Tips For Beginners
Weight training involves the use of resistance, or weights, to strengthen a muscle or groups of muscle. Dumbbells, bars & weight stacks are some of the common forms of resistance used. Weight training is a potent way of developing the strength of muscles. Many people mistake weight training as something only bodybuilders do. But, weight training offers a variety of health benefits to everyone. Muscle growth leads to an increase in the lean body mass in your body and lean body mass helps you lose weight more effectively. Beginners do need to follow certain guidelines when starting out. Follow the guidelines below to gain maximum benefits from your weight training sessions.
Learn correct techniques
Improper technique could hamper your gains or even worse, lead to muscle injuries. You should start with the supervision of an experienced personal trainer to avoid any accidents. One main thing you need to remember during lifting weights is to not hold your breath at any stage. Holding your breath may raise your blood pressure spontaneously. If in doubt, ASK. Any staff at the gym will be glad to help you.
Drink plenty of water
If you are strength training at an optimal level, you should be sweating. This loss of fluids has to be replenished. Drink lots of water before, during & after your training session.
Ensure periods of rest
Exercising Basics
Today, there are various types of fitness activities available to choose from. Hence, it is important to understand the basic forms of exercise & their intended purpose. Most of the exercises prescribed to you, will usually fall in one of the following categories.
Cardio-vascular exercises
Exercises included in this category aim at improving the functioning of the heart, lungs & blood vessels. Some activities falling in this category include swimming, running, walking, cycling etc. These exercises are also known as aerobic exercises. Apart from their benefits to the cardiopulmonary system, they also help in losing excessive fat around the body. Cardio sessions generally last between 15 to 45 minutes, performed either continuously or in short bursts. The exercises aim at increasing your heart rate to between 70 to 85% of your maximum heart rate. They should ideally be done 3 to 5 times in a week to ensure optimal results.
Flexibility Exercises
Having a proper stretching routine in place is essential to ensure that your joints stay flexible & supple. Flexibility exercises are often neglected, while preparing a fitness course. Make sure to incorporate some of these exercises as part of your daily routine. Many prefer Yoga as their preferred form of stretching regimen. It is important though to follow certain precautions before stretching. Always stretch a muscle after warming up your body with simple warm-up exercises. The joint can then be taken through its full range of motion, to give the tissues over the joint a gentle stretch. Remember to stop if you feel pain or discomfort. Stretching becomes even more important for certain muscles of the body which are prone to tightness, such as the hamstrings & the low back muscles.
Strength Training
Strength training is basically the use of weights to train a muscle. Benefits include increased bone & muscle strength. Also, since it increases the metabolic rate, strength training can also be used for reducing fat content in the body. Always begin with light weights & then work your way up to the heavier section. Make sure your technique is correct & that you are not holding your breath while exercising. Do not work a muscle group more then twice a week; to ensure adequate time for rest. A single session may consist of anywhere between 5 to 10 exercises, targeting specific muscle groups in the chest, back, shoulders, arms & legs.
Whatever your choice of exercise, make sure it has elements from all the above three categories. This will ensure that your fitness regimen is effective in making you a healthy & happy person.
Motivation Is key To Sticking With An Exercise Program
Ever found it difficult to follow a fitness program for long? Have you stopped exercising after only a few weeks of starting? Maybe you need the right kind of motivation, to help you keep going. Follow these tips below, to make fitness & exercise a part of your life.
Focus on the outcome
Think of the exact goals you wish to achieve with your fitness program. Your goals may include weight loss, or building up a good physique or maybe just maintaining your fitness levels. Whatever your goals, keep reminding yourself of them, on a daily basis. Another way is to visualize how you may look after reaching your individual goals. For example, imagine how you will look & feel once you lose weight. In addition, you can put up posters to keep reminding you of the goals. This gives you a strong motivation to follow your workouts religiously.
Work in a Group
Working with an exercise partner or in a group is always fun. A healthy competition may develop between you & your colleagues, which will only drive you to become better. You also get someone to talk to about your fitness strengths & weaknesses. Once in a group, exercise no longer feels like a dull activity. You may now want to attend all the sessions & avoid missing out on all the fun of working out together.
