Caffeine

Caffeine, you know the stuff our parents used to always try to limit for us. Some people think it's bad for you and think they should cut it out completely but then there are those who don't really care. In between is a group that thinks its fine but shouldn't make up the majority of your consumption. So which is right? The truth is that caffeine is not bad for you but, consuming to much can be bad and the effects it may have on you are what you need to worry about. Everybody reacts to it differently so you just have to be smart about how much you consume.

The good things about caffeine are that it stimulates the central nervous system, it increases your basal metabolic rate meaning you can burn fat easier, it temporarily increases your mental clarity, and increases your muscular coordination for physical activities. Caffeine can open your air passageways to increase breathing quality. So as you can see, caffeine can be a very good thing to consume regularly.

Too much of a good thing can become a bad thing. The only real bad thing that can come from caffeine is addiction. What happens is people start craving it so they consume more and more which can lead to a jittery feeling from all of the sugar in most caffeinated drinks. So other than the fact that you shouldn't drink too much soda or coffee, caffeine is actually something that can be very positively effective for your fitness goals.

Replacing Bad Habbits With Good Ones

We all have a bad habit or two and they come and go throughout our life but we can't just stay in that habit. It would be counterproductive actually! Say you have a bad habit of staying up too late and sleeping in until noon or later every day! This all starts because you allow yourself to get off track by staying up late one night! That's right just one night. What happens is in that one night you stay up until 2 in the morning rather than going to bed at 11 or midnight and instead of waking up at 7 or 8 you start waking up at 10 or 11.

Then you get onto this slippery slope and each night you stay up a little later and later until you eventually turn into an insomniac! In order to fix this problem you have to replace your nighttime activities with more relaxing things and begin to wind down in the evening so that you can get to bed at a decent time. You are simply replacing a bad habit with a good habit and it works with everything from sleep habits to eating habits, to drinking or smoking habits. If you want to kick a habit replace it with a good one.

The Effects of Junk Food

We all know their bad for us but we still seem to keep eating them. It's funny because we as people all seem to want the good things now! We would rather have something that feels good at the current moment than discipline ourselves to have better effects in the long run. We see this in every aspect of life in today's world and it's sad. Everybody want's the good things in life but few are willing to pay the price to get them. If you want to live healthy you need to learn to stay away from junk food. If your going to the gym and working really hard to get in good shape but your eating junk food every day your pretty much defeating the purpose.

Eating too much junk food will lead to less energy and you will realize that you get exhausted really easy when doing physical activity. Junk food also causes you to crave more food and leads to over eating. Like I have said in recent posts you should feed yourself with meals throughout the day rather than snacking a lot throughout the day and eating 2 or 3 meals because when you eat more meals your metabolism stays at a steady state resulting in using that food for energy rather than storing it as fat.

Junk foods also have high amounts of cholesterol which leads to an unhealthy heart. The heart is the main organ needed to pump blood throughout the body so obviously it's important to keep your heart in healthy condition. Junk food leads to a build up of plaque in the arteries. As a simple guideline you should stay away from foods that taste to salty or to sweet. It's okay to have something sweet here and there but when you eat sweets on a regular basis you endanger yourself. So learn to eat healthy for your own benefit!

High Intensity Interval Training

High-Intensity Interval Training is an exercise strategy that is intended to improve performance with short training sessions consisting of 15-30 minutes. High intensity interval training is aimed at building strong endurance. A training session would consist of a warm up followed by 6-10 repetitions of a high intensity exercise done near maximum intensity. High intensity training is meant to push you to do as much as you can in a short period of time. The rest periods between sets are really short, about 10-15 seconds.

Studies have shown that 2.5 hours of high intensity interval training produce similar amounts of biochemical muscle change. High intensity interval training increases the resting metabolic rate for the following 24 hours due to excess post-exercise oxygen consumption, and can improve maximal oxygen consumption (VO2 max) more effectively than your typical long aerobic exercise.

Long aerobic exercises have been promoted as the best method to reduce fat but high intensity interval training has been proven to burn more fat.High intensity interval training is also known to increase athletic performance. With experienced athletes it can become harder to gain strength, high intensity interval training is a great method of overcoming these obstacles. Improvements in endurance can be achieved through high intensity interval training.

Comfort Kills

One of the biggest reasons people plateau at some point with the results they are getting out of their fitness program is because they get too comfortable. They get into this repetitive mode of doing the same workouts throughout the week, never switching it up, never raising the bar, and never living up to their full potential. Say you keep going to the gym Monday threw Friday doing different muscle groups each day of the week with the same routine just raising the weight here and there. Yeah you might see results for a while but you will eventually flat line.

