Competition is Good
Now, we’re not saying you should compete with your gym buddy but having someone to workout with will push you to try harder. You could set small challenges with each other or time trails to push each other to work harder. Try building your own circuits or seeing who can complete a certain number of reps in the lowest time. Friendly competition is best, but whatever you do, push each other to punch harder, kick higher, and run faster.
Dr Jinger Gottschall explains how to get the results you deserve.
Want to get the best results from the time you spend working out? Keep these seven tips front of mind.
Dr Jinger Gottschall is a university professor, studio owner, Les Mills instructor and former triathlete who has dedicated her career to academic fitness research. Here she shares some of her favorite fitness facts – highlighting exactly what it takes to shape a safe and effective training regime.
#1 CHOOSE THE RIGHT MOTIVATION
If you’re primarily motivated by external goals (how you look), it’s harder to maintain good exercise habits over time. You have a better chance of making a lifestyle change if you think about what internal factors motivate you. It might be lowering cholesterol, improving body composition, boosting energy, productivity and happiness. Choose internally-focused motivators like these and sticking to exercise will be much easier. Write your goals down. And if you want, share them. Sharing your goals with other like-minded people is proven to boost your chances of success through support.
#2 PROGRESSIVE TRAINING IS THE BEST BET
If you’re new to exercise or haven’t exercised regularly for over six months, studies show a slow, progressive training plan is the best way to build a habit and prevent burnout. Try not to do more than the plan specifies – by doing too much too soon you increase the risk of injury, not to mention frustration and the likelihood of giving up.
#3 VARIETY BRINGS RESULTS
The best results come when you follow a weekly regime that features a combination of cardio, strength and flexibility training. This was highlighted by a study involving 25 non-active, healthy adults who completed a training plan featuring a combination of LES MILLS™ workouts. After 30 weeks the exercisers saw an increase in lean tissue (+5 percent), a decrease in both body mass (-4 percent), and LDL cholesterol (-6 percent). And their cardiovascular fitness increased by an average of 50 percent. Thanks to results like these we can now confidently advise that a varied work out regime will significantly improve your chances of living a longer, healthier life.
#4 CHOOSE HIGH REP, STRENGTH TRAINING
Don’t shy away from lifting weights. Incorporating low load, high-repetition strength training can build strong, lean muscle and do amazing things for your fitness. We studied 20 non-active, healthy adults following a regime featuring three RPM™ cycling workouts and three BODYPUMP™ strength training sessions per week. After 24 weeks not only did cardiovascular fitness significantly increase, but bone density in the arms, legs, pelvis, and lumbar spine were statistically greater.
#5 LOW WEIGHTS MAXIMIZE CALORIE BURN
High repetition training with low weights can maximize calorie burn. Studies show the mean amount of energy expenditure during a BODYPUMP workout, using faster repetitions with lighter weights, is 29 percent greater than in the same duration of slower repetitions with heavier weights.
#6 ADD HIIT
If you already participate in three to five workouts per week, consider embracing the magic of high-intensity interval training. With the addition of just two 30-minute HIIT workouts a week you can see your health, fitness, and strength leap ahead. In a study of 84 healthy adults it took just six weeks of twice-weekly LES MILLS GRIT™ workouts for them to enjoy a decrease in body fat (-2 percent), a reduction in triglycerides (-16 percent), an increase in cardiovascular fitness (+6 percent) and improved back strength (+21 percent).
#7 DON’T FORGET YOUR CORE
Squeezing in the odd set of crunches isn’t going to give you the results you deserve. Core exercises that require shoulder (deltoid) and hip (glute) activity produce greater muscle activation in the abdominal muscles than exercises such as a crunch. Research shows that incorporating integrated core training into your workout regime can improve endurance, enhance stability and reduce injury.
Jinger Gottschall, PhD, is an Associate Professor at Penn State University, and former triathlete who learned first-hand the injury-inducing effects of doing nothing but cardio exercise. She has subsequently led numerous studies into the effectiveness of various exercise regimes and works closely with Bryce Hastings, Les Mills Head of Research, to test all sorts of exercise programming. When it comes to getting the best results from the time you spend working out, this woman knows the way to go.
This piece originally appeared on lesmills.com.
