Athlekinetix Blog

Moms have to be so many things to so many people. As if it’s not hard enough to balance family and career, there are always new expectations thrown at mothers to be asked to achieve. The latest mommy book getting quite a buzz is called The Hot Mommy Next Door: A Quick, Easy, and Effective Way to Drop Your Baby Weight and Achieve Your Personal Best After Pregnancy by Allison Fadoul.

Now it’s not enough being nurse, short order cook, chauffeur, homework helper, activity director, and bedtime story reader. Let alone being a friend, lover, and confidant to your significant other who may or may not be your baby’s daddy. Throw in everything you do at work and you are lucky if you can watch “Dancing With The Stars” without seeing stars yourself. Moms can’t even find two minutes to themselves a day that do not revolve around the needs of others.

It’s no surprise then, that when it comes to diet and exercise, the number one reason moms give for failing to commit is that they just don’t have the time. Now all of a sudden this book comes along and tells us moms that we now need to be “hot” too. The only hot most women my age are feeling comes in the form of hot flashes. Maybe this book is about living next door to a hot mommy instead of requiring us to be a hot mommy ourselves.

The truth is no matter how chaotic life is and how drained and exhausted you feel at the end of the day, you are only as good to others as you are to yourself.  Instead of being always last on the list in the family pecking order, give yourself the best Mother’s Day gift ever and put yourself at the front of the line. It is no different than putting the oxygen mask on you first during an emergency airplane landing before placing the oxygen mask on your child. Your family and success in your career are dependent on your overall health and wellness.

I don’t think being “hot” means donning thigh high stiletto boots and a bustierre. I can barely spell bustierre, let alone wear one.  Justin Timberlake said that President Obama brought swagger back into The White House. To me, being a “hot” mom means bringing your swagger back into your life. It’s bringing back your essence, your joy, and your sense of self. It’s about not settling for eating the cut off crusts of your kid’s sandwiches and knowing you’re worthy of every bite of a whole one.

Eating well, exercising, prioritizing, and owning and being proud of the “you” you are now is the new presecription for moms. To be able to walk with confidence and feel beautiful inside and out will make your neighbors take note that they are living next door to a true “hot” mommy.

A newly released Scottish study found that just three minutes a day of exercise can significantly improve your health. Huh? I’m not one to be left speechless often, but this new finding defies explanation. First we hear the recommended guidelines for maintaining good health are 30 minutes a day, 3 times a week of moderate exercise. Then, the National Registry for Weight-loss revealed that most people who have lost weight and kept it off for two years or more exercise at least 5 days a week of vigorous exercise for an hour a day. My personal favorite recommendation for how long we should exercise came from running experts who coined “90 is the new 60.”

I exercise 7 days a week for 2 hours a day. Now I know that is not typical and not realistic for most people. However, I’m more ‘more is more’ rather than the ‘less is more ‘ if I were to be completely honest with you. I think that exercise should be intense, full of variety, and done for at least 45 minutes to an hour a day. Every day. I never quite understood the so-called fitness experts who recommend taking the weekend off or every other day in between working out. First of all, exercise is a habit. If you do not foster and nurture this habit, it will become a choice. And I ask you, if you were given the choice to workout or not, which choice would you make?

The other reason I believe in exercising every day is the weekends are the time when food and alcohol consumption are at their highest. This is the time, if there ever was one, to step up the exercise. Even though I am of the ‘more is more’ philosophy, I am by no means insane when it comes to exercise. People who work out 3-4 hours a day are not only in need of a head check, but are actually doing their body harm by overexercising. I am a moderate ‘more is more’ type of woman. But, if this study was to be believed that 3 minutes a day of exercise is all we need to see results, then I am in LaLa Land. This isn’t even ‘less is more.’  Maybe it is ‘anything is better than nothing.’

In the Scottish study, adults who did six 30 second sprints on the exercise bike with rests in between for a total of 3 minutes, “improved their body’s ability to metabolize blood sugar by 25% after six sessios.” As of this weren’t unbelieveable enough, they also lowered their risks of diabetes and heart disease. Interesting.

