Health Pointers – Your Exercise Program

We have welcomed in a brand new year and now it is time to start thinking about your goals for the new year.  Are you looking to lose weight? Are you looking to be more fit? Whatever it is – it is time to start planning that new exercise routine.

Exercise is an essential in life. Most people will certainly nod their heads to this. Exercise is not only perfect for losing weight, it is also good for keeping a reasonable body weight, for giving a boost on the metabolic rate and also for burning those unwanted excess calories. Exercise also revs up the heart and the lungs’ machinery making them more efficient in doing their natural functions.

Aside from these, exercise also works for strengthening the bones and keeps people looking good and feeling good about themselves. Exercise also gives people the stamina to enable them to keep up with the pace of their lifestyles. Unfortunately, not many people chose to do what is good for them. Most people could not decide exactly what to do when waking up in the morning; whether to exercise or to press the snooze button one more time.

The following tips are very helpful in reaching and maintaining the ideal body weight. This is especially great for women since they get through a lot of things going on in their bodies and are more susceptible to osteoporosis. Not to mention that many women are under the pressure of keeping themselves beautiful. It is recommended that one or two of these tips at a time are incorporated to the work out routine.

Worry not that the exercise routine is not enough. It is important to keep the commitments one makes. Ideally, it is advised to exercise three to five times a week for 20-60 minutes. However, this is not exactly the case in the real world. One should not frustrate herself by aiming for the ideal when she knows for herself that it is utterly impossible. If she an manage it two times a week for twenty minutes per session, that will do just great.

It is best to focus on doing what one knows she can do than to reproach herself for having not done enough. She can start from this point and then progress on afterwards. This should make her feel successful for having kept her commitment to herself.

Weight lifting should always come first. Many women always do cardio exercises first before weight lifting. A disadvantage of this is that it is possible to miss a critical component of the routine and spend all of it on cardio training. A women may notice this by not being able to see results even after devoting long hours at the gym. This can be avoided by reversing the order. This will guarantee visible positive outcome.

Remember to monitor heart rate. It is recommended to exercise at 75-85% of the maximum heart rate. Many people stick with just pumping up only 50% of their maximum heart rate. To ensure that one is working out at the prescribed target heart rate, she should use a heart rate monitor or any exercise equipment with this feature.

Work out for only an hour or less. Doing this will keep one from dreading the gym. Focusing on the exercise and the aim to be accomplished will make each work out session more and more efficient.

Have some sort of fitness social support. Being in a fitness community maybe the important element lacking in your training program. A social support can do amazing wonders and therefore should not be underestimated. It would be helpful to work out in a gym once in while if one customarily does her work outs at home. One can also try classes in activities that have always been interesting such as yoga, pilates or sailing perhaps. One can also join clubs such as a walking club or a running club for instance.

Pep talk yourself. One should not pressure herself too much; rather, it is best to congratulate one’s self and give out words of encouragement in between exercises. One should never forget to say some positive feedback for herself.

Shopping On A Diet

Dieting is difficult enough without running out the grocery store and being faced with the temptation of processed foods, candies, sweets and tastes. 

 

There are some great ways of decreasing your temptation while shopping on a diet and improving your chances of leaving the store without a bag of Cheeto’s under one arm and the ice cream in the other.

First – don’t go shopping on a diet when you are hungry. You will always have better judgment and make better food choices when your stomach is full. Bring a snack for the ride to the store so you don’t have an empty stomach.  You can also grab a bag of baby carrots from the produce department or something similar to munch on while walking through the bakery and down the potato chip aisle.

Shopping on a diet with a list that you’ve made before going to the store will ensure better success.  Make out a menu for the week and use that to determine what you’ll place on your shopping list.  If you find you continue to have trouble and are tempted then take cash to the store and leave your credit card at home.  Take only enough cash to cover your groceries and not the extra 10 snacks you’d love to bring home.

Some people are tempted by the foods in the bulk aisle.  On one hand they are more cost effective but if you take them home and eat everything in one week they are calorie costly.  If you want to use bulk foods then take them home and split them into weekly or daily portions.  You can also split these foods with friends and family to keep your temptation down while continuing to save money.

