Good Reads
Posted on July 30, 2008 | Filed Under Fitness, Nutrition
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Experiment….
Posted on July 26, 2008 | Filed Under Fitness
I figure if 77 zealous inches can do this whole writing questions on her blog and asking people to answer them, I can too! But only fitness questions and only to better educate you, my faithful two readers.
Ok so this is for Libby, I’m not sure if she’ll answer or not but hey, it doesn’t hurt to try. Libby is a certified personal trainer, not to mention she’s in awesome shape, so I always enjoy picking her brain.
Question time
How many times a week do you recommend working out?
A: It depends on the individual person’s goal. For general health and fitness three times a week of vigorous exercise is enough. For someone who training for a particular event, or someone who’s very into fitness, I’d say up it to about four to five times a week. I workout five times a week, but only four of those are one-hour weight and cardio sessions and the fifth is just a 40 minute cardio session. With resistance training especially you need to make sure you’re giving your muscles recovery time, whether that means just doing weights, say three times a week, and resting your muscles in between those days (although you can still do cardio the other days). Or whether it means training one muscle group one day and a different muscle group the next, and another the next, etc. (split-training). Although even with that you should have at least one or two no-weight-training days a week. For people who are very into their fitness routine they have to be careful not to overtrain, which has the opposite effect in every way. A common sign of overtraining is that you’re training as hard as ever, but your performance is consistently getting worse, rather than improving. This drop in performance is usually accompanied by changes in mood (depression etc), as well as joint and continuous muscle pain, fatigue, loss of appetite, lack of results (due to not giving your body adequate recovery time), etc. Consistency is the key with your workout plan. I don’t recommend exercising seven times a week. You should give your body at least one rest day, without doing any form of vigorous exercise. As much as you body needs vigorous exercise, it also needs time to heal. Sometimes having one or two days off exercise a week is just what people need, as when your muscles have completely recovered you can punch in a much more intense workout the next time around, and get even better results. At least I’ve found that with my own training.
Do you think stability balls are useful tools, or are they just another gimicky thing that gives you ok results, but not anything more exceptional then your average plank position could give you?
A: Stability balls are extremely useful tools. I use them sooo much. The ball can transform a basic exercise into a super challenging, more effective move. Doing any exercise on a stability ball (as opposed to doing it on a steady surface) ups the intensity by a huge amount because you have to recruit all sorts of little extra muscles to stabilize yourself on the ball, that you wouldn’t be using otherwise. (And the more muscles you use in any given exercise, the harder the exercise will be, and thus the greater the results.) Take for example, a regular chest press with two dumbbells, on a bench. You are targeting your pecs primarily as well as your arm muscles. However, take this onto a fitball. Roll yourself down till your head is resting on the ball and begin the chest press while keeping your hips up and abs switched on, and suddenly you’re working your glutes, hamstrings and abs as well. Trust me, you’ll feel the difference. =). Or try doing push ups on a ball instead of regular push-ups. You’ll feel the burn in your abs 100 times more. This applies to taking any exercise from a stable surface, on to the ball. There are so many ways you can take an exercise to a new level just by using an exercise ball.
I’ve been looking into getting a kettlebell, how do you feel about them? Are they a good fitness tool that’s worth the money, or is it something where a dumbell would work just as well for the different kettlebell exercises?
A: Kettlebell workouts can be very time efficient as the entire body can be trained with relatively few exercises. When you train with kettlebells you tend to have to work at a very high intensity. This explains why kettlebell lifting is gaining a reputation for rapidly stripping body fat. It’s held differently than a dumbbell so you can use it in so many more ways than a dumbbell. There is a very large variety of exercises you can perform with kettlebells so it’s pretty worth it thing to get, in my opinion. The main thing I’d suggest is making sure that you learn to use it properly. There are DVDs available in regards to safe kettlebell exercise technique. Also many kettlebell lifts are ballistic or explosive in nature so this type of training is best suited to individuals who already have some experience with weight training. Overall I’d recommend kettlebells, especially if you need a change in your exercise routine or have hit somewhat of a plateau and if you like intense training.
How do you feel about artificial sweeteners? The Devil, or not so much?
