Exercise Idea: The Dead Lift

The Dead Lift is an excellent  exercise for overall body development - if you do it right.  A well executed dead lift works not only the hamstrings, quadriceps, erector spinae, gluteus maximus, and  adductor magnus,  it also challenges a variety of other muscles to provide stability.

Keep in mind that you must maintain a neutral spine position, arching and curving your back places stress on the intervertebral disks, and lets your muscles slack off.  Doing dead lifts propperly can help protect your back in your day-to-day life because deadlifts teach you to keep your lower back rigid against a load. Keeping your back in a neutral position helps avoid injuries when lifting heavy objects from the floor.

Don't roll your shoulders, your hip muscles should move the weight, not your shoulders.  To make sure you push from the heels (to protect your knees) curl your toes up.  Start the lift with your shoulder blades directly over the bar.  This will ensure that your hips and knees are at the right angle.

Strong bones are good bones.

NEW FLASH!!! calcium is key for healthy bones. Getting enough calcium throughout you life helps build bones up and helps slow the loss of bone.  Increased calcium intake—particularly in the form of the currently recommended three glasses of milk per day—will help prevent osteoporosis. Each year, osteoporosis leads to more than 1.5 million fractures, including 300,000 broken hips.

Calcium is a mineral that the body needs for building and maintaining bones and teeth, blood clotting, the transmission of nerve impulses, and the regulation of the heart's rhythm. Some studies indicate that low levels of calcium are related to obesity.

1 percent of the calcium in the human body is stored in the blood and other tissues.  Ninety-nine percent is found in the bones and teeth.

The body gets the calcium it needs in two ways.

One is by eating foods and supplements that contain calcium. Good food sources include dairy products, which have the highest concentration per serving of highly absorbable calcium, and dark leafy greens or dried beans, which have varying amounts of absorbable calcium.

The other way the body gets calcium is by removing it from storage in your bones. This happens when your blood calcium levels are too low. Ideally, the calcium that is "checked out" of storage in your bones will be "checked in" again later. But, that doesn't always happen. Most important, this payback can't be accomplished simply by eating more calcium.


There are a number of lifestyle factors that can influence calcium storage in your bones:

• Getting regular exercise, especially weight-bearing and muscle strengthening exercise.
• Getting adequate vitamin D, whether through diet, exposure to sunshine, or supplements.
• Consuming enough calcium to reduce the amount the body has to borrow from bone.
• Consuming adequate vitamin K, found in green, leafy vegetables. 
  

Physical activity that puts some strain or stress on bones causes the bones to retain and possibly even gain density throughout life. If you look at the shin bones of champion kick boxers you will understand.  Cells within the bone sense this stress and respond by making the bone stronger and denser. "Weight-bearing" exercises include weightlifting, walking, dancing, racquet sports, jogging, stair-climbing, and hiking.

Swimming is a good exercies, but because water supports the bones, rather than putting stress on them, it's not considered a good "weight-bearing" exercise for bone strength. Also be aware: physical activity doesn't strengthen all your bones equally, just those that are stressed, so you need a variety of exercises or activities to keep all your bones healthy.

Another way that physical activity helps, is that it increases coordination and strength. Active people can often avoid the falls and situations that cause fractures.

Oh, to have the legs of a sprinter

Here's a plan for 2 weeks worth of great running workouts.   It's based on 4 workouts a week, let's say Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings, followed by Saturday afternoon.  50% of the workouts are "sprints-based" and should be done on the track, 50% are "endurance" and should be done on your favorite running trails.  Because these workouts are high intensity workouts you should leave the alternate days to rest, or concentrate on your abs and upper body on the alternating days.



The sprints are an interesting variation of the typical cardio workout, and can also do wonders for your glutes and legs. The endurance runs burn lots of calories and can give you a great endorphin lift. 

Day 1 - Week 1


5 minutes general stretch
5 minutes jogging, start increasing your speed little by little

8 series of 50m HARD sprint followed by 1 minute fast walking

5 minutes jogging

8 series of 50m HARD sprint followed by 1 minute fast walking


5 minutes jogging, decrease the intensity little by little
5 minutes general stretch

Day 2 - Week 1 
 
5 minutes walking (try to lengthen your stride)
5 minutes general stretch


40 minutes running on hilly terrain


5 minutes general stretch
5 minutes walking (try to lengthen your stride) 

Day 3 - Week 1 

5 minutes general stretch
5 minutes jogging, start increasing your speed little by little

8 series of 100m HARD sprint followed by 1 minute fast walking

5 minutes jogging
8 series of 100m HARD sprint followed by 1 minute fast walking

5 minutes jogging, decrease the intensity little by little
5 minutes general stretch

Day 4 - Week 1


5 minutes walking (try to lengthen your stride)
5 minutes stretching

60 minutes or more running -keep your heart rate and breathing at a level where you can maintain a conversation

5 minutes walking (try to lengthen your stride)
5 minutes stretching



Day 1 - Week 2 



5 minutes general stretch
5 minutes jogging, start increasing your speed little by little

5 series of 150m  sprint followed by 1 minute fast walking
Sprint 200m jog 100m
Sprint 100m jog 100m
Sprint 50m

5 minutes gentle jogging

 

Sprint 50m
Sprint 100m jog 100m 
Sprint 200m jog 100m
5 series of 150m  sprint followed by 1 minute fast walking

5 minutes jogging, decreasing your speed little by little
5 minutes general stretching

