Exercises | Fitness | Body building

Exercise and workouts

2009-09-08T00:33:00.000-07:00

Exercise makes life healthier. We eat lots of junk food and the culture is never going to change until emergency arises. When such an emergency arise, it would be too late for us to revert to normal and healthy diet. In order to keep ourselves healthy from this polluting environment and junk foods, we need to concentrate on ways of keeping us healthier. Definitely maintaining a healthy diet is difficult. Eating food at proper time is even more difficult to maintain in this routine office-house schedule. So, what is the left out option we have? Exercises. Working out to keep our muscles stronger and exercising to keep ourselves fit is the only left out option. The advantages of practicing exercises everyday as a part of our daily routine is a handy way to stay fit. Staying fit means to keep ourselves in shape and muscular. Our jobs may require us to sit in front of a computer monitor for hours and work. We lack the basic hand and leg movements. By working out, we compensate for the loss of such basic needs. Working out vigorously can enable us develop stronger muscles. Stronger muscles makes us healthier and tougher. Stronger muscles in the neck and back regions enables the proper movement of spinal cord and prevents from back pain. People going on long rides on motorcycles should concentrate on working out to keep stronger muscles in the hip and back regions. As we age, the problems arising would be more and becomes difficult to find a cure. Prevention is always better than cure.

Squats

2008-08-18T11:25:00.000-07:00

The most common weight lifting exercises done for muscle called glutes and quadriceps is the squats.

Steps to follow :

· To do this you require a barbell and weights ( weights for persons of different levels ) and rack
· Place the barbell in parallel with the upper part of the chest
· Move towards the rack facing your shoulders and hold the barbell on both hands
· Now slowly remove the barbell from the rack and step forwards or away from the rack
· Raise up position from medium speed of your legs
· Hold the barbell until your legs are wide spread and balanced
· Place the barbell back on the rack slowly
· Repeat this for 5 or 6 times
· Advisable to add weights only for experts

Things to mind :

· Avoid using higher weights while doing squats
· It is not advisable to do this more times
· Doctors claim it is sometimes harmful, since lot of knee effort and force is required

Purpose and areas of effect :

· They help in developing the glutes muscle and the quadriceps
· They also help body subject to more weight lifting
· The barbell rests on the shoulders and so some toning is done

Exercises for neck

2008-08-18T11:14:00.000-07:00

Neck :

The link between the back upper part of the head and the shoulders is the neck. Neck muscles include the splenius. These are responsible for neck rotation and the movement. Neck also holds the weight of the head in any position it is held and also works with the shoulder muscles in connecting the arms for carrying weights. Neck flexion is the common and the most effective exercise for working out neck and it also affects the abdomen.

Neck Flexion :

Steps to follow :

· It requires a bench, towel and metal weights ( one is enough )
· First take the towel and cover it around the weight ( wrap )
· Lie perpendicular to the bench with the portion just below your shoulders to totally rest on the bench
· Hold the weight now near your forehead
· You shouldn't use the hand to carry the weight, only support it
· Now bend forwards using your neck and try to touch the chest with your chin
· Rest it in the backwards
· repeat this exercise for 10 to 15 times

slight variation can be, raising and lowering of your upper body alone

Things to mind :

· As a natural tendency we try to push the head with force
· But the hand is holding, so don't try to push hard

Purpose and areas of effect :

· The basic purpose is to help the splenius muscle of neck to enhance
· The variation part if executed well can help in developing abdomen muscles also

Abs Exercises

2008-08-18T11:11:00.000-07:00

Abdominal exercises are inturn shortly termed as abs exercise. One would imagine the a 6 pack abs by hearing abs exercises. But it is little way longer than anyone could imagine. There are atleast 100 different abs exercises treated with various slight degree of variation from each one of them. So it is a must to understand and do which one is exactly good for us to provide us with good results. Here are a few types of such abs exercises that has proven good for every kind of people who wish to have a 6 pack abs.

1. Bicycle Crunch

2. Captain's chair

3. Ball Crunch

4. Reverse Crunch

5. Oblique Crunch

Out of all these most favoured were the bicycle crunch, captain's chair and the ball crunch.