The good news about this is I will never have to hear from people again the ubiqitous excuse of  “I just don’t have time to exercise.” Hogwash to that now! I challenge anyone to say they can’t spare three minutes of their day to improving their health.

I am not swayed by the findings of the 3 minute rule enough to practice it in my life anytime soon. However, if you are currently doing nothing and are inspired by the 3 minute a day rule of exercise, by all means put on your sneakers immediately.

If you truly only have 3 minutes a day to exercise, I think push-ups, squats, and planks make for a good 3 minute trio. They work major muscle groups simultaneously, require no equipment other than your own body weight, and are effective in small doses. For 3 minutes, do 10 push-ups, 20 squats, and a 30 second plank on your elbows. Rest for 30 seconds and repeat the series for a total of 3 minutes. As you get stronger, lessen the rest time in between sets.

Perhaps the best result of this study is that exercise, even in the smallest of quantities makes a difference to your overall health. If 3 minutes does every thing this study says it does, then imagine the benefits to your health and body, if you were to exercise intensely an hour a day.

It used to be the reflection of an intense workout was a high heart rate, muscle fatigue, and even puddles of sweat. Those were the good old days. Today, the presence of buckets to throw up in is the sign of a hard core workout.  If you are eating while reading this, no need for alarm. You see, there is no actual barfing that takes place in these buckets. They are just for show.

The famous P90X that everyone is touting as being the poster child for intensity, has buckets waiting by on the set just in case you can’t quite keep your cookies down while doing the exercise routine. Apparently, it is irrelevant to the brains behind P90X that the buckets are actually located on your TV screen and won’t come in handy in times of need. Along these lines, it must also be irrelevant to the bigwigs at P90X that if you at home are working out so hard that you need to puke, there is something seriously wrong.

What’s even more bothersome with the proverbial bucket is the fact that it is beginning to show up everywhere. A local fitness celebrity holds an outdoor fitness challenge every week that is supposedly so intense that you have to qualify to be able to participate. Of course, intensity in the actual exercises wouldn’t be enough. Buckets have to line the obstacle course as well, just in case you forgot you were doing an intense workout. This gimmick has gotten so obnoxious, that even group exercise classes in local gyms aren’t immune. Recently, a class was held that promised to be an hour filled with power so intense that only a lucky few would be able to complete it. I was highly doubtful about that, but I surely wasn’t doubtful about whether buckets would be involved.  Unfortuately, I’m not a betting woman, because I would have made some serious cash on that one.

Oprah Winfry, with the Chris Brown/Rhianna mess, said publicly many times that love is not supposed to hurt. Guess what? Either does exercise. Exercise is not supposed to make you physically sick, no matter how intense the workout or class supposedly is.  I’m not talking no pain, no gain. Yes, lactic acid burn can be uncomfortable. Yes, muscles that are worked to fatigue the day before can be sore the next day. But, this “bucket” phenomenon is nonsensical at best and patronizing at worst.

If you feel like you are about to hurl while working out, it is not a testament to the strength of the exercise program, it is a sign that you are doing something wrong. Buckets are the rage today. What’s next, ambulance stretchers?

What does Darius Rucker, lead singer of Hootie and the Blowfish and now chart-topping solo country artist, know about fitness? More than you realize. When their album Cracked Rear View dropped in 1994, it was deemed an overnight sensation and went on to become the 12th best-selling album in music business history.

There are several things interesting about this. First, what the world thought of as ‘overnight success’ and the reality behind the success of the album were quite different. Hootie and the Blowfish had been working day and night for 10 years prior to the release of the album at any gig they could in order to play their music, get heard by as many people as possible, and try to make a dime to cover their expenses. This same principle applies to fitness. When people see someone who has lost weight or transformed their body, it is assumed that it happened overnight. What people were not privy to, however, were the hours of sweat and nutritional discipline required daily to make lasting change possible. Hootie and the Blowfish knew that one day they would be successful because they worked diligently to make that happen. Darius Rucker was interviewed and said, “We just believed in our music.” What they were doing for the previous decade before they struck it big was build the foundation for success one day at a time.

