by Kim Miller | Feb 15, 2016 | Getting Back into Shape/Health, Perspectives in Aging Well, Uncategorized
5 Must Do Hip Exercises That Ease Pain and Prevent Injury
Breaking out of a Routine
Often, I talk with my clients about how breaking out of a regular daily routine can help someone realize how out of shape they are. For example, taking a ski day after months of working non-stop without much exercise, or taking up tennis after a 5 year lapse.
This weeks tips are exercises you can do so that when you do finally break out of your normal work- life routine, you can be ready to ski the slopes with abandon, tee off on your golf game, run sprints around your friends, or serve with reckless abandon to your opponent on the other side of the tennis court!
It’s all about being flexible and strong in all the muscle groups of our bodies. Today we focus on the hips.
Why Hip Stretches are So Important
The hip is the largest joint in the human body. It supports most of the body’s weight and is key to maintaining balance. Because the hip joint and hip region are so crucial to movement, arthritis and bursitis in the area can be especially painful.
Chronic hip pain is more prevalent as the body ages, but there are various exercises and lifestyle changes you can introduce to treat painful and or weak hips. Follow these steps to help prevent and reduce hip pain and importantly to keep you limber and strong for those times you want to cycle out of the box and play hard.
Hip Flexor Stretch:
Get into proposal position with your right knee on the floor and the left leg bent at a 90-degree angle with your hands on your hips. Place a firm cushion—such as a Bosu ball, that’s found at most gyms, or a stack of towels—underneath the right knee. Engage your abdominal and butt muscles and tuck your pelvis slightly and press forward through your hips. “You’ll immediately feel a stretch in the front of your right hip. Gently glide forward and back 5 times, alternating deepening and easing off the stretch. Do 5 reps. Switch legs and repeat.
Hip Flexor Stretch:
Remain in the same proposal position with your right knee on the floor, your left leg bent at a 90-degree angle and your pelvis pressed forward to stretch the front of the hip. Reach your right arm up to ceiling. Bend your spine slightly to the left. Straighten to return to center. Do 5 reps. Then switch legs and arms.
Hip Flexor Stretch:
Go back to proposal position with your right knee on the floor and your left leg bent at a 90-degree angle with your hands at your hips. Draw a circle with your hips, counterclockwise 5 times and then clockwise 5 times.
Glute Bridge
Lie on your back with your knees bent and feet flat on the floor. Place your feet close to your butt. Engage your abs, which will flatten your low back to the floor and tilt your pelvis slightly. Pressing your heels into the floor, lift your butt, followed by your lower back and then your mid-back up as if you were peeling them off the floor. Lift until your thighs are parallel with the floor, keeping your shoulders, hips and knees in line. Keep your abs engaged throughout the lift. Slowly lower back down the floor in reverse order (your mid-back, then lower back and finally, your rear). Do 10 reps.
Pigeon Pose
Go into a downward dog pose. Extend your right leg high in the air behind you, and then bring your right knee forward to rest near the right edge of your yoga mat. Take your left leg straight back behind you and level your hips. Hold for 15 breaths.
Next Week check your inboxes on Wednesday. Don’t forget the Lose Your Waist Wednesday edition is jam packed with ways to help you reduce that dreaded middle.
Congratulations to January’s 30 Days to Lean Members.
24 members lost 224 pounds. Best part: healthy, happy, and on their way to continuing to do what they want to do for a long- long time!
Congratulations to both Ph I and PH II 30 Days to Lean Members who are continuing to lose lots of weight! Details at the beginning of next month, so stay tuned these members are getting healthier and leaner by the day! You can too!rckuhns
Next Lean: March 7th.
All My Best,
Kim
by Kim Miller | Feb 9, 2016 | Totally Tone Tuesday, Uncategorized
Hi Everyone,
It is Totally Tone Tuesday. It’s the day we talk about strengthening, stretching and balance!
In my practice I often see clients with tight hips. Sometimes they are not even aware of it until they move a certain way and suddenly pain is felt in their hips or back. I call this kind of pain, the pain of ‘living-in-a-box’. The reason I refer to it as ‘living-in-a-box’ pain is because it often occurs when one steps out of their normal daily routines and pain suddenly strikes.