 Day 2 - Week 2

5 minutes walking
5 minutes general stretch


30 minutes running.  pick a sustainable pace and see how far you get, then multiply by 2 to find out your mph


5 minutes walking
5 minutes general stretch



Day 3 - Week 2 

5 minutes general stretch
5 minutes jogging, start increasing your speed little by little

sprint 20m jog 80m - repeat5 times
walk 1 minute


sprint 30m jog 70m - repeat 4 times
walk 1 minute


sprint 40m jog 60m - repeat 3 times
walk 1 minute


sprint 50m jog - repeat 2 times
walk 1 minute


sprint 40m jog 60m - repeat 3 times
walk 1 minute

sprint 30m jog 70m - repeat 4 times
walk 1 minute

sprint 20m jog 80m - repeat5 times
walk 1 minute

5 minutes jogging, decreasing your speed little by little
5 minutes general stretching

Day 4 - Week 2

walk 5 minutes, try to increase your stride length
5 minutes general stretch

run 10k  (or 20 if you feel like it)... if you can run on the beach


walk 5 minutes,
5 minutes general stretch

Human vs Animal Animpics: Sprint 100m

How do humans stack up against our animal relatives in different sports?  There are a lot of sports that we will never be able to answer the question for because animals would not play by the rules or could not use the required equipment.  For example, finding an animal team to play hockey is out of the question.  But some sports are possible for animals, especially the classic individual track and field events.

So let us organize the world's first Human vs Animal Animpics and hand out the medals to see who does best overall.  Now one thing is that the humans get to choose their best athlete in each category.  Human athletes have the advantage of specific, hard training to excel in their event.  Animals do not generally train for specific events, but to overcome that disadvantage, we choose the animal competitor for the species most suited to the event.

So first event up: sprinting, in particular the 100 meters.  Who do we pick to represent humans?  Everyone would immediately pick Usain Bolt of course. He is the current world record holder.  And which animal species do we use to represent the non-human competition?  Let's pick a cheetah.  Cheetahs are often said to be the world's fastest land animal.

Now how to set up the event?  Well, we can't run Usain Bolt and a cheetah in the same race.  We already know Bolts' time: it is his world record of 9.58 seconds.  And the video below shows a cheetah called Sarah that did the 100m in 6.130 seconds.



So recapping the event: humans represented by Usain Bolt: 9.58 seconds.
Animals represented by Sarah the Cheetah: 6.130 seconds.

And the gold medal goes to .... THE ANIMALS!

Animpics Standings: Animals 1 Humans 0

Pregnant Sit-Ups

We all know that the old myths about doing exercise while pregnant are bunk.  A healthy woman, who has checked in with her OB/Gyn, can and should exercise regularly.  She just needs to drink plenty of water, be careful about overheating, and listen to her body.  But what about abdominals?

Abdominal exercises can help prepare the body for labor.  Studies show that women who continue to do abdominal exercises throughout their pregnancy  suffer less from back pain and diastasis recti (separation of the abdominal muscles).  Also, if you continue you take care of your body you are more likely to feel like the beautiful  woman you are, strong and sexy.

After the first trimester pregnant women shouldn't do basic sit ups lying flat on their back, as the extra weight of the uterus can press down on the vena cava, a blood vessel that returns most of your blood back to the heart.  That just means that you have to be a bit creative in designing your ab routine.  Here are some exercises I like:


The side crunch:  It's pretty obvious what you need to do, the lower arm can also be stretched out on the floor for balance.  This is a great way to work on your obliques

The reverse crunch: tighten your abs and try to lift your pelvis and legs up.  Its like a big pelvic tilt, a great way to strengthen your lower abs.

The Crunch:  A classic crunch, adapted to a 45º angle.  Great for the upper abs.

The Cat: a great way of working the deep abdominals.  (Ok I couldn't find any pictures of a pregnant woman doing this exercise, but several expectant moms in the gym use this exercise and love it)

1-2-3 Abs

Ok that thing about the eating contest with the bear gave me a nightmare...

So here are 3 videos of great abdominal workouts to get that belly back on track. We all know how important it is to build up your workouts progressively. Killing yourself on day one will only give you sore muscles, but over time you need to step up the intensity. It is totally satisfying to look back and realize how far you have come.

Video 1: The basics.

Start with this video and start with 2 series of 10 reps.  Concentrate on breathing well, and learning how to stabilize your body.  Over time increase the volume until you are doing 3 series of 24 reps.  If you are used to using a stability ball and/or have well trained abs you could do this over 3 or 4 workouts.  If you are new to all this take your time, build up over a 6 week period.



Video 2: Starting to have fun.

Once you are up to speed on the basics start including some intermediate exercises.  I wouldn't swap one exercise routine for the other overnight, instead I would add in the new exercises one by one until you are doing both workouts.  Make sure you can do all these exercises well, with proper posture and pelvic tilt before adding in exercises from video 3.




Video 3:  Monster Abs

This is where the real fun begins.  When you when you are ready, do these exercises and enjoy blasting those abs!  Note: just like with video 2, I would incorporate these exercises into my routine one by one, swapping out the beginner exercises from video 1. Remeber, you can't cheat with abs, do the exercises with proper technique and you will get results.  If you can't do these exercises withour cheating go  back to video 2 and prepare for a few more weeks.

Eat Against a Bear

World famous eating champion Kobayashi takes on a Kodiak bear ... not mano a mano, but to see who can scarf down an enormous platter of hot dogs first. Although Kobayashi does his best, the bear (unsurprisingly) beats him handily.