The same goes for your body. Change does not happen instantly. But, if you make the choice every day to lead a healthy life and eat right most of the time and exercise hard most of the time, your body will change. Guaranteed. If you believe in your body, like Hootie and the Blowfish believed in their music, you will be the next overnight sensation.

One of the interesting things that made Hootie and the Blowfish unique was it was a combination of pop, blues, folk, soul, and rock. The diversity of the music made it ‘hard to pigeonhole’ and appealed to a wide demographic as a result. Your exercise program should reflect this same principle. If you are a one trick pony, you better throw in some rock and roll and even a little rap once in a while if you want your body to look different tomorrow than it does today. If people around you can pigeonhole you as a runner, spinner, or weightlifter, you are in danger of being in a fitness rut. Keep your workouts unpredictable and shake things up and you will achieve your fitness goals.

Darius Rucker, after Hootie and the Blowfish, expanded his wings as a solo artist and tipped his hat in R&B. This was met with a lukewarm reception from his fans and his debut album bombed. This too will happen to you from time to time in your fitness endeavors. How many competitive athletes go from being phenomenally fit and at the top of their game and then struggle with weight issues when they retire? Hopefully, Charles Barkley you are reading this right now. Or, if you trained intensely to run a marathon and did all you hoped to do and more, but then never ran another mile in your life, Hootie speaks to you too. It is hard losing weight and keeping it off or being at your athletic best and staying on top. Just like Darius Rucker, you will bomb at some point and want to give up.

Darius Rucker didn’t give up and either will you. In 2008, he transformed himself again into a country singer. His first solo chart single “Don’t Think I Don’t Think About It” went on to become the first number one country hit by an African American artist since 1983. Get out of your comfort zone, try something different with your exercise routine, and set new goals for yourself to train for and achieve. The definition of madness is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. If your mind and body crave a change, do yourself a favor and change the way you eat and exercise.

It used to be when you heard of knee or hip replacement surgery, you thought of an 80 year old with severe arthritis. This is far from the case today. In fact, knee replacements are expected to increase 525% by the year 2030 and hip replacements are expected to double from 285,000 to 573,000.

Arthritis and old age are still reasons for this radical surgery, but there are many other reasons that people of all ages should pay attention to. The average age of joint replacement surgery keeps getting younger and younger. A primary reason for this is obesity. Even being overweight and not morbidly obese puts unnecessary continuous strain on your joints. Regardless of age, if you are overweight you are twice as likely to develop arthritis in your knees and hips which could lead to future joint replacement surgery. Studies have shown that for every pound of weight you lose, ‘you are taking 3-5 pounds of weight off of a bad joint.’ Exercise is critical in not only helping you lose weight, but in preserving your joint health as well.

Another reason joint replacement surgery is becoming more common in people in their 40’s to 60’s is actually a positive one. People are living longer than ever and are leading more physically active lives than ever before. Being sidelined because of a bum knee or hip at 90 is different than at 50. It is a great reflection of health in the middle age demographic when people are putting their ability to stay in shape as a priority for their later years. Knee and hip replacement surgery is a godsend in this regard. It is adding quality not just quantity to people’s lives.

That said, however, it is often these physically active lives that are another cause for joint replacement. Overtraining, lack of cross training, and ignoring joint pain and injury are all causes for knee and hip problems in the non-elderly. The ‘more is more’ philosophy to exercise is taking a toll on your joints. Impact exercises like running every day for years with no break, adversely affect your joints even if you are in excellent cardiovascular health. It is important to listen to your body and intersperse your impact training with strength, flexibility, and balance training. Incorporating yoga into your workout regimen will help immensely with stretching and flexibility.

Knee and hip replacement surgery gives many people a new lease on life and an ability to be active for years to come. But, by maintaining a healthy weight and being kind to your joints in the way that you exercise, hopefully this surgery will prove unnecessary for you in your lifetime.

