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How You Can Master the Push-Up in Only 2 Weeks / Fitness. Push-ups sometimes get a bad rap--they're too often seen as a "Gold Standard" in macho tests of manliness, when they should be viewed as what they really are: one of the best compound exercises you can do.

How You Can Master the Push-Up in Only 2 Weeks / Fitness

The simple act of pushing up will use your chest, shoulders, triceps and back muscles--a feat few other exercises can do as well. The downside to push-ups is that they can be really hard to do. Healthy Weight: Healthy Eating for a Healthy Weight: Portion Size. Healthy Weight: Losing Weight: Improving Your Eating Habits.

Lolo Jones' Core Workout. A generation ago, you'd be hard-pressed to find elite runners paying attention to their abs.

Lolo Jones' Core Workout

Today, it's practically mandatory. "Our coaches drill the importance of core conditioning into our heads," says world champion hurdler Lolo Jones. "We're at it all the time. " That's because scientists and coaches now know that you can't run your best without a strong core, the muscles in your abdominals, lower back, and glutes. They provide the stability, power, and endurance that runners need for powering up hills, sprinting to the finish, and maintaining efficient form mile after mile. Excuse-proof your workout. Studies have shown that regular exercise can actually increase your energy level. We make excuses to reduce our discomfort about not doing something, expert says Getting into the exercise habit can lead to a "healthy obsession" Top excuses for not exercising include lack of time and lack of energy (Health.com) -- We all have our reasons for not working out.

Some are legit -- we're working late or nursing an injury -- but often we're just talking ourselves out of exercising. "We make excuses to reduce what's called cognitive dissonance," says Dan Kirschenbaum, professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Northwestern University Medical School. "If we are committed to exercise and yet don't do it, the excuse allows us to feel less dissonance, or discomfort. " That's not to say you're lazy; it's a normal response.

Until then, here's how to overcome your top four gym deterrents (as revealed in a Health.com poll). Excuses for regular exercise. No time? Work out like a 'corporate athlete' Seven minutes.

No time? Work out like a 'corporate athlete'

That's the amount of time it takes to complete the high-intensity circuit training program Chris Jordan designed to help his clients lose weight and get fit. Repeat the circuit two to three times and your workout is over. You'll sweat. Your muscles will probably be sore the next day. And all you need is a small space on the floor, a chair and your own body weight.

"(High-intensity circuit training) is growing in popularity because of its efficiency and practicality for a time-constrained society," Jordan writes in the May/June issue of the American College of Sports Medicine's Health & Fitness Journal. Jordan is the director of exercise physiology at the Human Performance Institute, where he developed the fitness programming portion of their Corporate Athlete program for business executives looking to improve their performance -- in and out of the office. Three Heart-Rate Monitor Mistakes Everyone Makes. Avoid these and you will be well on your way toward getting the most out of your device. A heart rate monitor can be a useful piece of training equipment. Heart rate is a reliable indicator of exercise intensity, so training with one can help you work hard enough but not too hard in each workout. But using this type of device will not automatically make your training more effective.

Get In The Zone: The Pros Of Heart-Rate Training For Runners. Learn how to utilize fat as fuel, improve efficiency and better gauge intensity by training in the right zones. When you think of an easy run, thoughts of runners cruising down the sidewalk, rocking out to the beat in their headphones at a comfortable clip probably come to mind. Unknowingly, however, most runners don’t really run all that easy on their easy runs. After a few warmup miles, many runners start to feel good and begin pushing the pace without even realizing it. What started out as an easy run may end up being a push to simply get it over with as quickly as possible.

To help runners and other endurance athletes keep their easy runs easy and their hard workouts at the correct intensity, more and more coaches are relying on heart-rate training. Running 101: Training With A Heart Rate Monitor. Heart rate monitors are useful, but hardly essential.

Running 101: Training With A Heart Rate Monitor

Many runners wear heart rate monitors while they run. Should you? Heart rate monitors are not the essential training tools that some advocates make them out to be. When used properly, they can be valuable training aids. But even when used properly, they are subject to certain limitations and should not be relied on too heavily. Calculate Your Training Heart Rate Zones. Lose It! - Home. Race Pace Bicycles, Ellicott City, Columbia, Baltimore-Federal Hill, Owings Mills, Westminster, Maryland. Men's running shoes and apparel, running shoe reviews: Nike, Brooks, adidas, Mizuno, Asics, Saucony & New Balance.