Training Methods
Get fit – How to stick to your new year’s resolution
We’ve all been there. The new-year-new-you train is at the station, but every time we get on the train it turns out this is a circular line and before we know it, we’ve ended up back to where we started. So how do we stick to it this year?
Can you build muscle and lose fat at the same time?
It is a simple law of the universe that in order to gain weight, we need to consume more calories than we use, and in order to lose weight, the opposite is true. It may therefore seem counterintuitive to some to suggest that we can grow muscle and anabolic (tissue building) process, whilst also having catabolic (breakdown of tissue) processes occurring at the same time. This led many to believe that you need to be eating an excessive amount of calories to support muscle growth, as you will hopefully now see, this is not entirely true.
Squat Part One. The Set Up
The squat used to be an exercise that was revered and was once the realm of the serious powerlifter, bodybuilder or Olympic weightlifter. However, the back squat is a movement that is rightfully becoming increasingly popular, for both sports performance and even the recreational gym goer. This is due to the many benefits that performing this movement correctly can have on strength, stability, power and creating lean muscle tissue.
Three things you should be doing to support muscle growth.
There are many complicated theories and philosophies about the best ways to build muscle, indeed the ‘science’ of muscle growth can be complex. It is easy to see why many people over-complicate the process, this is due to a number of reasons. The most important one is lack of patience; despite what many think and what the fitness industry often portrays, muscle growth is a slow, slow process, with only a few grams of muscle growth being possible for the non-genetically gifted amongst us! Most people, after the initial few months of training find it harder and harder to grow muscle and if you’re growing 2-3kg of muscle per year consistently, then you are doing pretty well. That said, many people fail to reach their maximum growth rates, it fundamentally comes down to these three things:
Alcohol and effects on performance
Like most of the population, athletes and those who exercise regularly often consume alcohol. It has been reported that alcohol ingestion constitutes up to 5% of the total daily energy consumption in elite athletes and is especially common in team sports where it is encouraged as part of team bonding, but it is also associated with stress relief.
Training in the morning or evening?
Let's be honest, it's difficult enough to find time to train for many people within the hectic and busy schedules we have, without really being able to worry about what times are 'best' to train. The work patterns we have and family life are likely to heavily impact on the times we have available to train, not to mention for those who work night shifts when the daily routine can go out the window.
Resistance Training: Three reasons it is a must for women’s health.
More and more women are seeing the benefits of using resistance training as a form of exercise. The weights section of a gym, a once feared over-masculine zone, has now become a place where many women now make their home. The obvious benefits of resistance training, from strength sports to high-intensity functional training such as cross fit, include developing a leaner, athletic physique. Women now aim to be fitter, stronger and develop self-confidence, which promotes a healthier body image than has previously been portrayed in the media.
Exercising & Losing weight for beginners
For somebody who hasn’t exercised before or doesn't exercise regularly, there is nothing more daunting than the prospect of joining a gym, or often simply the thought of exercise in any form. Many factors can inhibit or prevent a person from undertaking an exercise regime, these can be health related, work related, family related or simply that there doesn’t seem to be enough hours in the day to fit in exercise. The key point to remember is, exercise can be one of the most fulfilling activities available. It doesn’t have to depend on a gym membership or getting up at 5am to run in the cold and rain, there are many programmes that will allow you to boost health, strength and stamina that don’t require leaving your home.
How to plan a training routine: Part two
In part one, we discovered the three main components that need to be considered when designing a training program, including the specificity of exercise, training intensity and volume and how to think about how to structure training to make it gradually progressive towards a goal. If you haven’t read the first three points discussed in part one of this article, it’s probably wise to do so, or point four and five outlined in this article might not make too much sense!
How to plan a training routine: Part one.
Whatever your goal, in order to plan a training routine there are key ‘rules’ that you need to follow to ensure that you make progress. These can be broken down into five important areas that we need to consider when structuring our own training, which will be covered in detail in these two articles.