STAND UP
Sitting at a desk all day can get boring, so why not make it a little more exciting by standing up and walking around. It may seem silly but stretching your legs can help you feel better, as well as help you add some fitness to your workday. Instead of emailing a colleague, walk over to them, go on a short stroll outside on your lunchbreak, even if you just stand up and stretch for 30 seconds every hour, that’s something! It’s so much better for you to be stood up than sat down for most of the day.
ADD EXERCISE TO YOUR EVERYDAY ACTIVITIES
This is a super simple one to do, and you can switch it up each day or have a certain routine that you follow. Basically, when cooking, jog around the kitchen if you are waiting for something to boil, if you’re watching tv why not hold a plank during the adverts or do push ups. Just keep yourself moving, and by tying it in with your everyday activities, it won’t feel odd or boring.
WALK OR CYCLE
If you live close to where you work or where your daily commute takes you, why not walk or cycle? As well as getting in some exercise, your heart rate will rise which will fill your body with good hormones, making you happier and ready for the day ahead of you. If you’re a little further away, why not cycle, however if this isn’t possible, go on a bike ride when you get home from work or make it a regular weekend activity.
ITEMS THAT SAY ‘DIET’ OR ‘LIGHT’ ON THE PACKAGING
Items that pop up in the shops that are labelled as ‘diet’ can seem enticing, especially if we’re on a diet and we want to treat ourselves but don’t want to feel guilty about it. But have you ever looked at the ingredients for some of these products? Do you know what everything is? Instead of the normal item containing sugar, the ‘light’ version will be made from artificial products and other chemicals that aren’t really that great for us. Let’s take diet lemonade for example. Diet lemonade doesn’t have all the sugars that normal lemonade does, but the sugar will have been replaced by artificial sweeteners and chemical flavourings, so it tastes like the original. When you break down what is in diet products, it’s scary, and probably best to stick to a smaller amount of the original or skip it all together.
FRUIT JUICES
This probably won’t come as a surprise to anyone, but fruit juices contain so much sugar. Most juices do contain fruit, but many that line the supermarket shelves just contain chemicals that taste like fruit, so you’re basically drinking fruit-flavoured sugar water. That’s crazy! Even juices that are 100% fruit contain a lot of sugar from the fruit itself and the fiber that is great has been taken out. Treat fruit juices like fizzy drinks. They’re nice for a treat but stick to water.
CEREALS AND CEREAL BARS
Many cereal boxes boast that the product inside is ‘low in fat’ or has ‘low grain’, however when you look at the ingredients list, a lot of what’s listed is refined grains, sugar and artificial chemicals. So many people feel that they are getting a great product, but with what’s inside cereal, it’s scary to think about what we’re actually eating. Leading into cereal bars, these are also full of sugars and are often covered with chocolate or contain sugary pieces to make the bar look more appealing. Always look and think about what you’re buying, especially if you are getting cereal bars to eat after a workout or even to put in your children’s lunchboxes.
You’re probably thinking that you’re a bit stuck after reading this, but you shouldn’t. Everything eaten in excess is unhealthy, but if you think about it, look at the ingredients, and really put some effort into what you’re doing, you will be eating healthily. The truly healthy foods are the ones that don’t need to claim that they’re healthy, and the real foods don’t need an ingredient list because the real food is the ingredient. Next time you go shopping, look before you buy, you will thank yourself for it.
You need to be in tune with pain if you want to safely train.
THE NOT SO PAINFUL TRUTH ABOUT PAIN AND EXERCISE
By Emma Hogan
The transformative effects of exercise don’t come when you take it easy. But how much should you be suffering in order to get results?
We all know that you don’t get results when you sit in your comfort zone, but is there an ideal degree of “discomfort”? When it comes to how much exercise should hurt, says Bryce Hastings, Physiotherapist and Les Mills Head of Research, there are no hard and fast rules. For the most part it depends on the type of suffering – put simply, while it’s okay for exercise to feel uncomfortable, it should never be painful.
“Too often people don’t distinguish between the discomfort that comes from fatigue and the feeling of pain,” says Hastings.
Unfortunately, the confusion between fatigue and pain can be off-putting if you’re only at the beginning of your exercise journey. “When you’re just starting out you sweat, you get an increased heart rate and you feel uncomfortable – all of this is the stress response that comes from exercise,” says Hastings. It’s not until you become accustomed to regular training that you learn this stress and fatigue is part of the deal. Your body embraces it because you know that it goes away quickly.