In order to gain strength, build stronger muscles, and to keep moving forward you need to confuse your muscles with new exercises as well as push yourself out of your comfort zone! Don't limit yourself with what your can do, it's mind over body and if you push yourself you can do anything you want to do. The only limit is that you can't do too much too fast or you will end up injuring yourself. For example say your benching, your doing a set of 6 with 160 a set of 6 with 170 and two sets of 4 with 175 but when your done you know you could have done a little more. This doesn't mean that you have to go raising the weight just yet but doing more repetitions, and then progressively raise the weight.

This is why goal setting with deadlines is so important! When you set a goal with a deadline your telling yourself okay, I need to be able to put up this much weight by this date and in order to do this I am going to push myself a little further with each workout. It's all about progress! You need to keep making progress and constantly look to better yourself through creating more challenges weather it's a tougher workout, being more disciplined, or even adding a new activity to your daily life like running every morning. Look for ways to constantly challenge yourself in ways that will make you stronger in everything you do. If you allow yourself to slip into a cycle of comfort and continual repetition you will surely hit the wall so keep the challenges coming!

Keeping A Regular Work Out Schedule

Have you ever realized how people seem to go through phases of living healthy and slacking off? It's like going through a popular trend or something to some people but then they stop for a while losing all the hard work they put in. It's as if people think they can just go to the gym and work out for a couple weeks and see some results then their good to go. They end up gaining the weight back in half the time they spent working so hard to get it off!

The bad thing is that some people actually repeat this type of cycle over and over again always ending with the same results! The bottom line is this. "Being physically fit requires living a physical lifestyle", there's no shortcuts or magic tricks to get the results you want. I don't care what the add on TV says, sure they might help you shed some weight or whatever they advertise but they don't keep you moving forward constantly increasing your health! In order to live a healthy fit lifestyle there are 10 things you need to take into account.

A balanced diet, getting the needed vitamins and minerals, quitting any bad habits like smoking or drinking consistently, "Exercising regularly", having regular annual doctor check ups, balance your life to reduce stress, be yourself, find some healthy hobbies you enjoy, and most importantly have fun! If you stick to these ten principals you will not only feel better but you will start to enjoy your day to day life as well as your work outs! Don't think of working out as stressful either! Make sure to keep it fun with new exercises and always be sure to push yourself to be the best you can be!

Eating More Speeds Up Your Metabolism

A lot of people want to shed some weight so they try to watch the amount of food they eat thinking they will stop putting on more weight. The opposite ends up happening. After a while they begin to realize that they are actually gaining weight even though they aren't eating as much. The truth is that when you don't eat much your metabolism slows down and you begin storing more and more calories each meal. So to speed up your metabolism you need to start eating more meals each day along with drinking plenty of water. When you eat more your body starts burning fat calories more than carbohydrates.

You should actually eat 6 meals per day rather than 2 or three! I know that does seem like a lot but what has happened is we have become a culture that snacks more than we eat meals. When we snack our metabolism slows down and we begin to store more calories and have a harder time burning them. Yes this actually takes effort, work and planning. You have to discipline yourself if you want to get the body you want to get! It's not impossible like a lot of people begin to think at one point or another. It just takes a whole lot of discipline and organization.

Another problem is that most people wait too long between meals! We tend to wait until we are actually hungry to eat, I know that may sound crazy but you need to change your mindset from "eat when I'm hungry" to "eat to keep fueling my body". The truth is that if you feel hungry you have already waited too long to eat! So make sure to keep eating throughout the day! And not junk food of coarse! Eat things like, fruits, vegetables, wheat's, grains, and yogurt. Keep yourself fueled and you will start to see a change in your metabolism! Start starving yourself and you will find it harder to burn fat!

Children & Physical Activity

Physical activity is extremely important for a healthy lifestyle. Children should be out running and playing each day! That's why they need to have recess in school so that they can remain active, not just to give them a break from being taught. Physical education is so important in schools and it needs to remain a main course for all students! There has been a rapid decrease in the activity level of children in the last couple decades and it's still declining. This is mostly due to the big boom of electronics. Kids can now have fun right at home sitting down not moving anything but their fingers now.

