Spring into Action with Ten Top Fitness Tips
by Peter J. Morel CFC, CPT, CAFS
Use these ten tips to spring into the warm seasons, ready to enjoy whatever
they will offer!
#1 Remember to warm up properly
Many people neglect to do a proper warm up, an important process necessary
to prepare the body and its systems for the high intensity of the
exercise program to follow. In the past, trainers and fitness consultants
were quick to put people on the bike or rowing machine for an average
of ten minutes to increase the temperature of the body and to help
disperse the blood from the viscera to the working muscles. We
now know that while this is fine for the cardiovascular system
as it sends valuable messages to the central nervous system preparing
it for the work to come, careful attention must be paid to the
intensity of the warm up. If not, the increase in blood lactate
could hamper the workout.
Muscles need a different type of neural message. Your central nervous system
needs to relay four things to each group of muscles you are preparing
to work within the exercise session: 1) What muscles do I want
working?; 2) What exercise am I asking these muscles to perform?;
3) What is the range of motion in this exercise?; 4) Will there
be a substantial weight involved in the exercise? Completing a
couple of low repetition sets with a lighter weight than will be
used for your actual workout sets can be a very good warm up.
#2 Use efficient exercises
Exercises like the bench press, the squat, and the pull up, are the backbone
of any resistance-training program. Called "basic compound movements"
because they force you to use the muscles attached to more than
one joint, these exercises use more of the muscle fiber pool than
isolation exercises such as flies, leg extensions, or alternate
curls. By using compound movements, beginners will reduce the time
that they need to exercise and will reduce the possibility of over-training
and over-exertion. These movements develop strength in groups of
muscles and eliminate imbalances in strength in opposing
movements.
#3 Make changes
Change your exercise routines often. A beginner's central nervous system
learns through repetitive motion, doing a motion over and over.
It's recommended that those new to exercising wait until this neural
adaptation phase is complete before making changes - for most people,
this takes between four to six weeks. For more advanced exercisers
- those of us who have been at it for two years or more - changes
need to be made as often as every two weeks before your body adapts
to the routine of your program and learns to 'cheat.' If changes
are not made, you will enter a state of non-progression where advances
will be at a standstill. The only way to get the body to respond
to exercise is to stress it in a way it is not used to.
#4 Use training cycles
The use of training cycles is vitally important to avoid falling into the
'bodybuilding' way of life, using split routines and volume training
without change. For athletes, this can be a quick path to the doctor's
office. No athlete can be expected to train in the same way for
53 weeks of the year, on the contrary, changes in intensity and
for sport-specific movements are essential. For example bodybuilders are concerned
only with appearance and have no need for jumping power, take off
speed and a-lactic recovery.
Cycles are designed to help an athlete to peak at the proper time, usually
at the onset of the competitive season. Cycles for mass, strength,
power, speed, endurance, and recovery must all be programmed into
an athletic program when needed.
#5 Keep a detailed log
Very few people can train instinctively - those who do usually end up in
my office on a referral from a doctor or chiropractor! The most
important reason for keeping a training log is that it gives you
an up-to-date account of where you are within the training cycle
and informs you when you need to change. It also comes in handy
for answering questions at the doctor's office. I've often asked
people what exercise they were doing and how much weight was being
used, only to be told that they don't remember.
A log will also show whether or not you are achieving your goals or have
reached a plateau in your program.
#6 Eat a proper diet
Nutrition is one of the most important components of the good health formula.
Nothing could be truer than the old adage, "you are what you eat."
Everything within our bodies can be broken down into the elements
we ingest on a day-to-day basis.
When you begin to add exercise to your daily routine many systems are taxed,
and how well they adapt is what makes the program work for, or
against you. Without proper nutrition, exercise cannot work for
you. If you abandon your daily pizza and french fries for lean
meats, fruit and vegetables and follow the same exercise routine,
the difference in results will be remarkable.
#7 Eat smaller portions more often
By dividing your caloric intake throughout the day, your metabolism will
be forced to work at an elevated rate in order to keep digesting
the constant influx of nutrients. If, on the other hand, you eat
a meal consisting of a four-ounce chicken breast, a side of vegetables,
a salad, milk, and desert, your body will only absorb small amounts
of each nutrient at a time. The rest will be sent out as waste.
By dividing the nutrients into smaller portions, more of each will
be used for the repair of the systems taxed by the stress of exercise.
Humans are grazers not gorgers; our systems are not designed to
binge and fast, but rather to eat small amounts more often.
#8 Get a good nights sleep
This is yet another very important component of the formula for good health,
since your body does as much as 70 percent of its repair work during
sleep. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to conclude that if you
don't get a good night's sleep you'll be a mess the next day. Don't
sleep much longer than the recommended eight hours, however, because
you'll be depriving your body of food for too long, which is counterproductive
to your goal of improving your physical health.
#9 Keep your workouts short
Research shows that levels of productive hormones in the body reach their
peak after approximately 45 minutes of exercise. Working with weights
or doing cardio past this point is counterproductive since levels
of byproducts such as lactic acid and catabolic hormones like cortisol
will begin to saturate the blood, impeding performance and recuperation.
By keeping your workout short and intense, you keep these levels low and
create a good environment for your body to adapt to the stress.
Workouts do not need to be long and grueling and many people would
achieve better results by reducing the amount of time they exercise
in a given session.
#10 Exercise the largest muscles first
If you plan to work on more than one body part or if you're doing a whole
body workout, split your program into large and small muscle groups.
By working the large groups like the back, chest, and legs first,
followed by the small groups like the biceps, shoulders, and calves,
you will eliminate the fatigue factor in the small stabilizers.
For example, let's imagine that you wanted to do a bench press,
and you know that your work weight for that given exercise is 250
pounds. Before attempting the bench press you did shoulder presses
and triceps extensions, then you moved on to the bench press. You
attempted to do your first set of tem repetitions at 250 pounds
but could only get eight. In the next set, you only complete six.
What's the problem? You're not exercising your chest at the proper
intensity that this large muscle group needs, and the other small
muscles used in this exercise for stabilization and as secondary
mover to the chest are already tired from the exercises you did
prior to the bench press. A good total body split is chest, legs,
back, biceps, shoulder, calves, and triceps.
Until next time stay fit and be strong.
Peter J Morel
CFC,CPT,CAFS
President TopShape Inc.
Consultant to the Active Living Alliance for Canadians with a disability.
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