Four workouts you have to try to see if you fit the bill! Read my latest blog on the Huffington Post.
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Have a Honeymoon With Your Workout!
Why do some people LOVE to workout and others have no desire or motivation? It’s all about having a positive experience. In honor of Valentine’s Day, my latest Blog on the Huffington Post will show you how to fall in love with fitness!
Posted in General Tagged exercise enjoyment, fitness, start new workout, valentine's day, workouts Leave a comment
Can You Really Get a Hardcore Total Body Workout in 20 Minutes?
Short on time? My two favorite workouts that take less than half the time and still provide a full body workout.
Check out my blog on the Huffington Post and read about how to get a hardcore workout in 20 minutes.
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To Wii or Not to Wii?
If that’s your question, my latest blog on the Huffington Post can help you find your answer.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jill-s-brown/to-wii-or-not-to-wii_b_433816.html
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Thinking of doing a detox diet or cleanse to spark your weight loss goals?
Before you do, check out my latest blog on the Huffington Post, “A Cleanse by Any Other Name…. is still a crash diet!“
10 Kick in the Pants Resolution Tips for 2010
See my latest post on the Huffington Post. How to stick to your resolutions this year … and always!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
Posted in Diet, Group Exercise, Weight Training Leave a comment
Shoes that shape you up? My experience with Shape Ups.
“Get in shape without going to the gym,” that’s what the Skechers Shape Ups shoes say they can do for you. But can you really get in shape without setting foot in a gym? That’s an interesting question for someone who’s a trainer and a gym rat like me.
Of course you can get in shape without going to the gym, who can deny that? Joggers, swimmers, hikers, cyclists, rowers, surfers, cross country skiers, the list goes on and on for activities that get you in shape without stepping foot inside a gym. However, you CANNOT get into good shape (read: physically fit) without being active. Also, the activities of choice need to be done most days of the week and performed at least at moderate intense for a sustained period of time (30 minutes minimum). This is simply what the body requires for any physical fitness improvement.
The Shape Ups are a class of shoe referred to as “rocker bottoms.” They were designed to recruit more muscles in the legs than are typically used while walking and their “Kinetic Wedge” soles are meant to simulate the conditions of walking on sand. Basically this means the shoes require more energy to use.
Which brings us nicely back to the subject at hand. Can Shape Ups shape you up? The answer is a “yes, if….” They can If you walk in them vigorously enough to where you’re getting your heart rate high enough to be in a cardiovascular training zone (at least 60% – 65 % of your max heart rate). This is where you’re feeling breathy and breaking a bit of sweat (and it’s not because of the temperature outside). The other contingency factor is your current fitness level. The more out of shape a person is, the faster they’ll see and feel results. A very fit person may not see major changes in their bodies, but will probably feel the difference between this type of shoe and a regular walking shoe.
As for me, exercise is basically what I do for a living. I workout pretty intensely most, if not all days of the week, and for what most would consider a pretty substantial amount of time. What possible benefit can the Shape Ups have for me? I started wearing my Shape Ups over the summer and I love them. Since I’m already very fit, I don’t expect to see a whole lot of change in my body by wearing them, but I really enjoy that bit of extra work I feel in the backs of my legs when walking in them…. particularly uphill. I also get a great stretch in the backs of my legs and calves, so I love using them as a workout recovery. Why not burn a few extra calories while recovering, and get some extra stretching in while doing my errands?
Another benefit of wearing Shape Ups is how they make you continually adjust your balance because the soles rock. This is good for improving balance and pelvic stability (which is a component of core strength) and that’s something most people can use!
Lastly, truth be told, the Shape Ups also add another 3” to my height, and that’s a benefit I can’t get from any of my other athletic shoes!
Posted in General Tagged fitness walking, Shape Ups; leg shaping shoes, Skechers Shape Ups Leave a comment
It's Endurance Time
The term “endurance” may mean different things to different people. But for fitness fanatics, enthusiasts and gym rats, endurance has a great deal of significance, both in a physical and a psychological sense.
Strength and endurance, when it comes to physical activity, do not mean the same thing – but there is some crossover. Think of the difference as a sprinter vs. a marathoner. Endurance is not all about speed as you probably know. No sprinter could run at their fastest pace for anywhere near a marathon distance. And, a long distance marathon runner would probably get smoked racing against someone who trains for sprinting.
If you take my Spinning or Revving classes you know that Fall is the season where we focus on Endurance Training. We don’t do too many sprints and the ones we do are short (be sure to show up for some Fartlek training – don’t worry, you’ll like it….I’ll explain more about that later). If you are training with me this season, we are focusing on keeping our pace steady and our heart rate consistent. Good idea for you to break out those heart rate monitors and try to keep your heart rate in the range of 75 – 85% of your max heart rate.
The basic formula is 220 minus your age multiplied by .75 and .85. The range in between is a good goal. For women, take 226 minus your age and continue with the equation.
If you know your resting heart rate (RHR), you can do the Karvonen formula (which is a bit more precise): Take 220 minus your age, minus your RHR, multiply by .75 and .85 then add your RHR back in.
Being able to keep our heart rates at the higher end of the spectrum without going totally anaerobic, the more we improve our Cardiovascular Endurance.
“Muscular Endurance” is our ability to cope with fatigue and tolerate high levels of lactic acid. As our muscular endurance improves, the longer we can maintain proper form and pedal at higher speeds with more resistance!
So, what will we be doing in our Spinning and Revving classes to improve our endurance? We won’t be using extremely high resistance because will make us so fatigued that we’ll need to recover (lowering or taking off resistance and reducing our heart rate). The better our endurance, the less we’ll need to recover obviously! Fatigue, incidentally, is not something we just feel in our muscles… it’s also psychological… “how much longer will this last? I don’t know if I can go on! I can’t hold on much longer!” Does this sound familiar in your head?
