Fitness, Training, Health & Conditioning

Many of you have probably seen some form of advertisement for the product known as “Perfect Pushup“. Here is our take on how valuable of an asset it can be for your workout programs.

First is Quality – Upon opening the product it looks like it is a decent quality item. At no point during the first few minutes of it did I think it was a piece of junk. The base of the handles are sturdy and the handles are just the right size. Several of us tried it out and we all agreed that the handles fit great in your hand. They rotated very smoothly without and grinding. I was pleased at this because I fully expected that to be the issue but I was pleasantly surprised at how smooth the rotation was. Last thing on the handles was that they were also not so hard that it was hard on your hands. In fact it was quite comfortable.

Final Score for Quality – 2/2

Next lets look at the efficiency of the product – This is where I was pretty disappointed. Included in the package was a DVD that tried to get you pumped up for the product and the workout. They do however go over all of the different exercises in good detail. Also included is a workout card that on one side has a reminder of proper form for each of the moves in the video as well as the modifications to make it harder or easier (kneeling or feet on a chair, lame). On the back side is the workout they would like you to follow. It is a 21 day program that includes 10 workouts. The whole program is pretty limited. It is a great pushup workout but it offers very little beyond that. To be fair however they are not claiming to be more than this so you are getting what you paid for, a new toy to use when doing pushups. Here are a few of my major concerns. The biggest is there is not any form of a warm-up. In fact the first thing you are supposed to do is to max out on pushups, good thing you did not buy a squat rack from them I guess. I felt it a bit irresponsible to not give people at least a few exercises to do to help make sure that the shoulders are in a position to do a pushup without compromising the safety of the elbows and wrists. Also there are so many people that have very tight shoulders and upper backs that to go straight to a pushup can prove to be a serious mistake.

Final Score for Efficiency – .5/2

Next is the Value of the product – The price tag I got form Amacon.com was $29.99. I consider this to be a very fair price. I would not want to pay more than that for a product like this but 30 bucks is fine. It ill be a good addition to your home gym or as an extra tool in any fitness facility.

Final Value Score – 2/2

Extras – I already talked about this earlier but you do get a DVD that goes over the basics with you. It does not give you a workout to follow, just the basics of the equipment and some exercise guidelines for proper form. The workout card is extremely limited and offers little to make you excited to continue with the program.

Final Score for Extras - .5/2

Ease of Use – I really liked how easy the product was to use. I can see that someone had not really done much exercise in their past they may struggle a bit with control over the rotation at first. There is no assembly of any kind to do so it is right out of the box and into your first set.

Final Score for ease of use – 2/2

OVERALL SCORE – 7/10

So here are a few extra ideas you could do to make this a bit more of a complete workout. If you have read any of our strength training philosophy posts, you know we have a system that we feel maintains a higher level of muscular efficiency. This includes working all of the different angles we discussed are necessary to keep proper motion in the shoulder.

Here are 3 variations to try;

First is a more vertical pushup, this will help to incorporate more of the muscles of the shoulders

Second is to incorporate a row into the pushup position. This will help to gain strength in the muscles of the back of your shoulder and upper back.

The final one for now is my favorite of the three which is more of a tricep move. Try doing a dip with the handles for a great workout for the tricpes.

We will have a complete Perfect Pushup workout available for you to download. It will include a complete warm-up designed to give you the most out of your workout as well as a much more complete workout designed to incorporate the entire body. Look for it soon.

The Fitness Industry is a constant fad. Everyone is looking for the next best thing to make an infomercial about to get rich. We want to use the many years in the fitness industry to help you sort through what may help you and what is a total waste of your money.

We will use a scale of 1-10. 1 Being a total piece of junk and a 10 being something that can truly help you in your quest to stay in shape.

There will be several categories that we will try to give yo an all around perspective on the product. 

1. Quality – this will include not only how it looks but also how does it feel as you are using it. For instance I have used home gyms that look great but are so cheap due to them being way to light so it is distracting to try and exercise on them. 

2. Efficiency – how could we not go over this, everything we talk about has to do with how much it will either help or hamper the efficiency of movement in your body. This section will be to tell you which way the product goes.

3. Value – is the price they are asking worth it. Will you get a fair amount of use from the equipment in regards to your personal workouts.

4. Extras – many fitness items are shipped with example workouts or DVD’s to help you out. This score will let you know if these extra materials are of any value to you

5. Ease of Use – how easy is it to use the product? Is it easy to setup and easy to store etc.

We will add any additional info that we think will help you make the right decision on purchasing the products we review. If you would like to see a particular product reviewed, let us know and we will do what we can for you. 

