AtoZ Fitness Article Blog.

1RM Made Easy
by Lynn VanDyke

By Lynn VanDyke
Master Trainer and Fitness Nutritionist

Starting an exercise program is hard enough, isn’t it? No matter what you seem to do or how much you plan, it’s never as easy as it looks. However, there are plenty of ways to help make your exercise time fly. One of the most popular ways to help your workout is to add a little music to your exercise plans. Here’s what you need to know.

Why add music to your routine?

A lot of people will say that they like the quiet time of exercise, listening to their breathing, and checking their workout times. If you are not one of these folks then you need something to help make working out easier and more fun – like music.

Music helps you take your mind off of how hard your workout might be. For example, when you’re off running or lifting weights, music can help you forget about the things that you are thinking about and focus on your favorite songs. This subtle distraction can allow you to focus on working out hard and strong.

When you add music to your workout routine, you can create a soundtrack for your success. Add your favorite inspirational music – think "Chariots of Fire" or the "Rocky" theme – to make you push just a little harder and make it to the end of your workout routine. Whatever music makes you feel strong and powerful, add that to your workout rotation.

How do you add music to your workout?

Before you can add music to your workout, you will want to realize that some preparation time is necessary. What you’ll want to do is create compilations (mixes) of your favorite songs beforehand. For those of you that have digital music players, this is quite simple. All you need to do is create a play list by adding your favorite songs to a folder, burning them to CD, or playing them on your player.

What about the tempo of my music?

One of the things that you will want to keep in mind when you’re working out is how fast your music is. While you want something that’s faster in pace, you don’t want to choose anything that’s so fast that you can’t keep up or you’ll over-exert yourself. Some techno music can be a little too fast for light cardio workouts or strength training.

On the other hand you’ll want to make sure that you’re not including songs that are too slow either. Generally speaking, you will want to start with slower music for your warm up and stretching, then slowly build up the tempo of your music and then bring it back down again for the cool down.

This sounds too difficult

While this does sound time consuming, you can also find recommendations on many fitness sites and in magazines. These lists are already created to help you maintain a certain fitness pace, so they can be very effective. Or you might want to choose musical CDs and tapes that are specifically designed for working out at a certain pace – such as 80 bpm (beats per minute).

Music is the soundtrack to our lives; why not include it as the soundtrack for your workout? When you choose inspiring and fast-paced music, it can actually help you work out longer and harder – give it a try! Select songs that inspire and motivate you!

Women athletes are felled by knee injuries at a rate four to eight times greater than men, dropping like ten-pins on basketball courts, skating rinks and other fields of play.

The source of these debilitating injuries has been traced to one overriding culprit, the hamstring—women in particular are at risk for anterior cruciate ligament tear, the much-feared ACL injury that typically requires reconstructive surgery and a prolonged period of rehabilitation.

“What we’ve found from our studies is that men have more hamstring activation relative to the quadriceps than women,” reports Dr. William Ebben, a faculty member and researcher in exercise science at Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

“The women were quadriceps-dominant and their hamstrings-to-quadriceps ratio was lower. We know women are not activating their hamstrings well. They’re falling short in terms of maximizing their ability to activate their hamstrings during exercises.”

The hamstring is the large muscle in the back of the upper leg; its opposite is the quadriceps in the front. A male’s hamstrings are usually 70 per cent as strong as his quadriceps; the relative strength of a woman’s hamstrings is less than 50 per cent of her quadriceps.

Since the hamstrings and quadriceps help stabilize the knee, any muscle weakness or imbalance between the two places additional stress on the anterior cruciate ligament, which limits rotational motion of the knees.

Researchers at the Cincinnati Sports Medicine and Orthopedic Center have determined that hamstrings need to be 60 to 70 per cent as strong as the quadriceps to lessen the probability of anterior cruciate ligament damage.

Dr. Ebben attests to the significance of the hamstrings-to-quadriceps ratio: “If you have really active quadriceps, which is often the case when planting, jumping and running, and your hamstrings are less than two-thirds the strength of the quadriceps, then the quadriceps cause anterior shear and pull the ACL taut.

It appears women may not be able to activate the hamstrings well in the face of active quadriceps. And if they’re not able to fully activate the hamstrings in the performance of their exercises, they’re not going to get as good a training effect.”

The goal then is to somehow find a way for women to narrow the gap between their hamstrings and quadriceps, a tricky proposition since the deficiency is borne from specific anatomical and neuromuscular realities.