After 25 years in fitness, it amazes me that at 41 years old I am in the best shape of my life and I am not alone. Dara Torres made a comeback to swimming winning the Silver Medal at the Beijing Olympics at 42. Have you seen Madonna’s 48 year old body lately? Helen Mirrin in her 60s still looks like a knock-out in a bikini. Exercise is a recipe not only for good health, but also for aging strong and beautifully.

The only problem with being someone in this age demographic who has been a long-time dedicated, disciplined exerciser, is that the perils of age slowly catch up to our bodies. It is no coincidence to hear many people who never miss a day of exercise, all of a sudden completely sidelined because of injury and medical issues. Arthroscopic knee surgeries, knee and/hip replacement, herniated discs in the back, sciatica problems, hysterectomies and the like are commonplace surgeries for people who have intensely exercised over the years and/or are simply getting older.

The question I get most frequently asked regards the extreme difficulty getting back into shape after a hiatus from exercising. Arguably, the most troubling aspect of exercise is that there is no forgiveness for time off. ‘It’s as if I’ve never exercised a day in my life’ best describes the sentiment of getting back in shape after a physical setback.

Trust me, I know. I just got back from vacation, didn’t run for two weeks and the first few times running when I got back were awful. That was just two weeks and I exercised every day doing other physical activities, just not running. Imagine not being able to exercise for 2 months or longer and   trying to getting back into the exercise mindset. Lance Armstrong after his epic battle with cancer described his first rides back on the bike as ‘being slower than a grandma.’ His unbelievable comeback with 7 Tour de France wins after facing death shows the possibilities of getting your mojo back after being benched by injury or illness.

It also shows how you can be stronger than ever when returning to exercise after an unwanted break. The upside of an exercise comeback has to do with something called muscle memory. This refers to the idea that if you were an avid exerciser before your injury or illness, and then abruptly stop exercising for an unspecified length of time, and then return to exercising that your muscles maintain ‘muscle memory of their previous, superior conditioning.’

This is not to say that an an exercise comeback won’t be painfully slow and difficult. It will be both. However, by taking your jump back into exercise slowly and listening to your body when you’ve done too much, with time and hard work your body will remember the physicality you once possessed. It may not be immediate, but with persistence and consistent effort, your body will ultimately be stronger than ever.

There are many reasons to incorporate cross training into your overall exercise program. Cross training means doing different exercises than you do on a regular, routine basis. The benefits of cross training that you are probably most familiar with have to do with working different muscle groups, preventing injury, and preventing exercise burn-out due to boredom of doing the same exercise routine day in and day out.

All of these are important reasons of why you should get out of your comfort zone when exercising and  try new exercises and activities. However, there is a lesser known benefit to cross training that we should all pay attention to. Cross training can be an excellent opportunity to improve your strength and athleticism in areas of fitness in which you already excel by focusing on improving your areas of weakness.  Athletes do this all the time and so should you. 

As part of human nature, we tend to do what we like and what we are good at over and over. The secret here is if we took time to work out specifically in ways that we hate and are not naturally proficient in, we will not only strengthen our weaknesses, but we will be better at doing that which we love. For example, my son is a competitive swimmer. He is a sprinter, not a distance swimmer. He sucks as a distance swimmer in fact. In spite of this, meet after meet, he competes in distance races in addition to the sprints in which he shines. I asked his coach recently, who is a past world champion swimmer himself, if maybe it was time to stop this charade of having my son pretend to be a distance swimmer when clearly this is not his area of expertise. He told me that I was right. My son could train to be a distance swimmer forever, and he will never become one. Yes, maybe he will improve and become better than he is now, but that is as far as it will go. But, more importantly for me to understand he said, my son will guaranteed become a faster sprinter because of his cross training with distance swimming.

Everybody can apply this advice to their current exercise program. If spinning is your thing and that is all you do because you like it and are good at it, add running a couple of days a week. Especially, if you are not a runner. You may never run fast or far, but you will become a better runner than you are when you started. This is the beautiful thing about cross training, though, it doesn’t matter if you ever become a good runner. It just matters that you are devoting some time a week to running.  As a result of your  running, you will ultimately find yourself spinning harder, faster, and further than you ever did before.

