominently displayed on your clothing, helmet, equipment, etc.
• Using and endorsing only your sponsors products and not that of any opposition companies.

The second piece of advice would be to get yourself online and try to build up a network of like-minded people by having a website or blog. The more exposure you have, the more visible you are.

If you have the courage to approach a sponsor, you need to tell them what YOU can do for THEM. Your correspondence doesn’t need to be a detailed 500 page essay of your life from birth. Most companies just simply want to know who you are, what you’ve done, what your future goals are, your experiences with their products, and how you plan to promote the company if you are selected to be sponsored. The shorter the better. Some of the information you should include is:

• Your complete contact information – name, address, phone number, email address, web site URL (if applicable).
• A letter explaining how you already do or will promote the company in your sporting circles and the community.
• Brief resume/history or results, primarily focusing on the preceding season.
• List of the company’s products that you use.
• A very clear explanation of what you are looking for from the company.

The fact of the matter is that sponsorship is a job. I have seen so many athletes release a statement that they have been sponsored, but then I hear nothing further from them. You “work” for your sponsor and it is your “job” to promote them whenever and wherever you can. You, in turn are paid in whatever compensation arrangements you have established with your sponsor, such as free clothing, free supplements, discount supplements, etc. You also need to be realistic here and realise that you may never get paid in cash and you may never get everything for free (especially in bodybuilding as it is not really a lucrative sport).

Once you are sponsored, you need to support that sponsor and mention them whenever you can, be it in any media coverage right down to even facebook or blog updates. Keep your sponsors in the loop with what is happening with you, your results and achievements, and let them know how you have promoted them. There is nothing more frustrating to a sponsor that having an athlete that does no work or promotion for them. If you fail to do this “job,” then don’t expect to continue your employment. You need to follow through on your promises and obligations to your sponsor.

Don’t expect for the terms of your sponsorship to not change. As you progress in your sport you will see different levels of sponsorship. When you reach elite level (I’m not there yet!!), there can be a great deal of extra pressure on you in the form of expectations on your performance by your sponsors, along with increased commitment to the company and the community. You will be required to fulfill your responsibilities even if it impacts your performance or training, as in attending an event for the company two nights before a big race or your national competition if your sponsor wants you there. Most companies will be sensitive to what you need as an athlete and your time constraints.

Always remember that you need to be a good representative and ambassador for your sponsor, no matter how big the company is or in which way they sponsor you. Each sponsor deserves the same level of commitment, especially those that helped you when you first started out, as they are the ones who helped you when you needed it the most. Your relationship with your sponsor needs to be one of absolute integrity. For your own integrity and that of the company, it is not right to endorse multiple brands of nutrition products, or be seen using another company’s products in place of the one who sponsors you, just look at Britney Spears and the Pepsi/Coke debacle!! It is always better to over deliver than not or barely meet the minimum requirement!!

I hope this has provided some information for anyone actively seeking sponsorship. Good luck!!

Love Rae xxx

So How Much Muscle Can You Gain?

By:Wannabebig.com

One frequently asked question which always seems to plague gym instructors, Internet message boards, various magazines and books has to do with muscle gain. Many of us have heard or have overheard the local gym guru or the community fitness expert boasting about how much he/she has gained, or how one of their clients has gained 10 pounds in a month.

When someone hears this, a light goes on inside their head and it kicks off a series of thoughts that quickly translate into a set of unrealistic goals. I will say this: that from whichever mouth it comes, whether a highly regarded coach, trainer or a bodybuilder, the fact of the matter is that it’s physiologically impossible to achieve this muscle status! Later on, I’ll explain why.

Often, people making this claim have a faulty perception of how the body either works or are just super-optimistic. Of course, it’s not only the gym (freaks) that espouses this myth; it can be traced to numerous ads in a variety of muscle magazines lining the bookstore shelves. The bodybuilding industry, nowadays, thrives on people who are hungry for a quick change.