Kids should be outside having snow ball fights, riding their bikes, skateboarding, playing sports or playing on a playground. Kid's don't need to be working out but they definitely need to remain active! According to Sports Illustrated For Kids 64% of active teens and young teens believe that being healthy and physically active is extremely important, compared to 44% of non-active kids. Respondents were asked to choose the group to which they belong.

Three quarters of the active respondents 75% say they are physically active enough, while fewer than half 47% of the non-active respondents say so. The survey shows that 40% of non-active teens report being overweight. Only two in 10 of the active respondents believe they are overweight. So as you can see physical activity is really important and we should all work to promote fun physical activity in the life's of children. We need to work to establish a healthy lifestyle at a young age so that when they get older they are already engaged in living healthy.

Dedication

Nothing is accomplished without dedication. If you want something you have to get out there and take it for yourself. If you want to get in the best shape of your life you have to get in the gym and consistently keep working to get better. If you aren't dedicated to your fitness goals then you will find yourself losing interest, dreading your workouts, and eventually dropping your goals! Dedication is a mindset that must be put into effect. The truth of the matter is that if you really honestly want something then you will go out there and do what it takes to get it.
Fitness is a lifestyle, and that means living healthy day to day striving to better yourself every chance you get.

This means, eating healthy, staying active each day doing some form of physical activity and constantly looking to improve yourself. If Michael Jordan hadn't been dedicated like he was he wouldn't have become the best player to ever play the game. He told himself at a young age that he was going to be the best player there was and he did it. From this example you can see that you have to first agree with yourself and be confident in yourself. Then you have to dedicate yourself to working each day at accomplishing your goal. So keep working, never give up, never give in, stay dedicated and you can do anything you set your mind to!

My Love For Living A Healthy Lifestyle

Do you remember being a child? Back when you would always want to be outside with your friends playing? Weather it was playing basketball, baseball, skateboarding, riding my bike, or just running around with friends playing tag or whatever I remember being very active. But I have realized that as we grow up we tend to fall away from being active. We seem to start staying inside more as we work or when we get home from work we sit down and relax for the rest of the evening. But in all honesty we all know that we could get out for at least half an hour at some point in the day and engage in some form of activity. It's almost as if we make fun things out to be some form of hard work! What happened to the spirit of fun? We all need to have a list of activities we enjoy doing and engage in something each day. It could even be just going to the gym and working out.

Honestly, how bad would it be to get out of the house and take a bike ride around your neighborhood or go to the park for an hour with some friends and play catch or football, basketball, baseball, or volleyball. If you like skateboarding then go to the skate park for a while. If you have a dog take it for a walk in the evenings. There are so many things you can do that will contribute to living a more healthy life. The effects of living an active lifestyle range from feeling better physically to feeling better emotionally and even to sleeping better as well as maintaining a higher level of energy throughout the day.

I love to stay active. If it's nice outside I want to be outside doing something. Activities that I enjoy would be going skating, playing sand volleyball, basketball, or just walking around downtown. The key is to do things you enjoy that keep you active day to day. If you don't enjoy what your doing then you will most likely stop at some point due to lack of interest. So make a list of things you love to do and get out and have some fun living healthy. Bring back the spirit yo had as a child!

The Importance of A Strong Back

The back muscles are more important than people tend to give them credit for. Most people focus on the arms and chest when they go to the gym because that's what society portrays to be the most important. Well the truth is every muscle is important and you should exercise all your muscles! But back to the back. We use our back muscles all the time from lifting objects, to standing, to sitting, and even to coughing and sneezing! Think about what would happen if you had some thing stuck in your throat and you where to weak to cough it up! I know it's drastic but it is realistic!

Having a strong back will also make your day to day life easier and less strenuous. There are three muscle groups in the back, the Latissimus Dorsi, Erector Spinae, and Rhomboids. The Latissimus Dorsi muscles are found on the sides of the back and are used for flexibility and extension for the upper body as well as rotation. The Erector Spinae is known mainly as the lower back but it actually spans from the buttocks to the neck. The Erector Spinae is used for flexibility and extension for the upper body as well as rotation. The Rhomboids are made up of minor and major muscles that go between the shoulder blades to help with rotation, elevation, and retraction of the shoulder blades. The back is worked through exercises like seated rows, bent over rows, kneeling bench dumbbell one arm rows, dead lifts, and reverse fly's.

So as you can see, the back muscles should be a regular part of your training plan. Not working the back will lead to injury and obviously back problems! The main reason most people end up having back problems is due to the fact that they neglect the back muscles and go on working their arms and chest. Then they end up hurting their back doing something as simple as kneeling over to pick up their keys they just dropped on the floor! Also remember to avoid sitting too much throughout the day, sitting is terrible for your back and it is something we all do too much!