We hope this section of the blog can help you make your money help you to achieve your fitness goals.

So do you find yourself staring at people running along the side of the road yet? It is so interesting to see the many variations in our running styles that have developed based on the genetic code we were given and then the stimulus we supplied to our muscular system. Other factors go into this as well such as injuries we suffer during our life and how that can have impact on us.

Let me ask you this, at what point of your life were you the most efficient at running? The answer is when you were very young. Somewhere around the ages of 5 to 7 we are typically pretty efficient runners. The reason for this is that our bodies are in the final phases of our natural strength development. Refer back to the philosophy posts for a more in depth version of this example but in case you have not read it I am referring to the natural development of our muscular system. 

Depending on what your beliefs are this could be God’s strength design or if you prefer, Natures Strength design. Consider the development of an infant. It starts off on its back, then is able to roll over to its stomach, from there is is able to get up on its knees and crawl, then eventually walk, run, skip, jump and any other physical feat we may ask of it. The way this works is through our bodies unconscious recognition of a need for stimulus to the muscular system. 

During the physical development of my 3 beautiful children they each were able to make a significant jump in their physical abilities when we started taking them to Gymboree. If you have not heard of Gymboree is is simply an organized, instructor led fitness class for young kids. What I love about it is the ability for kids to start to really challenge themselves physically without the risk of getting all beat up like they would at a typical playground. Almost everything they climb on at Gymboree is padded. What I also like is that they are able to do all of this barefoot so they can really develop the muscles in the feet as well.

These are terrible pictures to show you what Gymboree looks like but I hope you can see some of the equipment.

In the background you can see some of the size appropriate ladders and climbing structures. Here is the point I am getting at. As I watched kids climbing around on all these things I realized that what they were doing is forcing strength throughout the entire motion of their hips. They had to to be able to get up, over, and on all the obstacles in the room. I also loved how little encouragement they needed to do it. They were choosing to work out extremely hard. It was quite refreshing. 

Then I started to think about how often we take our hips through their full range of motion. When I was training at ADAPT Training this was a staple of everything we did. I was working there at the same time my son was going through his early development stages and the parallels were astounding. 

I, like Pete Egoscue and Brian Cassidy before me realized that to create an efficient stride we need to force our hips to be put through as many different angles as possible. Running is so much easier for us as kids since we are consistently putting our hips through their natural range of motion and also strengthening them through this motion. This then aligns the femur as it comes out of the pelvis bones. Then from there it also allows the Tibia and Fibula to be in proper alignment. This ensures there will not be unnecessary pressure in the knee since the bones that compose the knee are in alignment. 

This is also how you are able to help prevent injuries in the foot that are typical of runners. I am trying to say it as many times as possible, alignment is the key to being the most successful runner you can. Alignment is dependent on you consistently giving the necessary stimulus to your muscular system for it to maintain its primary job, movement and alignment of the skeletal system.

Next up I will show you how you can do this on your own with a few examples. Also soon we will have a full running efficiency workout regimen available to you.

We discussed running efficiency last post and I will add posts to this soon, now lets also talk about strength training as well.

The picture listed above (from nasa.com of all places) is truly what is wrong with the current mentality in strength training. What I mean by this is that we have lost the idea of what strength is. To be strong has nothing to do with how much you can bench press or how much weight you can put on the curl bar, or my personal favorite, how much can you put on the squat rack.

Now before every member of the World’s Strongest Man Competition comes looking for me, yes obviously those things can represent strength. But lets be honest how many of you out there really have dreams of becoming the worlds strongest man? If you are not named Hanz or Franz, keep dreaming. Even Olympic Weight Lifters are considered the strongest people in the world. But again how many of you are planning on going to London in 2012 to represent your Country in weight lifting?

Many of the thousands of clients I have trained usually ask me within the first few sessions, when are we going to start weight training? Early on in my training career I would usually cave and start mixing in some just to keep them happy or, to keep them paying. I very much dislike the traditional training world for that reason. Commission sales is never about the client nearly as much as it is about keeping food on your table. Over time I was able to start to establish some standards to help them understand when it is appropriate to be able to start training with resistance in the body.

Brian Cassidy helped me to understand several key components of how to interpret the human bodies ability to withstand outside resistances such as weight training.  Mr. Cassidy learned this from a man named Pete Egoscue. He has a book that he published quite awhile ago, I think it was 1993. It was titled “The Egoscue Method of Health Through Motion“. He also has a few more that he has published since but this one is my favorite.