Cool Cat On The Treadmill

Treadmills have a kind of fuddy duddy reputation in the fitness world. They are seen as a cop out low intensity training. After all, why not just go out and let loose tearing unimpeded down the street! Of course, there are circumstances like safety and climate which can make a treadmill the best choice. And cranking one up to top speed is not easy; depending on the speed it can seriously work you out. Moreover, all the cool cats run on treadmills, as you can see in the video below.

Speed Rock Climbing

Anybody who thinks they know somebody who is hardcore in extreme sports, take a look at this. Dan Osman climbs that cliff without a safety harness and at top speed. Very extreme. However, he eventually paid an extreme price ... he died doing a bungee jumping stunt. So don't try this at home, kids. That aside, rock climbing WITH a safety harness is a great way to get in shape!

Blast Your Calfs

Think about your image of the perfect body... Maybe you want size, broad shoulders and massive pecs, or maybe you want lean lines with toned abs and firm glutes. But what about your calves? On a woman well shaped calves can help define the whole ankle and knee area, making your legs look fantastic in high heels or capris. On a man well formed calf muscles are vital in avoiding the "chicken leg" problem, after all if your upper body is blasted you need a good pair of legs to hold it up.

Calf exercises are a part of body building that most people just throw in when they have a little extra time at the end of a workout. But don't be so cavalier: your calf muscles need a correct workout in order to develop.

There are two main calf muscles that you should be concerned with when performing any calf exercise.

• The Gastrocnemius extends from your knee joint to your ankle joint.  It is the primary muscle when your knee is extended.
  
• The Soleus is a wide, flat muscle that lies deep withing the calf.  It can only fully contract when your leg is bent.

Be careful with the intensity and duration of your calf exercises.

Your Gastrocnemius will benefit most from heavy weight and low reps.  If you use a slow tempo and lift enough weight to tire the gastrocnemius within 20 seconds your standing calf raise will be maximally effective.

Your Soleus needs higher reps, lower wieght and a medium velocity.  Try to pick a weight that taxes you after about 40 seconds when doing seated calf raises.

Make sure to use a full range of motion.  If you have never stretched or strengthened your calves before start flat footed, but make to sure to go all the way up and down.  Once you have prepared your calves with regular workouts and stretching sessions take the exercises to the next level,  Start with the balls of your feet raised up 2-3 inches so that your heels are below you toes at the lowest point in the exercise.  Many gyms have a special platform for this, but if your doesn't you can usually improvise.

Don't bounce: when you go down let your heels down under control.  When you go up and get to the top "squeeze past" for a moment.  Also beware, if you bend your legs during any straight leg calf exercises you are cheating.  Bending your knees in a straight leg calf press is like doing a really crappy squat because your quadriceps are doing the work.

It's very important to remember that when you do any exercise for your calf muscles you need to do them correctly. If you don't you will just be wasting your time.

He Shoots He Scores! Wayne Gretzky Tribute

Since we have been giving out well deserved tributes lately, here is Wayne Gretzky's turn. He was probably the best player ever in hockey.

Zinedine Zidane

Any list of the football greats of the world has to include Zinedine Zidane. His ball control and ability to read the pitch were probably the best in the game. This tribute video showcases some of his fantastic situational awareness and mastery over the ball.

Bob Beamon's Long Jump Record

In the Mexico City Olympics of 1968 Bob Beamon pulled off a world record long jump. That record stood 23 years.

Another Type of High Jump

Here is another take on the meaning of "high jump". Watch the world record setting high dive!

Stefka Kostadinova's World Record

Watch Stefka Kostadinova setting the still standing world female high jump record of 2.09m. Who thinks that Blanka Vlašić is going to break it within the next couple of years?

Blanka Vlašić Queen of High Jump

In high jump the opponents are the tape measure and yourself. I love sports like that, where you have to challenge yourself directly. It makes it easier to grow, both physically training wise and mentally. Because you don't have the excuse that you lost because the opponents were simply too good. When you don't perform, you have to look yourself straight in the eyes in the mirror and realize that you are the only thing holding yourself back. Blanka Vlašić has looked in the mirror and knows exactly who is looking back. And her dedication to her training and mental maturity shows: she is not the Queen of High Jump for nothing!

High Jumper Revue

Here is a video review showing the evolution in the women's world record high jump. It is a tribute to the best high jumpers the world has ever seen!

Sprint Warm Ups

It is always a good idea to warm up before hitting your training for real. Especially for high intensity training like powerlifting or sprinting where you put high stress on you muscles quickly. Here is a warm up drill you can use before training your sprints.

Handstands

Handstands are fundamental if you are interested in advanced body weight exercises. Working on them can increase your strength and coordination. Technically, a handstand is any act of balancing on the hands while supporting the body in an upside down, stable position. There are many variations on the common handstand, and all of them require upper body strength and balance.

To learn how to do handstands start by "kicking up" onto a wall.   That is, put your hands on the floor about 30 cm away from the wall, then kick one leg up, quickly followed by the other.  As you get accustomed to the maneuver try to control yourself so that you arrive at the wall, instead of slamming into it.

Little by little you can wean yourself off the wall.  One of the best ways to get comfortable with handstands is to practice them a lot, if you keep at it for a few practice sessions you will be doing hand-stand push-ups and capoeira moves in no time.