So often we think we are in great shape.
After all, we can do what we need to do each day without too much stress on our bodies. But here’s the thing; it’s not most people’s normal routines that illustrates the huge gaps in strength they are lacking in the many muscle groups of their bodies. Normal routines are just that – normal. And with normal we think everything is good. But it’s really not. At some point, we want to break out of our normal routines and do something different.
Let’s say, you haven’t played golf in a while and while on vacation you go out and play a round. You play a round to find out that your back got out of alignment because your hips, core, and back have not been contorted like that in many years. So now you are in pain for the next two weeks.
So Often What One Does Next
They stop the golf and go back to living-in-a-box. You know, that comfortable box that says, “I have no aches. I have no pains. I am in great shape.” Forgetting about the golf and the great times they had, they continue ‘living-in-a-box’ routine until even the slightest of daily changes affects them. Then they cease doing much of anything at all. Living-in-a-box is just that – staying in the comfort zone of what makes us feel in good shape. Albeit that may mean just walking a few minutes a day, keyboarding a computer, eating, going to the theatre and other in-the-box-routines.
Why Bring This Up
We don’t need to live inside a box. Sure, we are not going to ski like a mad man in our 90’s but we can certainly experience the same rush and feeling of skiing like a mad man or the rush of playing tennis or golf with intensity well into our 90’s. And the only thing is, we gotta condition our bodies to move in ways that we do not move in our daily life, we have to learn how to live out of the box.
Next week, look for 3 hip exercises that will get you outside of your comfort zone and allow you to do what you want to do for a long, long, time!
Congratulations to January’s 30 Days to Lean Members.
24 members lost 224 pounds. Best part: healthy, happy, and on their way to continuing to do what they want to do for a long- long time!
Next Lean: March 7th.
All My Best,
Kim
by Kim Miller | Dec 13, 2015 | Uncategorized
There are varying degrees of difficulty that come with gaining core strength. Like exercising any muscle group, it is important to progress smartly. The abdominal muscles are layered with slow twitch muscle fibers which mean they are best tailored for exercises that enhance the endurance within the muscle fibers. Typically when we train the actual center core we are training the rectus abdominis, external abdominal, internal abdominal oblique, and the transverse abdominus.
Core training in the last several decades has taken on new meaning. Training the core today means not just increasing the endurance and strength of the muscles just noted, but also includes such muscles as the lower back extensor muscles, latissimus dorsi muscles, gluteus medius and maximus, and the hip rotator muscles.
It is recommended that abdominal core training be executed last after working other muscle groups because it is instrumental in just about every move we make. If you are an advanced exerciser, and use mainly free weights then you know what I mean. Core stabilization is absolutely necessary for lifting heavy free weight so tiring the core out before the other muscle groups would be unwise as you will risk injuring your back.
Below are 3 abdominal core routines that I have clients practice once they are able to hold a plank for 1 minute.
Tough Girl/Boy I Challenge
20 ball crunches with feet wide
1 minute plank hold
Repeat above two exercises.
Standing torso oblique’s 20 reps each side
Plank forearms to up on hands and reverse. 5 reps up and down
Repeat above 2 exercises
Side raise on floor with legs extended and arm extended- hold 20 sec each side
Repeat on each side.
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Reminders:
Week One Get Rid of The Squish in the Middle Tip:
Eliminate bread of any kind. Including whole grain bread!
Last Week’s Get Rid of the Squish in the Middle Tip:
Get you carbohydrates mainly from low glycemic fresh vegetables. Think 5 vegetables raw daily and 4 vegetables steamed daily. Roast vegetables sparingly.
This Week’s Get Rid of the Squish in the Middle Tip:
Eat Fat. Science tells us that fat keeps us satiated and burning fat. While sugar including carbohydrates like crackers and breads keeps most of us fat except the very athletic or high metabolism lucky ones.
