Cardiovascular Training

February 8, 2011 by Leave a Comment
Cardio

Cardiovascular exercise will benefit you in numerous ways.

 

What is Cardiovascular Training?

The goal of Cardiovascular Training or Aerobic Exercise is to elevate your heart for a specific period of time. The extent to which you elevate your heart rate and the total time you keep your heart rate elevated depends entirely on your own personal goals.

There are a variety of activities that you can choose from to develop cardiovascular fitness. The most common are walking, jogging, running, swimming and cycling.

Why Does Aerobic Exercise Work?

When you exercise at an appropriate level, you place stresses on the body beyond what your body is accustomed to. The great thing about our bodies is that they are so adaptable. When you place stress on your body, it begins to adapt. It does this so that the next time you ask your body to perform that task, your body is prepared for it and can accomplish the task without being stressed. That is how improvements in fitness occur.

When you perform cardiovascular exercise, all sorts of really cool physiological things occur. It can get really technical, but it’s important for you to understand, so I’ll explain the essential functions in basic terminology.

First of all, there are two terms that you should understand. The first is “Cardiovascular”. “Cardio” refers to your heart and “Vascular” refers to your veins and arteries (your circulatory system). The second is “Cardio Respiratory”, which is the relationship between your heart (cardio) and your lungs (respiratory). So when you perform aerobic exercise you are improving your heart, lungs and circulatory system.

Circulatory System

Your veins and arteries carry blood. Arteries carry oxygen rich blood to the muscles (cells) that are working and need oxygen to be able to continue. Veins carry oxygen depleted blood from the muscles back to the heart then to the lungs to be re-oxygenated.

Regular aerobic exercise will result in an increase of red blood cells, which carry oxygen to the cells. It also results in an increase of capillaries (the tiny blood vessels that deliver the blood to the tissues and cells). Therefore allowing more nutrients to be delivered to working muscles.

Your Lungs

With exercise, your lungs will increase their capacity, and they will be able to hold more air. The more air that you can breathe in, the more oxygen that is available to your cells. Your lungs will also increase the ability to pull oxygen from the air and deliver it to the blood. This occurs because more alveoli (tiny sacks in your lungs that transfer the oxygen from the air and deliver it to the red blood cells) are exposed to the increased volume of air/oxygen in your lungs.

Your Heart

Your heart is a muscle, so it will become bigger and stronger. You will increase the amount of blood the heart can hold. And the heart will pump a higher percentage of its blood each time it beats. It will pump more blood with every beat. This will allow you to deliver more blood to the body via your arteries. Your heart is muscle tissue and it will also benefit from an increase in capillaries, more oxygen rich red blood cells, just as your skeletal muscles will. As a result, it will become more efficient.

End Result

More air in your lungs
More oxygen delivered to the red blood cells
More red blood cells
A more efficient heart pumping more blood
More capillaries delivering oxygen to the cells
More efficient cells utilizing the oxygen
A More Awesome YOU!

How Aerobic Exercise Will Help You

Moderate physical (aerobic) activities will yield tremendous physical benefits. Those benefits include decreased risk of heart disease and certain cancers and improvement in blood pressure and cholesterol levels. The increase in physical activity will result in increased energy (caloric) expenditure which will help to decrease your body fat percentage. Your metabolism will improve not only during exercise but also for a short period after activity. Improvements in aerobic capacity will help to make all of your activities of daily living easier, resulting in more energy throughout the day.

Here is a short list of more benefits of Cardiovascular/Aerobic Exercise

1. Instant feel-good. You will feel invigorated for hours after training
2. Train your heart. The heart is a muscle and cardio is its strength training
3. Increased endurance and stamina. Get through your day without a cat-nap.
4. Increased confidence right away!
5. Healthy lungs
6. Increases metabolism for up to 24 hours
7. Improves immune system. Being sick less equals more days to work out!
8. Reduces stress
9. Improves circulation. You will be less sore after weight training
10. Sleep better
11. Relief from depression and anxiety
12. Reduced risk of some cancers
13. Reduced risk of heart disease
14. Lower blood pressure
15. Lowers cholesterol
16. Live longer
17. It’s something great you can do for yourself to improve your health!