Here are some tips:

• Practice on a flat surface with lots of space.  
• Keep your fingers spread out slightly and facing forwards. This is to allow for the greatest amount of control and stability in the handstand.
  
• Engage and extend your shoulders. Think of shrugging your shoulders upwards or trying to push into the floor. This muscular tension will give you greater control. Don't "sink" into your shoulders.
• Keep your abs tense to keep your body in line and protect your back.
• If you feel like you are going to fall, try to twist 90º, and then bend over, so that your feet touch the ground.

World's First Bicycle Lift

Biking is a great way to get fit. Instead of taking your car places, take your bike! If you are dedicated to fitness, you will bicycle through rain and up hills. But a lot of people are scared away from biking by hills in their neighbourhoods. Well, Norway came up with a solution to that. This video shows the Trampe bicycle lift in operation. It is in Trondheim and was built in 1993, the first ever bicycle lift in the world. The goal was to encourage more people to get around by bike, which makes the population healthier and more fit.

It is basically a rail that runs along the side of the road up a steep hill. At the bottom of the hill at the start of the rail is a control booth. When you start the lift, a little pedal starts to go along the rail up the hill. You just put one foot on the pedal and let it push you up the hill.

Bicycle lifts like this are not recommended for your bike workout, but if you are just trying to get a little exercise and are not training, a lift up a hill could be just what you need.

The Spirit of Running

When you really get into running, you get a kind of natural high that is hard to describe. You get into full flow and your world becomes the run. Nothing else matters but the feel of speed. This video showing a pair of brothers doing Parkour to me captures that feeling. The sense when you are running that you are a superhero. Watch this for some inspiration to train! Disclaimer: although inspiring, what these guys are doing is more in the world of stunts than training. A good training program gets you to the point where you can do parkour, but parkour is not a good training program!

Liven up your daily run - Part 2

Hey everybody.  I hope you enjoyed your workout today.  Here are 7 more ideas for livening up your regular run

1. The Tempo Run.  First warm up, then for a set amount of time run at a hard but controlled pace. Afterwards cool down.  So, if you can run all day at 3.4 mph and 4.5 mph about as fast as you can sustain, you might warm up for 5 minutes, run 20 minutes at 3.8 mph then cool down for 5 minutes.  This would be an intense half-hour run, perfect for a day when you are working against the clock.  If you are a beginner runner you might need to go do "research" on a treadmill or at the track first.  You need to know how fast you can run, and you need to be able to identify your running speed.



2. Cruise Intervals. A famous running workout popularized by Jack Daniels, a famous running coach.  Run 3-8 minute intervals at your  10k (6 mile) pace with recovery intervals between half a minute and 3 minutes.

3. HIIT. HIIT is short for High-Intensity Interval Training, and it is great for a fast, hard, fat burning run.  Blast out a series of maximum intensity sprints alternated with gentle jogging intervals (warm up first!).  Your total workout should last about 25 minutes including warm-up and cool down.  It sounds easy, but the intensity makes HIIT put burn in your buns.

4. Yasso 800s. Go to the track, and after warming up do 10 times 800m.   However long it takes you to pound out the 800m, recover over an equal time gently jogging.  This workout is called the Yasso 800 because Bart Yasso says that whatever your average time for the 800m is should be your marathon time.  So if you average 3 minutes 45 seconds per 800m burst you should be able to do a marathon in 3 hours 45 minutes....If you put in the miles on your long runs and hill runs and tempo runs and interval runs....

5. Mile repeats. This workout is just how it sounds.  Run a mile strong but steady, recover by jogging gently for 2 minutes.  Repeat, and again.  If a mile is daunting you could adapt to other distances — 1000m, 800m, 400m, etc.

6. Mystical Zen run. This is where you change things up.  Do not measure distance.  Do not bring a watch.  Do not plan, not even the route.  Just lace up your shoes and go.  Pay attention to what your body is telling you.  Pay attention to what your are feeling.

7. Soft Footing Run. If you have an even sandy beach, run on the beach. If you don't, find other soft footing like grass or a wood chip trail.  A good rule of thumb is that you shouldn't be able to hear your foot falls.  Like hills, soft footing will challenge your muscles making them work harder to give you your usual push-off.

Liven up your daily run - Part 1

Running is great. It's an excellent way to train cardio, burn calories and spend some time outdoors. The equipment you need is minimal, and once your body is accustomed to frequent running workouts the runner's high is addictive.


But sometimes runners can get stuck in a rut. Too many runs at medium speed is just boring. A one-speed workout program is boring, and it doesn’t maximize your workout results either.


If you include some variety into your running program to make things interesting you'll enjoy your workout much more and maybe you'll even become a better runner.


Varied workouts make things interesting. Too much repetition is hard on the mind, and even if you have several routes plodding along at the same speed every day will make one trail seem like another.


Incorporating different types of running into your week will help you increase your speed and endurance. That's because your body adapts. After a month or so of doing one type of workout, you body will get used to the load and you’ll no longer be getting the same kind of benefits even though you're working just as hard. If you change things up every couple weeks, you will probably continue to see improvements.



Here are some ideas to liven up your daily run.



1) Go Long Once a week up your mileage. Add about 10% on to what you consider your maximum. For example if you all ways do 3 miles, try doing 3.3. Then next week try doing 3.6 little by little you can work your long run up to some impressive distances. Many people who usually run 10k (6.2 miles) during the week will do 16 miles or more on the weekend. Just remember that this run is a slow steady run.