Bicycle Crunch :

You dont need any sophesticated instruments or tools to do this exercise. Some simple steps are

· Hold your hands to the back of your head and lie flat on the floor
· Remember to use a sheet on the floor
· Raise the left leg and bend the knee to forty five degrees
· Now keep the leg straight and move the other leg off the ground
· Slowing touching your left knee through the right elbow, lift your body ( dont do this vigorously until you are well trained )
· Switch with your left elbow and right knee similar to a cycle ( bicycle )
· Repeat this for 10 or 15 times
· On continuous workout this can be increased to 50 or 100 times also

Captain's Chair :

This requires an item found in gym commonly called as the captain's chair. The speciality of this exercise is that it increases the degrees your body strains in doing this exercise. Steps to do are

· Place your hands holding both the hands
· Stay flat with your elbow resting on the padded arm of the chair
· Here you have to move both of the knees towards your chest
· Then return them back to their old straight position
· Do this exercise for some 10 or 15 times daily
· On continuous workout it can be done for 25 or 30 times

The importance is that, since the knees are moving towards the chest, the cholestrol of the body gets burnt and the increase of body movement and degree of variation is significant and result a healthy fit body with a 6 pack abs.

A slight variation of this exercise can be done. For persons with high fat near the hip, belly side can do this by slightly twisting their legs when bringing near the chest. Important thing to note is that all these should be done slowly. No vigorous training until you have mastered them.

Ball Crunch :

This requires you to have a small or large ball, where you can lie with your back on the ball and your knees touching the ground. The steps involved are

· Stay with your back lying on the ball and your feets touching the floor
· Slowly move to and fro on the ball making a torso movement
· You move forwards then your neck touches the ball
· Moving backwards results in more flexibility of the abdominal muscles

This is highly effective for persons with high cholestrol and fat content. Due to the torso movement made, you have the highest chance of getting a flexible fit body with cholestrol burnt during the exercises.

Fat burning Exercises

2008-08-18T11:07:00.000-07:00

Exercises that are exclusively for burning excess fat are called as fat burning exercises. They involve working out with muscles contraction at a rapid rate or slow pace. Some examples are running, jogging, swimming. Running and swimming require rapid rate whereas jogging requires only a slow pace. But all these are types of fat burning exercises. All types of exercises basically falls under two wide categories

1.Aerobic
2.Anaerobic

The terms look familiar but the difference between them is what that separates the exercises and categories.

Aerobic exercises are exercises that demand oxygen presence to the muscles, which are also done in very slow pace that facilitates the intake of oxygen. Oxygen is the supporter of combustion. It burns the fat as well. So aerobic exercises are the vital fitness exercises that help to burn the excess fat. It is found that aerobic exercises burn more fat than these anaerobic exercises. The reason behind this is that aerobic exercises pump the heart more within its heart rate zone and demands the oxygen to be supplied to every part of the body. Thus thereby increasing the availability of oxygen and burning the excess fat. Persons with high cholesterol, belly fat, excess fat can do these kind of exercises on a regular basis. Jogging is a kind of aerobic exercise. That's why most doctors advice heart patients to go walking and jogging in the mornings. Morning air is unpolluted with excessive supply of fresh oxygen helping you naturally to burn out all excessive fat.

Anaerobic exercises are those that are done with no presence of oxygen ( logically not possible ) or with lesser oxygen. Since body cannot stay without oxygen, they are termed to be taking lesser intake of oxygen. Fats are substances with high carbohydrate content. Carbohydrates are hydrocarbons. Hydrocarbons combust in the presence of oxygen to leave out Carbon-di-oxide and water. Since these anaerobic exercises have little presence of oxygen, they don't burn so much of fat like the one mentioned above. Still it is favored by a few of the community. Persons with already well built body, but needs exercises to continuously maintain their physique can practice these anaerobic exercises like running, swimming and other intensive workouts.

Most people think running as a type of aerobic exercise. Since morning time is ideal for running, it doesn't assume that they are part of aerobic exercises. While running, muscles try and push harder and doesn't intake the oxygen. Only blood vessels strain with the secretion of adrenaline ( an enzyme ). Once after you run and come to rest, the urge of need to intake oxygen is raised, but this oxygen is sufficient enough to reach all of the muscles only and not to burn the excess fat. So it is advisable for persons with high fat, to walk and jog rather than to run. Learn to walk before you run.

