Because so many of my clients present with rounded shoulders and a kyphotic upper back I generally start with very light weights when we do our vertical pushing exercises.  For my clients who can not get their arms overhead I utilize mobility and flexibility work only.

Before you press weight overhead make sure you are certain of the proper technique and never try to lift heavy on your first try.  Keep the core very tight and stable to protect the low back.  Remember if you do not have dumbbells you can substitute bands for a majority of the exercises.

Good luck with your vertical pushing exercises in my next blog post I will give you some of my favorite vertical pulling movements.

Stay Motivated,

Karen

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We left off talking about how to create the perfect weight lifting routine.  I also promised you I would give you some of my favorite exercises for each of the movements.  In the last blog we talked about horizontal pushing, so today we are going to talk about horizontal pulling exercises.

Generally speaking horizontal pulling movements will focus on the  muscles of the upper back.

Horizontal pulling days are a very important part of your workout, often times the muscles of the back are significantly weaker than the muscles of the chest, which leads to a large muscle imbalance in the body.  To help balance out the issue it will be important to have a 2:1 or 3:1 ratio of back exercises to chest exercises.  As you become stronger and begin to correct the imbalance you may be able to move back to a 1:1 ratio.  But keep in mind that the majority of clients I work with are in a seated bent over position all day and need a 3:1 ratio to break the sitting cycle.

Good Luck with your Horizontal Pulling exercises!

As promised here are some good articles I have recently read:

Why Everybody Needs Omega-3 Essential Fatty Acids: Part I

Don't worry I am not trying to sell you anything or get you to buy from this company but without a doubt this is one of the best and most thorough Omega-3 articles I have ever read.  There is a lot of scientific information to get through but it tells it all.  I even bookmarked it for future reference.

Heal that Hunchback

A little technical but still a great article.

In my next blog post I will cover Vertical Pushing exercises.

Stay motivated,

Karen

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In the chart below you will see two lists, a unilateral list and a bilateral list.  Unilateral exercises require the limbs to work independent of each other while bilateral exercises have both limbs working together.  It is important to do a combination of both types of exercises as most all of us have a weaker side.

Remember form is more important then reps and the amount of weight lifted.  In my next post I will include my favorite horizontal pulling exercises.

Stay Motivated,

Karen

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The correct weight lifting routine is probably the most important thing you have to worry about if you want results.  Upper – lower body splits, tri's and chest, bi's and back days are gone.

Not only are we busier and have less time to spend in a gym we are now smarter and realize we don't have to train each individual muscle group to get great results.  In fact training that way will lead to more overuse injuries.

A proper weight lifting routine should focus on the movements of the body not the actually body parts.

Their are 7 fundamental areas I like to focus on:

1. Horizontal pressing
2. Horizontal pulling
3. Vertical pressing
4. Vertical pulling
5. Knee dominant exercises
6. Hip dominant exercises
7. Core development/ anti-rotation

By focusing your routine around the 7 areas as opposed to the individual body parts you get a more balanced and complete functional workout.  Our muscles do not function in the real world in isolation so therefore we should not train them in isolation.

The movements can still be split up so you have control over how many days per week you do your weight training workout 2,3 and even 4 day splits are possible. 

It is also important to train both bilaterally and unilaterally.  Bilaterally meaning a barbell chest press where both sides are pushing together and unilaterally meaning an alternating dumbbell chest press where the arms are working independently of one another.  Again both of these can easily be put into a 2,3 or 4 day split.  If you always train with bilateral movements only you will never reach your full potential.  If one side of the body is stronger than the other, (which is usually the case) you will always be pushing/pulling harder with that side of the body.   Over time this unbalanced approach will lead to greater chance of over use injuries.

In my next post I will give you examples of some of my favorite horizontal pushing and pulling exercises.

Stay Motivated,

Karen

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I can almost guarantee with 100% certainty that the Olympic athletes breaking all those records did not train using the machines found in the gym.  Even more so, I can almost guarantee with 100% certainty that those machines are not even found in the gyms they train in.