Filed Under: Cardiovascular Exercise, Exercise and Fitness, featured Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Healthy Holidays And Merry Fitness

December 8, 2010 by Leave a Comment

 

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays From Fitness Know How Headquarters!

 

It’s holiday time again. I wish you all good health and happiness during the holiday and upcoming New Year. But I don’t wish the typical weight gain that occurs this time of year on anyone. The typical American will gain weight. There are a lot of numbers out there suggesting just how much weight you will gain, let’s just say it’s a safe bet to assume you will gain five to fifteen pounds this holiday season. You already have plans to lose weight and can’t afford another fifteen pounds. You can’t afford another pound! Here are some tips to help you get through this wonderful yet difficult time of the year.

First, if you are currently working out don’t stop. If you don’t work out, start. I know this is a busy time of the year and you are being pulled in a lot of different directions, but if you simply maintain your weight throughout the holidays you are up to fifteen pounds ahead of the typical American come January 1st. The other advantage of beginning to workout now is that the gym will be empty. This will help you get acquainted with the equipment and time to develop a workout plan before the crowds hit in January. Another important reason to workout now is the challenge of all the excess goodies (and the calories that come with them) during the holidays can be offset by expending energy in the gym.

Second, start new traditions. Don’t exchange gifts with everyone like cookies, candies, cheese balls, nut rolls, and dare I say, fruit cake. Instead buy or make an ornament with items from a vacation you took during the year or some other personalized gift that they can keep forever. It is far more pleasant to reminisce about the creative gifts that everyone has exchanged over the years, than how difficult it is to walk a flight of stairs because you have all contributed to each others obesity.

Third, control yourself at holiday parties. This one is a little more difficult, but here’s what you do. When you get invited to a holiday party; remember the host is inviting you because they like you, not because they need you to come over and eat their food. Don’t show up to the party starving. Eat before you go. Not a lot, just a snack, enough so when you get there you don’t consume 3000 calories of hors d’oeuvres before you take off your jacket. You don’t want to eat so much food that you show up and don’t eat a single thing either. A good rule of thumb is to consider how much you typically eat for a meal and eat half of that, one to two hours before the party. If the host is offended because you did not make a pig of yourself at the party, consider looking for other friends to socialize with over the holiday season. Go very light on the hors d’oeuvres. Don’t feel obligated to try everything, instead enjoy the food you know you enjoy. Eat only a taste of your favorites, especially the high fat calorically dense items.

The holidays are a time to spend with friends and family, a time to get together with those we love. Remember why the holidays are important to you and celebrate as such. But if you don’t want the holidays to be about you getting fatter, follow these simple suggestions and enjoy.

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Bonus Tip! Top Ten Summary!

November 8, 2010 by 2 Comments

I hope you’ve enjoyed my “31 Tips To A Much Improved You”. You received the last Tip about a week ago and I’m sure you’re applying all the information to your daily routine and you’re feeling awesome. Anyway I wanted to follow up with a review of the most important changes that you can make so that you continue to live a much healthier life. Here are the Top Ten Things you should be doing everyday…enjoy!

1. Drink a gallon of water every day

Staying hydrated is essential if you want to lose weight, or maintain a healthy body weight. It also helps to reduce your hunger, aid in digestion, increase your metabolism, reduce pain and headaches, and reduces the risk of digestive system cancers.

2. Engage in Cardio 3-6 days each week

Cardio increases the risk of heart disease and stroke. Helps to control risk factors such as blood pressure and cholesterol. It also burns calories and increases yourmetabolism; which helps to maintain a healthy body weight.

3. Eat your fruits and veggies

Fruits Provide: Fiber, Antioxidants, Vitamins and Minerals
Vegetable Provide: Fiber, Antioxidants, Vitamins and Minerals

Here’s the thing Fiber, Antioxidant, and Vitamins and Minerals, all fight off diseases, especially many cancers
 
4. Resistance Training 3-6 Day a week

Resistance Training increases your strength, bone density, and your metabolism. It’s the only way to ramp up your metabolism 24 hours a day. And it helps to make everything you do in life a lot easier.