2) Climb Some Hills. Long runs help your endurance. Hilly runs work on your strength. Think of it like weight lifting, but the weight you lift is you. You can loop around one hill, or just choose to run through hilly terrain. On the days that you do hill runs, reduce your total mileage by 10%, and make sure that your pce down the hill does not exceed your pace up the hill.


3) Fartlek. It's not what it sounds like. Fartlek means “play with speed”. Do your normal run, and stick to a normal distance. After a warm-up period start alternating fast running and gentle jogging to recover. Some people count their steps, or use a watch. Other people use landmarks. As you get faster and stronger your intervals will become harder and longer.


Tomorrow I'll continue with 7 more ideas to liven up your daily run.

Good Night! Sleeping for Fitness

Sleeping is a big part of our daily lives. It makes no sense to develop a highly tuned training routine and leave out the one third of the day you spend sleeping! There are two main variables related to the health effects of sleep. One is how long you spend sleeping and the other is how you divide your sleep time among the different stages or types of sleep.

The deep links between sleep and the daily cycles of our biology and biochemistry (called Circadian cycles) mean that the best way to sleep is consistently. You should try to maintain both constant length of time asleep and a constant bedtime. There are two main stages of sleeping: deep sleep and rapid eye motion (REM) sleep. Deep sleep normally occurs in the early phase of your sleep time. Deep sleep is especially important to your training because it is during deep sleep that the body works on building and repairing muscle. That means deep sleep is when a lot of your muscle growth happens!

So while training it is important to always go to sleep at a constant bedtime, because if you go to bed late you could miss out on the deep sleep that happens at that early phase. Also make sure you can get good quality early sleep. For example, if you find that early in the night there is still a lot of highway or traffic noise going on in your neighbourhood you should look for earplugs or another way of damping out the sound. Or if your family or roommates are still up when you go to bed, their noise and activity could impair those all-important for muscle growth early sleep hours.

The last part of your sleep is mainly the REM type sleep. REM is the stage where you are preparing to wake up. It is best to wake from this stage. Too much REM sleep has been linked to depression and emotional demotivation so you don't want to let the morning sleep in stage go for too long. But be careful not to cut your REM sleep short: you need it too. Too little REM sleep can leave you with high levels of lactate in your blood the next day, which tires your muscles out sooner. If you find yourself emotionally down and hard to get yourself motivated, try cutting back on your REM sleep by getting up earlier.

Sleep is highly individual and it is difficult to measure or sometimes even suspect its role in our lives. But the most important thing is to maintain consistent bedtimes and sleep time and make sure your sleep is high quality. Make sure your bed is comfortable and that your bedroom is dark and quiet. Although it is hard to quantify ahead of time, paying attention to quality sleep will benefit your training and your life!

Drinking Water While Training

Water is a fundamental necessity for human life. The non-fat components of the human body are 70% water by weight. A person can live for a couple of weeks without food, but only a couple of days without water. How much water should we be drinking for optimum health? You will hear that the ideal amount is 8 glasses a day. However, that is something of an urban myth. There has been no clear finding recommending to drink 8 glasses a day. A much better general guide is to drink whenever you are thirsty.

However, when you are training thirst is not a good enough indicator. You can be dehydrating without feeling thirsty. If you are training hard blasting your muscles, especially if it is hot out, you will be loosing a lot of water to sweat. In hard training it is a good idea to drink a glass of water every 15 minutes or so, without relying on feeling thirst. Just stop a few seconds and gulp a glass of water every quarter hour.

How many calories???

A fun game you can play is seeing how long it would take you to burn off the calories from that snack that you indulged in. There are many calorie counters on the internet, both for counting your food intake and your energy expenditure. For example a strawberry sundae has about 270 calories, which could be burnt in an hour and 10 minutes if you do some carpentry. Other examples are:

A can of coke: 45 minutes of ten pin bowling

A Budweiser: 15 minutes of painting the fence

A medium-sized pancake with butter and syrup: 30 minutes walking very briskly

A full serving of pad-thai: 1 hour 10 minutes of competitive rowing

An order of onion rings: 35 minutes of intense workout with a punching bag

A taco salad with chili con carne: 25 minutes of bicycling at 15 mph

A danish pastry: 30 minutes of step aerobics

A McDonald's Fillet-o-Fish: 7 hours 30 minutes of vigorous sexual activity

Push Ups

Simple exercises that you can do without any equipment are the perfect way to start training. If you want to get fit but you find it hard to get out to the gym and you don't want to spend the money on home equipment push ups can be just the thing for you. Also if you are traveling or staying away from home you can still do push ups. Push ups train your arms, chest and upper body. They will also strengthen your core muscles.

Some tips on how to do a good push up. Keep your body in a straight line. Don't let your hips do above or below the line of your spine. Put your hands down on the ground a little farther apart than the width of your shoulders. Your shoulders should be right above your hands. Make sure than your shoulders are not in front of or behind your hands. Now straighten your body, tighten up the muscles of your core and lower your chest until it barely touches the ground. You can keep on increasing the repetitions as you get stronger. That way you will generate continuous development of your arms and upper chest.

The video demonstrates good military push up technique. Watch it and then do some for yourself!

Flexibility

Flexibility is an important part of overall fitness. The yoga world is a great source of ideas for stretches and other flexibility training. You don't have to buy into yoga completely as a spiritual way of life to use their exercises! This video walks you through two basic yoga stretches that you can use anytime anyplace. A handy addition to your fitness training toolkit!