When our blood sugar gets too high (hyperglycemia), our body releases extra insulin to counter it. And the first thing insulin wants to do is get our muscles to take that sugar up and use it for energy, but the unfortunate truth is that most people, and even those exercising an hour or longer a day eat far too many sugars and so insulin tells the body to store the excess sugar we have not used as fat. Fat acts differently though which brings me to this week’s get rid of the squish tip: Eat good fats that you find in nuts, seeds, olive oil, olives, coconut oil, and avocados.
Add these foods to your diet, and remove the sugars and breads. In a few days time you will be feeling leaner. Go to https://bodysmartinc.com/?p=2028 on why what you eat is more important in weight loss than calories.” .
Motivation in part is about seeing changes. Develop a mindset that , “I am in this as a way of life.” Notice the small changes in your mood, body composition, energy levels, mental clarity, sleep patterns, and general anxiety levels as you make small changes. Over the days, months and years you will see that it really is possible to get better with age. All my Best.
by Kim Miller | Nov 23, 2015 | Uncategorized
How to Get Your Core Lean
We all want a leaner looking waistline. That’s a good thing. Core development should be about aesthetics yes, but it’s also about much more! Last week’s article should have sparked several more motivational reasons for obtaining a stronger core.
Go to https://bodysmartinc.com/?p=2095 to get up to date on how a functional strong core not only aesthetically enhances one’s body shape, but also improves daily living mobility in routine tasks such as gardening and picking up the grand kids, to better posture and balance, to improved back mobility and decreased back pain, to more power and agility in athletic play.
There’s a funny story I like to tell about the core. A 325 pound linebacker walks into a gym and after a warm up begins squatting with an 850 lb bar setting on top of his back. A new to the fitness scene guy walks into the gym that day, sees him squatting and wonders if he can do the same exercise as this 325 pound linebacker. “Smartly,” he realizes he should start with a “lighter weight” so he stacks the bar to 425 lbs and proceeds to go down into the squat position with the weight on his back. As he goes down to squat with the weight on his back, his whole body collapses to the floor. He looks up to see if he can get help, but no one is around. He loses consciousness for a brief moment and within seconds afterwards he observes that many of his friends are surrounding him saying, “What are you doing? You are crazy!” Your big belly is not strong enough to lift that heavy weight! Not understanding, the new to the fitness scene guy looks at them totally confused and sighs, saying, “I was not trying to lift the weight with my belly! I was trying to lift it with my legs!” His friends rolling their eyes sigh, and grudgingly help him up.
What is The Point?
Our legs, our arms, our backs and our chest are only as strong as our core. Only when the core is strong can the body get stronger. We are limited by the strength of our core in further enhancing our muscular strength, our muscular power (women not excluded) and our general daily energy stores.
Making Sense
If you are one of my new clients, you probably have noticed that I am a big believer in using the machine weights for general body strengthening. Anyone new to fitness or who has been out of fitness for a year or two or longer, I place into my 12 week strengthening jump start strength machine program. This program progressively conditions and strengthens all the major muscle groups of the body while simultaneously working the core muscles functionally.
Some trainers suggest that machines for strength training are non functional in building core stability because of the back support on most strength machines, but if we consider that the core structures of the abdominal wall are being stressed just enough to manage the new weight then the core is actually being enhanced functionally as the weight increases. By managing this aspect well, that is increasing the weight smartly and having the person stabilize the core as they press the weight, over the 12 week period of time, the client becomes stronger not just in the individual muscles but in the core stabilizing muscles as well.
Bottom Line
Don’t let all the information on strength training confuse you. Get into a solid 12 week program that includes 8-12 machines and progress it incrementally. The additional nuances of training with free weights and body weight can come later. Get your core strong by getting your muscles strong using the progressive overload technique and practicing core stabilization when lifting weights. You may find additional information on a beginner’s strength program at https://bodysmartinc.com/?p=246. There you will find a comprehensive program for beginners or for those people that have been out of the fitness realm recently.
Last Week’s Get Rid of The Squish in the Middle Tip:
Eliminate bread of any kind. Including whole grain bread!
This Week’s Get Rid of the Squish in the Middle Tip:
Get you carbohydrates mainly from low glycemic fresh vegetables. Think 5 vegetables raw daily and 4 vegetables steamed daily. Roast vegetables sparingly.
