... and 4 more fitness-y tips! Let's get your Monday rocking with a flurry of tips, secrets, strategies, hacks, and avoidable mistakes in this here fitness world, shall we? ...
... especially as it relates to keeping a youthful body and staying forever young. Today we'll be focusing this next round on the second component of my Workout Hero Transformation Strategy -- -- doing effective workouts
Or as we like to call them around here -- Anti-fragile workouts.
Anti-fragile workouts are the absolute "magic bullet" when it comes to staying forever young as they tell your muscles you need them.
#10) – Get stronger at the Foundational 7 Moves:
1. Squats
2. Deadlifts
3. Booty Blasters
4. Horizontal press
5. Vertical Pull (like in pull-ups or cable pulldowns)
6. Vertical Press
7. Kb swing
BONUS! -- anything that improves your heart since that is pretty much the most important "muscle" of them all! (for obvious reasons)
Just like you build a building with a really strong foundation, then build up from there - it is these 7 Moves you want to continually improve upon.
From those 7 there are a myriad of variations to keep us busy forever, so don't worry your awesome mind about getting bored ;)
In this social media era, there is a flurry of "shiny object" moves that we could easily get distracted doing, but whenever I'm tempted by it,
I remember the old Bruce Lee saying... "I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times."
Do you remember the cult classic movie The Cutting Edge from back in the 1990’s?
2 weeks ago, one of the signature songs from that movie came on during our workout, and an awesome Workout Hero (not sure if she is okay being named) mentioned how it was from The Cutting Edge.
I remember how I loved that movie too as a kid, so it spurred Bethany and I to watch it over the weekend. If you recall, the main character skating duo of Doug and Kate are heavily outmatched and long shots to win the Gold Medal.
Their one chance is to master the extremely difficult, very dangerous, but very cool looking and "points-getting" special move their coach invented...
the infamous "Pamchenko". So they proceed to practice that one move 1000's of times over the course of the 5 weeks leading up to the Olympics.
(I won't spoiler alert it for you in case you haven't seen it, :) )
As for Anti-fragile Training - instead of just 1... you have 7 Moves to master and continually improve upon... and not a single one is as difficult (or DANGEROUS!) as the Pamchenko :)
#11) There’s no “right” rep range and comes down to personal preference
Doing sets of 6-12 reps is just as effective as doing sets of 15-20. However, (and this leads to the next tip), sticking to one rep range forever will see diminished returns over time as your muscles get used to that
#12) However - strictly strength training and "heavy lifting" rep ranges is typically in the 1-6 rep range.
Unless you're a serious powerlifter or professional athlete, you don't need to stick to this rep range every week. In fact, you can skip them altogether if you want as you get plenty strong in the 6+ rep ranges.
Once you're an experienced weightlifter though, I do recommend hitting these lower rep ranges at least once every 2 months though as a nice little change-up.
#13) Muscle Confusion 1.0 (I'll tell you about Muscle Confusion 2.0 some other time ;) )
P90x came out in the 90's (I guess I'm on a 90's theme today :) ) and pounded into our brains this concept of "confusing" your muscles so they don't get used to doing the same thing over and over again, and stop seeing results.
That program had us doing a different routine everyday to keep your body guessing.
In my fitness professional opinion, this concept is right, but you don't want to change things up too much so that you can't track progress.
This is a lengthy topic so I'll stop there and save more for some other time so that this doesn't get obscenely long :)
...(*actually, this will be it's own series of tips so stay tuned!)
#14) 3 sets is ideal and the magic number to get in
However...
1-2 is all is needed to see progress in your first few months, but 3 is better if soreness isn't too bad
AND....
... it's good to work in a 4th or more from time to time as a nice little challenge, (as you might have learned from last week) :)
#15) The lovely "Goldilocks" zone...
During your first few years of Anti-fragile Training, when it comes to the muscle building moves, always stop about 1-3 reps short of absolute max.
*(they used to call this "going to failure"... meaning your muscles "failed" to complete any more reps. I never liked calling it that because failing is considered a bad thing, isn't it? But you're hardly failing at anything by working out... in fact, it's pretty much letting you WIN AT LIFE!!! So hence the name change of "going to MAX" :)... Kay, off my soap box and back to our regularly scheduled program :) )
Meaning going till the very last rep and you had no more "reps left in the tank".
Doing this ensures you get practically all the benefits of going all out to absolute max, but with none of the risk of injury or over training.
When you give yourself that nice little "buffer", we call that staying in the Goldilocks Zone -- going not too hard, but not too soft either :)
16.) Burpees are awesome, BUT...
... if you don't like them, it's not worth going through all that hate :)
"The juice isn't worth the squeeze," as some smart people say. :)
I love them because they are like the "hot dish" (or "casseroles" if you're from Minnesota :) ) of workouts moves with all the different ways they work your body with just that one move...
... but there's plenty of other stuff out there just as beneficial for you if you hate them.
Oofda, did you catch all that?
I just feel I'm getting warmed up with all the tips and stuff concerning the workouts' side of someone's fitness! (can you tell which side of fitness I'm most passionate about?)
It's here I bid you a fond farewell and if you have the chance to watch a movie this week and want to take a trip down Nostalgia Lane... then that Cutting Edge movie is where its at!
Till next time, you stay classy and good-looking now and know that your awesome future awaits!
Your Guide & biggest fan,
Mr trainer man Erick