Showing posts with label weight training. Show all posts
Showing posts with label weight training. Show all posts

3/20/2014

Do You Need To Change Your Workout?

Whether your goal is to improve performance, slim down, cut-up, bulk-up, reduce risk of injury or work around a problem area, a carefully considered change up in your workout might be just what the doctor ordered.  In this issue, the signs that your fitness program needs a change and the changes that can take you to the next level.  

If any of these statements are true, a change in program is overdue.

You've been doing the same exercises for more than 6-8 weeks, the only change has been to increase weight.   Your body adapts to the exercises, you will experience a diminished return on investment in terms of muscle development, and changing body composition (gaining or losing weight). Planned changes, or periodization, can help you break through the plateau.   What's more, continually performing the same exact movements makes you more susceptible to repetitive motion injuries.  Read more here Machines vs. Free Weights

You're taking up or increasing participation in a sport or activity (running, cycling, hiking, basketball, soccer, and so on).  Your fitness program can complement and enhance your activities and sports participation, or it can conflict with them.  You may have noticed a particular problem since increasing your new activity, small adaptations to your workout can make a big difference.

Your goal or timeline has changed, you may want to get into shape for a vacation or wedding or the beach.  Simply doing more of the same thing may not be the optimal solution;  in fact, you're more likely to see diminished return and experience some sort of injury that prevents you from reaching your goal.

You've got a new health issue, to name a few common ones: back, neck or shoulder pain; blood pressure; broken bones; cancer; depression; diabetes; GERD; hernia; plantar fascitis; pregnancy; surgery; tendinitis.   Programs can be modified to achieve results and help deal with most issues. In some cases, exercise can be part of "the cure" or recovery.

You're bored or having trouble sticking with an exercise program.  A new routine can be just the thing to motivate you. Of course, it should also be relevant to your fitness goals and level.

Ten Changes to Make Today

1.  Get off the Machines They're a great place to start and can be an important part of the program... but if you've gotten stuck in a machines-only exercise rut you're doing more to work the machines than to work your muscle in a meaningful way.  Plus, they may put you at risk of repetitive motion issues.   Read more here Machines vs. Free Weights

2.  Decrease Stability/Decrease Weight/Increase Repetitions Strengthen your core and burn more calories as you workout. Performing exercises standing, on an exercise ball, on balance boards or with suspension training like TRX are a good way to go.  A stronger core can also improve your performance in lifting and many sports and give you a tighter and fitter appearance.

3.  Increase Stability/Increase Weight/Decrease Repetitions
Go heavy at almost any age to increase muscle - since muscle burns more calories than fat, you'll begin losing weight while you rest!  Carefully select exercises and pay attention to proper form.

4.  Change the Tempo  Increasing time spent on the eccentric (negative), adding an isometric contraction to exercises, or simply slowing the overall tempo - and increasing the time that the muscle is kept under tension rather than the weight - can help produce gains in strength, endurance and muscle size and break through plateaus.  Longer negatives increase strength and endurance, isometrics help cut and build muscle size.

5.  Plyometyrics   Increase explosive power, reduce risk of injury and have some fun with Plyometrics.  Participants in a well-designed program of stretching, plyometrics and weight training reduced landing forces from a jump by 20 percent, and increased their hamstrings strength by 44 percent.  Plyometrics can also be applied to upper body exercises and sport specific training.

Click here to learn about how many sets and reps you should be doing and see program examples at trainercary.com.

6.  Assess, Correct, Emphasize and Eliminate  Bad posture and movements patterns can reduce performance and increase risk of injury.  A movement and postural assessment like the one on my website can identify which muscles are tight and need stretching and which are extended and need strengthening, and help determine which exercises and stretches to add or remove from your program.  You can learn how to assess yourself at trainercary.com/fitness-assessment.

7.  Change the Mix or Timing of Strength and Aerobic Training  As a rule, if you want to get improve your running speed do cardio before strength, if you want to increase strength or build muscle, do cardio after.  The timing change that has personally helped me the most is to alternate days so that I can go all-in every day.

