Exercise Articles

Alternative Weight Training Exercises

There a number of popular weight training exercises that most people know about. The most common of these are the bicep curl, the shoulder press and the lunge lift : the ones that are usually seen in movie montages where the main character is getting “buff” and the ones performed in a gym by people seeking to gain a little muscle mass.

While these will help you reach your goal of increasing your strength and toning your muscles, there are other, alternative weight training exercises that can accomplish the same thing.

Upper Body Strengthening Exercises

If you want to gain arm strength, consider doing some shoulder and triceps exercises along with the usual bicep curls. Some of these do not even require extra weights : they use the weight of your body as the resistance that the weights provide. To gain strength and definition in your shoulder area, do an exercise that works the deltoid muscles in your upper back and shoulders.

Sit in a chair with a resistance band around your feet. Hold the ends of the band in your hands. Lift your arms straight up, while keeping your back straight. Do several reps of this each time that you work out.

Another great exercise for arm strength is the triceps lift. To do this exercise, place two chairs next to each other and stand between them with the backs of each chair facing you. Put your hands on the top of the backs and do a push up like maneuver so that you are leaning on the chairs with your toes on the floor behind you. Hold the position for as long as you can before relaxing and completing it again.

Body Weight Training Exercises

To work out other parts of your body, try some calf raises and deep knee bends : without the weights in your hands : simply use your body as the weight. To do calf raises, stand near the wall with your hands on the windowsill for balance. Point your toe to the floor and, one leg at a time, lift your heel in the air while contracting your calf muscle. Repeat several times before moving on to the other leg. A few repetitions of this will add definition and strength to your leg muscles, most specifically, your calf muscle.

A deep knee bend should be completed while standing near the wall as well, as it will help you keep your balance. Stand perpendicular to the wall with one hand touching it. Keep your feet should length apart, and bend at the knees while keeping your upper body straight. When your upper legs are parallel to the floor, you have bent down far enough.

Slowly lift yourself back up, using only your legs muscles to do so. Repeat several times. This exercise works multiple muscle grounds, including the hamstrings, quadriceps, calf muscles, hip flexors and gluteal muscles.

In order to gain both muscle strength and definition, consider doing alternative exercises like these along with the standard weight lifting movements. You will find yourself getting stronger and more flexible more quickly, and you will not be stuck working the same muscles over and over again each time.

Injury Proof Workouts with a Healthy Diet

During physical activity, we can be prone to injuries. We can lose balance and trip over, fall and sprain an ankle.  We can prevent injuries during workouts by strengthening our muscles before embarking on an exercise program. Strengthening core muscles improve balance and flexibility and enable us to exercise effectively to burn fat and build muscle.

However, muscle strengthening is not all about exercise; it also needs balanced nutrition. The purpose is this article is to identify the types of diets which can strengthen muscles effectively.

High Lean Protein Diet

Protein is essential in your diet to encourage growth of muscle mass. This is because a protein-rich diet can provide you with amino acids needed for your body to recover from stress and injury. Amino acids are also needed to rebuild and strengthen muscle tissues after exercise. However, be careful with the type of protein you should include in your diet. You may include lean protein foods such as eggs, beans, chicken, turkey, legumes and low-fat or nonfat dairy products.

Complex Carbohydrate Diet

Complex carbohydrates differ from plain carbohydrates because they are slowly digested, thus providing a slow but steady release of glucose for energy. Consuming this type of carbohydrate can boost your energy levels, especially during a muscle strengthening workout. Consuming carbohydrates also spares protein from being used up for energy in the body.

A good example of a complex carbohydrate is the type of carbohydrate found in oatmeal. Oatmeal is high in dietary fiber, which in turn releases steady energy while keeping blood glucose levels at a normal range. Oatmeal also helps you control your appetite and prevents hunger pangs by making you full all the time. Other foods with complex carbohydrates are whole grain foods and yams.

Healthy Fat Diet

Fat is not all that bad; in fact, you need a reasonable amount of healthy fat to strengthen your muscles. This is because a healthy amount of fat can build muscle and can help rebuild skin, hair, nails and joint tissues. Choose to include monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats in your diet such as the ones found in olive oil, nuts, seeds, canola oil and fatty fish like salmon. These fats can help decrease high cholesterol levels in the blood and can protect you against cardiovascular disease.

Frequent Eating

For muscle strengthening, consider consuming a diet that allows you to eat frequently. Eating frequently has been shown to promote weight loss and burn fat. This is because more frequent eating encourages your body to burn calories during digestion every time you eat. The more frequent digestion is, the more calories are burned. Each of your meal portions should contain only 300 to 400 calories.

Frequent eating can also help manage protein stores in the body so that protein is not utilized for energy but only in the building and repair of muscle tissues. There should be six small meals per day to help you shed fat and prevent hunger pangs.

Other useful tips:

Warm up exercises : get your blood circulation going and warm those muscles up. If you're planning to carry weights or just do a couple of heavy exercises, limbering up will be your best defense against muscle sprains or injury.

Get the help of a professional : if this is your first time going to the gym or are planning to seriously get into an exercise regimen, getting the help of a gym instructor is a must. At least get a friend who has experience. Lifting weights in the gym could be dangerous. If you're trying to lift a heavier weight enroll the help of a friend who could assist you if anything goes wrong.

