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Men: Are you exercising and eating healthfully but not losing the weight you want? The good news is that there are more benefits to these two habits than just weight loss.
Megan Senger, professional fitness writer/editor and fitness instructor based in North Carolina, has summarized a few studies that center on men’s wellness, with comments on what the findings may mean for you.
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Protein powders, especially the whey variety, have long been glorified in fitness circles for their muscle-building benefits. “Pump some iron and chug back a protein shake” is a preferred muscle-making formula.
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Competitive athletes often train for peak neuromuscular power to excel at the complex movements their sports require. Many personal training clients want to apply the same principle to their favorite sports.
With the right power training, fitness competitors can improve their tennis serve, golf swing, running speed, volleyball spike, soccer performance, basketball vertical jump and so on.
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Purpose, passion and people! The fitness industry is all about forging relationships that lift others up. Fitness professionals have energy to spare, and they are dedicated to mentoring new generations of pros, networking with peers, and motivating clients and participants every day.
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If you enjoy teaching (and doing) high-intensity classes, this workout is for you! The “every minute on the minute” (EMOM) protocol is fun, fast-moving and challenging. You start a predetermined number of reps at the top of a minute and rest for the time you have left until the next minute begins. Class participants will enjoy the flexibility of going at their own pace while also being incentivized to work steadily throughout the experience.
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For years we’ve heard that people who regularly lift weights can benefit from eating higher amounts of protein than the general population. There’s just one glaring problem. Most of the research behind this advice was conducted on men, with little focus on women. Now, a study in the April 2019 issue of Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise has shed light on the specific protein needs of this understudied demographic.
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A small study addressed the question of whether one gets better results from performing resistance training reps at a self-selected pace or at a fixed rep duration (2-second concentric phase, 2-second eccentric phase). Researchers from universities in S?úo Paolo recruited 12 resistance-trained men and evaluated exercise volume, muscle activation and time under tension.
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For maintaining functional ability—and potentially even for living longer—growing research
supports the benefits of power training, particularly as we age. Power is the ability to move weight with speed and to generate force and velocity with coordinated movement.
If you teach high-intensity classes, you may have noticed that many of your devoted students don’t take advantage of gentler options, such as restorative yoga, foam rolling or low-impact classes. Cross-training is necessary for peak fitness and reduced injury risk, yet persuading participants to try something new or different is not so easy. This class, Mindfulness and Strength, prioritizes mindfulness and flexibility.
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It’s 2 a.m. Your 3-month-old son is screaming at the top of his tiny lungs, waking up everyone in the household. Begrudgingly, you get out of bed and zombie-walk over to your son’s crib in the next room. Your body aches, you haven’t slept in days, and now you must bend over to pick up a squirming child in the dead of night. Unfortunately, your son’s not a great strength coach and doesn’t allot enough warmup time to prepare your body for a deadlift.
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Great news for healthy older adults who may not be able to weight-train more than once a week. For 65- to 75-year-old men and women, supervised whole-body resistance training once weekly for 6 months led to significantly less inflammation, lower blood pressure and blood sugar levels, and better overall well-being.
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While group fitness is most popular in Salt Lake City, Los Angeles and New York City, using weights or resistance machines is most widespread in San Diego, Chicago, and the Cleveland, Akron and Canton areas of Ohio.
Virtual-based training—either streamed live or recorded in advance—is growing in popularity. The most prevalent home-based activities include body-weight exercise, Pilates, stretching, tai chi and yoga.
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Strength training (or resistance training) does much more than build strong muscles and bones. Research in the past few years has confirmed that lifting weights changes human metabolism in ways that improve health and well-being. Resistance exercise improves resting metabolic rate and cardiorespiratory fitness. Indeed, some authors call strength training an exercise therapy program (Strasser & Schobersberger 2011).
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Preliminary research on high-intensity training benefits may motivate people who prefer short training sessions and are concerned about diabetes risk. University of Glasgow researchers in Scotland found that 15-minute strength training workouts, done three times a week for 6 weeks, dramatically improved insulin sensitivity and boosted muscle size and strength among 10 young, overweight men.
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If you’re looking for a different way to progress a client’s lower-body strength, consider adding a weighted vest to the training program. Specifically, wearing a progressively heavier weighted vest while stepping may be effective in boosting lower-body power and functional ability among older women.
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It’s not over in 9 months. A new mother’s body keeps changing long after the baby arrives. Hormonal shifts, breastfeeding and risks like pelvic organ prolapse (see “3 Issues for Postpartum Exercisers,” below) complicate the weeks and months after childbirth.
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Resistance training volume (RTV) is the total amount of work performed during a session of lifting; in other words, RTV = reps x sets x load (the product of repetitions times number of sets times intensity of load) (Figueiredo, de Salles & Trajano 2018). Any one of these variables can be adjusted to increase volume in a resistance training (RT) program. For example, you can increase RTV by performing extra sets of an exercise, adding more repetitions or increasing the weight being lifted.
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It’s that time of year when springtime reinvigorates clients and participants, coaxing them to come out of hibernation and play. Why not leave the fluorescent lights behind and take class outside? Parks, fields, even parking lots are great places to lead outdoor workouts. There are options for everyone—and you don’t have to lug around a bunch of equipment, either. Maximize your time and space by incorporating simple, effective body-weight exercises that improve strength, speed, power and flexibility.
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Mindful movement practices like yoga and Pilates allow you to incorporate flexibility, core work and body awareness into your current client programming. Core yoga is a practice that blends the precision, control and core-strengthening benefits of Pilates with the mindful and meditative benefits of yoga.
Try this core yoga slow-flow sequence and share it with your clients!
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When I first paid for personal training sessions many years ago, I remember specifically telling my trainer that I wanted to focus only on my upper body, with maybe a little core work sprinkled in.
Legs? No way!
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IDEA Fitness Journal
Current Issue:
December 2019
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