Fat Burning And Weight Loss Advice: Exercise

Showing posts with label Exercise. Show all posts

Why It's Hard To Lose Weight Without Exercise

By Gregory L Gomez

Unfortunately one of the most difficult things for people to accomplish is to lose weight and get fit.

To achieve this in a natural way, maintaining healthy nutrition and a regular exercise plan is your ticket to success.

As simple as that may sound it actually confounds most people which is the main reason nearly 50% of American adults are overweight. Losing weight is difficult because not only must a person completely revamp their eating habits and maintain a consistent exercise routine, but also consider the length of time it will take to lose the excess weight. This is usually what throws people off course.

In other words, sure it may be rather easy to eat healthy and exercise for one week, but how about for one month, a half of year, a whole year or longer? The length of time needed to drop the weight will depend on how overweight a person is, and how consistently they stick with their plan.

There are some people who want to lose weight but do not want to workout. If you are one may be leaning this direction, it's important you understand that it will be hard to lose weight without exercise. Even though exercise comprises of only about 30% of a person's weight loss success, the other 70% being nutrition, working out regularly still plays a key role in creating a healthy life.

Not only does working out burn calories and fat from our body, but it lends a motivational hand to help remain inspired with this new way of life. It is very easy to slip back into old habits and routines when you are not motivated to lose weight any longer.

If that's not reason enough for you to include exercise into your weekly routine, let's look at the numbers and that may help change your outlook on this healthy habit.

Say for instance an individual whose calorie amount to maintain their current weight is 1,800 calories per day. This past week Monday through Friday this individual was able to create a deficiency of 350 calories each day by focusing on healthy choices and portion size. The deficiency total for the work week totals 1,750 calories which is equivalent to about a half of pound of weight lost.

However on Saturday, this individual went out with a group of friends to celebrate a birthday and this is where the problems began. Not only did this person have 3 alcoholic beverages but had a number of appetizers along with an enormous meal. To top it off, since this person was under the impression that since they maintained healthy nutrition during the week they ordered a large chocolate overload dessert and devoured afterwards.

Do you realize that amount of food comes out to over 2,500 calories? That amount goes entirely over the amount of calories allowed for a day let alone for one particular meal.

This is one of the main reasons why it is hard to lose weight without exercise to burn off any extra calories that may be tossed into your body on any given day. By maintaining this healthy habit, you will not have to worry much if a birthday celebration or a night out with friends arises since you will have exercise to back you up to help get rid of the junk.

Gregory L. Gomez, a LAUSD teacher who's also on journey to develop a healthy life in an effort to lose weight and get in shape. Follow his progress on http://HealthyChoicesInLife.com as he strives to lose nearly 100 pounds by eating healthy and maintaining a consistent exercise routine. Get a FREE monthly Healthy Choices Newsletter along with a Healthy Eating eBook just for stopping by at http://healthychoicesinlife.com/healthy-eating.

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A New Perspective on Dieting and Exercise

By Ed Kaine

What's the best way for us to think about our bodies, our weight, and our dieting habits? Our aim is to provide you with new, realistic ways to think about this stuff, in hopes of dispelling some of the drastic ideas about weight and body image that you get from most media sources.

Celebrity bodies, fad diets, intense training programs-these pervade our culture, and combine to give us a skewed idea of how to take care of our bodies. Weight and physical health are individual matters. Because of this, any diet, weight loss, or exercise program should be tailored to each person, and should be balanced with the other circumstances of his or her life. Popular diet and exercise programs (think of the Atkins diet, the South Beach diet, and other big-name solutions) usually apply drastic strategies and try to sell them to the most possible people. Well, these strategies just can't work for everyone. Each of us has a different life, with different activities and stresses, and therefore with different demands on our bodies.

Someone training to run a marathon, for example, could not afford to go on the Atkins diet-it would rob her of the carbohydrates needed to fuel her training. Someone who spends eight hours a day seated in an office with want to eat fewer carbs and calories, but still make sure to get enough nutrition. We need to balance activity with food intake-when you expend energy, you'll need to replace it with calories and carbs. This a more adaptive, personal approach than a strict diet plan. There are all kinds of factors in a person's life, and a ton of ways to balance them out for optimal health. At the beginning of this issue, we introduced you to the CRAFT model, which is a tool for thinking about life balance. CRAFT comes in handy when thinking about weight. If you're thinking about changing your diet or your fitness program, don't look to for big, famous programs. Look at your life. Look at your context and circumstances, and determine from there what behaviors you should change, and how to change them.

It's about balance. Fad diets appeal to us by advertising huge cuts in carbs or calories. Flashy exercise programs emphasize intense workout routines and long sessions at the gym to attain ripped beach bodies. Dieting and exercise are of course great ways to get healthy-but we just need to keep them balanced. And that balance depends on you. You have got to consider your own metabolism. You have got to consider your own health conditions and family history. And you have also got to consider your priorities, your activities, and how you want to spend your time. Do you want to sacrifice hours from your social life, or from your work, to be at the gym?

Maybe you do-maybe exercising is a huge priority for you, and is something you derive enjoyment from. But know that the choice is yours, and that there are other ways to get healthy without adopting massive, strict programs that force you to decide between health and other parts of your life. You can work healthy habits into your existing routine. As a writer and editor, I spend a lot of time in front of the computer screen. My life is sedentary, and consists of long days and nights writing, editing, and poring over research. I don't follow a strict diet, and I don't have the time, or the desire, to hit the gym for an hour or two each day. But I practice healthy habits. I drink water constantly. I eat nuts, dried fruit, and baby carrots while I work. I take breaks to go on mind-clearing walks; when I have more time, I'll take a long bike ride. Because I don't do too much hard exercise, I try not to overeat, and try to avoid junk food. I eat based on the energy I need, and let my activities and routine dictate my calorie intake rather than sticking to a strict daily limit. I don't have a strict mindset, but I do have flexible habits that respond to my priorities, desires, and needs. Everyone can achieve this-it just takes a little thought.

