Defined Fitness Tip For Results 18: Does Running Make You Fat

So you just got back from your morning run and are feeling great. You burned some calories, got your metabolism revved for the day and are on your way to dropping a few pounds.

Or are you?

Is it possible that running, or any type of cardio for that matter, actually causes you to gain weight?

According to researchers who followed regular runners who logged the same weekly mileage, regardless of amount, gained weight each year.

So how does this happen and why? This is a question I was asked after a recent presentation I gave.

What happens here is the body is always trying to find the most efficient way to function, it's a basic survival function, however efficient doesn't burn calories it preserves them. So each time you take your run you burn less and less calories. For example, if you were to run 3 miles today and burned 300 calories that same run tomorrow will only burn 298, then 296 and so on. The only way to off set this is to run faster, longer, or further. All of which have their limitations. In addition, this type of activity will tend to burn muscle tissue and fat, which results in two negative outcomes. One less muscle tissue means a slower metabolism and two burning muscle will just create a smaller version of the way you currently look, you know those skinny fat people.

Before we go any further, I will say that initially when you start running or walking you will see some initial weight loss. This is only due to an increase in energy expenditure, e.g. going from sitting on the couch to getting up and moving. Overtime your will not continue to lose weight.

So in order to continue burning fat, increase your metabolism, and maintain muscle tissue you need to focus on an activity that will achieve all of that. So what activity is this? Strength Training.

By spending the majority of your time doing strength training and keeping your rest periods short and limited you will see changes in your body that you're not able to get through running.

Try the following KB Complex, complete each exercise before resting and do 3-5 sets.

Single Arm Swing (L & R)

Single Arm Snatch (L & R)

Single Arm Squat & Press (L & R)

Give it a try and let us know what you think!

www.definedfitnesswexford.com

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Closet full of clothes that don't fit? But, you keep in hopes of wearing again. Ready to DROP 2 sizes in 8 weeks? Get started TODAY with your 30-DAY TRIAL MEMBERSHIP for only $89. Call 724-934-2000 or click here and visit our site for more information.

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SATURDAY HOURS COMING SOON!! Starting March 5th, we will be open from 9-11 a.m. with a Group Fitness Coaching Class at 9:15 a.m.

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Have a question post it in the comments and we'll answer it in a future blog.

Defined Fitness Tip For Results 17: Strength Up Your Hips

Do you sit all day? Does your lower back? Do you have trouble getting into a deep squat or lunge? If so, the problem could be that your hips are tight and weak.

Check out today's video here and learn how to loosen up the muscles around your hips and then strengthen them.

www.definedfitnesswexford.com

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Closet full of clothes that don't fit? But, you keep in hopes of wearing again. Ready to DROP 2 sizes in 8 weeks? Get started TODAY with your 30-DAY TRIAL MEMBERSHIP for only $89. Call 724-934-2000 orclick here and visit our site for more information.

Defined Fitness Tip For Results 16: Build Go Muscles Not Strong Muscles

For the past 30 years we have been training the same way. Our fitness programs have been highly influenced by equipment manufactures, which designed machines to isolate muscles one at a time. However, as great as this maybe be for developing the “show muscles” of a bodybuilder they do not help us function very well in sports or everyday life.

A brief look back at the history of fitness will show that the overall fitness of the average person, quickly declined at about the time when weight machines began replacing free weights and total body lifts were replaced by isolation lifts.

Unless you are a bodybuilder there is little benefit to isolating muscles. Instead, by changing the focus to building “go muscles” you will increase overall strength, which means gains in athleticism and performance of daily activities.

“Go Muscles” are built through total body exercises that involve pushing, pulling, and carrying weight that challenges the body and stimulates the metabolism, leading to leaner more toned body. These exercise are first built off of the ability to lift and control your own bodyweight before adding any additional weight. Exercises can be as simple as a squat with your own bodyweight or a set of push-ups, or as complex as a farmer’s walk with an unbalanced load or a barbell power clean.

So why is a 40-year-old mother of four children doing seated chest presses and bicep curls? When all she wants to do is lose ten pounds and have more energy. She is never going to compete in a bodybuilding contest and spends eight hours each day sitting at a desk in front of a computer. As a result, she has developed postural imbalances in the shoulders and hips due to prolonged sitting. So why is she sitting on a machine in the same position that she spends most of her day when she exercises?

Instead, she needs to get up and on her feet, picking weight up from the floor and pulling weight toward herself, with exercises like kettle bell swings and TRX rows that will help to improve her posture by strengthening the muscles that are weak in her body from sitting all day.