Belly Dancing

Belly dancing can be a fun way to keep fit. For a lot of people training just for fitness can be too boring or otherwise hard to do. These people often find that another activity they enjoy which has fitness as a side effect is much more effective. Belly dancing is one of these strategies. Dancing can be fun in and of itself but it acts like an invisible training routine.

To begin learning belly dancing you don't need much. Some space to dance in, maybe a square a couple of meters on a side. You'll need a full body length mirror so you can see what you are up to. Find a private place. It is hard not to be self conscious if you are learning to belly dance in public view. Self consciousness is not a good state for learning or training. It is also not very fun. Find some clothes that expose your hips and belly. It is called belly dancing after all. Although not strictly necessary, some scarves and silky ribbons will help you get into the mood. Very important : find yourself some Arabian belly dancing music! You can't dance without music!

With those things at the ready, all you need is to know how. That is where this video comes in! Watch it and start dancing! Not only will you have fun but you will start to tone up your muscles and enjoy all the many benefits of physical fitness.

Importance of Ideal Form

Is picture perfect form necessary for building muscle? You will always hear about how you shouldn't "cheat" when performing an exercise. However absolutely perfect form can actually interfere with muscle size growth and raw strength increase. This is because perfect form is designed to isolate and target specific insertions or specific sections of picked muscles. It is aimed at controlling the shape and definition of that muscle. It is not aimed at pure strength and size.

A little bit of cheating lets you put on the extra stress needed to provoke muscle growth. The leverage limits of perfect form make it impossible to go into that overload zone needed to really promote growth. That is not to say that anything goes. You should not cheat to the extent of using completely different muscle groups. Especially do not cheat just to squeeze off an extra rep. If you are doing that it is going to be counterproductive. The point is to blast your muscle by putting it into a stress zone outside of its limits.

So don't think you have to have perfect form at all costs. A little bit of cheating can help build size and strength. But don't overdo it or the only person you will be cheating is yourself.

How Much Weight

How much weight should you use if the goal is to increase muscle size? The best strategy is called the Principle of Progressive Resistance. The idea is to link the weight with the number of repetitions you can do in a set. First pick a target number of reps. It should be in the range of 10 to 12. Then start with a light weight and do a set. You will easily be able to do 12 reps with something left over. Now gradually increase the weight. Day by day, set by set, add more weight. Stop adding weight when you can just barely complete your target number of reps. Each set should leave you absolutely unable to do even one more rep past that target. Then take a minute or minute and a half between set rest and do the next set, also up to the target.

Over time your muscles will quickly gain mass as you blast them. When you get stronger, you will find that making it up to your target number of reps becomes too easy. Once you have something left and can go beyond the target, add more weight until you can't any more. That is how you use the principle of progressive resistance to pick the best amount of weight to use.

Tone and Lean Your Body

Most of us women would like to have an toner and leaner body. Not necessarily one covered with iron straps of blasted muscles. It can be challenging to find enough time to achieve this. The key is to select a training routine that delivers results without sucking up too many hours in the gym. Believe it or not 3 hours a week is all it takes!

First off, we have to cover cardio. What particular cardio exercise you do doesn't really matter. The important thing is you have to do at least 3 days a week of high intensity cardio. To be definite, I always say do 30 minutes of cardio. Follow a Day ON Day OFF pattern with 3 on days each week. Running is a good choice for cardio. It especially helps with some of the common female problem areas like the butt, lower stomach and thighs. If you are just starting your training, work up to 30 minutes gradually. Start with 15 minutes (or even 10 minutes) and then then next week add a couple minutes until you get up to 30.

In addition to cardio you will have to do some light weight training for that feminine toned, lean muscle look. You can do 3 sessions of 30 minutes a week and it will be enough. Begin with lots of repetitions and low weights. Every couple of weeks as the exercise gets less difficult add a little more weight. For your legs and butt you can do 2 sets of 10 or 12 repetitions of squats, hamstring curls and quad raises. For your arms, shoulders, back and chest do 2 sets of 10 or 12 repetitions of these : arm curls, tricep dips, side arm raises, front arm raises, bent arm raises and pec decks.

Now let's talk about the abs. A tight, lean stomach can be a girl's best asset. Twice a week do a non-stop high intensity ab training. It is super important that you go continuously without resting. The exact exercises you use are not nearly as important as the intensity and continuous nature of the workout. Here is a list of ab training exercises you could choose from. Do each exercise for no more than 25 repetitions and then switch to another. Keep doing this without resting for a 4 to 5 minute period. If you are just starting your training, you can go for less than 4 minutes and gradually build up the time. Here are some exercises you could use in your abs training: crunches, bicycles, v sit-ups, normal sit-ups, inclined bench sit-ups, back extensions or suspended leg lifts where you hang from a bar and lift your legs parallel to the ground.

Follow a routine like this and you will soon find yourself in possession of a head turning lean, toned body!

Ways to Up the Intensity of Your Training

The basic theory of bodybuilding is to build muscle by presenting them with ever increasing resistance while eating lots of proteins (so there will be raw material present in your body to build more muscle). Although this seems simple, when you get into it you quickly find that it is not so simple. The number of variables you are faced with actually makes training most effectively a complicated affair. On top of that, each person's body will respond slightly differently to the same training regime. And different bodybuilders have different goals.

