There’s no secret to it. You need to get strong. Huh?  If you’re stronger you can handle more weight. If you can handle more weight you’ll build more muscle.

OK how do I get stronger ? Now we’re talking.  That’s easy, do compound exercises, eat plenty of nutritious food and get enough rest.  Want more detail ? Lets start with the exercises.

The Old Standard 5X5 Routine

Workout A                                                   Workout B

Squats 5X5                                                                 Squat 5X5

Bench Press 5X5                                                         Overhead Press 5X5

Barbell Row 5X5                                                          Deadlift 2X5

Pushups 3X your max                                                  Pullups 3X your max

swiss (exercise) ball crunch 3X15                                 Reverse Crunch 3X15

You do three workouts a week. Alternating between A and B.

This routine covers nearly every muscle in your body and will help you stimulate serious muscle growth. Your job after that is to eat well and sleep enough to make the workouts pay off ! We’ll get into the nutrition part of things in a couple of days.

YES YOU MUST SQUAT !

This exercise has more misconceptions attached to it than any other. The biggest is that it will wreck your knees. The squat, done correctly will strengthen your knees. Notice I said done correctly. So lets take a look at how to do a squat the right way.

Warm Up

The easiest way I’ve found to warm up is to walk a mile or so at a pretty decent pace. After a quick walk my knees feel much nore flexible and loose.

Start With No Weight

Stand with your feet approximately shoulder width apart in an “athletic stance”. This means keep your knees  “soft” or slightly bent , Not locked. Your feet can be slightly turned out , whatever feels natural and comfortable. Now you’re still just standing there. Now put the back of one hand on the small of your back and you should feel a slight curve. This is your neutral position. During the entire exercise this slight curve should not change ! I can’t stress this enough. If you forget every thing else about the squat, don’t forget this !

Now, from your athletic stance put your arms staight out in front of you palms down  (or however you’re comfortable). Slowly lower yourself by bending your knees, do not bend at the waist at all. What you want to do is lower yourself as far as possible where you are comfortable. For some this may be where your thighs are below parallel to the floor. For others you may only be able to drop a little ways. Do what feels right for you. Remember, the curve of your lower back should not change.

Now from the bottom position push yourself back up as though you are trying to push the center of your feet through the floor. Resist the urge to stick your butt out as you try to rise. This is natural, you must train yourself to avoid it and keep your back straight throughout the entire exercise.

Try and do ten repititions or 5 or even one as long as you do it correctly and set youself up the right way for future  injury free weight training.

We’ll get into a routine for legs later but for now work on your squat, as there is no better or more effective leg and butt exercise. Time spent learning the right way is time well spent !

Until next time ,  Cheers !

What is “the core” ?

The Transversus Abdominus has been described as a ” corset ” of muscle surrounding the back and abdomen.   It is the main core muscle. The others are the multifids, diaphragm, and the pelvic floor.  These muscle groups are made up of many smaller muscles with long latin names  so I left most of them out.  These muscles all work together to stabilise the spine and keep it rigid.

The Exercises

1.  Wrestler’s Bridge -modified

Lie flat on your back with your knees bent , make sure there is a small gap betwwen your lower back and the floor

Inhale, then slowly exhale and lift your hips off the floor so that your thighs and back form a straight line.

Inhale again, and slowly exhale and lower yourself back on to the mat so your tailbone touches last.

Do 5-8 times.

2.  Hip flexion with knee extension.

Start in the same position as the wrestlers bridge.

Inhale, slowly exhale and lift one foot just clear of the floor and straighten your leg out.

You should stop with your leg straightened out and the heel just off the floor.

Inhale , and slowly exhale and return your leg to the starting position.

Do 5-8 times per leg.

3.  Front Lift

Lie face down with your forehead on a pillow (optional).

It’s important to keep your back straight-not arched, now lift one leg up 2 to 4 inches off the floor, hold briefly and lower your leg. Repeat for other leg.

Do 5-8 per leg.

Almost every one will suffer a back strain or injury some time in our lives. These core stability exercises will help prevent these back injuries by keeping the core strong and supple. Especially for those who spend most of their day sitting in a chair. Horrible invention, those things. If you do spend most of your day sitting try and get up and walk around as often as you can, and still get some work done of course ! Do some standing stretches, walk up and down some stairs, make an excuse to walk to your car or a nearby store. Anything, be creative, it’s your body and your health.   Now get to work !

For a PROVEN and COMPLETE Excercise and Nutrition System

3  SETS  OF 15 REPETITIONS FOR ALL EXERCISES.

75 SECONDS REST BETWEEN SETS

SUPERSET:  SQUAT ,  CABLE SEATED ROW

SUPERSET:   SUPINE HIP EXTENSION , DUMBELL PUSH PRESS

SUPERSET:   ROTATIONAL LUNGE , SWISS BALL CRUNCH

Alternate through doing this workout and change reps/sets to 3/12 and 3/10 on alternating days. Always with a day’s rest between workouts.  Increase weight as the reps decrease.

