Strickland Fitness

I hope everyone had a great weekend! Now, it’s time to get back to work. Today will be a workout to knockout the weekend! Emphasis will be on legs and abs…topped off with a little cardio. Workout A is for beginners and workout B is for the more advanced. Here are the exercises and at the bottom you will find the workouts. After you have done it, put a check in the box for Oct. 5^th. Great Job!!!!

1 Leg Squat

This exercise is great for targeting the gluts and quads while working on strength and balance. Raise your left leg out in front of you so your left hip and knee are bent at 90 degrees. Standing only on the right leg, slowly lower yourself bringing your hips behind you. Only go down about a quarter of the way. Press through your heel to raise yourself to the starting position. Concentrate on not letting your right knee collapse in towards your left leg. Your knee should stay directly in line with your foot.

Jump Squats

Starting in a standing position, lower yourself into a squat position with your knees bent no more than 90 degrees. Once you reach your squat depth, immediately explode up jumping up as high as you can. Land softly and immediately lower yourself into the next.

Isolated abdominal crunches

Lying on your back with your feet flat on the floor and your knees bent at 45 degrees, place your hands flat on your thighs. Concentrating on contracting your abdominals, use your abs to pull your upper body off the floor while sliding your hands up your thighs towards the top of your knees. Your upper body should only go high enough that your shoulder blades clear the ground. Lower back to the starting position.

Pelvic Lifts

This exercise works the gluts, hamstrings, and the lower back. Lying on your back with both feet on the ground and your legs bent at 45 degrees, press through your feet on the floor raising your pelvis off the ground. You should raise it until you have a straight line from your head to the tip of your bent knees. Lower your pelvis to the ground and then raise again. Concentrate on activating the gluts while going through the motion. You can add intensity to this by extending 1 leg out to straight while holding your pelvis up. The next step would be to raise and lower your pelvis with 1 leg while the other leg is in full extension.

Plank

Start by lying face down on the ground or use an exercise mat . Place your elbows and forearms underneath your chest. Prop yourself up to form a bridge using your toes and forearms. Maintain a flat back and do not allow your hips to sag towards the ground. Concentrate on holding yourself up with your abs and not your arms. Always lower yourself to the ground if you feel any pain in your back.

Cardio

20 minute run

 

Workout A

12-15 one leg squats

Rest for 15 seconds

10-12 jump squats

Rest for 15 seconds

20-25 isolated abdominal crunches

Rest for 15 seconds

12-15 pelvic lifts (both legs on the ground)

Rest for 15 seconds

30 second plank

Rest for 1-2 minutes and return to start of series. Do the entire series 3-5 times depending on exhaustion level.

At the end of all the series, do 20 minutes of cardio on your apparatus of choice with your heart rate between 50%-65%.

 

Workout B

Try not to rest between exercises

15 one leg squats

12 jump squats

25 isolated abdominal crunches

15 pelvic lifts (try doing it with one leg)

Plank for as long as you can up to 1 minute

Rest for 1-2 minutes and return to start of series. Do the entire series 4-5 times depending on exhaustion level.

At the end of all the series, do 20 minutes of cardio on your apparatus of choice with your heart rate between 65%-80%.

 

 

Use of any knowledge from this website is voluntary. By reading this post, you agree to the terms and conditions outlined in the disclaimer in the about section of this website. Thanks for participating!

 

 

 

 

 

 

How did the first cardio session go? I hope everyone was able to put a check mark in the first box on your calendar? Remember, even if the first challenge was easy, this program is based on progression so it will get harder. If the first challenge was tough, don’t worry, keep at it and you will succeed! On that note, you will only get results if you put the work in. Work out as if I was standing there with you. When I train my clients, they work hard; not only for me, but for themselves. So give this Challenge everything you have and you will get results!! You will feel stronger, fitter, and most importantly, better!

Today’s challenge is doing exercises that only require your body weight. Beginners do work out A, and non-beginners do workout B. Total workout time: 35-45 minutes.

Before starting the workout, be sure to warm up and do some active stretching (http://stricklandfitness.com/2009/07/05/pre-workout/). 10 minutes.

These are the exercises you will need….

Squats: with your feet shoulder width apart, lower yourself until your knees are bent to 90 degrees and return to the standing position. Keep your back straight and pretend you are going to sit in a chair. You can put your arms out in front of you to help you from falling back.

Push-ups/knee push-ups: In a push up position, make sure your body is in a straight line from head to toe. Keeping your stomach tight, lower yourself to the ground and then push up to the starting position. Make sure your head does not fall lower than your body and your mid-section stays in line with the rest of your body. Knee push- ups are exactly the same except you will have your knees on the ground with the straight body line being from head to knees.

Walking lunges: You should have about 20-30 feet of space to do this. Take a big step forward, stop, and then drop your butt straight down. Your front leg and back leg should both be bent 90 degrees at the knee. Keep your back straight and stop lowering yourself when the back knee is a few inches off the ground. Rise up and bring the back leg even with the front and step that leg forward and repeat the lowering and raising. This sequence should be even paced and controlled.