Make it a priority each day to stretch your back as well as the rest of your body to build flexibility and be active! Get some good circulation throughout your body and you will start to see the improvements in tight or sore muscles. It's all about living an active healthy lifestyle and maintaining a good amount of flexibility. Always warm up and stretch before working out as well as cooling down and stretching after working out. Also learn to stretch your back in the morning before your feet even touch the ground. This will help with back soreness and tension a lot!

Incorporrating Cardio Into Strength Training

We all know it can be long and strenuous getting on the treadmill and running to burn fat. Yes you still need to do it but you should also learn to incorporate cardio right into your actual workout. This is done by taking smaller rests in between sets and setting your workout up so that you are doing two to three lifts or exercises at once working different muscle groups. For example say you are working chest and back. So in order to set up your workout this way you would get three workouts ready to go at once.

Let's say your doing dumbbell chest presses, bent over row, and heel touches. One set would consist of doing something like 8 dumbbell chest presses, 8 bent over rows, and 20 heel touches, then a rest before the next set of sets. Working out this way raises your heart rate and allows you to engage in a form of cardio training due to the small rest periods as well as building muscle with the resistance training.This type of training should not be done until a good solid foundation has been built.

Jumping into this type of training to fast can lead to fatigue and discouragement. So understand your boundaries, but push yourself to see results. Also remember that fat can be burned through your workout by designing a workout like the one described above. Yes you do need cardio, but you should also look to have lifting routines that challenge you aerobically. One of the big mistakes most people make is thinking they only loose fat from running or cycling but you actually burn several calories throughout the course of a good resistance training session.

Gym Essentials

Usually when you go to a big gym you are surrounded by so many high tech machines which all seem to amaze people with advances. The truth is that yes these machines are good and they do work but gyms tend to pack in more than they really need. In all honesty if you want to get a good workout all you need is some form of cardiovascular exercise, a set of dumbbells and barbells with adjustable weights along with a couple leg machines. I have come to find that most commercial gyms use the presence of several unnecessary machines to draw in customers.

This presence of several machines causes those using the facility to potentially neglect free weight exercises which are the most important. Using a machine engages your muscles on one level keeping the movement on a set path. When you use free weights like dumbbells or barbells your muscles have to work harder in order to stabilize the weight throughout the lift. This engages your stabilizer muscles. For example if you use a machine to do biceps curls you are only engaging the biceps and not the muscles that support it. When you use dumbbells you engage you biceps as well as all the surrounding muscles of the arm, chest and back.

So remember not to get sucked into a gym just because they have a bunch of fancy machines. The truth is that you only need a good set of dumbbells, barbells, a few machines, and a cardiovascular section with treadmills, bikes, and possibly stair climbers. If you do go to a gym with all of these machines learn to use free weights more often and you will start to see and feel a difference in the results you get!

Training Load Progressions

One of the biggest mistakes people tend to make when they go to the gym is the rate at which they increase their workout intensity. Some don't push themselves enough while others try to do to much to fast leading to injury. Most individuals tend to get caught up in a routine that starts out great, giving them immediate results, but then they hit a plateau and they cant seem to make more gains. This is because your muscles become to the load put on them as well as the same old routine over and over again. So in order to counteract this from happening you need to change up your routine and make sure you keep raising the bar. Muscle confusion is needed to see good results!

The easiest way to tell that your plan is working like it should is the fact that you should constantly be seeing gains. You should have monthly goals to aim for like raising your bench press 15 lbs or losing 6 inches from your waist. The goal needs to be kept in a place where you can see it on a daily basis. So the two key things to remember when approaching a plan is that it is both goal oriented and that there is constant progressions taking place.

As you go on with training you should always challenge yourself more. Set goals with steps leading to completion and when you complete a goal set another one! Remember, you are embarking on the journey to a better lifestyle. You need to continue making progress and keep moving forward!

Speed Strength

Speed strength is the ability of the neuromuscular system to produce the greatest possible impulse in the shortest possible time. There are two aspects of speed strength, starting strength and explosive strength. Speed strength is a necessity for athletes as it serves to increase your ability of quickly changing directions as well as getting an explosive start from a resting position. Sprinters for example need good starting strength in order to get a good explosive start off of the starting blocks.

