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Lead Stories: Saturday, September 6, 2008

Move of the Day: Fast Feet

Posted December 10th, 2007 at 9:00 AM by Katie Drummond

Section: Health & Fitness, Injury & Rehab, Exercise

This move aims to increase foot movement and to improve foot function. It also helps to improve reaction time. This is a great exercise to include in your workout to help raise your heart rate between sets and can also help runners to prevent injuries. You should have good balance before trying this exercise.

To begin, stand up straight with your shoulders back and your knees slightly bent.

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HIIT: The Ultimate Workout

Posted November 27th, 2007 at 5:45 PM by Shannon Clark

Section: Health & Fitness, Exercise

If you aren’t a stranger to the gym, you’ve likely already heard of something called high intensity interval training (HIIT). Whether it was between two trainers discussing their training techniques or someone complaining about the brutality of the workout, it may be something you’ve avoided up until now.

There is no doubt that high intensity interval training (HIIT) is something that will give you a run for your money. It definitely is not - by any means - easy, but it will get you results.

Not only is it more conducive to retaining your current muscle mass then longer cardio sessions, but it is also far better (in most cases) in terms of promoting fat loss and increasing the metabolism. The thing about HIIT is that it does not expend an extremely large amount of calories while you are performing it.

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Pressed for Time?
Try Interval Training

Posted October 15th, 2007 at 10:26 PM by Hariz Siddiqui

Section: Running & Training, Training Tips, Health & Fitness, Exercise

The following article is written by TFS Media’s Lindsay Hutton.

If you’ve been watching television lately, you’ve probably been bombarded with the latest fitness trends claiming the average person can get away with doing about 10 minutes of cardio a week and still lose weight. In a society where lack of time is the number one reason people give for not exercising, 10 minutes a week sounds too good to be true. Well, unfortunately it is, but while this claim is a stretch (a BIG stretch), there is some truth behind the “less is more” concept.

For those that are not familiar with interval training (in it’s basic form - it can be adapted for marathon runners, etc.), it consists of exercise that incorporates short bursts (think 30-60 seconds) of high intensity activity followed by a longer period of low intensity recovery. For example, a basic interval training program would consist of walking briskly for two minutes, sprinting for one minute, and alternating this pattern for 20 minutes.

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Interval Training on Consecutive Days

Posted October 15th, 2007 at 11:45 AM by Martha Jones

Section: Running & Training, Training Tips, Health & Fitness, Exercise

The faster an athlete moves in training, the faster he or she will be able to move during competition. So athletes use a training technique called interval training in which they run, cycle, skate, ski or swim very fast for a short time. When they become severely short of breath, they slow down until they recover, and then move very fast again.

Researchers at Ithaca College showed that athletes can gain as much by doing this type of intense interval training on consecutive days as on alternate days (Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, September 2007).

Interval training causes considerable muscle damage, so it usually leaves athletes sore the next day. Most trainers recommend exercising at a slower pace until the soreness disappears. That is why athletes usually follow each intense day with one or more easy days.

However, many competitions require an athlete to exercise flat out for several consecutive days. He/She may have to compete in multiple preliminary heats over several consecutive days to reach the finals.
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Results in less than 5 minutes: The Tabata Method

Posted July 13th, 2007 at 7:19 PM by Adam Jacobs

Section: Health & Fitness, Exercise

The following article is written by HesFit.com writer Stephen Antel.

It looks easy on paper: 20 seconds of exercise, followed by 10 seconds rest, for 4 minutes total. A workout that claims to melt fat, increase your aerobic and anaerobic thresholds, can be done with little or no equipment, and can be done in less than 5 minutes? It almost sounds too good to be true, doesn’t it? Well, such a ‘program’ does exist, and it’s called the Tabata method.

The Tabata method is named after Dr. Izumi Tabata. Dr. Tabata conducted several studies to determine the effectiveness of high intensity interval training on sports conditioning. He compared standard HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) using 30 seconds of intense exercise with 2 minutes rest to a protocol that had shorter bouts of exercise and rest periods with 20 seconds of intense exercise with 10 seconds rest. What his findings revealed was that standard HIIT, while effective at increasing aerobic capacity (sessions of exercise over 3 minutes), did little to increase anaerobic capacity (intense exercise of less than 3 minutes). The Tabata method, as it was later named, showed marked increases in both aerobic and anaerobic capacities.

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Train your muscles to use lactic acid as fuel

Posted January 6th, 2007 at 11:00 AM by Hariz Siddiqui

Section: Running & Training, Training Tips, Health & Fitness, Exercise

You exercise so intensely that your muscles burn and you gasp for breath. Then you slow down for a minute or two, catch your breath, and then go very fast again. This training technique has been used in all endurance sports since the 1920’s. Now George Brooks of the University of California at Berkeley has shown why interval training makes you a better athlete.

Inside each muscle cell are mitochondria, the little furnaces that burn fuel for energy. A major fuel for your muscles during exercise is the sugar, glucose. In a series of chemical reactions, glucose is broken down step by step, with each step releasing energy. When enough oxygen is available, the glucose releases all of its energy until only carbon dioxide and water remain; these are blown off through your lungs.
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Endurance training techniques for runners of all levels

Posted January 5th, 2007 at 12:00 PM by Emily Hoskins

Section: Running & Training, Training Tips

Unlike many recreational activities, training for a marathon is serious business. If you fail to train properly you not only run the risk of not finishing, but you could seriously injure yourself.

There are several types of endurance training out there, so finding the right one for your personal goals and needs is crucial. The types of aerobic endurance training differ in duration, frequency, and intensity which will lead to different physiological adaptations within the body that improve your overall fitness level.
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Slope on treadmills

Posted January 3rd, 2007 at 4:00 PM by Jeanie Rebb

Section: Running & Training, Health & Fitness, Exercise

Good treadmills have a lever that raises the front end to simulate running up hills, because running on level ground does not do much to strengthen your upper leg muscles. Running strengthens primarily your lower leg muscles.

You stress your upper leg muscles significantly only when you run up hills. Each one percent increase in the elevation angle on your treadmill requires four percent more energy.
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What is interval training?

Posted December 29th, 2006 at 7:00 AM by Jamal Walker

Section: Running & Training, Training Tips, Health & Fitness, Exercise

To become stronger and faster, athletes use a technique called interval training, in which they exercise very intensely, rest and then alternate intense bursts of exercise and rest until their muscles start to feel heavy. Intervals are a fixed number of repeats of a fixed distance at a fixed pace with a fixed recovery time.

There are two types of intervals: long and short. A short interval takes less than 30 seconds and does not build up significant amounts of lactic acid in the bloodstream, so an athlete can do lots of repeat short intervals in a single workout.
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Marathon Training Tips: Increasing Intensity, Speed & Preventing Injuries

Posted October 30th, 2006 at 12:00 PM by Martha Jones

Section: Running & Training, Injury & Rehab, Training Tips

Many runners have the mistaken impression that they have to run a lot of miles every week to be able to run fast in a marathon. Most will find that running too many miles slows them down.

To run fast in races, you have to run very fast in practice. However, on the day after you run very fast, your muscles will feel sore. If you run fast while you are sore, you are likely to injure yourself and not be able to run at all. Take easy workouts until your muscles feel fresh again. Read the rest of this entry »

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