5. Eat 5-7 small meals each day

Eating 5-7 small meals a day will regulate blood sugar and hormone levels, and increase your metabolism. This will make it super easy to either lose excess body weight, or maintain a healthy body weight.

6. Stretch Every Day

Stretching every day will help to reduce aches and pains. Plus it will make all of your daily activities easier

7. Eat lean sources of Protein

Protein is essential to your health. Focusing on lean proteins will help to ensure you keep your calories under control and maintain a healthy body weight.

8. Do your Core and Ab exercises

Having strong and healthy core and abdominal muscles is the foundation for being fit. A strong core will minimize back pain and optimize your ability to perform physical activities

9. Eat. Oatmeal, Yams, and Brown rice

You’ve got to have Carbs, they are your body’s (and your brain’s fuel of choice). Plus you can’t utilize fat without having carbs in your system. Eating Oats, Yams, and Brown Rice will ensure that the carbs you are eating are healthy and gluten free.

10. Eat your healthy fats, get your omegas.

Eating Fat is essential to your health. To be healthy make sure to eat mono- and polyunsaturated fats (and avoid saturated and trans fats). Also get plenty of Omega-3 andOmega-9. Dietary fat has a ton of health benefits, but the most important might be maintaining healthy cholesterol levels.

 If you’ve found this information to be interesting, helpful, and useful, please share it with your friends.

And remember to visit www.fitnessknowhowhq.com regularly. I’ll be updating the site with new health, fitness and exercise information frequently.
Thanks for trusting me with your health

In Good Health,

John Preston.

Filed Under: Blog, Exercise and Fitness, Nutrition, Top 10 Lists Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Fitness Tip #31 of #31 Do Something New

October 31, 2010 by Leave a Comment

Wow this is the final tip of the month! Funny how time flies when you’re getting healthy.

I’ve shared a lot of really important information with you this month. I’m confident that you’re probably already beginning to notice the positive effects of making these  changes in your life. You can expect to see real, continued improvements in your health during the upcoming weeks and months.

The reason for making the decision to lead a healthy life is simple. If you are healthy, you feel good. When you are healthy and feel good you can choose to engage in activities that unhealthy people cannot. Now that you’ve taken the first steps to living a healthy life I want you to do something that you’ve never done before. This can be a very simple new activity.

When you participate in a new activity you’ll be challenged in ways that you’ve never experienced before. And all of these challenges and experiences will only impact you in a positive way. Each activity has unique skill set and movement patterns. The more you challenge yourself physically to learn new movement patterns the more efficient and balanced you’ll become physically. By introducing new movement patterns into your life you’ll not only challenge your body but also your mind. And like a good friend of mine always says, “The body follows the mind.”

So get out there and take advantage of your newly rediscovered health and learn and do something new. But make sure it’s something you’re interested in, here are some great examples:

1. Yoga
2. Pilates
3. Kick Boxing
4. Learn any Martial Art
5. Join a swim club
6. Join a rowing club
7. Tennis
8. Golf
9. Hiking Club
10. Dance Lessons (Swing, Ballroom, Belly, Two-Step)
11. You get the idea

Take Massive Action and sign up for something today…do it, right now!

OK now you’re equipped with a ton of information that will help you to live a much healthier life for the rest of your life. Enjoy!

And if you’ve found this information to be interesting, helpful, and useful, please share it with your friends.

And remember to visit www.fitnessknowhowhq.com regularly. I’ll be updating the site with new health, fitness and exercise information frequently.

Thanks for trusting me with your health

In Good Health,

John Preston.

Filed Under: Announcements, Blog, Exercise and Fitness, WTF (Miscellaneous) Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

31 Days To A Much Improved You – Tip #26 Add These Four Stretches To Your Daily Routine

October 26, 2010 by Leave a Comment

Lateral Bend - Start Position

Lateral Bend - Finish Position

Lateral Bend

The Lateral Bend is a great stretch to open up your lats, low back, abdominal muscles, and depending on how tight you are, your inner thigh.