A: Well firstly, they are unnatural, and full of chemicals, and I am pretty much against most processed foods, as the bottom line is that the body was not designed to deal with foreign substances like artificial preservatives and chemicals. Too much processed food just clutters up your system. Having a natural, and as clean a diet as possible, is always the best way to go both for your weight and your health. With the artificial sweeteners some are worse than others and I know that Aspartame is probably one of the worst one as they have done all sorts of studies on it and have linked it to scary things like cancer, etc. On the other hand, artificial sweeteners do save you calories, but there’s growing evidence that they can increase your appetite for sweets and carbohydrates as well, causing you to eat more later in the day anyway. So you end up not really saving any calories. Also, studies have shown that artificial sweeteners can stimulate high insulin levels in your body, and having high levels of insulin promotes fat storage. There’s an alternative to them though. I’m not sure if you’ve heard of Stevia. It’s an all-natural alternative sweetener and it’s is not artificial like the other chemical sweeteners It’s a natural non-caloric herb that’s been used for thousands of years in some parts of the world. It is a South American herb and when dried into a powder, has sweetness about 200-300 times stronger than sugar. Here’s their website: http://www.steviva.com. You can find it in most health shops here, and probably other countries as well.
If I only had 20 minutes to workout and you were training me what kind of workout would you put me through?
A: Umm, let’s see. I would put you through a total body circuit training program including both strength training and short-burst intense cardio exercises (making sure you had a heartrate monitor on, and that throughout the entire workout your heart rate was consistency up and at a challenging level: ie at least minimum 70 percent of your maximum heart rate…). I’d make sure to include exercises that work every major muscle group in your body, utilizing total body movements. (A big benefit of utilizing total body movements [working more than one muscle group at a time, also known as compound exercises] is that they require a very large energy expenditure which means that you burn a lot of calories during a short time of training.) Some examples of exercises I’d include in the circuit would be: alternating leg lunges with bicep curls, push ups, burpees, leg raises off a bench for your abs, assisted pull-ups, squat jumps holding weights…going straight into overhead presses, single leg tricep-dips, deadlifts, jumping lunges, etc. I’d go thru the circuit twice taking approx 15 minutes, with about a two minute rest between the first and second circuit. I’d probably end with five minutes of boxing as well. Something like that, anyway. =) It’s much more about the intensity of your workout, rather than how long how you spend working out, that gets you good results.
Yay! I’m so happy Libby Answered. Thanks Libby for those insightful well thought out answers.
TTFN
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A Few Of My Favorite Things
Posted on July 23, 2008 | Filed Under Fitness
Keep your backside from doing a backslide
Feel free to thank me when you can’t walk up the stairs, laugh, sneeze, or breathe without pain…
No one said Fitness was painless, amen?
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I dare you….
Posted on July 11, 2008 | Filed Under Fitness
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Jillian Michaels 30 Day Shred Workout
Posted on July 11, 2008 | Filed Under Fitness, Rants and Raves
Lately I’ve been trying alot of new workout videos/programs, and out of all the new stuff I’ve been trying I’ve really liked the 30 day shred workout, by Jillian Michaels.
You might recognize her as one of the trainers from the TV show The Biggest Loser. Her workout is fairly simply, no intense choreography, no peppy aerobic movies, pretty much just basic strength training, cardio, and abs. There are three workouts that are each about 25 minutes, including the warm-up and cool down. I tried the hardest level and found myself backtracking to level 2, heh..
I really liked her system; 3 minutes of strength 2 minutes of cardio, and 1 minute of abs, rinse and repeat. I felt challenged pretty much throughout the whole workout and today my back, shoulders and obliques are quite sore, there were a few moves that I really was not used to, so I ended up having to modify them.
So in summary, this workout is a perfect workout for those days when you only have a short amount of time to workout and you want to actually get your heart rate up, and get some weights in there as well. You could also do two of the workouts together if you have a bit more time.
TTFN
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I knew it….
Posted on April 1, 2008 | Filed Under Fitness, Misc, Run
http://www.womenshealthmag.com/fitness/scientists-confirm-runner039s-high
I asked the awesome Libby for some advice on some leg toning exercises, and she suggested some pretty intense combinations of lunges and squats. Let me just say that I am SORE, as in lots and lots of pain. On the plus side, I think they’re working. My legs and my backside are feeling alot more toned and strong already, so thanks again Libby, and my new Brazilian bikini thanks you as well.
In other news I found out why I haven’t been running well lately…..Coffee. It pains me to say it, but it seems like my afternoon coffee was throwing off my groove. I ran today without having had it, and I had zero side stitches, zero waves of nausea, and a wonderful 3.5 mile run in about 30 minutes. Adios afternoon coffee, it’s been fun but running is more important, I’m sure you understand. Don’t worry though we’ll always have our mornings together, that will never change I assure you.
The funny thing is that when I was training for my half marathon, I remember having an afternoon coffee, a couple hours before my run, pretty much every day and it not bothering me at all, I guess things change. Now that I figured out what my problem is, I’m back to training for a 5k. I’ll keep you up to date on how it’s going, and when I choose which one I’m going to do.
“Laziness is nothing more than the habit of resting before you get tired.” - Jules Renard
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