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When it comes to arm exercises for women, it’s the small things that count. How so? The smallest errors in posture and technique can add up, and over time, slow down your progress substantially. Now most women probably aren’t even conscious of the small mistakes they’re making in the gym. After all, showing up is the biggest part of the battle. So perfecting the technique of each arm exercise probably takes second place. The good news is that you don’t have to perfect every single movement to the point that it’s flawless. All you have to do is watch out for the big deviations. So here is the important list of what NOT to do when doing arm exercises for women: 1. Using momentum to bring the weight up. You may not even be aware that you’re doing this. Why? Because you probably look at yourself from the front when exercising. Yet the only way to really see if your using momentum is to look at yourself from the side. So whenever you do a curl, double check the side mirrors? 2. Letting the shoulders come up. Most common with press downs for the triceps, although some women also do this when performing curls. What’s the big deal? When you elevate the shoulders, you work your trapezius (neck) muscles, not your arm muscles. And do you really want a big neck? 3. Allowing the elbows to shift around. Probably the most common error, letting the elbows shift takes all the stress of your arms-not a good thing if you want rapid arm toning. It can also lead to some shoulder impingement issues in the long run. So keep your elbows locked in place! 4. Not using the heels for support. The most stable anatomical position is with the heels firmly digging into the ground. If you frequently place your weight on the balls of your feet, please stop! You will be able to lift heavier weights and prevent injury by using your heels. Be conscious of the above mistakes when exercising your arms and do your best to avoid them. However, please do not become so self conscious about your form that you don’t go 100%. Try hard to maintain good form, but don’t obsess over it. After all, you should enjoy your arm workouts! Author Katherine Crawford MS, a Harvard exercise physiologist and recent arm fat sufferer, is an expert on exercise for women. Discover how to get sexy and toned arms now by visiting her website on arm exercise. |
Posts Tagged ‘exercises’
Stability Ball Workouts - Core Routine or Passing Fad?
Saturday, September 26th, 2009| Scentsy | Flameless Candles | Wickless Candles |
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How does it sound to you? That is the claim that stability or swiss balls are an essential for any well equipped home fitness center. As they can tone bulging middles better ab work outs done on the floor. Too good to be true or what? But with the increase in popularity many are debating whether stability ball workouts are just a lot of hot air or if they really do add a critical element to your core workouts. In other words do stability balls help you firm up your waistline faster or are they a glorified toy and little else? When you do your regular ab exercises like the plank, crunches or the reverse crunches on the ball your range of movement with the ball is small. But your body struggles to do a balancing act when you perform such movements. The result of this struggle is that over time the core and stabilizing muscles become stronger from their effort to keep you on the ball. Has that improvement been quantified at all? An often quoted study from the New Zealand’s University of Auckland found the crunches are 20% more effective when done on a stability ball instead of on the floor. If you have tried this you know why that is. The unstable nature of the ball means you have to work more core muscles to stay on it. And it’s this fact that helps you get more out of your crunches as opposed to doing them on the floor. And if you’re like me, always in a hurry, anything that can leverage the time spent working out is worth doing. Not sure but there may be another benefit here. Which is some feel being on the ball triggers the release of pain inhibitors that can lead to decreased back pain too. Trainers Tip: You must get the right sized ball. That’s right they come in different sizes based primarily on how tall you are. When sitting on yours, the idea is to end up with 90 degree angles at the hips and knees. Also remember you can fine tune this slightly by adjusting how much your inflate the ball. Anyway, seems like what you’ve got is a tool that enhances the affect of all sorts of exercises designed to make you skinnier. I don’t know about you but to me this says stability balls are anything but a passing fad. Seems to me they should be included in any serious abdominal workout you do. About the Author:
For a surprising calories burned chart or more about excercise ball routines, visit the popular site MeltOffTheInches.com. There you’ll find other articles filled with the help and advice you need to look absolutely fabulous.