Start by holding a dowel, broom stick, golf club, what ever you may have. Your hands should be wide so that you form an “X” with your arms and legs. Your hands should be above your head.  Your legs should be wide and your toes open about 45 degrees

Before you start to bend to the side notice the space between my upper arm and head. That space should remain constant throughout the stretch. Exhale as you bend to one side hold for 5 seconds, then bend to the other side and hold for 5 Seconds.  Repeat 4 times on each side.

Spinal Rotation Stretch

Lying Spinal Rotation Stretch

This picture shows the end position of this stretch. To start lye on your left side. Your left leg should be straight. Bring your right leg across your body to a 90 degree angle. Your right leg should also be straight. Put your left hand on top of your right leg just above the knee. Raise your right hand to the ceiling then let it start to fall to the floor behind you. The goal is for your right shoulder to rotate around to the floor. If it doesn’t don’t worry about it for now, just know that’s the goal. Hold for 30- 60 seconds. Breath deeply and try to relax and get comfortable. Before your repeat on the other side. Lye on your back and pull both knees into your chest. Repeat 2-3 times on each side.

 

 

 

 

 

Kneeling Quadricep Stretch

Standing Quadricep Stretch

Quadriceps Stretch

I’m showing two Quadriceps Stretches here. The one on the left requires that you have access to a gym or equipment and home, the one on the left doesn’t

Starting with the Quadriceps Stretch on the left. You’ll need a step and a pad for your knee. Place on of your feet on the step, you should be on the ball of your foot. Simply lower yourself down to the ground so that your back knee is on the pad. This position will stretch your quadriceps and possibly your hip flexor as well. To increase the stretch raise the hand that’s on the same side as the knee on the pad, overhead.

The Quadriceps Stretch on the right is pretty simple. Grab your ankle and pull it to your glutes (butt). If you have trouble standing on one foot. You can support yourself by holding onto a chair or counter. If your Quadriceps are too tight for you to grab your ankle, then wrap a towel around your ankle and use that to pull your ankle toward your glutes.  Hold each Stretch for 30-6- second and repeat 2-3 times.

Downward Dog

Downward Dog

The Downward Dog is rooted in Yoga. It’s a great full body stretch. It also helps to develop so strength and stability in the shoulders. This picture show the end position. To start you want to get onto you hands and knees, with your hands directly under your shoulders and your knees directly under your hips. This is the same start position I cover with Pointers in Tip #9

From that position lift your hips straight up to the ceiling. Keep your legs straight and press your heels into the ground. Now pretend that there is a string connecting your armpits to your ankles.  Shorten that string. This will help to open up space in your shoulders.

Hold for 30 to 60 seconds and repeat 2-3 times.

 

 

 

Add these four stretches to the stretches I covered in Tip #5. Do all eight stretches ad least once everyday. Twice a day is optimal. Watch the video below to learn more about how to correctly perform these stretches, enjoy and I’ll be back tomorrow with Tip #27

 

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOngfJvAo_w[/youtube]

Filed Under: Blog, Exercise and Fitness Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

31 Days To A Much Improved You – Tip #22 Add These Four Ab Exercises To Your Daily Routine

October 22, 2010 by 2 Comments
Reverse Crunch - Start Position

Reverse Crunch – Start Position

Reverse Crunch – Finish Position

Reverse Crunch

The Reverse Crunch will help you to reestablish your ability to contract you abdominal muscles. It will also help to increase the strength of your lower abs. Start in a lying position on your elbows Bend your knees to 90 degrees. Leave your heels on the ground and lift your toes. Before you start to lift your legs off the ground you need you go into a posterior pelvic tilt.  If you were wearing a belt, tilt your pelvis back so that belt buckle would get closer to your belly button. Your lower back should flatten out into the floor a little. Hold that pelvic tilt position during the entire exercise. Now lift your heels off the floor until your shins are parallel to the floor. Then slowly lower your feet back to the floor. If you lose the pelvic tilt, reset it before performing the next repetition. If this exercise is easy you are probably not maintaining the pelvic tilt. If your stomach or chest bows forward, that is a sign that you are losing the pelvic tilt.