8.  Work One Side of Your Body at a Time  One side may seem weaker or smaller than the other, but that's only the beginning. Unilateral exercises can help improve core strength, and improve your overall strength by improving "neuromuscular efficiency" - the way your brain "recruits" muscle fibers.  This is time consuming, so you may not do it every time or for every muscle.  Read my article The Brain Train.

9. Superset and Circuit   Combine two or more different exercises for the same muscle group, with no rest in between, such as a chest press followed by pushup, and you can work the muscles longer and harder before tiring or risking injury.  Alternate between front and back of body or upper and lower body so that you don't have to rest in between, you will buirn more calories and increase the number of exercises per session.

10.  Interval Training  Alternating between higher and lower intensity in your cardio workout could be right for you if you have a good cardio base and want to improve performance or increase weight loss.  You'll also burn more calories for a few hours after exercising with interval training.  Read my quotes in this article The Best Interval Training Technique for You, on fitbie.com, from he publishers of Men's health

Still Stuck?  Get a Partner.  Join a Class,  Hire a Trainer  If two weeks or more pass by and you've skipped your exercise appointments, your plan isn't working.  Do you need an appointment with a friend or trainer so you don't cancel? Maybe a class? Or a written program to follow and log? Can you keep the commitment to exercise on your own? Do you get bored easily? Will you push yourself hard enough?   Do you need my help?

Contact me  if you have any questions or want to set up some sessions to develop your personalized program, or visit TrainerCary.com for more information.

2/03/2013

Get the Results YOU Want

Whether you're new to the gym, returning after a break, or resolved to bust through a plateau and take your fitness to a new level in 2013, this newsletter has you covered.  In this issue,  the tools you need including  help Setting Goals, Assessing Your Current Fitness, Scheduling and Commitment, Program Design and Measurement, and sample programs that you can adopt or adapt. 
Effective Fitness Goals are measurable, achievable, yet challenging.  Break big goals up into smaller goals so that you can track progress and be motivated by little successes along the way.  Choose the right measurements of success:  Some goals like strength and athletic performance and weight loss are easily measured in pounds, or with a ruler or stopwatch. For toning, body measurements, clothes size and subjective assessments of how you look and feel and move are often a better indication of change in body composition.  Ensure success by incorporating the following into your plan: ·         
·     Burn 3500 calories (or eat 3500 fewer) to lose a pound of fat.
·      Exercise at least 150 minutes per week to maintain health and body composition, and 300 minutes weekly significantly improve body composition according to the American College of Sports Medicine.
·       To ensure safe, effective long term weight loss, make lifestyle changes that lead you to drop 1-2 pounds per week, according to ACSM and the American Dieticians Association. 
·        It takes about 16 exercise sessions over several weeks to increase the size of muscle according to the National Strength and Conditioning Association. 
·       You cannot spot reduce, according to the American Council on Exercise. Combine aerobic and strength training to burn calories so that the body draws on stored fat from all areas. 
Once you've established your goals, assess your posture, movement and any problem areas using this mini-self-assessment.  Incorporate exercises that improve your posture and movement. Common problems like rounded and elevated shoulders, knock knees, out-turned feet and hips that are tilted can lead to injury, prevent you from working muscles at the optimum angle, and interfere with balance and force production. You'll perform better when working out or in sports and reduce risk of finding yourself on the disabled list.
Custom-tailor your program to focus on your goals, condition and abilities.   You probably can't wear a new suit off the rack without having it tailored to you, the same idea applies to "one-size-fits-all" exercises program, or borrowing exercises that suit another person or purpose.  If your goal is weight loss, focus on aerobic exercise, strength training large muscles (legs back chest), circuit-style training with limited rest, and multi-joint exercises to maximize calories burned.   For other goals, select the number of sets, repetitions and rest interval using the chart below.