Fatigue is your friend. Transformation happens when you push your body into the fatigue zone.
If you want to get gains in fitness or strength, fatigue is your friend. Transformation happens when you push your body into the fatigue zone. But should all workouts push you to the same level of fatigue?
Hastings explains there are five exercise intensity zones, and a sound weekly workout regime involves spending time in each zone. Ideally, you should be exercising at a moderate to hard intensity (where the discomfort of fatigue probably sits between 6.5 and 8.5 out of 10), as this will help improve aerobic fitness and promote fat burn. Pushing your body to its maximum training zone (where the discomfort of fatigue hits 8.5 to 10 out of 10) will help you develop maximum performance, but you only want these spikes of intensity a couple of times a week. He also cautions that feeling flogged during exercise is not the only measure of a workout’s value – while exercising at a very low intensity is unlikely to generate fatigue, low intensity activities like yoga and core training can improve overall health and help recovery.
If it’s not fatigue-based discomfort, it’s a pain.
When it comes to distinguishing between types of pain, there are two things you can do:
1) Mentally split yourself in half and evaluate where it hurts. If you have pain in the same place on both sides and it’s the same type of pain, then it’s probably delayed onset muscle soreness (or DOMS). In most cases this is nothing to worry about. You can check out some tips on how to deal with it here.
2) If you have a specific point of pain that’s on one side of your body but not on the other, and that pain is above 3 out of 10, and interfering with your function, then you’re possibly suffering an injury. In this situation we suggest you seek professional advice.
It’s the location of the pain that matters most
The benefits of your training come from discomfort in the muscles, not the joints. So if you’ve got any joint pressure or discomfort it’s an issue. Let’s take squats for example. Squats are all about working your quads and glutes, so if you’re squatting and your quads start getting sore that’s to be expected. But if you start to get a lot of pressure in your lower back that’s a warning sign, because that’s not the intended target. It indicates that no longer is the soreness born from muscle fatigue, it’s possibly pain coming from compressed joint tissue. It’s the same as if you’re doing the overhead press and suddenly your neck starts getting sore – that’s not the intended target, so could be an issue.
How much should you suffer?
The amount of suffering you subject your body to should depend on the exercise you’re doing. If you’re using a leg press machine all you need to worry about is pressing, so you are safe to go to volitional failure – which means going to the point where you actually can’t push anymore. But if you’re doing weighted squats it’s a different story. Fatigue will often make things more difficult when you’re at the bottom of the squat, which can be dangerous if you encounter failure at this point, so normally you might finish your set at 85 percent fatigue. You can push the fatigue point further out if you have a safety mechanism such as a spotter, someone who stands over you ready to take the load if needs be.
Warning signs: when to take action
The major warning signs are unilateral (one-sided) pain, any joint pressure or discomfort, and sudden onset sharp pain. And sometimes sudden onset weakness can be sign that something is not right.
Hastings says these are all warning signs: “Pressure in the front of the knee while you squat, pain in your elbows when you grip, pressure in your neck or upper back when you’re doing an overhead press, pain at top of the shoulder while you bench press.”
Of course muscle and joint pain are not the only discomfort people associate with exercise. I am thinking about that awful gasping sensation that comes when you just can’t get enough air in your lungs, or when you’ve raised your heart rate so high it feels like it will pump its way past your ribs and out of your chest. But Hastings says that if you’re fit and healthy you should be able to push your body to its max – reaching high levels of exertion without any significant concerns.
His advice? Don’t shy away from discomfort but always think about what your objective is, and if it feels slightly off, it probably is.
PAIN: WHAT YOU NEED TO REMEMBER
• It’s important to identify the difference between fatigue and pain.
• Fatigue is good – as transformation happens when your body hits the fatigue zone.
• It’s okay for exercise to cause discomfort in your muscles – but you shouldn’t feel any discomfort in your joints.
• Post-workout pain that is equal on both sides of the body is most likely delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS).
• If you suffer from one-sided pain, joint pain or sudden onset sharp pain seek professional advice.
Why?