 

 

Elevation - Start Position

Elevation - Finish Position

Elevations

This is a more dynamic abdominal exercise. Start in a lying position with your hands by your side. Lift your legs so that they are perpendicular to the floor; straight up and down. From that position lift your hips, knees and heels straight up toward the ceiling.

In the “Finish” photo I exagerated the hip lift so you can see that your hips should be coming off of the floor. In reality you want to avoid having your feet move forward toward, or over your head. Your hips should only lift about 1-3 inches off of the floor.  If this is easy you are probably swinging your legs a little too much. Return to start position and repeat.

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Leg Circles - Start Position

Leg Circles - Position 2

Abdominal Leg Circles

For this exercise there are three position. Please check the third picture below for this description to make sense. Start in the same position as the Reverse Crunch. Set your pelvic tilt. Extend your legs out straight and lift your feet a couple of inches off the ground. With out touching the ground slide your heels along the floor toward your hips. Then straighten your legs and lower your straightened legs back to the start position. After completing one set use the same exact positions but rotate your feet in the opposite direction.

Lift your straight legs off of the floor unilt your legs are perpindicular to the floor. Bend your knees, then press your heels away from your body. Back to the starting position.

 

Leg Circle - Position 3

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Medicine Ball Twist - Start Position

Medicine Ball Twist - Finish Position

Medicine Ball Twist

Balance on you tailbone (boat pose/coccyx balance). Hold a medicing ball in both hands. Keeping it close to your body rotate your shoulders as far as you can. Rotate in both directions.

A common mistace is to have very little shoulder rotation and to move the ball from side to side with your hands.

The obliques, the muscle we are trying to strenghten with this exercise rotate the trunk/spine. So if we want to strenghten them properly our shoulders must turn.

 

 

 

Add these four abdominal exercises to your daily routine. Do them at the same time as the four Core exercises that I introduced in Tip #9. Build up to doing two sets of each. 25 Repetitions each for the Reverse Crunch and Elevations. 15 Leg Circles in each directions. And do as many Medicine Ball Twists as you can.

Watch the video below to learn more on how to perform these exercises correctly. I’ll be back tomorrow with Tip #23

 

 

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8vcF8qYZZGw[/youtube]

 

 
 
 
 
 

 

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Fitness Tip #19 of #31 Get Your Cardiovascular Exercise

October 19, 2010 by Leave a Comment

Ok I know you’ve been walking for an hour each and every day. And that definitely counts as cardio. But we’re going to ramp things up a bit and develop a more structured cardio program for you. The goal with this structured, intentional cardiovascular program is to begin to increase the amount of time spent with an elevated heart rate. By increasing the intensity of your program you’ll really begin to realize the benefits of being aerobically fit. Here’s how we are going to do it.

You’ll still go for one hour walks every other day. On the day that you don’t go on the walk you’ll add and shorter (20-30 minute) workout at an increased intensity. So how are we going to measure intensity?

Easy, with your heart rate.

This can get a little bit technical but I’ll keep it very simple for you.

Here are some general guideline for you to follow.

Moderate intensity = 50%-65% of your max heart rate
Medium Intensity = 65%-75% of your max heart rate
High Intensity = 75%-85% of your max heart rate

How do you figure your exercise heart rate? Use this formula;

220 – (Your age) X (% of Max heart rate) = Target Heart Rate (THR)

Follow this Example, A 42 year old who wants to exercise at 65% of Max

(220 – 42) X .65 (65%) = THR
178 X .65 = 115

So a 42 year old should exercise  with a heart rate (THR) of 115 beats/minute if the goal is to workout at 65% of maximum.

To calculate your heart beat, simply take your pulse for 15 seconds and multiply by 4. It’s actually easier to double that number twice. So if you take your pulse for 15 seconds and you double it twice you want to end up with a heart rate of 140 beats per minute (in our example, your THR will vary).