Plank: Start by lying face down on the ground or use an exercise mat . Place your elbows and forearms underneath your chest. Prop yourself up to form a bridge using your toes and forearms. Maintain a flat back and do not allow your hips to sag towards the ground. Concentrate on holding yourself up with your abs and not your arms. Always lower yourself to the ground if you feel any pain in your back. This means your abs have given up and your back has taken over.

Workout A:

10-15 repetitions of squats

Rest for 10 seconds

10-12 repetitions of push-ups (try doing regular push-ups first, lower to your knees to finish the set if needed).

Rest for 10 seconds

10-12 repetitions each leg of walking lunges

Rest for 10 seconds

2-3 times plank holding each one for 10 seconds.

Rest for 1-2 minutes and return to start of series. Do the entire series 3-5 times depending on exhaustion level.

Cool down with stretching.

 

Workout B:

In the order of Squats, push-ups, walking lunges, and plank, do each exercise for 45-60 seconds without stopping. Challenge yourself to a pace that will raise your heart rate and still be able to complete the time. Do not rest between the exercises. Once you have completed all 4 exercises rest for 2 minutes and then repeat. Do 4-5 rounds. Finish with stretching.

 

Put a check mark in your calendar for October 2^nd when completed. Great job!!

 

Use of any knowledge from this website is voluntary. By reading this post, you agree to the terms and conditions outlined in the disclaimer in the about section of this website. Thanks for participating!

 

 

 

 

 

Back Pain and Tight Muscles

This is definitely not a diagnosis; however, lower back pain can be caused by tight muscle in the legs, hips or abdominals. I have many new clients that come to me with one of their goals being to eliminate lower back pain. If this pain is not caused by soft tissue, nerve or spinal damage (which is out of my range to treat), the first thing I look for is tightness. Many times this is the problem. After a specific and persistent stretching routine, their back pain is slowly eliminated. Besides the upper leg muscles, abdominals, and muscles in the hips attaching to the pelvis, so do all the lower back muscles. If the any of the upper leg, abdominal or hip muscles are tight, that causes constant tugging on the pelvis. If the pelvis is being tugged on, then so are all the lower back muscles which are attached to it. This tugging on the pelvis is called a pelvic tilt. If the pelvis is tilted either way of the neutral position, this can cause extreme stress on your lower back. The purpose of stretching your legs, hips, and abdominals is to release the tight muscles and get your pelvis into a neutral position at all times. What are some things that can cause tight muscles? The first and most common thing is sitting down for long periods of time. Sitting causes the abs and hip flexors to be in a shortened position. The shortening causes an anterior pelvic tilt (the pelvis tilts forward). This puts your lower back muscles into a compressed state when standing. If you have a sit-down job, stretching the hip flexors and working on strengthening the abdominals will help to release your pelvis. Running is also a common reason for back pain. Now, I am not saying you shouldn’t run (it is a great cardio workout and stress reliever), however, what you do before and after your run can help to relieve back pain. Besides impact on the spine, running will cause a lot of your leg and hip muscles to tighten up. If you are a runner, be sure to do a good warm up of active stretching (see warming up post) and an immediate post run stretch and another one before bed. It is a good idea to stretch the morning after a run as well. I will post another article about specific stretches to do to release your pelvis and help eliminate back pain. If you have any specific questions, you can email me.

There is one common mistake people make when training their back. That mistake is that they are not usually training their back even when doing exercises for the back. Let’s look at the Lat pull down. This exercise is used to train a large muscle in the back called the Latissimus Dorsi (Lat). The Lat is responsible for shoulder extension, adduction, and rotation. It also plays a role in the extension and lateral flexion of the spine. Now when we sit down at the Lat pull down machine, we know we should be lowering the bar TO THE FRONT OF OUR CHIN (not behind the head) and releasing it back up, thus working our Lats. After all, it is a Lat exercise. What normally happens is we don’t even get the Lats firing and end up using our arms to complete the action. We use our arms everyday so we know how to get those muscles firing. With the arms doing most of the work, we are now doing a variation of a bicep curl. Ever do a back exercise and wonder why your arms are tired and you don’t really feel anything in the back? The arms are working harder than the back. Let’s solve that problem.

We will use the Lat pull down again for our example. You are sitting at the machine, your back is straight and not arched and you have your arms fully extended above your head gripping the bar. As you begin to pull the bar down in front of your chin, concentrate on pulling your shoulder blades down into your back pocket. You should feel your shoulders drop down as well. This action of dropping your shoulder blades will activate your Lats. Keep them dropping as you bring the bar down to your chin bending at the elbows. Now as you begin to slowly release the bar back to the original position of arms above the head, don’t let the shoulder blades leave your back pocket. Try and keep them down until you have reached the starting position. At this point you can release your shoulder blades and prepare for the next rep. It should take 2 seconds to pull the bar down (positive motion) and 4 seconds to bring the bar back to its original spot (negative motion).

You will feel your arms working because they are helper muscles in this exercise. The real burn should be in the back. Concentrate on this concept and you will be well on your way to the perfect “V” shape.