So it is not always crystal clear what the best type and combination of training is to blast your muscles with. So what we are going to do here is talk about some of the basic ways you can add to the intensity of your workouts. Obviously factors like the number of reps and sets you do, the weights you use, the rest time between sets, rate at which you increase weight and so on are the fundamental controls we have to manipulate. But it might not be clear what to manipulate and why. Let's look at some of these "controls" to see how and why you would set them at certain values.

Ramp Up Weight
It is super important to keep increasing the weights you lift (or the resistance the muscles have to work against). The only way to build muscle is to damage and break them down so they grow back even bigger. To achieve this you have to constantly up the weight. If the weight does not progressively increase the muscles will get used to a certain level and stop being broken down, thus stop growing.

The best way to set your weight and make sure it keeps going up is to follow the progressive loading principle. It works like this. First you start with a light weight and do as many reps as you can. If you can do more than 12, the weight is too light. Keep increasing the weight until you can just barely do 12 reps. The last couple should really be blasting your muscles. Then over time as the 12 become easier, add more weight. Keep on adding weight so you are always just able to do 12 reps. Twelve is a good number, but it is not a rule. Most people using progressive loading use from 8 to 12 reps as the goal.

Number of Sets
You can up the intensity of your training by adding a couple more sets. The best number of sets is about 3 for more isolated muscles, like biceps for example and 5 for muscle groups, like thighs for example. You can bump sets up to 6 or 7 for an intensity boost. But such boosts should be for short time periods, say a month maximum. Also when adding more sets to your training, you should also add extra rest days for the muscle group you are giving the extra sets to.

Repetitions
You usually should do 8 to 12 reps for a set, according to the progressive loading principle we talked about above. But to increase the intensity of your training, you could drop the weight and add more reps. You can try a "two four" set : that is what I call it when you do 24 reps on a muscle. First you do 8 half motion reps working the muscle in one direction, then 8 half motions in the other direction and then 8 full reps to finish.

Speed
Normally the speed of a rep helps complete it. You can up the intensity by slowing the motion down. Move the weight as though you are doing a Matrix slow motion fight scene. You will find that this is really hard to do. It will certainly blast your muscles in a different way than before.

No Rest For the Wicked
Normally you should be taking about one to one and a half minutes of rest between sets. If your muscles are too tired you will not get maximum benefit out of a set. But to add to the intensity, you can lower this rest time. Be careful not to overdo it and keep an eye on the actual results you are getting. No point hurrying from set to set with little rest and not get any muscle growth due to excessive muscle tiredness. Try taking 25% off your normal rest time. For example, if you usually rest about a minute and a half between sets, that is 90 seconds. 25% of that is about 22 seconds. So cut your rest to 70 seconds or a minute and 10 seconds.

Negative Reps
It will often happen that on the return motion you still have something left after you have hit your maximum 12th rep on the forward motion. For example, if you are doing a bench press the 12th rep is your last lift. You just can't get the weight up for the thirteenth time. But you might still be able to manage the *downward* part of a 13th rep. What you can do is have a partner assist you to allow you to complete extra forward reps, then have the partner let you complete the reverse motion by yourself. This is a way of adding extra intensity where you might need it.

So here are a few things you can do to up the intensity of your training. But keep in mind that extra intensity should be used infrequently. Overdoing high intensity will just put you into overtraining and you will exhaust yourself and get little muscle growth. By all means throw on some extra intensity if you are feeling stale or if a while has gone by without seeing much progress in your muscle size.

Endurance Like the Rock of Ages

Would you like to have endurance like a rock? Endurance is the ability to just keep on going after everybody else has fallen away. It requires blasting your muscles in a different way from building strength. You have to go more gradually, like endurance itself. I would like to show you my "Rock of Ages" program. It is an 18 week system designed to ramp up your endurance to diamond tough levels. After these 18 weeks you will be a machine. But it is a hard program. It will require mental strength and iron discipline to make it through without it breaking you. This system uses only basic moves and does not require and fancy equipment. Like endurance itself, it is simple but very powerful.

So without further ado, here is my 18 week "Rock of Ages" endurance program.

Week 1

• Run 2 miles each of 3 days
• 4 sets of 12 pushups on 3 days
• 4 sets of 25 situps on 3 days
• 3 sets of 3 chin ups on 3 days
• 15 minutes swimming 5 days

Week 2

• Run 2 miles each of 3 days
• 5 sets of 15 pushups on 3 days
• 5 sets of 25 situps on 3 days
• 3 sets of 3 chin ups on 3 days
• 15 minutes swimming 5 days

Week 3

• 5 sets of 20 pushups on 3 days
• 5 sets of 30 situps on 3 days
• 3 sets of 4 chin ups on 3 days
• 20 minutes swimming 5 days

Week 4

• run 3 miles on 3 days
• 5 sets of 25 pushups on 3 days
• 5 sets of 30 situps on 3 days
• 3 sets of 4 chin ups on 3 days
• 20 minutes swimming 5 days

Week 5 & 6

• run 2 miles, then 3 miles then 4 miles, day off, then run 2 miles
• 6 sets of 25 pushups on 3 days
• 6 sets of 30 situps on 3 days
• 2 sets of 8 chin ups on 3 days
• 25 minutes swimming 5 days

Week 7 & 8

• run 4 miles, then 4 miles then 5 miles, day off, then run 3 miles
• 6 sets of 30 pushups on 3 days
• 6 sets of 35 situps on 3 days
• 2 sets of 10 chin ups on 3 days
• 30 minutes swimming 5 days

