Kick Your Body Into 2nd Gear -- In 3 Easy Steps by John Sherman

Kick Your Body Into 2nd Gear -- In 3 Easy Steps by John Sherman

When it comes to life in general, 90% of us feel the need to loose weight or change the way we look in some way.

Once weve undertaken our fitness quest for weight loss or hypertrophy, usually after the first week or two we find that the energy required to do so is becoming harder and harder to conjure. Usually, these physiological changes leave our bodies craving for the fuel needed to perform these transformations. In this article i'll show you exactly how to get the energy your body requires and how to kick your body into 2nd gear.

What do I need to keep the pace up?

When it comes to gearing our bodies to perform at higher than average energy levels, firstly it takes time. Time requires patience, which is a virtue in itself. It also requires a strong belief in what you're setting out to do.

Here are the 3 things you need to change for optimal energy.

1. Sleep

The first and most important of them all is sleep. It is during our sleeping hours that the body does the vast majority of its repairing. Usually, the first 4 to 5 hours of sleep are spent repairing the bodies neural systems and pathways.

The last 4 hours are spent knitting worked muscles, and replenishing glucose stores for the next days activities, which, remember, are going to be higher than usual.

Based on this first step, if your not getting at least 7 to 8 hours sleep every night, your body is eating into its energy stores and before long, you will find yourself with not enough energy to carry out your program, and once your mental stubbornness wears down, you will loose the will to want to do it in the first place and youll revert to your previous habits.

The easiest way around this problem is to get regular, high quality sleep. Make it a priority equal to and above going to the gym.

2. Nutrition

The second step to gearing your body towards performance is nutrition. Eating right is vital to maintaining a program, especially for those of you who are participating in weight programs where the end goal is hypertrophy.

Your intake of food should be regular and healthy. Get as much fresh meat and vegetables as you can manage and stay away from processed foods wherever possible.

When writing nutritional plans for clients, I like to suggest a minimum of 5 meals a day. Beginning with breakfast as the largest meal of the day, and tapering down food portions accordingly, all the way to dinner.

Remember that it takes time and patience to get your body used to eating large meals early if it's not something youve been doing for a while. Eating regular, complete meals will encourage your body not only to grow, but also to shed fat, as fat is only there as an emergency source of energy for your body.

Contrary to what the media will have you believe, the way to loose fat is not by starving yourself, but by feeing yourself healthy meals regularly -- every 2 hours!

By doing this, your body will think that you're living in a time of food aplenty, and holding fat will do nothing but hold you back. If you want to gain weight without putting on pounds of fat in the process, simply eat this way and stay away from processed foods and sweets. Chocolate tastes great, but unfortunately it isn't part of the human bodies evolution, and therefore useless if not harmful in building a healthy lean physique.

3. Program design

Now that you're eating right and sleeping right, the third and final step is to get a program that is not only suited to you and your energy levels, but also in accordance with what your goals are.

So many people who frequent gyms and training halls these days are over trained for what they are physically capable of. To put it simply, you cant sit behind a desk all day every day for 10 years, wake up one day and start working out and running for extended periods of time and expect your body to sustain it.

Im not saying that you should be shy of hard training by any means -- you cant get anywhere without hard training -- but dont ever OVER train. If youre waking up in the morning and you can barely move out of bed then youre not recovering from the previous days training.

Weight programs with the intention of hypertrophy should last from 45 to 60 minutes max. If thats not long enough then youre either socializing too much or doing too many exercises. Be specifically scientific about the way you build your programs, from the second you finish stretching, the clock should start ticking. You need designated rest intervals between sets depending on what stage youre training at -- be it technique, cellular or neural.

Ask questions to whoever builds your programs, and if they cant give an informed answer on rest, duration and time under tension, find someone who can and get them to build a program for you. Youre playing around with your body and the only person who has to put up with it is you!

If running, cycling, skating, swimming or playing teams sports ensure that you stretch thoroughly before and after you train, then it will help you to be able to get up and do it again tomorrow. All these things should be down in your program, so that nothing is left out or forgotten.

By sleeping right, eating right and approaching your training with the right mindset, you will be able to function in your everyday life while building your body and not feeling that its too muchwork for you.

In todays society of business, money and power, science and thorough work prevail, even though our bodies are expected to function in a slap and dash way. Approach your training in a scientific way and it too will run like the business you own or work for, and it will look after for many years to come.
About the Author
John Sherman is currently studying and practicing Neuromuscular therapy and metabolic typing at the Institute of Human performance. John is also an avid Martial artist, recently completing his "Uchi Deshi" - 2 years living, training and breathing Koyokoshin Karate. He is also one of the newest AccomplishLife resident authors. For more visit AccomplishLife - Self Help and Personal Development

Bodybuilding Sins That Cause Back Pain and Missed Workouts: Part 2 by Jesse Cannone, CFT, CPRS and Steve Hefferon, CMT

Bodybuilding Sins That Cause Back Pain and Missed Workouts: Part 2 by Jesse Cannone, CFT, CPRS and Steve Hefferon, CMT

Welcome to article number 2 in our series Bodybuilding Sins That Cause Back Pain and Missed Workouts. In this article we are going to talk about how bodybuilders tend to create massive muscle imbalances and what you can do to not be one of them.