Mass Monster They are ready to buy into the notion that a change can be accomplished because a certain ad lays claims by way of an incredible cut and paste transformation. Frequently, it’s a beginner who testifies to the astounding feat of gaining 30 pounds over a period of several months.

This is, no doubt, a great achievement but most have been fooled into believing that a large percentage is muscle when most of it is due to an increase in glycogen stores, body fat and water.

Now it’s not my intention to dash your hopes or crush your dreams. I’d merely like you to know that the body simply cannot adapt at the speed claimed by many.

For example, Chris Thibaudeau of Iron magazine online states: “making physical changes takes time;” this couldn’t be closer to the truth.

So be forewarned that in your quest to change or morph yourself into the next Ronnie Coleman; the transformation is going to take more than a few months. Our bodies are equipped with systems that need to adapt together over a period. This is what you should bear in mind while working towards the goal of a more muscular physique.

Sometimes we are our own worst enemy when it comes to gaining muscle. Nine times out of ten, most of us fail in the dedication department. What starts out as a carefully planned and calculated program, ends up hitting some bumps along the way.

However, even if we are dedicated (some may call it obsessed) and diligent about our nutrition, with proper training and recuperation practices, we still would not be able to add more than 1 pound of muscle in a week. That’s right, only one pound a week–and this is assuming you’ve had a darn good week both inside and outside the gym!

Often, people believe that if they take in 3500 more calories during a week that they will be successful at packing on slabs of muscle. However, the old adage that one pound equates to 3500 calories is right for fat but NOT muscle. If you want to gain one pound of fat, then you should be taking in an extra 3500 calories a week. Now there’s one way of putting on some weight!

As I mentioned earlier, the body’s multiple systems are all intricately interconnected: if one system has not undergone the proper adaptation, then the results will show in the form of a failure to produce optimal hypertrophy of the muscle complex. For example, if we were to look at some of the soft tissues involved in the hypertrophy process of the muscle complex, we’d see that muscle would generally adapt to a load within several days.

Hypertrophy: Enlargement or overgrowth of a muscle due to the increased size of the constituent cells. Increased training will result in an increase in the size of cells, while the number of cells stays the same.

Unlike the tendons and ligaments, studies have shown that muscle responds by adapting after a period of several weeks or even months of progressive loading (McDough & Davies, 1984). It also should be noted that the protein turnover rate in collagen occurs approximately every 1000 days.

This clearly shows that even if one were to gain in bodyweight, the body would only be able to accommodate a certain amount in the form of muscle; otherwise, the muscles would fall prey to injury due to the time-span in adaptation rates for various other tissues.

Bloated Those who scoff at this and continue to believe they’ve gained super size over such a short period forget, as suggested earlier, that much of the increased bodyweight is largely due to increased body fat stores, glycogen and water.

Hypertrophy of the muscle complex has, so far, been shown to be controlled by what is known as protein turnover (the breakdown of damaged muscle proteins and creation of new and stronger ones). This process takes time. Just as the many living organisms around us in nature require time to grow, so do our muscles. In our enzymes the protein turnover rate occurs approximately every 7-10 minutes. In the liver and plasma, it’s every 10 days.

And in the hemoglobin it’s every 120 days. In the muscles, protein turnover rate occurs approximately every 180 days (6 months). This lends even more support to the observation that the turnover rate limits the natural body (of the non drug-using athlete, bodybuilder) in building muscle quickly.

The Colgan Institute of Nutritional Sciences (located in San Diego, CA) run by Dr Michael Colgan PHD, a leading sport nutritionist explains that in his extensive experience, the most muscle gain he or any of his colleagues have recorded over a year was 18 1/4 lbs. Dr Colgan goes on to state that “because of the limiting rate of turnover in the muscle cells it is impossible to grow more than an ounce of new muscle each day.”

In non-complicated, mathematical terms, this would equate to roughly 23 pounds in a year! Keep in mind that high-level athletes are the subjects of these studies.

