Health and Fitness

Believe it or not, nine out of ten lifters in the gym do not know this simple fact… and it’s actually a shame.營gnorance of this fact cost guys countless hours of wasted time and effort in the gym and ultimately leads to failure. They become discouraged due to the lack of results despite there greatest efforts. But why is that? The answer is simple. They do not understand the fundamentals of building muscle! Most guys have the perception that they are building muscle while they are in the gym sweating and pounding away at the weights. Actually, you are doing the exact opposite! Give me a minute and I’ll explain… During your weight training you are actually breaking down your muscles, not building them.

When you train properly (which means training to muscular failure) you are creating microscopic tears in your muscles. This explains the soreness that comes with the few…

There isn’t a single person that I know who doesn’t realize that being overweight is very unhealthy and could be a serious health issue. While it is common knowledge to include regular exercise as part of your diet, one of the things people forget to do at the gym is weight training. Most people usually head straight to a cardiovascular machine, like a treadmill or elliptical trainer, since that burns the most calories.燘ut, by adding weight training, you can really burn even more.

One thing that people don’t realize, that by adding some kind of weight lifting in their workout, you really help boost your metabolism.燛ven after only doing 20 minutes of light to moderate lifting, your body will continue to burn calories hours after you have finished.燱hile doing some sort of cardiovascular exercise should still remain the key area of your training, by adding just a little weight lifting, you…

Forgive the crunch pun, but is the best way to describe these tips on how to get some quick exercise training in when you have little time to do it. We all have busy lives but for some of us who have made it a priority to stay in top shape, with little or no time to spare, here are some ways that you can continue looking and feeling great throughout the day with little to no effort.

Quick Pull Ups

It is recommended that somewhere in your home in a place where you will not mind having installing and having a pull up bar such as a closet or the entrance to a private bathroom, that you do this for easy quick access to a few sets a day. Making sure you are positioned right and the bar is even, doing about 3 to 4 sets per day will give you…

If you are struggling to get the body you desire by doing cardio alone, you should consider starting a weight lifting muscle building program. A good weight lifting program will help you add muscle mass and actually increase your body’s fat burning ability. Let’s look at why adding lean muscle mass is so important and desired.

Why Do We Need Lean Muscle Mass?

For men the advantages of adding muscle mass are obvious. A good looking physique with broad shoulders and big arms is desired by most men and admired by women. Unfortunately, most women avoid adding muscle mass, fearing that it will make them look bulky or huge. This is absolutely not the case. When women add lean muscle it makes them appear lean, toned and sculpted. Think fitness model or athlete, rather than female bodybuilder.

It is possible to add approximately one pound of muscle per week to your body. Since…

One of the major keys to keeping improvement consistent is changing a weight training routine every 4 weeks on average. There are an infinite amount ways to change things around… one of those that creates fast and significant results is adding plyometric training.

What is Plyometric training?

Think of plyometirc training as explosive training. It consists of many jump ups, jump downs, fast push ups, explosive push ups, and many more. It is a prime training method of building power.

Athletes tend to use this type of training a lot because of its ability to build great power. Power is your muscles ability to produce maximum force in the shortest amount of time. This type of training is not just for athletes… normal people can use it too.

It has the great ability for the “normal” person to create more energy. It also builds up the stabilizer muscles in the joints… making your weight…

A wide back, along with well developed
shoulders is one of those impressive body
parts that you can’t hide no matter what
you are wearing. Discover the most effective back training exercise you can use to build a thick, powerful back.

Your shoulders and lats
create that impressive v-taper and make
your physique look powerful and strong.
Your back is also the biggest muscle group
in the body. Thus, effective back routines
are an extremely important part of your weight
training routine.

Solid back routines for weightlifting should
center around one exercise: the deadlift.
Walk into any gym and count how many people
perform the deadlift in their back routine.
I bet you can count the number on one hand.

In fact, I bet you don’t even need to know
how to count because the number of people
you see using the deadlift in their back
routines will most likely be zero. This
is usually true with the squat as well.

And how many trainees have well developed
legs or a…

The ideal scenario to be in as a bodybuilder is maximum hypertrophy. This means our body is producing the most muscle tissue that it possibly can. This will make you a much larger individual, which is the goal of bodybuilding.

The majority of hypertrophy occurs while you’re asleep. A typical bodybuilder will sleep 9hrs, which means the body goes without nutrients for most of that time. The process of building muscles relies on the protein in our body. The nutrients from protein stay in the body for roughly 2-4hrs, so that means during the night, 5-7hrs your body goes without any nutrients. Therefore it is essential that you eat something that will prolong digestion while you sleep. In this case it is dietary fat. When you mix dietary fat and protein before bed, you will have the protein last throughout the night.

To continue on with the protein in your system, this…

I’m going to share with you some of the more powerful bodybuilding techniques that you can do. This will lead to increased energy, muscle and testosterone. Remember that these need to be done on a regular basis to have any long-term effect.

Try doing the full squat instead of a regular squat. Regular squats you just go squat down to the point of sitting in a chair. A full squat is when you go down until your butt is almost touching your ankles. This will really give your legs a workout.

A military press is another great exercise to put in your routine. You need a barbell and you’re going to hold it above your head, gripping it at shoulder width. Next, you’re going to bend your arms and let it come down to your chest, then explosively push it back up. This will work the shoulders and upper chest area.

Try the…

Almost everyone should lift weights. Weight lifting strengthens bones, muscles ligaments and tendons; increases coordination for tasks requiring strength; and gives confidence and mobility to elderly or disabled people.

Just exercising doesn’t do much to strengthen muscles. If it did, marathon runners would have the largest muscles. To become strong, you have to exercise your muscles against progressively greater resistance.

Just exercising doesn’t strengthen bones either. Female marathon runners sometimes stop menstruating and lose tremendous amounts of bone, even though they may run more than 100 miles a week. To regain bone, they have to eat more food which will usually start them menstruating again, and include weight-lifting in their workouts. They may also need to take estrogen.

Many people with muscle or nerve diseases can also benefit from lifting weights. They may be unable to work out as long or as hard as a healthy person and they will take longer to…

There has always been a debate on whether or not performing a single rep during your workout is a good idea. Many people think that if you want to know how much you can lift for one rep you can simply look it up in a chart and avoid any chance of injury. Others feel that there simply is no reason to max out. I’ve heard people say that you should worry about perfect form and measure your success based on the way you look, not how much weight you are pushing. Granted, if you are a bodybuilder you may not need to do singles but for the rest of us inserting singles in a program can be helpful for various reasons. In fact I swear by them.

Let’s face it everyone that lifts weights can’t help but talk about it. Just the fact that you’re bigger than most people you…