Week 9

• run 4 miles, then 4 miles then 5 miles, day off, then run 3 miles
• 6 sets of 30 pushups on 3 days
• 6 sets of 35 situps on 3 days
• 3 sets of 10 chin ups on 3 days
• 35 minutes swimming 5 days

Week 10 & 11

• run 3 miles, then 5 miles then 4 miles, day off, then run 5 miles then 2 miles
• 6 sets of 30 pushups on 3 days
• 6 sets of 35 situps on 3 days
• 3 sets of 10 chin ups on 3 days
• 3 sets of 20 chest dips on 3 days
• 35 minutes swimming 5 days

Week 12 & 13

• run 4 miles, then 5 miles then 6 miles, day off, then run 4 miles then 3 miles
• 10 sets of 20 pushups on 3 days
• 10 sets of 25 situps on 3 days
• 4 sets of 10 chin ups on 3 days
• 10 sets of 15 chest dips on 3 days
• 45 minutes swimming 5 days

Week 14

• run 5 miles, then 5 miles then 6 miles, day off, then run 4 miles then 4 miles
• 15 sets of 20 pushups on 3 days
• 15 sets of 25 situps on 3 days
• 4 sets of 12 chin ups on 3 days
• 15 sets of 15 chest dips on 3 days
• 60 minutes swimming 5 days

Week 15, 16, 17 & 18

• run 5 miles, then 6 miles then 6 miles, day off, then run 6 miles then 4 miles
• 20 sets of 20 pushups on 3 days
• 20 sets of 25 situps on 3 days
• 5 sets of 12 chin ups on 3 days
• 20 sets of 15 chest dips on 3 days
• 75 minutes swimming 5 days

Make it through those 18 weeks and you will have the endurance of the Rock of Ages.

Get into the Flow.

Winners forget they're in a race, they just love to run.

Have you ever had a day when you went out on a run and the day was just so perfect, and you felt so good, that the miles sped by and you were surprised, even sad when the path came to an end?  Or maybe there was an afternoon that you spent playing basketball/soccer/whatever and you lost track of time so totally that you only stopped when you had to?

That sense of being totally in your activity, of being right with the universe, is called Flow. 

Flow is the mental state in which the person is fully immersed in what he or she is doing by a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and success in the process of the activity.  Sometimes people describe being in a flow state as being  on the ball, in the zone, or in the groove.

Sucessful athletes often enter into flow when they are training or competing.  So do musicians, artisans, even people who program computers.   If the conditions are right you can enter into flow state in any activity that requires concentration.  And when you do, it feels good.

Psychologists describe being in the zone as a loss of self consciousness, it happens when action and awareness merge.  Athletes have described the feeling as"being the ball".  It happens when there is a balance between ability level and challenge, and the activity is intrinsically rewarding:  People have noted that while in the groove there is an effortlessness of action.

So how do you get into the flow?

• Do something you like.  Something that you enjoy doing, just for the sake of doing it.  
• Set a realistic goal, don't waste your time on stuff that is too easy, and don't frustrate yourself with stuff that is to hard.
• Spend a couple minutes getting ready before you start your activity.  Maybe that means do a warm-up.  Maybe you have to reveiw your goals, or your points of inspiration, or listen to music.
  
• Avoid distractions and interruptions.  You can't be in flow state and monitor your cell phone.
• Keep your training area a "positive zone".  Keep critics, and the people who doubt, or pressure you away from where you train.  Those people have their place and time, but not when you're training.
  
• Give yourself time.  You need to concentrate on an activity for about 15 minutes before your brain will "switch over"

Christie's One Hour Body Weight Workout

This is a one hour workout designed to focus on abdominal strength, but mixing in elements of cardio and power. Its enough of a mixed bag that you will train a little bit of balance and agility too.  When I say one hour, I mean you can get through it in an hour if you work fast and hard.

Warm-up:

5 minutes light cardio:  Start by jogging then add in side-shuffle.

• 45 seconds jog
• 15 seconds side-shuffle ...continue untill you reach 5 minutes.

5 minutes joint rotations and light stretching:  Warm up your joints by moving them through their full range of motion. This will pump blood into your joints and muscles better than stretching and will also warm up your mind-body connection. 

For example you will be doing push-ups, so do wrist rotations and swing your arms in circles.  If you've been sitting staring at a screen shrug your shoulders in circles and do semi-circles with your head to warm up your neck.  Keep on going to warm up all the parts of your body, quickly, but not missing parts.

Circuit 1: (repeat the circuit 3 times)

• 12 burpies *see video
  
• 30 tuck-crunches
• 12 chin-ups,* if you can't do chin-ups modifiy by jumping at the start of each chin-up, or doing chin-ups under a table so that your heels are touching the floor and your body is on a diagonal
• 1 minute V-sit
• Walk 10m in hand-stand (or try to do a hand-stand against a wall 10 times)
• 30 supermans
• 30 bicycle crunches

Circuit 2: (repeat 3 times)

• 10 walk-lunges forwards, return jumping backwards on one foot, REPEAT only varying which foot you jump backwards on.
• 30 reverse crunches
• 400m sprint
• 1 minute of the plank
• 15 squat-jumps with a heel click at the highest point in the jump
  
• 30 side bends with your arms sraight out in a T
• 30 russian twists in a v-sit

Cool-down:

• 3 minutes light jogging 

• 2 minutes fast walking - be sure to take long steps

• 5 minutes stretching.