Putting It All Together

Now that I’ve put a damper on your expectations you can step back and take a closer look at your training, nutritional practices and recuperation tactics. There’s no need to beat yourself up because you’ve only been able to gain a pound a week for the last 6 weeks. If anything, assuming your body fat levels have been kept at bay, you’re probably on the right track.

When it comes to muscle gain there is no dramatic technique or quick fix that will allow you to pack on more muscle naturally. It’s better to stay focused and realistic by training hard, eating meticulously and spending time to recuperate properly; this will result in your achieving a more muscular physique. Keep in mind that it’s physiologically impossible to gain more than one pound of lean muscle per week.

For most weight-gainers, .5 pounds per week would be an even more realistic goal as they reach their genetic limit. Remember that gaining muscle is a long-term project and not something that can be simply turned on. If you’re dedicated and diligent in your efforts, you’ll not be disappointed!

Love Rae xxx

Love Rae xxx

This is the link to buy from iTunes

I received a phone call from my little sister on Tuesday who told the tale of how my 2 year old niece lost her blankie. Now this is no ordinary blankie, this is one that was a part of a cot set given to Snuggle Bug by our mum when she was born. It was a gorgeous, girlie, soft mauve blanket with a quilted cupcake on it. Every night that Snuggle Bug went to sleep she would ask for Blankie and snuggle up with it. My sister said it was like Nana was cuddling her to sleep every night.

My sister and brother-in-law had a friend stay the night, and had to drop him off down the other end of the freeway the next day. My sister was sandwiched in the back between Scrumptious Bum and Snuggle Bug with the windows open to let the breeze through. All of a sudden Blankie was torn out the window by a sudden gust of wind. There was no way of stopping as it was heavy morning traffic on the freeway, so Blankie was lost. Little Snuggle Bug told the tale as best she could in her 2 year old vocabulary to Granny later that weekend… “Blankie gone! Out winnow! Lost!!” as she raised her tiny hands, palms toward the heavens and shrugged her little shoulders.

When telling me the story of how Blankie was lost, my sister mentioned it occurred along the stretch of freeway that I walk every day from the gym to work and that I should keep an eye out for it. It was said jokingly, but with a touch of wistfulness, as though perhaps by saying it out loud it might bring it to pass, and I didn’t have the heart to tell her I no longer walked this way to work. When I heard the longing in her voice I resolved right then and there that I would do my best to bring Blankie home to her and the little one.

Later that day I did something quite foolish and risky, and jumped the fence to walk along the freeway. There was only an emergency stopping lane between me and the cars hurtling toward me at 100km per hour. I looked under every bush and tree on that 90 minute walk and kept an eye on the middle of the freeway where the trains run, searching for Blankie on that side of the freeway as well.

I thought I saw it on the other side of the freeway on the train line side. I drove back later that night when traffic was lighter and faked breaking down in the middle emergency lane. I could have cried when I realised that it was only an old white towel. I had so badly wanted to bring Blankie back home. I was covered head to toe in black dust, scratches from branches and had nothing to show for it. I was very disappointed to say the least considering I had been so sure I would find it, I had just felt so strongly in my heart that I would.

Yesterday I thought about it all day and decided to have one last walk along the freeway, only this time over the other side. As I started my walk on the bike path that runs the length of the freeway I said a little prayer and asked for help and a small miracle in finding this little blanket that meant so much to our family. In order to get to the other side, I had to cross the bridge that halfway over leads down into the Leederville train station. As I walked past the entrance to the stairs that lead down into the station, I had this overwhelming feeling I had to get on the train. I went to shake it off and continue walking, but it was like my feet were glued to the spot. Every time I went to take a step to go by, I had this overwhelming “GET ON THE TRAIN!!” sensation, and when I looked down into the station and noticed that the next train was 2 minutes away, I stopped resisting the urge, ran down the stairs and tagged on.