I certainly do not have any machines in my studio, granted it is small and machines would make for a tight fit.  But even if I had a gym this size of a football field, I still would not have any machines.  At one point in time machines had their purpose and to an extent still have a small purpose.  (I will get to that in a bit).  Even in the 60's and 70's as crazy as they were those belt generated jiggling machines had their purpose.

My husband just had his ACL replaced, I have him doing leg extensions and hamstring curls on a machine at a gym.  Rehab situations are a perfect use for machines.

So what's the problem with them?  For starters as I stated earlier our education and technology has allowed us to create far better exercise equipment and the knowledge we have gained allows us to create much more effective workouts.  Workouts that do not utilize machines found in a gym.  With the direction we are headed, you will even begin to see the treadmill and elliptical machines becoming obsolete.

With that being said, then why is it, when someone signs up for a new gym membership their free orientation session involves nothing but the machines.  The personal trainer (may be qualified, maybe not, more on that another time) in charge of new client orientation, gives the same bland machine circuit to every new client regardless of the clients goals, experience or even the shape the clients body is in.

This happens for multiple reasons, it is safe, easy, gets people using the expensive machines (that would otherwise sit idle) and people feel comfortable starting out on machines. 

Regardless of right or wrong, if you want to train to see results get off the machines and start hitting some of the other equipment found in your gym.

Stay Motivated,

Karen

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The video for today is an ankle mobility exercise. 

In the video I am working one ankle at a time, it is OK to work both at the same time if you prefer.  I like to keep them separate because the mobility is much worse in my left ankle.  Set your foot about 6 inches off the wall and then just use a rocking motion back and forth until you can touch your knee to the wall.  As you get better move your toe a little further from the wall.

As you rock be sure to keep your heel planted to the ground.  In the video you will see where my heel comes off the ground a bit.  When that happens just keep working it until you can do it without the heel coming up.  You may have to move the foot closer to the wall.

The other piece you will notice in the video is the movement in my hips.  I am rocking my knee in to the left, to the middle and to the right.  I want to get as much mobility and movement back in the ankle as possible.

Perform 2-3 sets of about 30 seconds for each ankle.  Mobility drills can be done 5-6 times a week if you would like.  Good luck!

Stay Motivated,

Karen

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When people refer to mobility generally speaking we are talking about the joint and the joints ability to move through all of its desired range of motion.

When we refer to flexibility we are talking about the muscle and its ability to allow the joint to move to little or to much.

Let me give you some examples.  For instance, I had an ankle injury in high school, because of the injury I do not have full range of motion in that ankle, a bony impingement will not allow it to flex all the way.  The muscles surrounding the area have nothing to do with that problem.  This problem is not correctable.

On the other hand my shoulders will not move through a full range of motion.  In this case my external rotators are extremely tight.  The joints are fine.  With a good foam roller/stretching program this problem could be greatly reduced if not fixed all together.

Hopefully you are with me so far because I am going to take it a step further and talk about stability now.  Stability is anti-movement it is the ability to keep a body part from moving in way we do not want it to.

The 3 words are all interrelated and very important to each other.  Gray Cook was the first person to really break down mobility and stability.  He discovered that certain joints in the body had to be very stable and limit movement while other joints had to be very mobile.  Mike Boyle was the second person to really piggy back off of Gray and develop some real solutions to the problem.

Basically he said your body is like a stack of blocks starting at the ankles and working up:

• ankles – mobile
• knees – stable
• hips – mobile
• lumber spine - stable
• thoracic spine – mobile
• cervical spine – stable

With that information they both came to the same conclusion, that the majority of us live opposite.  Ankles in-mobile, knees unstable and etc all the way up.  If the hips are in-mobile you may have knee pain, but almost always have low back pain.  An in-mobile thoracic spine will almost always cause pain in the cervical area.

The answer to all of this is really pretty simple make the in-mobile, mobile and the unstable, stable.  How you accomplish this is also pretty simple.  Use various mobility drills to add some mobility to the in-mobile joint and add in some stability work to the unstable areas. 