Hormonal and biomechanical factors are widely acknowledged as part of the problem.

Resistance is Never Futile

A number of resistance training exercises have proven to be helpful, and should be performed by every woman athlete. These are the Russian leg curl, the stiff leg dead lift, and good morning exercise, all of which target the hamstrings.

Russian Leg Curl: With the help of a partner whose job is to hold your heels in place, rise up and down from a floor mat using your knees like a hinge. You lie face down to begin this dynamic exercise, with heels up and toes curled and flexed inward. It’s your partner’s job to prevent the heels from rising off the floor as you lift your torso. Knees and heels maintain contact with the mat throughout. The upward movement begins with a pushup that propels you onto your knees. It’s important to use the hamstrings to complete the rise and control the return back to the mat.

Stiff Leg Dead Lift: Stand with feet shoulder-width apart, barbell resting on the floor. With knees slightly bent and buttocks out, gently bend forward at the waist, back straight and head up. Lift the bar, raising it slowly until you’re in an upright position again. Arms throughout are fully extended, never flexed. Do not round the back or lower the head. A light to moderate weight load is advisable to guard against back injury. This exercise is frequently performed while standing on a shallow platform.

Good Morning Exercise: Lift a barbell from a squat rack, and then step back, positioning your feet shoulder-width apart. Thrust your buttocks out and slowly bend forward until your torso is parallel to the floor. Knees will be slightly bent. As with the stiff leg dead lift, do not lower your head or round the back.

The quadriceps is least active when performing the Russian leg curl, an open-chain exercise that engages the hamstring in a very comprehensive fashion. Closed-chain exercises activate both the quadriceps and hamstrings, so the stiff leg dead lift and good morning exercise duplicate real-life muscle patterns.

“Maintaining antagonism between the muscle groups is always preferable,” says Dr. Ebben. “The closed-chain exercises activate the hamstrings less but do so in a more sports-specific way. In the case of the Russian curl, you’re activating the hamstring in the face of a silent quad, and the hamstring is learning to fire and function with a silent quad.”

Dr. Ebben recommends women follow a training regime that begins with the Russian leg curl to maximize strength gains in the hamstrings, and then progress to the closed-chain exercises :

“Build a nice foundation by comprehensively activating the hamstrings and then follow-up by doing it in the presence of an active quad. These are all predominately hamstrings exercises so you’re still going to get the advantage of narrowing the ratio between the hamstrings and quadriceps.”

We shop on the internet, we pay bills on the internet, we talk to other people on the internet – why not increase your fitness on the internet as well?

While many of us have always thought of the internet as a very inactive part of our lives, there are more ways to use the internet to increase our fitness than ever before.  Just run over to your nearest web browser to start the search for great fitness workouts.

One of the easiest ways to start bettering your body on the internet is through the various fitness websites.  Some of these are sponsored by fitness personal trainers, while others are created by fitness magazines and other resources.

They can detail the correct ways of performing basic exercises or even set up programs that you can follow, based on your fitness goals.  For example, Runner’s World magazine runs a website that gives everyone from beginners to advanced runners programs for running their next 10K or even marathon.

Online fitness resources are also found through a number of fitness website programs.  Much like online weight loss programs, you can sign up with various sites in order to reach certain fitness goals.

Simply enter in the goals that you wish to achieve, and a trained fitness counselor can prescribe the right training program, based on your current fitness level (provided that you give them an accurate picture of this) and body type.  For a monthly fee, you can follow the program and report your results as the trainer adjusts the program when you’ve hit higher levels.

Fitness resources can also be found through the many DVD clubs that are now available.  Certain monthly DVD membership websites allow you to request fitness DVDs for as long as you like, giving you the ability to test out certain DVDs before you buy them, or just switch up your routine from time to time.  You can also find a number of fitness downloads that you can then load into a digital music player.

And of course, there are plenty of outlets for fitness training gear on the internet as well, helping to suit you up for any sport imaginable.  You can find every kind of shoe or outfit for whatever sport or activity you wish to enjoy – as well as all of the weight equipment you might ever need.

If you want to get in touch with other exercise and fitness enthusiasts, you can also find a number of message boards and interactive sites that allow you to converse with others that are trying to get into the fitness groove – inspire and motivate each other along the way.

About the Author:

Lynn VanDyke is a master personal trainer and fitness nutritionist. She has authored the wildly popular ebook, Melt the Fat and offers personalized online personal training !