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Let’s Shoot Down Common Beliefs About Cardio Exercise
Wednesday, September 16th, 2009| Scentsy | Flameless Candles | Wickless Candles |
One lesson I regret not learning years ago is that aerobics isn’t the only weight loss exercise going. Hard as it to believe, but when it comes to burning off fat resistance training may rank up there too. Which might explain why I was having a hard time losing the weight despite hours on the treadmill. Because for some strange reason my fat loss was not what I was expecting. So if you too are laboring (literally) under the misconception that aerobics is the best too, the isn’t it time to clear the air? I mean just why is aerobic training said to be best for burning fat? Or so it seems? And where does resistance training fit into this picture? Yet haven’t aerobic exercises always been touted for fat loss? For a couple of reasons. Aerobics are easy and not all that tasking compared to other options. And they’re easy to understand. Hit your personal fat burning zone. Remain there for a duration of 35 minutes or so. And that’s it. And don’t forget you can often distract yourself with TV, music or other types of entertainment when doing aerobics. Alternatively, we’d rather not think of the stress and strain resistance training involves. I mean it involves lifting weights repeatedly for a specific number of times. Ugh! All the math involved gives me a headache. No wonder we prefer to stay in our aerobics comfort zone. Well maybe we’d be wise to dig further to compare the list of benefits offered by strength training verses those from cardio exercise, as defined, alone. Here’s some fat burning pros and cons cardio offers you. You burn slightly more calories with your cardiovascular routine than with weights or resistance training. There is less burning of calories after your workouts. Plus you can’t ignore the serious stress you’re putting on your joints and the strain on your muscles unless of course you’re doing water aerobics. Okay so what does resistance training do for you in the fat burning department? Believe it or not, depending on the amount of weight used and number of repetitions done you can burn more or less the same amount of calories as with an aerobic workout. Then get this. After the workout you will continue burning calories as your muscles repair and rebuild. Your metabolic rate has also been bumped by maybe 30% and will stay that way for like the next 24-36 hours. Which is how you can burn fat even while asleep. When you workout your core and ab muscles you have less chance of injury as you learn balance and co-ordination in such workouts. Voila! Looks like resistance training builds fat burning muscles and helps you lose fat too. No complaints there. So now what? What should you do about it? For sure, don’t go crazy and stop your cardio workout routine upon reading this since aerobic activities bring with them their own health benefits. Rather, the sensible things to do is, meld low intensity aerobics with measured resistance training to get the best of both worlds. Or additional benefits from cardio like: They strengthen your heart and lungs making them more efficient. Aerobics help your blood circulate better. They work to get you to a better overall level of fitness, endurance, and stamina. Help in the muscle repair after a strength training workout. That makes the success formula obvious. Simply embrace a complete system of cardio, resistance training and better diet to become a fitter, leaner you. Easy, right? Freelancer Jalinn M Hardy writes for MeltOffTheInches.com. It’s loaded with helpful ideas including why a regular jump rope fitness workout is a great exercise for anyone looking to lose inches. So if you don’t know the benefits of jumping rope why not check that website out now? |
Here’s a Quick Way to Get Rid Of Love Handles
Wednesday, August 26th, 2009| Scentsy | Flameless Candles | Wickless Candles |
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Oh those troublesome love handles. They continue to hang in there no matter what you do. Bulging visibly through your sweaters and tops - embarrassingly so. What’s worse is nothing seems to work. You’ve joined cardio classes, tried jogging, and watched what you eat all to no avail. Those love handles of yours remain unrepentant and resplendent as ever. What you’ve got is a bit of a Catch 22 here. Because it’s not easy to spot reduce the fat away from a specific part of your body. Yet let’s see if we can’t suggest an approach that might help change your life for the better as you lose those pesky love handles. You are you game and up for anything, right? As I said it’s next to impossible to specifically target your obliques. And what makes matters worse is that for some of us these are often the last reserve of body fat to go. I know. Not what you wanted to hear. Given all this you’re better off targeting your body fat percent. Or how much fat you’ve got in total. At this point you should be asking how to reduce your body fat percent. Here’s some ideas to help with that. A diet plan that has you eating 500 less calories daily is critical. And don’t think you’ll be depriving yourself here. Not when a one cup serving of sugar covered corn flakes has nearly 400 calories by itself. I’ll bet there are plenty of other things you could stop eating or drinking that would make 500 calories seem like nothing. Just in case 500 calories a day sounds like too much, you want to include 30-45 minutes of cardio 4 times per week. Five would be better still. This will help to increase the amount of fat burned. Letting you approach that fat clinging to your sides from two ways - fewer calories taken in and more burned off. The ideal thing is to get into a sustainable routine that you enjoy. Over the long haul if you can cut back on how much you eat and burn off more calories you will see those love handles melt away. The third step in this process is to go ahead and exercise the muscles you’re hoping will become evident eventually. While doing oblique focused exercises won’t have an immediate impact they can’t hurt. To focus on your obliques do things that involve twisting your core. Even better your entire torso. So you want to do exercises like side crunches, weighted side bends and bicycle crunches. This will help tone and firm those muscles giving you something to show off once the fat is gone. So there you go. Anyone can have sensational abs by consistently following a prudent diet and a workout routine designed to burn off the fat. Probably not quite as simple as 1-2-3 but this three way approach should have you looking in the mirror without wincing in no time. About the Author:
If annoying middrift weight gain has totally bummed you out maybe another ab routine like that just suggested would help? Besides love handles, Jalinn M Hardy has written more about tummy toning and training strategies that work. Find out how to get a bareable belly at MeltOffTheInches.com.
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