by Kevin O’Connell If what you are after are aesthetically shaped and toned legs and calves, there are exercises and routines to favor and to avoid. The primary exercises for the quadriceps and the glutes — thigh and butt muscles — are squats, leg presses and extensions. The primary movements…
The holidays are notorious for being a time when even the most health-conscious woman lets her fitness goals slip to the wayside as she happily accepts a second helping of mom’s famous pumpkin pie and skips that day’s planned trip to the gym. All those indulgences coupled with a busy…
Navigating the gym is no simple task for newcomers. Fitness equipment can be intimidating for members who’ve never used it before. For people who don’t already have a workout regimen, the choices can be overwhelming. The following pointers will help gym novices become familiar with their new surroundings in no…
by Laura Leigh Fields Warm weather is the perfect excuse to get outside and enjoy the splendor of the outdoors. Better still you can run, jump, and play like you did when you were a child. There are many summer activities that are not only fun, but also creative ways…
Ask any professional body builder what they do when they’re not working out, and you’ll quickly find out it has nothing to do with exercise. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. Fitness buffs use their downtime to relax — as in, their muscles. The reason for this is that the…
One of the benefits of exercise is that it improves cardiovascular fitness. Your heart rate, or pulse, is the number of times your heart beats in a minute and is an indicator of how hard your heart is working during exercise. Learning to monitor your heart rate will help ensure…
Many workout and fitness plans get derailed by some common mistakes and bad habits. Be careful to avoid the following mistakes. Working out without a battle plan — Some people walk into the gym and wing it — with no sense of how well they’re working out all their muscles,…
It’s fun, it’s sexy and it’s one of the hottest crazes in the world of working out. It’s called strip aerobics (or sometimes striptease aerobics), and ladies are doing it in gyms and living rooms across the country. Though inspired by striptease and burlesque dancing, most of these workouts are…
If you’re a certain age, you remember doing endless leg lifts in your best Jane Fonda costume to terrible 80s pop music. Fast forward a bit, and it’s sweaty spinning classes that attract the masses. Whatever the year, there has always been one hot workout trend that everyone is offering…
At first glance, smoking and exercising do not seem to go hand in hand. Smokers are generally not known for their stamina and overall good health. They do, however, put their health in jeopardy if they do not engage in some kind of exercise to offset the health effects of…