Why did you choose these resolutions? Is it to lose weight, tone up, prepare for an event? Whatever it is, when you don’t feel in the mood for exercise, remind yourself of the reasons why you are doing this. Your goals must be important otherwise you wouldn’t be reading this. Tell your friends and family why you have chosen these resolutions, and that they need to remind you of those reasons when you tell them that you don’t want to do it later. Sometimes having someone else to push you on is more motivating than just yourself.
Where?
Where will you put your resolutions to play? Whether joining the gym or doing workouts at home, make sure you’re doing what’s best for your body and what will help you see the change you want to see. Nothing crazy will happen overnight as change takes time, so wherever you choose to be, put your body first and don't push yourself. Like we’ve said, it will take time, but stick at it and you will see the results you’re aiming for. Wherever you choose to bring your goals to life, make the most of the time you spend there. It can be so easy to get distracted, but get your head in the game and focus on what and why you have chosen the goals you have. Where you then choose to be should come quite naturally.
Increase Confidence
Being more spontaneous and trying things you wouldn’t normally do takes confidence. Showing that you’re able to do new things proves to yourself that you have the confidence to keep doing things you might not say yes to. This increase in confidence can help you in your everyday life too!
Helps You to Break Out of a Rut
By having the same routine every day, it can become boring and difficult to get out of. Trying something new allows you to break out of a rut which you may find fun, refreshing and enjoyable for you. The thing you try, you might even add to your routine to keep it fresh and exciting, rather than just the same as normal. Whether you choose to just go on a walk or try a new class somewhere, new isn’t always as bad as everyone says.
By Margo White for Fit Planet
Working out and working up a sweat go hand-in-hand. But perspiration is about much more than keeping cool. According to Dr Vybarr Cregan-Reid it also sets humans apart from other animals, and has helped us climb to the top of the evolutionary ladder.
MARGO WHITE: Why do we sweat?
DR VYBARR CREGAN-REID: We have different kinds of sweat that is produced on different parts of our bodies. It’s mainly our thermoregulation technology, which allows us to stay cool on a hot day. It also creates our scent, our body odor. Everybody knows about the smelly parts, the groin and armpits, but that involves different types of sweat glands, to create a specific scent that is as unique as our DNA. But the main function of most of our sweat glands is thermoregulation.
Before we go on, you’re a lecturer in Victorian literature, so how did you become so interested in (and a bit of an expert) in sweat?
It’s all because I wrote a book on running, Footnotes; How Running Makes us Human. A lot of that is about how running inculcates creativity, how this almost meditative activity has very specific neurological effects on the brain. So I’d go out for a run, and come back with an idea, and this interest in sweat was one of them. It suddenly became clear, when I was out running, that sweat is an evolutionary imperative that has given us an advantage over other mammals, in terms of hunting.
Sweat is about as essential to being human as having a brain is, and has played a key role in the evolutionary success of our species. We think of it as a sort of throwback to our previous animal selves, but the reason we’re at the top of food chain is partly due to the fact we sweat, but also the way we sweat, on particular parts of our body.
Can you elaborate?
We are terrible sprinters, as a species. Animals the size of our palm can run faster than we can. But in certain environments, we have distinct advantages over other animals, because animals, like antelope or deer, aren’t able to lose heat as efficiently as we can. And because they’re quadruped, more of their body is exposed to sun on a hot day. So not only do they capture more heat from the sun, but they’re less efficient at losing it. We’re two-legged so we’re slower, but we don’t take on as much heat, and we have efficient cooling technology all over our body.
So two legs are better than four?
Yes, if you start chasing an antelope, it will skip away with the airiest disdain. But if you keep plodding along, at a jogging pace, you’ll catch up with the antelope. It will run away again, but once you’ve repeated this several times the antelope won’t be able to lose enough heat and will get to the point of heat exhaustion. Any animal that is good at sprinting is not good at running long distances, but many aspects of the human body are optimized for running long distances.
But horses sweat, don’t they?
Horses are the only animals that sweat in a way that is most similar to the way humans sweat. But they have a sort of waterproof coat, so they have a different protein in their sweat that allows it to foam up, pass through their waterproof coat and evaporate. So horses lose heat by sweating and we do too, and when you compare us to other animals, we really shift a lot of heat.