If you missed the first article, you can read it by clicking on the link below.

Heres a breakdown of the articles to look for:

1. Article #1 - Choosing The WRONG Exercises
2. Article #2 - Training Variations for Pain Relief and Maximum Results
3. Article #3 - Targeted Stretching
4. Article #4 - Targeted Exercises
5. Article #5 - Rest, Recovery, and Injury Prevention

Article #2 - Training Variations for Pain Relief and Maximum Results

Bodybuilders are a stubborn bunch almost as bad as runners! And they tend to follow the HERD doing whatever exercises and routines the pros are doing...

Now, if your goal is to be as big as possible and you are not at all concerned with your health and fitness, dont even bother this article this article is for bodybuilders who ARE concerned about their health and want to be big, strong, powerful, and agile if thats you, read on

The reason so many bodybuilders suffer from so many different injuries is because there are several things the pros dont tell you

First off, the articles that you see in all the muscle mags arent even written by the pros and the workout routines they recommend are always extreme and often not even used by the pro who supposedly wrote because their main goal is to sell magazines not give you the real deal on bodybuilding.

If you are serious about bodybuilding and want to achieve your true peak, you need to stay injury free and thats just about impossible if you train they way most bodybuilders do.

There are several key strategies that you can use right now to not only eliminate any aches, pains and injuries you currently have, but also keep from creating more muscle imbalances in the future. For a more detailed article on muscle imbalances go to
http://www.losethebackpain.com/achesandpainsarticle.html

Strategy #1 - Target the Weaklings!

No, we dont mean the exercises you think your weak at, or even the muscles you think are underdeveloped what we mean is the muscles that are weak in relation to the opposing muscle group.

For example, in the first article we talked about why the Leg Extension is not a great exercise and why its responsible for so many cases of knee, hip, and back pain and the reason is, most people, especially bodybuilders, are already over developed and stronger in the quadriceps and usually have a significant imbalance between the quadriceps and hamstrings.

Another reason bodybuilders tend to develop so many severe muscle imbalances is because they emphasize the front of the body more than the back a great example of this is what we call The T-shirt Muscle Workout and it usually consists of dozens of sets of chest and biceps

you know what we mean in just one workout you do flat bench, incline, decline, pec deck, dumbbell fly, cable cross overs and then for biceps youve got barbell curls, dumbbell curls, preacher curls, cable curls, machine curls, and the list goes on

So instead of emphasizing the muscles that are already strong, why not really hit those weak and under worked muscles like: neck, upper back, shoulder rotators, hamstrings, glutes, hip rotators, lower abs, and shins.

These areas tend to be weak, tight, out of balance with their opposing muscles, prone to muscle strains and pulls and most importantly, these imbalances lead to major injuries and conditions like back pain, knee pain, rotator cuff tears, tendonitis and others.

All of these conditions are caused by muscle imbalances and will NOT go away unless you work towards correcting the imbalances and the only way to know for sure which imbalances are causing your pain or injury is to do a series of physical assessments like the ones covered in our Lose the Back Pain Video.

Strategy #2 - Experiment!

Heres a personal challenge for you: Replace at least 1 of your normal weekly workouts with something totally different like combat martial arts, kettle bell training, functional training, or even strongman style exercises.

For example, instead of doing your super heavy, 3 inch partial rep leg presses, try a single leg squat and if thats easy, try adding weight! Or instead dozens of sets of shoulder presses and lateral raises, see if you can do 1 handstand push-up.

Those are just a few examples do yourself a favor and experiment with other types of exercises. You can find hundreds of different types of training styles by taking classes, reading books, watching videos, surfing the web, hire a personal trainer, etc.

We arent asking you to give up your traditional workouts but just cross-train a bit so you not only work towards a balanced body but also towards a stronger, more powerful and usable strength. Again, what good is muscle if you cant use it!

Strategy #3 - Switch It Up!

Another great way to minimize the number of missed workouts due to injuries is to vary the exercises that you do for each muscle group. For example, if you always do barbell squats try rotating in other exercises like single-leg leg presses, trap-bar dead-lifts, d-bell squats, etc.

Conclusion

Remember, the key to eliminating injuries and preventing future ones is to identify what areas you need to target. In the next two articles well be discussing in detail, how to address various injuries like back, hip, knee, and shoulder pain with targeted exercises and stretches. In the meantime, be sure to read thru all of our detailed Articles and if you have questions, please post them in our
Discussion Forum.

About the Author
Article by Jesse Cannone, CFT, CPRS, CSPN and Steve Hefferon, CMT, CPRS of http://www.losethebackpain.com. If youve got back pain or sciatic pain, youve gotta check out their video.