Training your body with an exercise that does not come naturally to you will not only change your body, but will make you stronger in the exercise in which you are already a rockstar.

Resistance training is an all encompassing term that includes muscular strength and muscular endurance training. Muscular strength training requires heavier weights and focuses on working your muscles to the point of fatigue. Whereas using lightweight dumbbells in group exercise classes or in your living room is muscular endurance training, rather than strength. Both muscular strength and muscular endurance training should be included as part of a balanced exercise program.

One of the misconceptions of both strength and endurance training has to do with the number of sets and reps that are required to affect change in your body. The old school of thought, and one that is still doggedly adhered to today, is the stereotypical 3 sets of 12 to 15 reps or to the point of fatigue. Muscle fatigue refers to the point when you can no longer perform an exercise without compromising your form. This isn’t a problem with strength training because you are using heavy enough weights and often one set is enough to reach muscle fatigue.

The problem with the ‘3 sets of 12 to 15 reps’ thinking has more to do with muscular endurance training. One of the misconceptions that is still alive and well in the fitness world is that lighter weights  require more repetitions in order to have a training effect on the body. This is simply not true. With muscular endurance training, you are probably never going to get to the point of complete muscle fatigue even with the magical 3 set requirement. This shouldn’t be the goal.

Not only is this type of set training repetitious and boring, it is not a necessary requirement for endurance training. Instead of performing your resistance exercises in a mind numbing trance repeating the exact same exercise three times, focus on working the same muscle group in multiple ways. A big secret here folks is these exercises don’t need to be executed one after the other in order to work the muscle you are targeting.

For example, if you are doing tricep overhead curls, you do not have to do three sets of 12 in order to effectively work your triceps. You can do a set of overhead curls, tricep kickbacks, and tricep push-ups. If you want to do these tricep exercises all at one time you can. But, as long as you include all three of these exercises (or any other tricep exercises you like better) at some point in your resistance training session, this will be as effective as if you did three sets of 12 of the same exercise in a row.

Another rule to remember is that exercises that seem unrelated from each other can actually work the same muscles. For example, lying flat on your back doing ab crunches is not the only way to work your abdominals. Try this on for size at your next workout. Do a series of your typical ab crunches, maybe 20 traditional ones and 20 side to side, and even throw in some bicycles if you want. From this point, continue with your resistance training session as you had planned, but throw in push-ups, planks, and some plyometric exercises and see if your abs are not speaking to you. Remember, the idea of a set number of repetitions in strength training does not have to be repetitions of the same exercise. It is working the same muscle in different ways.
 
The bottom line with muscular endurance training is not to focus on the ‘light weights/more reps’ mantra. Even if you are using dumbbells, if the exercise is so easy that you could do 100 reps with no problem, you are using too light of a weight. Get heavier weights next time or you are wasting your time. Make your workouts challenging and fun by focusing on incorporating creative exercises that target your muscles in more than one way and stop counting sets.

AthleKinetix is a non-stop, high intensity, no choreography, no boredom, no rest class which incorporates the use of all the group exercise equipment you have in your studio or for small group personal training. The exercise library mix and match system of 400 exercises is the key differentiating factor of Athlekinetix training. No class is ever the same. Innovative, challenging classes can be created in minutes by any instructor or trainer.  Attendees walk out the door with a small size exercise library and know how to select, cue, and execute these exercises in order to create  dynamic, changing classes every time they teach.

How is AthleKinetix Different from other Existing Programs?
Interval Training:  Interval training, by definition, is a high intensity workout with purposeful breaks in intensity in order to bring the heart rate down. With AthleKinetix, the base heart rate stays consistently higher than an interval class because of no rests between exercises.  Sporadic bursts of anaerobic intensity take the heart rate even higher.  An AthleKinetix resistance training class is as challenging cardiovascularly as an intense Spinning class.
Boot Camp: Boot camps often are running based which can create and aggravate joint injuries. The very nature of boot camp tends to be competitive and favoring front-runners in the exercise pack. Exercisers who lag behind are often left behind.  AthleKinetix is inclusive and non-competitive and has no running component at all. Every exercise can be adapted and modified easily.  In addition, the outdoor elements of boot camps limit the exercise equipment that can be used by the participants.  With AthleKinetix, at least 5 different pieces of equipment are used every class. AthleKinetix is not an “indoor boot camp” either. There are no drills, sprints, suicides, and stations. AthleKinetix exercises flow from one into another with no breaks in between. Every AthleKinetix class targets muscular strength and endurance, cardiovascular endurance, balance, flexibility, and core stabilization. AthleKinetix specifically engages the synergist and stability muscles in every exercise performed.  Boot Camp does not.
 