Over the next few weeks in my upcoming posts I am going to give you some of my favorite mobility drills, I am going to try and give you one for at least each area where mobility is needed. 

If you want stability drills for each of the unstable areas you will have to let me know in the comment box.

Stay Motivated,

Karen

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The purpose of this exercise is to help open up the tight muscles in the chest and shoulder and relieve the knots found in the upper back and around the shoulder blade area.  Lay on the roller and go through the angel motion twice,  just as you did when you made your angels in the snow as a child (arm part only, keep the legs still).  Note any areas of tightness as you go through the motion. 

The third time through you will begin to move a little to the right and left on the roller stopping on any pinpoint (trigger points) painful areas.  Roll back and forth on the spot gently until you begin to feel the spot loosen.

Continue this process until you have hit and relieved as many trigger points as possible.

I hope it helps, have a wonderful weekend.

Stay Motivated,

Karen

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"Why in the world would I want to roll around all over the ground over top this piece of foam?  That has got to be the dumbest thing I have ever heard".

Does that sound familiar to anyone?

Whenever I  recommend to someone that they need to begin to use the foam roller, I generally get all sorts of funny looks and comments about how a piece of foam couldn't possibly help them.

If you will bear with me for just 1 or 2 paragraphs I am going to give you a quick anatomy lesson.  Over top of our muscles sits a layer of fascia.  Fascia is made up of a very strong connective tissue, its jobs are to surround, protect and offer some support to the muscle.  The fascia also helps to divide the muscle keeping it separate from other muscles.

Over time through injury, overuse, neglect, inactivity and faulty movement patterns the fascia can become tight, knotted or actual adhesions can form.  All 3 things will cause what we call a trigger point or knot.  A very painful spot in the muscle that can usually be pinpointed with a thumb.

If the trigger points become severe enough typically a visit to the doctor will ensue.  Unfortunately, no amount of medicine or the typical trauma care given at the doctor's office will cure this particular problem which leaves most people very frustrated when they leave the doctor.

Usually the first treatment you will be given is to go home and stretch the tight knotted muscle. 

So let's break this treatment down.  First of all we have learned it is not the muscle that is tight it is the fascia.  Second, go and perform this little experiment for me.  Take a piece of rope or an old worn out t-shirt rolled up and place a knot right in the middle of it.  Now grab both ends and stretch the heck out of it.  Finally take a look at the knot is it tighter or is it looser?

If you performed the experiment correctly the knot will be tighter.  Translate this information over to the fascia, if I am stretching a tight and knotted spot am I helping or making it worse?  Obviously you are making the problem worse.

The Solution – the foam roller and changing the density of the knotted area before you stretch allowing you to break up the knot as opposed to making it tighter.

Many people complain that rolling over the knotted area is very painful, yes that can happen but, what you will notice the more you roll is the pain will begin to diminish.

Check out this page if you are in need of a good foam roller.  Later in the week I will share a few of my favorite exercises on the roller.

Stay Motivated,

Karen 

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People lift weights for many reasons, to increase health, to lose weight, to look better, to get stronger or maybe to increase muscle mass.  If I want to get better at tennis I am not going to swing a golf club.

The same is true for weight lifting, if my number one goal is to increase my stamina I am not going to workout the same way a bodybuilder does. 

How you workout plays an important role in the results you get.

The number one shortcut for building muscle relates directly to the amount of weight you are lifting.  You must lift enough weight to impose a demand on the body.  (The SAID Principle specific adaptations to imposed demands).  If you are not lifting enough weight to challenge yourself or you are keeping the same weight (or close to it) on the bar for 3 weeks you are not going to build muscle.

You must place a demand on the body at all times for the body to change.  If building muscle (mass) is your primary goal.  Increase your intensity (the amount of weight you lift) and stick with the 8-12 rep range 3-4 sets.  Remember, you are not going for a metabolic effect here so you will want to take your rest breaks in between each set, 2-3 minutes.

Good luck building that muscle!

Stay Motivated,

Karen

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