You feel like you are there talking with him as you are reading it. He gives a much more detailed description of the philosophy pages that are listed on this Blog. Really he is the one who started this style of training. Or at least to my knowledge he is.

Here are some things you need to consider in regards to strength training. What does strength mean to your life. Like I said earlier to train like a strong athlete is to be a part of a sport. Weight training is its own sport that requires a significant amount of time. You must practice the moves over and over again to make sure you can do them correctly without injuring yourself. You must follow schedules and specific programs that will enable you to continue to improve at the lifts you are doing.

What is it that you do in life that you need strength for? Are you a weekend warrior athlete? Do you like to spend you free time gardening? Do you have young kids at home that you want to get outside to the park and play with? Depending on the goals you have for your activity levels, you would be wise to choose the right type of strength training.

Now I also understand that there is another component to strength training and that is vanity. People want to look good and we have learned that strength training can change the way our muscular system appears. We can add muscle mass, we can tone and define our muscles or just make them long and lean looking.

In this section of posts we will discuss the various styles of strength training and what type is going to prove the most beneficial for you to do.

We will cover how your posture, injury history, previous training, and even your job and lifestyle will impact what you should choose for your strength training to make you successful and more importantly to gain strength that will benefit your life style.

I want to make you aware of how beneficial it is to cross train as a runner. Now when I say Cross train, many think of circuit training on various pieces of cardiovascular equipment. To truly Cross train requires a completely different take on this. This style of training is designed to complement the stimulus that running represents to the muscular system. As I have mentioned in several philosophy and training posts, you must always look at the negative side effect of any exercise you ask your body to do. 

Well lets look at the negative side effects of running. First unless you have an absolutely perfect gait pattern (running stride) the the most obvious negative side effect is compensation. This means that rather than your body having a natural stride to it, you body instead must create a stride by asking muscles in the body to perform tasks they are not designed to do. 

Look at the following picture;

Here are 4 different athletes running up a grass hill. Look at the variations that exist in each of the strides. In the first athlete you can see that as they lift their left knee it causes their femur (the long bone in the thigh) to turn in causing the lower leg to be forced out to the side. Also look at the pressure in the back leg as they tries to push off it. The foot is turned out to the side and he is pressing much more with the outside of the foot.

The second athlete is just the opposite. Look at their left leg. Here is a femur that is twisting to the outside causing a tremendous amount of twisting in the knee. Also look at how far the left foot is turned to the outside as he is trying to press off. 

Now in the third picture this individual looks pretty decent. The Right femur is turning in just a bit but the joints are really in pretty good alignment. The back leg is also for the most part straight and there is even pressure being used on the back foot.

Then in the fourth athlete, they have a femur that also is turning out as they run, again causing some unnecessary torque in the knee joint.

So going back to the negative side effects. Looking at athletes 1, 2, and 4, they are all causing the muscular system in the lower body to compensate for a lack of efficiency in their stride and instead must create a stride by twisting the joints around to generate a linear movement. This can lead to both acute (instant) or chronic (develop over time) pain symptoms. Imagine each of these athlete in a football game. Now imagine that athlete #2 is planting off his left leg as he gets tackled on his right side so the force pushed him to the left. Can you visualize how easily he could injure his right leg. That would be an acute injury because he would most likely cause immediate damage in his ligaments. Now take the same athlete and make them a distance runner. Could you see how they could develop injuries such as shin splints or plantar fascitis? these are injuries that occur when there is more pressure being placed on a certain part of the body than there should be. For instance of when running you put more pressure on one side of the foot than another. 

So there is the biggest negative side effect of running, muscular compensation that will lead to injury. 

Next what about other parts of the body. Remember that your muscular system is a machine. Every part has the ability to affect other parts of the body. If you are compensating in your lower body, trust me your also doing some serious compensating in your upper body. 

Look at this photo;

Here is another example of some serious compensation in the legs. Femurs are twisting all over the place and in turn they are also causing the arms to swing wildly across the body. This can cause some serious muscle problems in the shoulders and neck and back. Again you are now asking certain muscles of the body to be involved in generating an non efficient running stride. This means that muscles that normally would not be a part of this are being asked to compensate for the muscles that should but are unable to due to the compensation. 