Speed strength is built through olympic lifts and power lifts. Olympic lifts are lifts such as snatches and cleans. Power lifts consist of squats, bench press, and dead lifts. The olympic lifts should consist of 80-90 percent of your one rep max, and your bench should be at 50-60 percent of your one rep max. Explosive leg power is important to pretty much every sport ranging from football to basketball to track and so on. Speed strength is needed in every sport, without it you are cheating yourself out of being the best you can be.

Absolute Strength

eAbsolute strength is the maximum force you can exert with your muscles. Training absolute strength improves speed both in the aspect of running and in the aspect of moving limbs. The greater your absolute strength is the greater your speed and explosiveness. Absolute strength is developed through heavy weight training. This involves using 80-85 percent of your one repetition max. There are three areas of training used to build absolute strength. These three areas are concentric strength, eccentric strength, and static strength.

Concentric strength is your one repetition max for a movement. Eccentric strength is your one repetition max for lowering a weight rather than lifting it. Static strength is the maximum holding strength in a given position. All three areas need to be worked in order to build absolute strength. You need to balance them out and maintain a stable balance.

There are many beneficial things like supplements, hypnosis and therapeutic techniques to help increase absolute strength. Any of these things are fine to use as long as you don't cross into anabolic steroids. Serious athletes or bodybuilders should look into these things but make sure to stay away from steroids.

Limit Strength

Limit strength is the amount of force you can generate for one all-out effort. Limit strength is basically your foundation for getting stronger. Limit strength has three sub categories, eccentric, concentric, and isometric. Limit strength is needed in sports such as shot put, football, and can only bring better athleticism for sports like baseball, basketball, wrestling and pretty much about every other sport. Limit strength is what gives a basketball player the explosion to jump high, the lineman his ability to lung forward quickly with force, the shot putter the quick drive and snap of power from the legs that drives the force from the ground through the body to the put.

Eccentric strength is measured by how much weight you can lower under controlled. Eccentric strength is done through the negative phase of a lift. For example when you lower the bar during a bench press. So what you would do to train for eccentric strength you would first start by warming up with a regular bench press for a few sets. Then, when your muscles start contracting you lower the weight and only lower the bar and the spotter raises it for you.

Concentric strength is measured by how much weight you can lift in one all out effort. Concentric strength is trained through using heavier weight in your workout. Power lifting focuses mainly to build concentric strength for example. Concentric strength is usually known of as your one rep max in lifting terms. To measure your concentric strength you use all of your energy to move the weight 1 repetition.

Isometric strength is measured by the amount of weight you can hold without losing control. To train isometric strength you would for example hold your arms straight out level with your shoulders with light weight not moving but just holding the position. This is done with any exercise to improve the isometric strength of that muscle. Training should consist of high repetitions for short periods of time. For example hold the position for 3-5 seconds 12 to 18 times.

All three areas of limit strength should be built in order to maintain a solid foundation especially if you are an athlete. Limit strength is one of the most important things for an athlete to have because if you don't have good limit strength as an athlete you will not be able to reach your full potential. Limit strength should be developed before you start your sport and should always be maintained and enhanced.

The Importance of Breakfast

When you wake up in the morning your blood sugar level is depleted and needs a boost. Breakfast replenishes your blood sugar which is needed for proper brain function throughout the day. Breakfast also helps by breaking the fast you go through while you sleep promoting healthy eating habits throughout the day. When you don't eat breakfast you are more liable to want to snack throughout the day rather than eating from meal to meal and fueling with liquids.

If you skip out on breakfast you will get pangs of hunger throughout the morning which leads to snacking. When you snack you usually look for a quick fix leading to candy bars or other snacks high in sugar. You should try to eat a breakfast consisting of some form of fruit, a good source of vitamin D, and fiber. Try to avoid cereals with a lot of sugar. Stick to things like oats, grains, and whole wheat toast with a glass of low fat milk and some fruit.

Think of breakfast as "breaking the fast" and make sure you start off the day with a good healthy breakfast that isn't full of sugar and fats. The traditional bacon in eggs is actually something to avoid. It's okay periodically but the focus of breakfast should be to set the foundation for the rest of the day. Always think of eating as simply fueling your body for the next 3 to 4 hours.

Take into account how active you will be in the next couple hours and eat accordingly. Another problem is that most of us overeat and we don't even realize it. Learn to only eat what you need and not to the point that you can't eat anymore. Change your outlook on eating and you will learn to only eat what you need leading to a better body and good energy.