5 Simple Metabolic Challenges for Fat Loss

5 weeks from now, the shirts come off and the bathing suits are on.  Are you ready to hit the beach?  More specifically:

Is your body ready to hit the beach?

The next few weeks are critical in getting the beach body back in action, so plan ahead with some forward thinking, and some crazy-hard metabolic challenges to increase fat-loss post-workout. 

Any one of these 5 metabolic workouts can be used on their own, or as an end to a workout (some take as little as 5 minutes, others up to 30).  Work yourself back to that lean physique!

Top 5 Reasons Our Bodies Need Exercise

Fat loss.  Strength.  Endurance.  Sports.  Rehabilitation. 

There are many 'surface' reasons why we want to get results via exercise, but what are the real reasons our bodies NEED exercise? 

The Single Best Exercise?

The New York Times (NYT) recently posed the question to exercise physiologists and other professionals in the fitness field (article here):

What is the single best exercise? 

The answers ranged from

• brisk walking (from an anesthesiologist and endurance exercise researcher)
• burpee/squat thrust (from chairman of kinesiology department in Canada)
• Squat (Professor of kinesiology at same university in Canada)
• High Intensity Interval Training, or HIIT, on a bike also made the list

If I'm the average person reading the NYT, I am certainly more confused by the article, and in fact, I am looking at these so-called 'experts', and wondering why each answer seems so different than the other.  I mean, don't they all read from the same textbooks?  Why is there no coalition to collaborate and put these wonderful minds to work for the obese American? 

Beginner Exercises for Upper Back and Thoracic Spine

Awhile back, I wrote an article called Why We Hurt, Lower Back Pain, and how lower back pain (LBP) can be rooted somewhere other than the lower back.  As novel as it sounds, this idea of not 'chasing the pain', and treating the dysfunction, is a popular method of training as well as Physical Therapy.  Moreover, the upper back, sometimes referred to as the thoracic spine, can sometimes be one of the causes of low back pain. 

8 Things to do with a slideboard

So, you have a slideboard too?

Oh, you don't?  Well, everyone's doing it!

Okay, maybe not, but should they?  Very quickly, the slideboard has moved up many a trainer's list (including my own) of tools that used in each session, for one reason or another.  Years ago, it was used mainly in physical therapy as a 'sport-specific' rehabilitation protocol for soccer and hockey players.  Today, you can find a version of them in most commercial gyms. 

I have put together a quick list of exercises you can perform with a slideboard in your workout.  NOTE: Slideboard should be slippery; sometimes you need to apply spray (Ultraslideboard sends you a can, otherwise I've heard Windex works great).

Exercise List:

Keep it Simple Workout Plan Phase II

On any given day, the internet and the gym can be filled with complicated routines and exercise programs.  Some will quote Mel Siff, others Zatsiorsky, some Kraemer, and others bodybuilding.com.  Whatever the origin, sometimes the amount of information can overwhelm even the keenest exercise science student.  As a result, program adherence turns into PADD, or Program Attention Deficit Disorder.  In other words, people get bored.  Quick. 

What to do!?

Fitness Love at First Sight

They say first impressions can last a lifetime, that they either make or break your opinion of something, someone, or somewhere.  In his book, 'Blink', Malcolm Gladwell refers to something similar called 'Thin Slicing'.  With this concept, just as with first impressions, our subconscious will decide rather quickly whether or not we will enjoy an experience. 

If this is true, well, then, I believe in love at first sight...

Hungover? Remember these 5 tips...

No one’s perfect.

Not even trainers, bodybuilders, athletes or celebrities. In fact, most are not even close, and rely on some tricks of the fitness trade to re-accelerate their health and fitness after nearly putting the brakes on it. Use these 5 points to overcome the 5 problems a typical cheat or party weekend exhibits and restart your regiment to get it up to full-speed once again.

Training Abs (Part II of III)

In Training Abs Part I we looked at the most common exercises that are used to strengthen the body, recruit a lot of muscle, and increase metabolism long enough post-exercise to create a energy deficit and allow the abs to show. 

Today we're going to look at some simple exercises and variations that actually target the core musculature and have an impact on 'tightening' while strengthening the muscles you need to work and to show. 

3) But REALLY, what are the best exercises that WORK my abs?