So here is the goal for you for this tip. Increase your cardiovascular fitness so that you can maintain a THR of 65% for 30 full minutes. If you can’t do that then I want you to do intervals until you can.

Here is the interval plan

Week 1 Four minutes at your normal walking pace one minute at 65%
Week 2 Three minutes at your normal walking pace 2 minutes at 65%
Week 3 two minutes at normal waking pace 3 minutes at 65%
Week 4 one minute at normal walking pace four minutes at 65%
Week 5 30 minutes at 65%

Ok here the disclaimer

Always warm up for 5-10 minutes prior to the increased intensity exercise. You can stick with the same exercise just perform it at a lower intensity. The above schedule is just a general guideline it may be to conservative for some people and to aggressive for others. Use this strategy to know when it is time to move on. You’re heart rate should return to your normal walking level prior to the next bout of intense exercise. If it doesn’t keep working at that level before moving on.

What type of exercises should you be doing. The simple answer is anything you want.. If you’re walking you may find that you’ll need to jog or run to get your heart rate up to 65%. If you’re fine with running stick with it, just make sure you get a great pair of running shoes. If you want to avoid running then you should probably find a fitness center for your cardiovascular workouts. It’s easy to increase the resistance or elevation on cardio machine to increase your heart rate without running.

You can choose any type of exercise that you like. We’re training heart rate here not movement pattern so you can even do something different each time.

Here is a list of great CV exercises

1. Walking
2. Jogging/Running
3. Swimming
4. Cycling
5. Stair Climbing
6. Elliptical Trainer
7. Aerobic classes (will be tougher to regulate THR)

So pick an activity that you like and every other day you’ll replace your 1 hour walk with more intense cardiovascular exercise.

You’ll experience

1. Increased energy
2. Increase metabolism
3. improved lung function
4. Greater aerobic capacity
5. Decrease resting heart rate
6. All sorts of other really cool physiologically things!

Lets admit one thing here, this tip is awesome. And don’t worry, once you can walk every other day for one hour and do 30 minutes of cardio at 65% of your max you’ll still need to keep progressing. I’ll have a ton of info for you on the site to teach you how….

And I’ll be back tomorrow with fitness tip #20

Filed Under: Blog, Cardiovascular Exercise, Exercise and Fitness Tagged With: , , , ,

Fitness Tip #18 of #31 Proper Technique And Injury Prevention

October 18, 2010 by Leave a Comment

In my humble (OK, expert) opinion I would rank proper exercise form as the second most important factor in having success with your fitness goals. What’s the most important you ask? I’ll never tell! Ok, just kidding. The most important component to being successful is consistency. If you follow all my advice to the letter and have perfect form on every rep of every set on every exercise, but you only do it once or twice each month, you won’t see any results. Hopefully this is so obvious to you that you’ll understand why I didn’t even include it as a tip.

Anyway back to proper technique. When you perform an exercise incorrectly you end up emphasizing muscles other than were originally intended to be emphasized. The end result of this is that you’ll either develop strength and flexibility imbalances or you will exacerbate the imbalances you already have. When you have flexibility and or muscle imbalances you typically will have some pain, stiffness or muscle discomfort (think low back pain). Plus you put yourself at greater risk of injury when you engage in physical activities prior to addressing these imbalances.

Here’s the beauty of exercise. When done correctly it will fix your strength and flexibility imbalances. This will decrease your pain and also decrease the likelihood of experiencing an injury.

Not only will doing exercises incorrectly lead to imbalances: it can also create faulty movement patterns. Once faulty movement patters are established it can take a ton of work to correct. In fact you can develop a faulty movement pattern in as little as 300 repetitions. But it can take over 5000 repetitions to correct a faulty movement pattern.

So it’s always easier to learn proper technique when you are first starting to exercise. Trust me you’ll be rewarded for the rest of your life.

So how do you ensure that you’re doing things correctly. First of all listen and watch very closely to the videos I’ve included in this program. That is a great start. Second find a trained professional in your area and work with them for a short period of time. Tell them your goal up front. You are there to learn as much as you can about proper technique as fast as you can, then you plan to work out on your own.