Circuit Training: Circuit training is station based where participants go from one place to another and perform an exercise for a period of time and then switch stations.  Classes are often self-directed with the instructor acting as timer and announcer.  Confusion often arises at stations when people forget what they are supposed to do.  Circuit classes can be repetitive and predictable.  The only confusion in an AthleKinetix class, in contrast, is muscle confusion.  All equipment is set up in front of each exerciser and there is no repetition of any exercise the entire class. Because the exercises constantly change, class after class, there is no predictability and burn-out.

Multi-Equipment Classes: Just because different “toys” are used, doesn’t make it AthleKinetix.  Many multi-equipment classes spend a lot of time on choreography and sequencing, building one exercise on the back of another until you have done 100 of the first move and are looking for the nearest exit door.  AthleKinetix, on the other hand, focuses on exercise fundamentals. There is no choreography and the exercises are presented in their entirety at the onset.  In addition, multi-equipment classes tend to have exercises divided up in segments depending on the equipment used whereas with AthleKinetix, all the equipment is used interchangeably in a fast paced flow. The equipment is kept at the participant’s side for quick transition of all equipment. There are no more than 2 or 3 exercises with the same piece of equipment before it is switched.

Multi-Modality Classes: There is pilates/yoga, kickboxing/step, Spinning/strength but there is nothing out there that incorporates multi-modality and multiple equipment into one intense jam packed hour of surprises.  In AthleKinetix,  there might be power yoga, Pilates, plyometrics, stability balls, medicine balls, bands, dumbbells, mat work, relaxation at the end, kickboxing, isometric holds, deceleration drills – it all depends on the selection from the vast exercise library. There is no way to predict what is coming.  NO REPEATS, NO REST, NO BOREDOM!

Women everywhere have the same mantra. “I don’t want to lift weights because I don’t want to bulk up.” The new mantra of women should be, “I want to lift weights so my body can be stronger, leaner, and toned.” The problem with women and resistance training is two-fold. The first problem is actually getting women to resistance train in the first place. The second problem then becomes getting them to use weights that are challenging for their bodies.

A study in Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercises suggests that women are lifting with weights that are too light to affect change. Women are not biologically capable of becoming bulky because of weight training. Using 8 pound dumbbells instead of 1 pound dumbbells is not going to make you look like a male bodybuilder. Resistance training does not mean bench pressing hundreds of pounds. For muscular strength and endurance training, you should be using weights that are challenging enough to fatigue the muscles you are working.

The expression ‘no pain, no gain’ is not a cliché for nothing. Resistance training, if done properly, should not be painful but it should be slightly uncomfortable. If you can do 100 bicep curls at the weight you are using, you are wasting your time. Next time use heavier weights. You should be physically spent after each set and thankful that it is over. If you are not challenging your muscles, you are not going to succeed in changing your body.

If you remain erroneously convinced that heavier weights will make you bigger instead of firmer and leaner, do not give up resistance training entirely. Rather, incorporate exercises into your fitness program that rely on your body weight as resistance instead. Push-ups are arguably one of the greatest exercises ever. They work your chest, shoulders, and core all at the same time. Power Yoga also utilizes your own body weight to complete a series of poses that will challenge your balance, flexibility, and strength.

Cardiovascular training is great for your heart and for burning fat, but strength training is necessary for sculpting and toning your body. Less is not more when it comes to resistance training. Women are strong and powerful beings in all area of their lives. Why should women be afraid to be physically strong as well?