Diet And Weightloss

It is important to stay injury free as any injury can make you incapacitated for long periods of time and they can reoccur at later times disrupting your training.

Rather than trying to lift too much weight at the gym and risk injury, it would be better to reduce the weight and do more repetitions of the same exercise.

Stretching your muscles before a workout or other form of exercise such as a run, jog or walk will help to reduce the chance of injury.

It is always wise to check with your doctor before starting any exercise program if you have any doubts about any aspect of your health. This is always a given!

If you have had prior injuries to any parts of your body you might need to ‘work around’ these when planning your training program to ensure they aren’t aggravated and cause you to miss valuable training time.

With weight training you can, under some circumstances, still train parts of your body if you have injured other areas, but it is often difficult as resistance training usually involves the whole body. At this point, training with machines might be an option.

With walking and running, it is obvious that damage to your legs will quickly put an end to your training. Stretching your legs before and after exercise, particularly your hamstrings, will help to eliminate problems with these two activities.

If you do suffer an injury, you will need to determine whether it is wise to continue training, albeit with less intensity, or to rest completely until the injury has recovered fully. Sometimes light exercise can help with recovery whereas other times it can delay your recovery and often make the problem worse.

It is times like this that professional advice from your doctor or fitness trainer will be invaluable. You should never be training to the extent that you are susceptible to injury as injuries can reoccur throughout your life once a muscle, tendon or ligament has been damaged.

The body is flexible and it is supposed to be flexible! You must be able to bend and reach that something you dropped on the floor, able to zip the back of your favorite dress on your own or reach that book you need to read which is on the top shelf.

The above are simply activities, nothing grand, you merely stretched out a bit. However, if there were difficulties in doing such simple motions, then you need a stretching program!

What is Stretching? Stretching is simply the act of extending to full length, the body or simply a part of it, by straightening or stretching the torso or the limbs.

Stretching is a fairly easy motion, should be included in the normal daily activities and can be done by anyone, regardless of age. However, the extent of stretching and flexing differs. The muscles tighten as a person grows older and the range of joint movements can be minimal. This can very well hinder an on-the-go lifestyle. That is why, as the person grows older, bending or flexing becomes more limited, and why stretching regularly, as part of a routine, is very important.

Simple stretches can be done everyday, doesn’t require much time and can be incorporated in the lifestyle and daily activities.

Stretching is an essential part of any training or sport and it must be done first before anything else. Stretching the body and limbs is good preparation for a more rigorous activity or workout.

Most athletes would do the sit and reach, wherein they sit on the floor or ground, extend their legs straight out and/or slightly wider than shoulder width and touch their toes with their fingertips. Actually, most trainers require their athletes to stretch and flex before playing.

The ideal length of time to stretch is approximately 10 minutes. This is enough time to move and flex the muscles in preparation for more complicated and strenuous movements. Extending the stretch and flex time beyond 10 minutes could be detrimental to the overall performance of the activity.

What are benefits of stretching:

1. Increase the range of movement.

• As one does stretching exercises, the length of the muscles and the tendons are increased. This will allow an increase in the range of movement and can help in alleviating injuries due the flexibility gained through stretching.

2. Increased ability to perform skills.

• When you have a wide range of movement, you are able to do more things and be more athletic. As as example, it allows a person to jump high, spin, turn, start and stop suddenly, bob and weave, etc because of stretching.

3. Injury prevention.

• Stretching can prevent injury to joints, tendons and muscles and can help in a faster recovery and decreased soreness. The muscles will be able to take more exhausting and rigorous movements with less probability of being injured.

4. Enhance energy.

• Being able to move more will also give you more energy. Stretching will also help enhance your awareness, like knowing that your body if capable of doing many things without tiring or becoming totally fatigued. As such, you are going to be more driven to move and get active.

Remember, your fitness is everything! Do what it takes to keep the body healthy. Eat healthy, exercise, stay fit and stretch it out!

Probably almost everyone has wondered at some point in time which cardio exercise is better. To put it in simple terms, both low and high intensity exercises will help you to burn off body fat. The question here is, which is the most effective to burn off more body fat.

Scientists discovered that during intensive exercises, your body burns glycogen, which is a form of carbohydrates that are stored in your liver and muscles for energy, although during low intensity exercises, your body will burn a lot of fat.

If you’re wondering whether low intensity exercise works or not, the answer is, not really because there are so many obese people still around. Even though they may be working out with low intensity routines, it still makes you wonder how it can be.

The scientists were right when they said the human body burns more body fat during low intensity exercises like walking or swimming. During a high intensity exercise such as running, the body will burn a lot more calories. Even if some the calories burned are from glycogen, there are still many fat calories burned as well.

To put icing on the cake, when your store of glycogen gets low, the carbohydrates from your food you eat will later get converted into glycogen to fill up the store and won’t be converted to body fat when they are left unused for energy.

High intensity cardio exercise will juice up your metabolism even after you have completed your workout. What this means, is that your body will continue to burn body fat hours after you have left the gym. This effect is nearly non existent in low intensity cardio or aerobic workout.

Cumulatively, your body will burn up more and more calories during and after you have finished a high intensity cardio exercise than it will with low intensity.

You can inject high intensity exercises into your cardio workout by introducing some interval training. You can walk for 5 minutes or so, then break into some jogging for another 5 minutes or so. Then, walk briskly again until you have caught your breath and then sprint for a minute before you walk again. From this point, simply alternate your running and walking for the next 15 minutes until you are finished. As you progress and become fitter, you can walk and run up and down inclines or hills also. The body gets smart after a while and needs a good shake-up with new routines.

One of the best things about cardio is the more you do it the more energy you’ll have. Cardio will help you to burn calories, although it’s more useful for keeping your energy levels high.

If you’ve never tried cardio before, you should give it a shot. If you like to exercise, you’ll find cardio the best way to boost your energy and keep in top shape. If you are just starting out, you’ll want to go slow and keep your cardio exercise in track - as it is very easy to over exert yourself.