You can also prepackage foods for the freezer, which will save you time and energy when you are ready to make dinner.

Don’t stress over the demo foods when you are shopping on a diet.  The portions are very small and you can have just one.  They will usually satisfy your cravings.  You are aiming for a healthy diet change and not increasing the number of guilt trips you take each day.  Allow yourself the occasional treat and you’ll find that you don’t ‘fall off your diet’ as frequently as you may have.

Try to avoid using processed or prepared foods in your diet.  They are high in calorie and chemical preservatives.  Try staying around the perimeter of the store where you’ll find the dairy products, fresh meats and produce.

Read the labels of the packaged foods that you do purchase.  You’ll be surprised by the amount of sugar, carbohydrates and fats you’ll find on the labels of your favorite foods.

Shopping on diet might be challenging but it isn’t impossible.  Your goal is to maintain a healthy diet and decrease the amount of guilt trips you take.  Shopping may not be the most fun activity of the week but it is a necessity and you will be faced with these challenges whenever you run out of food in the pantry.

Weight Loss Cardio Workout

 The best weight loss programs will always include a healthy diet, dietary supplements and exercise.  Often people try to lose weight without including an exercise plan.  However you can significantly advance your weight loss by following a exercise program that also includes a weight loss cardio workout.  A weight loss cardio workout is a basic workout that increases your cardiovascular work (the work of your heart) to a level that increases heart and respiratory rate.

The weight loss cardio workout doesn’t have to be miserable.  You can choose an exercise from many different activities that suits your particular lifestyle and interests.  The best type of weight loss cardio workout uses interval training.  This is training that has some periods, which are slightly faster than others.  These faster periods of exercise can be for 10 seconds or 3-4 minutes depending upon your current fitness level.

For example if you enjoy walking as a form of exercise, you may want to add periods of running, or vary your routes to include hills.  If you are a runner, sprinting is an excellent form of interval training.  However, if you’ve not been a runner starting with sprints will just increase your chance for injury and decrease your desire to keep exercising. 

There are other weight loss cardio workouts that also lend themselves to interval training and are just as effective.  Bodyweight exercise, those exercises using your own body weight, require no special equipment and meet all of the weight loss cardio workout conditions.  Rowing machines, elliptical trainers, biking, swimming and even fast walking are all exercises that can be adapted to interval training.

Weight loss always happens using a negative calorie balance.  In other words you eat less than you burn. Using interval training in your weight loss cardio workouts helps to burn more calories at a faster rate.  Before undertaking any cardio workout you should consult with your doctor.  You physician will take into account your planned activity, your current health and fitness status as well as any medication you might currently be taking.

Weight loss cardio workouts aren’t miracles.  How much you lose will depend upon several factors which include your age, your gender, hormones, genetic makeup, your current stress levels and whether you get enough sleep – not to mention the amount of exercise and what you eat.

The hard truth is that it took time to gain weight and it will take time to lose weight.  Most people don’t see results with exercise – increased tone – for several weeks or months.  Don’t panic, this is normal.  To take off a pound permanently there must be a 3500 calorie deficit in your diet.  This means that you burn 3500 calories more than you take in – and not all in one day.  So if you cut 250 calories from your diet each day and jog for 30 minutes or walk for 60 (burning another 250 calories) you’ll take off one pound each week.

Weight loss cardio workouts should be done between 4-6 times per week.  The more you’re able to fit them into your routine the faster you’ll see results.  Conversely, the more exercise the body gets the more efficient it becomes at burning energy, using less energy to do the same routine.  This is the reason that interval training works so well for weight loss cardio workouts.  By changing the speed and intensity of the workout the body must use more calories to continue.

Weight loss cardio workouts can be fun, improve your muscle tone and your overall fitness.  Using these exercises to increase your weight loss will also improve your self-esteem and the success rate of your program.  There is a new trimmer you waiting to make an entrance – don’t keep it waiting too long!