They way fitness is being done is changing and the focus is becoming more and more on developing functional training, i.e. “go muscles”, so change up your regular routine and take a functional training class at your local gym. Then begin incorporating those exercises into your everyday routine, if you haven’t done so already.

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Closet full of clothes that don't fit? But, you keep in hopes of wearing again. Ready to DROP 2 sizes in 8 weeks? Get started TODAY with your 30-DAY TRIAL MEMBERSHIP for only $89. Call 724-934-2000 or click here and visit our site for more information.

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HAVE A QUESTION? Post it here and we'll answer it in a future blog!

Defined Fitness Tip For Results: 180 Degree Plank

Looking for a great way to work your abs. Give this exercise a try click here and try the 180 Degree Plan

Do 30 seconds on each side, rest and repeat again!

Give it a try and post your feedback.

Defined Fitness Tip For Results #14: Exercise For Everyday Life

So often people only think of exercising to lose weight, get in shape for a specific event, or something athletes do to prepare for a sport. But, the reality is that it is much more.

Think of everything you do in a typical day. How many squats do you do in a day? Every time you get up and down from or to a seated position you squat, so probably at least a couple dozen each day.

What happens when a package is delivered to your doorstep? You have to perform a deadlift to pick it up.

However, due to less and less activity in our day to day lives we are getting more and more deconditioned and losing our joint mobility and range of motion. As a result of this decrease in our mobility we are beginning to compromise our movements in order to do them. So now when we sit up or down from a chair we no longer squat down properly, which can compromise the knees. Or when we pick up that package we can't stabilize our core, don't use our hips and instead bend over with our legs straight and back bent, which hurts our back.

In order to prevent this we need a training program that focuses on all of our functional movement patterns, stabilizes our core, and helps us perform better in our day to day lives, like the following. This will not only improve your movement patterns, but also improve your stamina.

Circuit #1:

DB Squat & Press

TRX Row

Single Leg Romanian Deadlift

Plank

Circuit #2:

Kettle Bell Swing

Push Up

Alternating Lunge

Side Plank

To get started on a program like this and get into the best shape of your life click here or call 724-934-2000 and get started with your 30-Day Trial for only $89!

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Bring Your Sweet Heart to Class on Monday February make a Valentine's Day date with your sweet heart and come workout together at 6:15 p.m. in our evening class. See you there!

Defined Fitness Tip For Results #13: Burn Calories Even When Your Not Working Out

How many calories did your last workout burn? How many did you burn after your workout? If I had to guess you probably don't know the answer to the second question.

However, the second question is the one that matters when your goal is to lose body fat.

It's not a matter of how many calories you burn in your workout, it's a matter of how many calories you burn in the hours after your workout. Know as the Afterburn Effect, which is how long your body stays at an elevated rate, burning calories after the completion of exercise.

Say you took an hour jog and burned 500 calories while working out, your body only stays at an elevated rate, burning fat for a few hours after the completion of your workout.

But, what if there was a way to keep your body burning calories at an elevated rate for 48 hours after your last workout? Sound too good to be true?

In 1994 a landmark study done by Tremblay et al looked at the effects of steady-state exercise (jogging) compared to interval training. The steady-state group exercised for 20 weeks and burned about 28,000 calories during exercise. The interval group exercised for 15 weeks and only burned about 13,000 calories during exercise. However, the interval group lost 9x more body fat in 5 less weeks, while only burning half the amount of calories during exercise as the steady-state group.

What happened here is after the completion of exercise the interval training groups body's continued to burn fat at a higher rate than the steady-state groups did.

So how do you get the Afterburn Effect working to your advantage?

First start by switching from the treadmill and elliptical to hitting the weight room floor. By the way, have you ever looked at the bodies of the people on the cardio equipment compared to the one's lifting weights? Everyday it's the same people on the cardio equipment plugging along, but never changing. The one's lifting weights have the lean, toned and sculpted bodies that everyone on the cardio equipment is trying to achieve.

Ok, now that you're off the treadmill and standing by the dumbbell rack what do you do?

Grab a set of dumbbells and start performing a few circuits of exercises. Like squats, rows and overhead presses moving from one exercise to the next without resting until you've done each exercise once, then rest for a minute and repeat 3 more times.

After doing a couple of circuits like this you will notice your body working harder than you ever did 0n the treadmill and after a few weeks you will be seeing changes in your body that you've never seen before!

Are you ready to put the Afterburn Effect in place for you and finally start seeing results? Get started today by calling 724-934-2000 or visit our website at www.definedfitnesswexford.com and sign up for your 30-Day Trial Membership for only $89.