20 Minute Workouts for a Healthier You

The key to jumpstarting your 20-minute workout and ending up with something that provides you quantifiable results is variation. Never underestimate your body's ability to adapt to routines. Your brain has been hardwired to become receptive to habit formation. In terms of exercise, that's a bad thing simply because if your body is used to a pattern, you'll get less muscle-building benefits from your repetitive regimen.

If you become too used to a given exercise, you'll end up burning fewer calories or gaining less muscle mass because your body has "efficiently" adapted to it, letting you do the same exercise with less metabolic impact and energy used. Ergo, when doing the following exercises, don't forget to switch them up so that you won't fall into any patterns and your body is constantly undergoing new routines before it gets too used to old ones.

At any rate, the true challenge of a 20-minute exercise routine is the motivation to do it. In order to end up looking halfway decent with your shirt off, you need to do a lot of work. Besides which, your washboard abs won't appear until you've won against the battle of the bulge and lost enough weight to make your abdominals visible.

To be more specific, you need to have a fat percentage within the single digits in order to get those model-like midsections you see on television. That takes a lot of work and discipline, so celebrities have personal trainers that push them to get in shape. Meanwhile, you only have yourself and your own determination to help you make a change for the better. All the same, you don't need to go to the gym all day to exercise.

As long as you do a superset of exercises within a short period of time... about twenty to thirty minutes a day... you're good to go. Each cycle of the superset takes two minutes, and by repeating this daily, you would've done enough reps to make yourself look buff, cut, and ripped. Take note of what each superset contains and do them.

The pushup and crunch superset includes ten left to right crunches, ten tricep pushups, ten crunches, ten wide pushups, ten crunches, and ten regular pushups. Meanwhile, the leg and ab superset requires you to repeat five cycles of twenty crunches, twenty calf raises, ten crunches, ten lunges per leg, twenty crunches, and twenty squats. As for running and walking, check out how much you can do within a thirty minute period.

Some can walk two to three miles and others can run double that amount of miles. When running, you can have this menu of things to do. You can jog a quarter of a mile, do three sets of quarter-mile sprints within a period of fifty to a hundred seconds, and jog a mile within seven to eight minutes. You can also do six sets of a sprint covering an eighth of a mile or jog with the same amount of miles.

The rule of thumb here is you can do lengthy walks or sprints with fewer repetitions or do shorter-distance walks or sprints with a greater number of reps. Don't forget to alternate between indoor and outdoor exercises to keep your body from getting used to either regimen.

Swimming for Better Health

Many people want to get into better shape, but are not sure how. Look at it this way: running can be unpleasant, especially if you are prone to shin splints; cycling is hard on the knees; lifting free weights can hardly be described as fun, and not everyone can get into Yoga or Zumba. That leaves the best exercise of them all; one that many people enjoy without even realizing that it is an exercise: swimming.

There are few exercises that are better for your health than swimming. Swimming at full speed burns around 703 calories an hour. This is the reason why Olympic swimmers eat so many calories, yet remain in excellent shape. Besides burning calories, there are many other reasons why you should put on your favorite swimsuit and jump in the water.

Low Impact Exercise

Swimming is a very low impact exercise. If you have bad knees and hips, or even an injured back, then jogging and cardio dance classes are not for you. You will only hurt worse. Instead, an hour of swimming will not harm your joints or back. You will feel some pain, post swim, but that is only your muscles trying to bounce back from your workout.

Water Provides Resistance

This is the reason why swimming burns so many calories. No matter how hard you try to propel yourself forward, the water tries to hold you back. Because of this resistance, your muscles must work harder as you move through the water. Every single part of your body gets a work out, from the top of your shoulders to the tips of your toes. On top of this, thanks to the resistance put forth by the water, you can always lie on your back and float in the water if a break from swimming is in order.

Provides Mental Health Support and Clarity

Tired of working out in the same area as people chatting on their cell phones or blasting their iPods so loud that you can hear their music three treadmills down? Try using electronic devices in the water! Exactly, it cannot be done. The quiet surrounding serious swimmers in the lap pool will give you a chance to enjoy some self-reflection or meditation. As you complete each lap, you will feel your stress melt away and your thoughts begin to clear. Pretty soon, you will feel as peaceful as the blue water that you are swimming through.

Works Most Muscle Groups

Have you ever seen a professional competitive swimmer? If you have, then you know how defined their muscles are. Swimming works your entire body: your legs work to propel you forward and keep you afloat, your arms work to keep your pace on track as well as propel your forward, and your torso (back and abs, otherwise known as your “core”) gets a work out as it stabilizes you in the water.

Swimming is an excellent exercise for those who want to get into great shape. It works many different areas of the body at once, without hurting your legs and knees like a high-impact exercise. If simply swimming laps is not for you, try attending a water aerobics class. On top of that, if you enjoy boating, snorkeling and water sports, then knowing how to swim is necessary for your safety. Can many joggers say that?

Image credit:  "Beautiful Woman Smiling In The Pool" by David Castillo Dominici via http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/