Goal
Sets
Repetitions
Weight/ % 1 Rep Max
Rest
Lean/Tone (Endurance)
1 - 3
 12 - 20
Moderate / 60-70%
0 - :90
Increase Size (Hypertrophy)
3 - 5
 8 - 12
Moderate-High / 70-85%
0 - :60
Maximum Strength
3 - 6
 1 - 12
High / 70-100%
:45 - 5:00
Power (and Plyometrics)
3 - 6
 1 - 10
Low / 30-45% or 10& body weight
3:00 - 5:00
     
Consistency/showing up takes commitment.  Schedule your workout appointments like any other important meeting. Put it right into your calendar!  Attend scheduled classes, meet a reliable friend, have an appointment with a trainer, or create your own "incentive reward" program - reward yourself for achieving a fitness goal or just for showing up. My clients often tell me that without our scheduled appointment they would find a reason to skip the gym.  I even found myself skipping my aerobic workouts or cutting them short - so I changed my schedule to alternate days of total body strength training and aerobic exercise because it made my aerobics more consistent. 
500 Crunches a Day Won't Get You a Six Pack
Abdominal exercises may be the most over-hyped, overdone and possibly least effective exercises.  Your abdominal muscles are covered with fat.  To see the muscles, lose the fat.  Abdominal exercises do not burn a significant amount of fat.  You cannot spot reduce.  So what's the secret?  Diet, aerobic exercises, and working the big muscle groups.    
Exercise progression means continually overloading the body's system by changing the exercise stimulus. Increasing weight and/or repetitions is one way to progress, but shouldn't be the only way. Your body adapts to exercises within 4-6 weeks, you'll experience diminished return from your program as you continue doing similar exercises and a similar range of sets, repetitions, time under tension and stability.  Or in the case of aerobics, if you continue training in a steady state. You also expose yourself to the same kind of repetitive stress injuries as factory workers when you continually do the same exact movements and work at the same intensity.  Periodization is changing your exercise program at regular planned intervals.
 For best results, most people should Periodize their training and cycle between 2-3 different phases of training on a 4-6 week basis. If you've been focused on stable training such as machines, lying on benches and/or sitting through your workout, try standing.  It increases core activation and targets a greater cross section of muscle fibers. Once you've mastered standing, progress to exercises on a single leg, or with balance boards and balls. Then come back to a more intensive stable strength training routine. Or try plyometrics to increase power.   I've got some examples of progressions here.  Another option is to include different types of training within each week.  Instead of splitting between muscle groups, try alternating workouts between strength, stability and power.
Visit  trainercary.com/programs for a progression of programs for any fitness level.
Running the Marathon in 2013 is a realistic goal if you've been running at least 2-3 hours a week for a about a year.  Running your best time may also be possible for those who've run before, or maybe you want to get back into the marathon because an injury sidelined you?   Or run shorter distance races.  Interval training can help improve your aerobic capacity and speed, read more in this article, The Best Interval Training Technique for You.

The biggest mistake people make is to assume that because they're running they don't need to do leg exercises.   In fact, a custom-tailored corrective strength and flexibility program can help prevent injury and improve athletic performance.  The steps are almost identical to those outlined above for strength training.  Assess your posture and movement, and follow the programs outlined on my website. 

Has your running program been sidelined by recurring injury or pain?  It may be possible to overcome these problems with the right program.   I recently began training a new client who stopped running years ago because it hurt his knees.  After 2 weeks on a corrective program, he was able to start running without pain.

My niece is one of the top divers on her Division 1 college team, but  hamstring pain and tightness has affected her ability to jump off the diving board.  She's about to begin a program to overcome this problem.  Basketball players, soccer players and other recreational and competitive athletes can often benefit from corrective programs. 

Choosing the right measurement tool can be an important part of your success.  Many people want a hard objective measurement but softer measurements such as how you feel and how your clothes fit are also important. 

People often rely too much on a specific measurement, or choose one that lacks positive reinforcement or accuracy.  Body fat measurements, for example, are imprecise tools, and for someone interested in losing a large number of pounds, potentially discouraging.  Changes in waist or clothing size might be a more appropriate and motivating measurement. 

Fitness Articles for You