-Functional Therapy Magazine

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Ed_Kaine

Exercise for Tennis - How Can Stretching Help It?

By Giselle Martin

Stretching plays an important role in a tennis player's development and results, not only short term, but also long term.

Let us quickly have a look at, what stretching is, and what it does.

Stretching is a form of physical exercise in which a specific muscle or tendon (or muscle group) is deliberately flexed or stretched in order to improve the muscle's elasticity and achieve comfortable muscle tone. The result is a feeling of increased muscle control, flexibility and range of motion.

Types of stretching exercises, quite useful for tennis players of all levels are:

1. Ballistic - Getting to the end range of a stretch and lightly moving or gently bouncing, with control.

2. PNF or Proprioceptive Neuromuscular Facilitation - Getting to the end range of a stretch and pushing back against someone or something for a short period of time.

3. Static - Getting to the end range of a stretch and holding the stretch for a set length of time. Static stretching isolates targeted muscle groups.

4. Dynamic - Is movement based stretching; an example of this would be squatting up and down for a set time.

It is common for players to stretch before and after tennis exercises in order to reduce injury and increase performance.

Some of the reasons for this are; Stretching helps improve flexibility, which enables more fluid movement, with greater range of motion. It helps blood circulation to the muscle, the more blood flow the more chance of a quicker recovery.

Stretching assists in joint function (especially dynamic stretching), lengthening the muscle out around a joint will help it move and function better, reducing the risk of injury.

We encourage all players to incorporate stretching plans into their tennis training program if they want ot imporve their performance, speed and movement in the court.

Below mentioned is what we recommend all tennis players about doing strecting exercises.

Pre tennis/fitness (once warmed up)

1. Dynamic stretching (up to 6 tennis specific movement based stretches)
2. Static stretching (only if a certain muscle feels particularly tight)

Post tennis/fitness (within 2 hours)

1. Static stretching (for young players 4-6 stretches to start will be enough, otherwise they tend to get bored and it seems like a chore)
2. PNF (to release a specific area of tension e.g. hamstrings) once to twice a week is good.

We highly recommend a stretching plan pre (dynamic) and post training (static). In fact we consider it a necessity if you want to reach the top.

We provide fitness training for tennis players of all levels. We offer tennis specific exercises and online tennis programs that are proven to improve footwork, speed, agility, core, power and strength.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Giselle_Martin

How to Exercise When You Are Metabolically Dysfunctional

By Jared Heldt
Many people are finding themselves dealing with chronic health issues whether due to genetics, stress, or a combination of other factors. Losing weight and/or maintaining is especially difficult when dealing with frustrating and difficult health issues. Special attention should be given to the condition of someone dealing with a chronic or invisible illness. Some might find that they aren't quite healthy enough for a number of reasons to exercise. Treating the underlying causes and problems leading to your health issues should be at the top of the list. If you are healthy enough to exercise its important to choose exercise that is efficient, effective and won't worsen health issues.

Excessive or chronic cardio is not recommended for those with chronic health issues. Especially those dealing with adrenal/blood sugar issues. Doing too much cardio can have a negative impact on your body and metabolism as a whole. At the core or foundation of your exercise regimen should be high intensity weight training. When done correctly High Intensity weight training can often produce remarkable results but is dependent on genetics. High Intensity training is a methodology of weight training which emphasizes brief, intense (and safe!) but efficient training. Proper technique and guidance is key to finding great results from high intensity training. The average person typically will do a high intensity weight training workout once a week. For those with metabolic issues, workouts may need to be every couple of weeks.

While cardiovascular exercise is deemphasized when training in a high intensity for potential of doing more harm than good, it is important to try to stay active. Finding an activity or hobby which keeps you fairly active is recommended. Personally I do martial arts, and dancing, which can be done cheaply and at home (Xbox 360 and Kinect and punching bag). Other beneficial activities might be qi gong or tai chi as they also help reduce stress and promote relaxation and calm. Meditation is also something worth looking into as well with its many health benefits.

Moving meditation techniques such as those in Tai Chi, Yoga and Qi Gong are recommended if unable to do meditation (especially those utilizing binaural beats). For those dealing with mthfr, detoxifaction or methylation issues, your mental health, and neurotransmitters may need to be addressed before trying high level meditation such as the holosync program (which uses binaural beats). Personally before having these chronic health issues I could use binaural beats to great benefit but since than I haven't been able to. I suspect it may have to do with my genetic imbalances which affect me mentally and my neurotransmitters.

Check out my blog at: http://www.paleoredux.blogspot.com and my squidoo lens on a similar topic: http://www.squidoo.com/high-intensity-training-for-the-metabolically-dysfunctional

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jared_Heldt

Simply the Best Exercise to Lose Fat: High Intensity Interval Training

By Nathan Towle

Almost every client that comes to me is looking to lower their body fat. Whether it's a thirty-something looking to be slimmer for her holiday, a forty-five year old mother looking to feel a little better or regular gym goer trying to finally attain that six pack, keeping body fat low without resorting to elaborate diets is high on most people's list.

To every single one of these people I say there is one training modality that will get you where you want to be. It is the