Customize Your Fitness Program
No one fitness regimen can suit everybody. Hence start on a program that you can follow practically. There is a wide variety of fitness options available such as strength training, kickboxing, yoga etc. Select the one that is likely to keep your interest for a long time. You may also choose to change your exercise routine every few weeks, to keep your fitness program fresh & interesting.
Monitor progress
Top Reasons You Should Exercise
Health is your most valuable asset. If you lose your health, all other material possessions are rendered useless. Practicing fitness exercises regularly, is an important component of staying fit & healthy. Following are some of the benefits of exercising.
1. Lose the Excess Fat
Every time you exercise, you burn calories. Hence, any weight loss program usually consists of exercises, in one form or other. In combination with a correct diet, exercises help you achieve a lean & well toned body. Losing the excess fat makes you look & feel younger.
2. Helps To Prevent Diseases
Exercising has been found out to help prevent various diseases. Heart diseases, cancer, diabetes & stroke are some of the diseases where exercising helps. Lack of exercise & mental stress are leading risk factors in developing most of these diseases. Hence, following a regular exercise program significantly reduces the risk of contracting any of these diseases.
3. Improve Health Status
Exercising regularly has been known to reduce cholesterol & triglyceride levels. It also helps in maintaining an optimal blood pressure level. Hence, exercising is also recommended for people already suffering from high blood pressure, diabetes & asthma, to improve their existing health condition. Exercising, along with physiotherapy, becomes the primary mode of treatment in joint related diseases such as osteoarthritis.
4. Develop a Positive State of Mind
Boxing For Fitness – The Ultimate Way To Get Fit
You may have heard that we recently added boxing to our list of tools to help get Orange County into shape. Here are a few reasons you may want to give boxing for fitness a try. Our Boxing instructor, C.L.Richard will work with people wanting to get in better shape as well as training for the the younger generation! Training starts at the age of nine and there is no age limit for adults!
With a calorie burnout of between 350 to 500 calories in an hour, Boxing workouts may be the thing for you. With regular practice, you can expect to experience the following health benefits from a boxing fitness program.
- Improved Cardiovascular
Much more exciting than running on a treadmill, boxing for fitness is an excellent aerobic workout. As with all aerobic exercises, they offer great benefits for your cardiovascular system. The various combination’s of punches & footwork provide an effective way of burning calories and getting rid of the excess fat.
2. Become Fighting Fit
Learn various forms of jabs, & punches, while developing your self-defense skills. Most classes you will use punching bags or pads to help you practice on a target. After your skill improves and if you want to, you may begin sparring with an actual opponent.
3. Strengthen Your Joints & Muscles
7 Fitness Tips To Keep Your Workout Routine Productive
Have you stopped making gains in the gym?
You work hard in the gym regularly, and have seen some good results. You are happy with your results and increase in fitness level and muscle definition. After all, you have managed to stick to your workout routine, much longer than before!
But after a while, no matter how hard you train, you are no longer seeing any gains in your in your muscle tone or fitness level! Sound familiar? If so, more then likely you’ve hit what is known as a plateau. This is very common and happens to even the most advanced fitness buffs and body builders.
If you follow these basic fitness principles, you should be getting back on track and start seeing those gains returning in no time .
1. Avoid Over-training
Each time a muscle is used in an intense activity like lifting weights, what you are actually doing is breaking down muscle fibers. Hence, they need some time to recover & repair.
A good workout routine would target each group of muscles only once a week. This gives your muscles plenty of time for muscle recuperation and growth. Training too frequently can also weaken your body’s immune system if it doesn’t have enough time to recoup.
2. Don’t Workout Too Long
Muscle-Building Myths – Its Hard To Tell Whats True
If you’re serious about your muscle-building program, you need to be very careful of who you take advice from. Bodybuilding and fitness is literally a multi-billion dollar industry with new websites popping up every single day.
Many of the so-called “experts” out there really don’t have a clue of what they’re talking about and are only motivated by pushing expensive pills, powders and “miracle programs” on you that you don’t really need.
I’m going to talk about 4 very common muscle-building myths to help you on the right path to achieving muscle and strength gains you deserve (and probably save you a few bucks too).