Next week, look for core conditioning for the more advanced fitness person including specific targeted exercises, as well as an explanation on why you can have a strong core, but not visually see the results of all your hard work! One hint – it’s not about shedding abdominal fat through increased cardio training!
by Kim Miller | Nov 16, 2015 | Totally Tone Tuesday, Uncategorized
Hi Everyone,
It’s Totally Tone Tuesday and it’s the day we talk about strengthening, stretching, and balance!
High intensity interval training, also called HITT, is a specific type of interval training that in the past was practiced mainly by athletes at the highest level of sports. Today, it is implemented commonly by athletes and non athletes alike who desire obtaining the most, lean, athletic, and sinewy physiques that are “possible for them.”
Emphasis on, “possible for them”, is placed because it’s important to understand that we have innate body shapes that make becoming lean more easy, or more difficult,depending on genetic factors. There are three body types:
Ectomorph
Body types are naturally lean and thin skinned. They will see quicker looking body fat results than the two other body types, mesomorphs and endomorphs.
Mesomorph
Body types are characterized by dense musculature. They will see results less quickly than ectomorphs, but have greatest lean muscle looking potential.
Endomorph
Body types are characterized by softness and fatty areas throughout body. These individuals respond to high intensity interval training less quickly than ectomorphs and mesomorphs, but results of fat loss percentages are more pronounced than the former two groups.
The Truth of the Matter
Think you are an Endomorph? Think again! Go back to your childhood, and recall what body type you were at age 10. This is what you are today, even if you feel a little soft.
EPOC to Super Charge Metabolism
When you exercise using the high intensity interval system, your body consumes considerably more oxygen. And the more oxygen you expend, the more calories you burn. However this increased oxygen during exercise is not really what fuels what we all desire- a higher metabolic rate, it’s the after-burn, or what is called EPOC, and more descriptively, excess post exercise oxygen consumption that fuels our metabolism. It works like this. The more energy your body uses during training, the higher EPOC. EPOC works in increasing metabolism by telling our body to get back to balance or what is referred to as homeostasis.
Getting back to homeostasis takes energy though, and this energy burns calories for several hours if not days afterward. That’s why hard working athletes who consume thousands of calories still find it difficult to sustain their weights. Their bodies are calorie burning machines even when they are at rest. How would you like to have even a fraction of their speedy metabolisms? You can.
To Get Started Now On EPOC
Take whatever cardio exercise you are doing and take yourself out of your comfort zone for a few seconds to upwards of a minute or two depending on your fitness level.
You can walk/run faster if your typical cardiovascular exercise is walking/jogging. You can go faster and or add more resistance if your typical cardiovascular exercise is biking. You can increase your incline and or resistance if your typical cardiovascular exercise is the the elliptical trainer/rowing machine and etc. You get the picture. The key in all of this as you take yourself out of your comfort zone is to expect an increased heart rate. When we do this, our heart becomes not only stronger but we burn so much more energy. Keep it low key in the beginning as it’s important to see how our skeletal and muscular systems respond to the increased demands. Injury chances increase if we do not smartly progress to more intense interval training.
If you want a more formalized progressive approach to achieving an increased metabolism through EPOC, join my Movement is Life Program. It’s a comprehensive progressive cardio program individualized specifically for you. There’s no personal training sessions to attend, and everything is done online at your convenience and your own pace. Call, email or text for further information. This plan includes texting, telephone calls or emails as needed to help you along.
Congratulations to the Following 30 Days To Lean Most recent member’s accomplishments:
Megan – down 24 pounds in 60 days! Congratulations Megan!
Mary – down 8.5 pounds in 30 days! Congratulations Mary!
Ann – down 14 pounds in 30 Days! Congratulations Ann!
Lynne – down 23 pounds in 90 days! Congratulations Lynne!
Congratulations to too many members to list members, that have taken both 30 Days to Lean programs, and continue lose weight and gain health momentum!
Kate says, ” the great thing about this program is that there are so many recipes and weekly menus that even when you finish the plans, you can continue losing weight by mixing and matching the recipes. I’ve lost a total of 39 pounds, and 11 of these pounds came after I finished with Kim.”