Depending on your income level, personal trainers can be expensive. But the investment is well worth it.

Oh yeah! Check back periodically with Fitness Know How Headquarters, I’ll always be adding new information.

I’ll check back with you tomorrow with another tip…

Filed Under: Blog, Cardiovascular Exercise, Exercise and Fitness, Resistance Training Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

31 Days To A Much Improved You – Tip #17 Add 4 More Exercises To Your Resistance Training

October 17, 2010 by Leave a Comment
Lunge - Start Position

Lunge - Start Position

Lunge - Finish Position

Lunge

The Lunge is a great lower body exercise. Start with your feet about shoulder width apart, step back with one foot maintaining that width between your feet. Your feet will remain in place during a stationary lunge. You should have more weight on your front foot. You should be on the ball of your back foot with your heel pointing toward the ceiling. With your upper body tall and sternum lifted you are going to lower your hips and upper body straight down toward the ground. You do this by allowing both knees to bend. Stop before your back knee hits the ground. Return to the start position by pushing through the heel of the front foot. It’s important to move up and down and avoid the natural tendency to drift forward as you descend. Repeat with the opposite leg forward.

 

 

Lat Pulldown Start Position

Lat Pulldown - Finish Position

Lat Pulldown

The Lat Pulldown is a good upper body exercise that will help to strengthen your back. Grab the bar with an overhand grip with your hands slightly wider than your shoulders. Lean back slightly to avoid hitting your nose with the bar. Pull the bar straight down to your collar bone and squeeze your back. Return the bar to the start position. Avoid allowing your shoulders to elevate as you pull the bar down. Don’t pull the bar lower than collar bone level and avoid rocking back and forth as you perform the exercise.

 

 

 

Step Up - Start Position

Step Up - Finish Position

Step Up

The Step Up is great because it mimics an important daily activity, walking up stairs. It also helps with balance. Start with one foot on the floor and one foot on the step. Press through the heel of the foot that is on the step and stand all the way up before placing your other foot on the step. Perform all of the Repetitions on one leg then the other. In other words, leave the foot of what ever leg you are exercise on the step until the set (for that leg) is done. Then switch legs. Hold Dumbbell in your hand or use a higher step to increase the intensity of the exercise.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Arnold Press - Start Position

Arnold Press - Finish Position

Arnold Press

OK, this is called an Arnold Press because Arnold Schwarzenegger supposedly invented it. It’s basically a Dumbbell  Military Press, but with some shoulder rotation. This exercise will help to increase your shoulder strength. Hold the dumbbells at collar bone level with your palms facing your body.  Press the dumbbells to the ceiling while simultaneously rotating your palms 180 degrees, so they are pointing forward at the finish position. Return your hands to the start position

 

 

 

 

 

Add these for resistance training exercises to the four that I introduced in Tip #12. Do all eight exercises 3 times each week, always resting a day in between workouts. Check out the video below to learn more about how to perform these exercises correctly. I’ll be back tomorrow with Tip #18

 

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_IwKIVSoCzw[/youtube]

Filed Under: Blog, Exercise and Fitness, Resistance Training Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Fitness Tip #15 of #31 Take The Stairs (No elevators/escalators)

October 15, 2010 by Leave a Comment

Hope your goal setting was an awesome experience for you yesterday. So you should be totally fired up about getting going today. This tip you’ve heard before, take the stairs instead of escalators and elevators. This is right in line with an earlier fitness tip (Park in the furthest parking spot every place you park). By taking the stairs you are going to increase your daily energy expenditure.

Now I know the extent at which you increase activity levels will vary considerably based on how often you encounter elevators and escalators in your daily life. If you don’t today is like a “free pass” day. But if you do your energy expenditure could go through the roof (not literally) with this tip.

Stairs are awesome. You’ll increase you aerobic function and you’ll build considerable strength in your legs just by changing this one habit.

If your co-workers ask what you’re doing, tell them. This will show them you’re serious about making positive changes in your life.

Have fun with this one…see you tomorrow

Filed Under: Blog, Cardiovascular Exercise, Exercise and Fitness, Resistance Training Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,
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