I boarded the train and was lucky enough to get the spot by the doors with the big windows. As the train pulled out of the station my eyes were drawn to a little mauve bundle on the side of the freeway emergency stopping lane near the train line. It was just before where I had jumped the fence the previous day, so this is why I had missed it. It was half wrapped around one of the fence posts as though holding on waiting to be collected, I knew in my heart I had definitely found Blankie, it was the right colour and the right size. My heart leapt into my chest and I held happy tears back, practically running all the way home after getting off at the station, even though I knew that there would be some time until the traffic was light enough for me to go back and fake another emergency stop. I ate dinner and paced the lounge room like a cat on a hot tin roof. I’ve never been one for patience and this situation was no different, in fact I would be hard pressed to find a time where I have been more impatient.

As I went to walk out the door to get into my car I turned to my flatmate and said “I can’t believe how hard my heart is pounding right now!” I got into my car and turned off the radio because it felt too distracting to have it playing. As I neared the spot on the freeway where I had mentally noted the landmarks to find it again, the only car behind me became impatient and passed me, leaving an empty freeway lane behind me. It was perfectly timed as I switched on the hazard lights and pulled into where Blankie was patiently waiting for me. I scooped it up, closed the door and let out a scream of pure joy, followed immediately by happy tears.

On arriving home, Blankie was immediately spruced up with an “intensive” cycle through the washing machine as I fantasized about the look on my sister’s face and Snuggle Bug’s reaction when I returned Blankie to them. I am babysitting the kids soon and thought that this would be the perfect time. However, as much as I would have liked to have done this, I was telling my big reveal plans to my co-worker (a father) who gently suggested that maybe my sister might not want to give the sleeping crutch back to Snuggle Bug if she is handling it’s loss quite well, and that perhaps she might just want to tuck it away for when she is older.

So I phoned my sister and innocently asked how Snuggle Bug was handling the loss of her Blankie. The little darling is handling the situation quite well as she understands Blankie’s been lost out of the window. When she gets tired of a night time she says “Blankie! Lost!” but is still able to go to sleep without it.

I had to come clean. So I told her the story of what I had been doing the past couple of days. She said that she didn’t mean to sound so vague, but that she was in shock because she could not believe that I had not only found Blankie, but the effort I had put in to do so. When she had sufficiently recovered she said that as much as she would also love to give Blankie back to Snuggle Bug, it was probably a good time to store Blankie away and remove the crutch. She couldn’t believe something that had meant so much to her was going to be returned, especially as she had resigned herself to the fact it was gone forever. So Blankie will be tucked away until Snuggle Bug is older, and then returned to her along with the story of how her crazy Aunty Rae risked life and limb to find Blankie and bring him home. In fact that will give me plenty of time to embellish the story, perhaps even throw in a tug of war with a wild dog or something equally dramatic!!

Then today came these words that made everything I did not only more than worth it, but something I would do again. A simple message posted on my Facebook page by my sister: “Can’t believe how amazing, yet crazy you are…… Snuggle Bug and I wouldn’t have it any other way. THANKYOU XXX” Even now I blink back emotional tears as a result of the overwhelming love I feel for my girls as I type those words on here. That message made me feel like I have been the one on the receiving end of a very precious gift, but then I always feel that way when I reflect on the people I love and the people who are in my life. I hope my little sister doesn’t mind me sharing such a precious story with everyone. I wrote it while all the emotions were fresh in my mind in the hope that when Snuggle Bug is old enough she can read this entry and know how important her happiness is to me.

So if you’ve been wondering where my blog updates were, I was unable to do them as I was otherwise engaged scouring the freeway for Blankie. A little mauve and well-worn blanket that may not be worth much to anybody else in a monetary sense, but it is priceless to our family. I can safely report that my mission has been accomplished and my prayer was answered… BIG TIME!!

Have a great night everyone,

Love Rae xxx

“Have faith in God,” Jesus answered. Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you will receive it, and it will be yours.
~ Mark 11:22, 24