This is a FAT DESTROYING workout !

TRY this for six weeks, three workouts a week and you WILL see results !

For a complet step by step program click here

Cheers

If we were to ask 100 fitness trainers and coaches we would probably get 100 different answers to this question. Running, jogging,swimming, circuit training, bicycling, basketball, high intensity short rest time resistance training, kickboxing, etc., etc.

Add in the fact that every one is different and has different goals and different levels of motivation and it becomes pretty clear that there is no single “best” fat burning exercise for every one.

With that being said, there are some guide lines to help you lose fat and build muscle in the most efficient way possible.

Here we’re going to focus on exercising not nutrition, that is an entire subject in itself.

One important thing to note is that as your body becomes more efficient at a particular exercise routine the less fat you will burn. For example, say you run two miles a day ,three days a week.  When you start this program it’s new to your body and it will adapt by using fat for energy. As your body adapts and becomes more efficient less fat is used as energy.  Long story short, the longer you do the same thing, the less benefit come from it.

Now check this out, here are some fat burning tips that work, but they’re not for the faint at heart. If you’re looking for the magic pill to make you look like a 19 year old fitness model , look somewhere else !

1.   Do Total Body Workouts.     When you are trying to lose fat you should put all your muscles to work with   every workout. A full body workout would include for example: Squats, pullups, pushups and some sort of cote/abdominal exercise such as crunches on an exercise ball (helps with balance).

2.   Do supersets.     Alternating one set of one exercise with one set of a different exercise instead of doing all of one type of exercise consecutively. An example of a super set would be:deadlift/incline bench press. Another eaxample: lunges/cable row.

3.   As the weeks pass by make the work harder. Either by increasing weight ,repetitions or by decreasing rest time between sets.

If you use these tips to set up your exercise program and stick to a program you will lose fat. Just eat reasonably and you all know what that means ! If you’re feeling guilty about eating something than you probably shouldn’t eat it!

For more details CLICK HERE

Keep the faith !

Did you know that men who lift weights at least once a week for thirty minutes have 23% less heart disease than men who don’t.  (Harvard Alumni Health Study).

Almost anyone who can walk for at least 20 minutes can probably start a weight lifting program. There is virtually no age limit for weight lifting. If you’re really overweight or way out of shape or over 40, you should get a physical and consult  with your doctor before starting on an exercise program.

Did you know that light and moderate physical activity  (walking , bowling, golf, gardening etc.) has no effect on heart disease ? Even a Lot of light physical activity makes no difference to heart health. From a study done in the UK starting in 1979 the men who were the best off did what the researchers called heavy exercise (climbing stairs, swimming, jogging, start-stop sports like tennis and basketball ).  Long story short , an hour a week of heavy exercise gives us more protection from heart disease than 90 minutes a day of walking.  Who would of figured that !

Here’s where the fat burning part comes in:

Strength training fires up your metabolism for up to two days after you finish a hard workout.

Endurance training doesn’t increase your metabolism aside from a short time after you finish.

For a guy like me, (hates running, hurts my knees) this is great news. I’ve got a set of workouts that I can complete in about 30 mins. And since I do my lifting in my basement at home I don’t use up time (and gas)to travel to a gym and back. No membership fees either ! Now I realize this isn’t for everyone, especially those living in apartments, but you’d be surprised what you can do with some dumbells and some motivation ? For motivation all I have to do is look at myself in the mirror wearing a pair of shorts. Nuff said

For the inside scoop : CHECK THIS OUT !

Cheers

Now I have two choices. I can do something about it or I can keep sitting on my arse ! I do believe I’m going to do something about it ! Only I’m not quite sure what. Maybe I’ll call a commitee meeting and form a focus group and then maybe a think tank . . .

Or maybe I’ll simply move a little more today than I did yesterday.  I will not spend any money on gym memberships or fitness equipment.  First I need to make sure I’m motivated to keep doing a little something every day. The easiest is to simply walk outside.  As I live in the North it depends on the weather. I could wear 5 layers and long johns and all that stuff to stay warm but I’m . . . well I’m too damn lazy to get all that gear on !

For now I’ll take the stairs at work (and find excuses to go to my car so I’ll use the stairs more often) and park near the far end of the parking lot to assure I walk at least a little more.

This is how I work, I need to start slowly and get back in the groove. Also maybe chain the refrigerator shut and give the key to my neighbor and tell him not to give it up until the morning !

It took a while to put on the extra pouds, and it will take some time to take them off.

Cheers