Here are some benefits of improved cardiovascular and muscular endurance: the body becomes better able to produce ATP (the energy your muscles need to contract) via aerobic metabolism. The body’s ability to deliver oxygen to the working muscles improves and the body’s ability to use that oxygen improves. You may have heard the term VO2Max? That is a key factor to your fitness level. The more energy your body can produce aerobically vs. anaerobically, the easier it is for your body to access fat as fuel and lessens the amount of lactic acid disturbance you feel when working out (that’s muscle burn folks!).
Back to VO2 Max for a second. VO2 max is basically your aerobic capacity and is considered the best measure of a person’s cardiovascular fitness and maximal aerobic power. Spoiler alert ladies: VO2max values are typically 40-60% higher in men than in women.
Elite endurance athletes typically have a high VO2 max and for the most part it seems to be genetically determined. However, with proper training, VO2 max can be improved by as much as 20%!
The goal of any endurance training program is to help the athlete reach their genetic upper limit for aerobic power
As you may have guessed, endurance training is important for many sports – not just the pure distance events like running, swimming and cycling for example. Even some traditional strength and power based activities are helped by having a solid aerobic base.
Happy Endurance Season everybody!
Technique Tidbit:
You’ve heard me talk about “efficiency” and “exercise economy” by now. Here’s what I mean, two athletes may have the same VO2 max and the same lactate threshold (the point during exercise where the body is accumulating blood lactate faster than it can be cleared out). Yet what is far more important is the speed or workload at which the person is exercising when they reach these points. Someone with a higher exercise economy will use expend less energy (consume less oxygen) at any given intensity. Therefore researchers believe economy of exercise – be it stride length, swimming technique or body position on a bicycle – is an important contributor to endurance performance!
Posted in General Tagged Endurance training, fat oxidation, Heart rate training zone, increase fat burning, VO2Max Leave a comment
The final word on BURN
Ever wonder why you feel more sore 2 days after a hard workout than you did right after the workout itself?
This pain is called Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness (DOMS).
DOMS is mainly caused by the “eccentric contraction” of an exercise movement. Think of your basic biceps curl. As you curl the weight up, you are doing a “concentric contraction” also know as the “positive” phase of the contraction. As you lower the weight, SLOOOOWLY and in a controlled manner, you are doing the eccentric contraction or, as you may have guessed the “negative” phase… funny to call it that since that is the phase that makes you the most sore! Coincidence?
Anyway, by definition, the eccentric contraction is when the muscle is contracting at the same time it is lengthening.
If someone tells you that your soreness the next day or 2 days after your workout is from lactic acid, they’re wrong, wrong, wrong. The burn you feel WHILE you are exercising is lactic acid, but that gets removed by the muscle cells pretty quickly. Doing a good cool down by exercising at a very slow pace right after your workout is one of the best ways to flush out the lactic acid. Stretching helps too, but neither stretching nor a long cool down will prevent muscle soreness from happening since post-exercise soreness is from the actual cells being torn. They need time, rest and nutrients in order to rebuild themselves.
The real soreness you experience after a hard workout should take at 8 hours or more to manifest and it’s caused by micro tears in the muscle. This is GOOD! This is how the muscle gets stronger. In response to the tears, your body repairs and rebuilds the muscle cells bigger, stronger and more capable of doing whatever the workout was that made you sore in the first place. So, each time you do it, it gets easier.
To help avoid some post exercise soreness try these things:
. Stretch all the muscles groups used thoroughly after each workout.
. Drink plenty of water, around 2 liters of water during the 24-hour period following the workout.
. Use NSAIDs, non-steroidal anti-inflammatories drugs like Advil (ibuprofen), Aleve (naproxen sodium/naprosyn) or aspirin. **Remember there are risk involved with these, so check with your health care provider on dosage and frequency!**
. Icing the affected areas for 15 to 20 minutes every 2 hours can give relief.
. Some research suggests that vitamins C and E may help. Research on the effectiveness of C and E is not conclusive but has been promising.
If you are still sore by the time you’re ready for your next workout, tone it down. Working out on sore muscles can lead to potential injury. If the soreness lasts more than three days, it is a sign that you have caused more extensive damage so you may need an extra rest day.
Now, if you’re getting sore after every workout, assuming you’re doing the same or similar workout again, this could be due to poor biomechanics, lack of rest or it could be due to dietary deficiencies.
Vegetarians, pay attention here. If you are deficient in protein, iron or certain vitamins and minerals, you could be experiencing chronic soreness from your workouts.
You’re probably okay if you’re eating eggs and drinking milk since that means you’re hopefully getting enough Vitamin D. Vitamin D deficiency has been associated with musculoskeletal pain in studies. Take a vitamin D supplement if your levels are low. If you’re not getting enough protein there’s definitely going to be a problem.
The American College of Sports Medicine recommends that endurance and strength training athletes consume higher levels of daily protein than the standard recommended daily allowance (i.e. 1.2-1.7 grams of protein for each kilogram of body weight, versus 0.8 grams per kilogram per day). Iron deficiency is also a culprit in causing muscle soreness. Since vegetarians are at risk for iron deficiency, make sure you eat plenty of vitamin C rich foods since vitamin C improves iron absorption. If you suspect your soreness is due to diet or you just want to be sure you’re getting all the nutrients you need, ask your doctor to do a blood test.
So remember, muscles should feel sore on some days after you exercise, especially when you’re doing a new workout or amping up your intensity. That means you’re getting stronger. However, if you’re feeling chronically sore, then there is most likely a problem.
Posted in General Tagged diet and muscle soreness, DOMS, muscle soreness, post exercise soreness, post workout soreness Leave a comment
Jill live on KTLA for Shape Ups