While doing these exercises all our aim is to burn the excess fat. Here is a data value for all these exercises and their percentage of fat burning. Doing aerobic exercises allows your body to burn more fat than the anaerobic exercises. The variation here is the intensity in which both the exercises are carried out. In general all anaerobic exercises are carried out with faster rate. But for aerobic exercises, they can be done fast or slow depending on the level of the person doing such exercises. For doing an aerobic exercise in its advisable slow rate, it is determined that the body can burn up to 60 percentage of the fat. By increasing the intensity it has reduced to only 35 percentage of the effective fat burnt. Also it is determined that only 5 percent of the fat is burnt by doing anaerobic exercises. This is because of the lesser oxygen intake which has been described in detail.

The things here to note is, no exercise is good or bad. For some aerobic exercises may look extremely satisfied, but for others anaerobic exercises are advisable. It all depends on the individual, his physical fitness and the level. For a beginner with high cholesterol, aerobic exercises serve the best. They reduce the excess fat and turn him handsome in a few weeks. But for a man already fit enough, he cannot carry out normal aerobic exercises, because they are not sufficient enough to maintain his physical fitness. So it is necessary for him to take anaerobic exercises. For professionals, both are necessary and their intensity level vary.

Why Exercise ?

2008-08-18T11:04:00.000-07:00

Major part of our life rest on the saying " when wealth is lost nothing is lost, when health is lost something is lost, when character is lost everything is lost ". The better way to make a healthy living is a caring mind and a co-ordinating body. Exercise is a simple term to describe "activity". But it is not sufficient enough to define its complete definition. The term is coined solely for the purpose of integration of mind and body. Exercises are the ways to build a complete person. A complete person is one who has a healthy mind and a sound body. We have to live this entire life with the body provided to us. It becomes a necessity for us to maintain a good health and a beautiful body. For a machine life, exercises are the ways to make us feel human back with life. Some major exercises we do often without knowing their importance are walking, running, jogging, skipping and swimming. These are the healthiest exercises a human can get. But the growth of technology has stopped us from doing our regular activities. Junk food, fast food culture has lead us to take more of tablets rather than a healthy exercise. Nowadays, a heart patient prefers more of tablets rather than going for jogging every morning. A blood pressure patient can start doing swimming exercises, where he can inhale excess amount of fresh oxygen and leave out excess carbon-di-oxide thereby effectively reducing the blood pressure, rather than the intake of tablets. Natural ways of exercising are the best medicines available so far. "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" is certainly true. Preventing ourselves from the attack of diseases is what everyone will prefer. As the future world is viewed to be a generation of diseases and pollution, perfect exercises are the best remedy for the current situation.

You cannot expect results immediately after doing a certain exercise. After taking your pushing exercises for a week or so, you cannot expect to become holly wood actor. Leave it time to make yourself better. Once you start your exercises, the body muscles contract due to the activity it is undertaking which has not been with it so long. For about a month or two easy and smaller exercises are sufficient enough to make yourself better. The body gets used to the kind of exercise you do everyday. Everyday the muscles contract and expect it to go along for a long term. Body building is a long term process, where the exercises are to be practiced everyday. With a proper planning and perfect execution any job can be done to its utmost satisfaction. Similarly, choosing a perfect exercise for the perfect structure is the secret of building a healthy and a beautiful body. It is also true that perfection can be the enemy of creativity. We cant always wait until we have created a perfect process. There must be a balance between preventing problems and developing better, but not perfect. The way of quality leaders is, "if it isn't better, improve it" rather than "if it ain't broke, don't repair it". By the time it gets broken, it shall be too late for us to repair. Age is a major factor in body building. The exercises a body can do now cannot be the same after 20 years. Because, with the same junk food culture, we are never to get a nutritious diet we require for our healthy body. A brand new Air conditioner may seem to work well until its guarantee period even if it is not well serviced. But later it becomes a trouble. Similar way, body wont show up it is going down until it is too late. So be wise, try to make exercises and yoga a routine of our lifestyle. See the miracles later.