Myth #1: In order to build muscle, you must achieve a “pump” during your workout. The greater the pump you achieve, the more muscle you will build.
For those of you who are just starting out, a “pump” is the feeling that you get as blood becomes trapped inside the muscle tissue when you train with weights. The muscles will swell up and leave your body feeling bigger, tighter, stronger and more powerful. While a pump does feel fantastic, it has very little, if anything to do with properly stimulating your muscles to grow.
A pump is simply the result of increased bloodflow to the muscle tissue and is certainly not indicative of a successful workout. A successful workout should only be gauged by the amount of progression. If you were able to lift more weight or perform more reps than you did in the previous week, then you did your job.
Myth #2: Building muscle will cause you to become slower and less flexible.
Types Of Exercise To Reduce Stomach- Get Six Pack Abs
If you plan on getting a solid six pack abs, you need to do the right set of exercises that will help you achieve this goal in the shortest time possible. If you find that doing endless sit-ups do not actually get you the results you want, it is time to try smart ab exercises, that will get you over this frustration. Knowing the right exercises will also save you some gym time and can give you the results you want faster. Here are some of the best lower ab exercises as well as home ab exercises that you can do to get closer to your goal:
1. Choose exercises that will require you to constantly challenge your balance.
Exercises that challenge your overall stability will get all your muscle tissues involved, even the ones that are on deeper levels of your core. Sit-ups are actually target exercises that only reach the superficial muscles. Although sit-ups also help, they do not really get you the results you want fast.
Ab exercises that can challenge your balance are those that are often done 
on an unstable surface. Movements such as one leg squats, walking along a balance beam, doing dumbbell rows while standing on one leg or using an exercise ball with focus on any abdominal movement are just some of the ab exercises that you can use. For home ab exercises, all you need are a set of free weights and a stability ball, and you can come up with routines that will challenge your balance.
For lower ab exercises, you can try hanging leg raises. Use your lower abs to move your pelvis, which is the real challenge here. Other good ab exercises are lying leg raises on 45 degree inclines and also cable crunches.
2. Try ab exercises using heavy weights.
You Can Have Six Pack Abs Too! Just Follow The Right Steps
Regular gym goers often ask how to get six pack abs. Reaching this goal will surely show everyone what you have been doing in the gym, and that you are serious with your exercise routines. This is definitely one of the most desired, yet hard to accomplish goals. Although getting six pack abs can be quite a challenge, it is not totally impossible, as long as you know the steps to reach your goal:
1. Take your diet seriously.
Six pack abs don’t just mean spending hours in the gym. It all starts with a low calorie diet that can prevent your stomach from getting flabby. Sure, your crunches and sit-up variations are important, but if you have a large flab on your belly, those muscles will not show up.
A good diet that can make your six pack abs possible is one that has enough
protein for muscle development, some vegetables and fruits for energy and healthy fats to keep you feeling full. It is better to keep your calories in control, because if the calories you are consuming is more than what you are burning for the day, you will surely not lose weight.
2. Introduce some variations in your exercise routine.
To form those six pack abs, you should change your exercise routines every now and then. Although you may prefer to stick to what you have been doing for some time now, it is better to put some variations and rotate your routines from one week to the next.
A Few Answers to Questions I Have Had Recently
I just wanted to answer a few questions I have recieved recently. These are the short versions of the answers, for more indepth answers come see me at the gym.
1. My metabolism won’t let me put on weight.
For those who have trouble putting on the weight you probably have a fast metabolism. Your system is simply burning up calories faster than you are consuming them.
You can use this to your advantage. If you up your caloric intake and add lots of quality proteins, like tuna and skinless chicken that high matabolism along with a sound workout routine will help you develop the lean toned body most are looking for.
2. It’s hard to find the right workout for my body type .
The simplest way to find a system which works for you is to find a person that had a similar body type as you before they started working out or dieting and begin to copy their routine. this will give you a good starting point and you can make adjustments to fit your needs.
If anyone needs help finding the right routine come by the gym and I’ll help you get one started. Even if you are not a member of King’s Gym, if you come by and see me I will help get you get on the right track.
3. More exercises means more muscles.
This is probably the hardest principles for a lot of people to understand. Overtraining is a common problem for many people trying to put on muscle.