As you said, there are types of sweat, released on different parts of the body.
We have two main kinds of sweat glands, eccrine and apocrine. Eccrine glands – the thermoregulation glands – are the most numerous type. They’re found all over the body, particularly on the palms, soles of the feet and forehead. Having eccrine sweat glands on an exposed forehead, for instance, means the blood going to your brain is kept cool, so we can think while we’re in motion. The top of the head, meanwhile, is shaded by hair, so it also takes on less heat. I think that’s amazing.
The other type of sweat, the apocrine sweat, is mainly for scent and found in the armpits and the groin. Unfortunately for us, its job is to smell – it’s like our olfactory fingerprint. And because it’s released in areas where it can’t evaporate quickly, it comes into contact with bacteria, starts to break down, and starts to smell. It’s a different kind of sweat, with a different function.
The sweat on our arms, legs and forehead doesn’t smell because there’s quite a lot of salt in it, and the bacteria doesn’t like it. This means it usually gets to evaporate before bacteria get to work on it.”
What about the smelly feet?
The sweat from our feet doesn’t smell like the sweat in our groin or armpits. The sweat on our feet is clean sweat, but the problem is that our feet stay covered for such long periods. Shoes have been around for a long time, about 40,000 years, but we’ve been around for two to three million years, on and off. We have smelly feet because we put them in a warm closed-in environment – we put them in ten-inch coffins, which gives the bacteria plenty more time to go to work. If you wore something similar on your hands all day, your hands would smell too.
We tend to have mixed feelings about sweat …
In certain environments, like the gym, it’s a badge of honor, but taboo in other situations. In job interviews it’s rather awkward when someone goes to shake your hand and you have sweaty palms.
The reason you have sweaty palms is you’re having a fight or flight response. If you have sweaty palms you can run and climb up a tree more easily, because sweaty palms gives you extra grip to hold onto things. But it’s an evolutionary throwback, something that happens when adrenaline is released. So sweaty palms and feet might have made sense, because it would enable you to grip better if you were running or climbing.
Do men sweat more than women?
No. There’s variability across our species, and some people will sweat more than other people, and that’s partly to do with the variability in our DNA. But I can’t believe that women sweat less than men. I think there are more taboos around women sweating than there are around men sweating. Things are beginning to change, but for too long there has been this idea that it isn’t a womanly thing to do, which I think is a tragedy.
Dr Vybarr Cregan-Reid is Reader in English and Environmental Humanities at the University of Kent, and author of Footnotes: How Running Makes us Human. He is currently working on his third book, Primate Change: how the world we’ve made is remaking us.
Here is a list of great snacks you can keep in your bag or desk at work to help you get through the day. Obviously, we don’t suggest you eat a whole packet of the foods to keep you going!
Hopefully this list inspires you to rethink your snacking habits and pushes you to choose healthier options. Let us know if you have any other suggestions for the healthy snacking list!
So, what should you wear? This can depend on what you’re doing, and if there is a uniform, but if you can wear what you wish, make sure you’re comfortable, as if not, you won’t enjoy what you’re doing, and you will quickly become uncomfortable. Lightweight and breathable clothing is recommended for all sports and gym work so you can continue working without feeling heavy and bulky from your clothes. This type of clothing can help you keep cool and dry in the gym also. It’s important your workout wear is appropriate for what you plan to do and for where you are. Make sure you’re warm in colder weathers, and if you plan on really working up a sweat, tight clothing can be uncomfortable to remove after a session. A final point to make if to not wear jewellery. This seems a simple one, but jewellery can be dangerous to wear in sports and around certain equipment in the gym. This is obviously optional, but many sports teams request that you don’t wear jewellery whilst training or during play, but this isn’t always necessary in the gym.
Firstly, if you’re just starting out, you don’t need to invest in expensive shoes. Wait until you know your body and foot type, as well as what kind of exercising you will be doing most. Then you can spend your money on trainers that will work best with you. You also want to watch out for trainers that look exciting with air bubbles, cushioning, and shock absorbers. Even though these look the best, there will still be pressure on your feet whilst working out, and they can be more expensive than other trainers.
We haven’t listed any shoes or brands to buy, but with this information, you can go to a trainer store with a better idea of what to look out for, and so you don’t end up spending your money on something that isn’t right.