So to address the negative side effects of running you really need to cross train in such a way that increases the efficiency of your muscular system. I think you can tell from the pictures that many of the problems with poor running form exist in the hips. The Femur in most of these pictures is twisting as it comes out of the pelvic bones. So the lack of muscular efficiency actually starts there, at the origin of the femur way up in the hip socket. 

Thanks to Geocites.com we can look at a cool picture of the muscles around the pelvis and femur;

Look at how many muscles are responsible for the positioning and movement of the femur. To keep this action working correctly you must make sure that each of those muscles is even in strength, and flexibility, and most importantly is working efficiently.

So your cross training then must be done in such a manner to try and provide an even amount of stimulus to every single muscle that is involved in running. If you have been paying attention, that would mean all of them, well almost all of them. Basically every single muscle in the body is in some way responsible for the proper movement of running. 

So how can you be sure you are accomplishing this in your training? Please send $1999.99 and I will send you the secret. Just kidding in the next post we will start going over some of the important factors involved in this as well as some examples of what to do.

Ok so if you think that $700.00 is a little out of your price range, here is a way to get started for even less.

If you have a television and a DVD Player, go on to Amazon.com and look at the reviews for the fitness videos. Pick out two for Cardiovascular training, 2 for strength training, and 2 for flexibility. You should be able to do this for under $120.00. Keep in mind the videos you choose may need you to get some equipment to go with it. Careful since this can raise your cost quite a bit. However, for under $200.00 you can be off and running and you should have enough variety to get you moving and enjoying success for at least a few months or more.

Here are some recommendations on workout videos. I would also like to let you know that we are in the process of building you some great workouts using the philosophy that has brought thousands life long results. Look for these in the next few months!

Now for the $700.00 dollar gym lets get started shopping!

I want to give the example of just a blank room. Lets assume that all you have is 4 walls and some carpet on the floor. Also I want to be conservative so lets say the room is 12ft x 12ft. This is an average to small second or third size bedroom (at least in the area I live in it is).

So looking at the example above we need to get ourselves a television, dvd player, and some videos to start with. This way we will have that as the basis for our workouts. From there we will add in some extra equipment that will help to take our workouts to the next level.

So for our television dvd, lets do our best do not over spend on it. Here is a good quality one at a good price.

Toshiba 19LV505 19-Inch 720p LCD HDTV with Built-in DVD Player (Black). This is a highly rated product for around $300.00 Amazon.com has it for $282.00 plus shipping is another $25.00

We will need to put it on the wall so here is a basic wall mount for it.

VideoSecu Wall mount for LCD Monitor Flat Screen TV with Swing Arm VESA100/75 -ML10B 1E9 This is $36.00 with shipping at Amazon.com

Now here are the videos we will order for our workout plan. I am going to save some serious money and get the package savings on:

The Biggest Winner – How to Win by Losing: The Complete Body Workout (5-Disc DVD Set: Shape Up – Front, Shape Up – Back, Cardio Kickbox, Maximize – Full Frontal, Maximize – Back in Action) ~ Jillian Michaels

This is one of the trainers From the television show “The Biggest Loser”. Amazon.com has this item for about $22.00 including shipping.

So now we have spent a total of $365.00 so far.

Now lets move on to some of the training equipment we will be adding to our gym.

First an Exercise mat (or maybe a few). These are going to save your knees. even on carpet it can get hard on your knees doing kneeling exercises.

Amazon.com is going to love you for ordering everything from them but they really do make it easy. I really like these exercise mats, not only do they roll up for easy storage, they have good grip to them and are quite comfortable.

The Valeo Foam Exercise Mat sell for about $20.00 with shipping. Lets go ahead and order 2 of them.

Lets also get some pushup bars. These are a very inexpensive way to add significantly to what you can get accomplished with your upper body workouts.

Here is the recommendation I have for you to get. I have tried these and love them, it is called the Perfect Pushup – Original. They once again are at Amazon.com for a great price.

I am going to get 2 of these as well so that is another $60.00

Now we also want to get some form of pull-ups. I mentioned in a post on the New Years Resolutions that a good option was the P90X version. Here is another good one made by the same company as the perfect pushup.It is called the Perfect Pullup. Convenient right? They can be found at Amazon.com

They are on sale right now for $60.00 plus free shipping so we scored on this one.

So this brings our new grand total up to $525.00

Now the last thing we need is some Dumbbells and and we will be able to do just about everything we need to improve every aspect of our fitness.

The most bang for your buck can be found in the PowerBlock SportBlock Adjustable 3- to 24-Pounds per Dumbbell Set. We will just get the 3lb to 24lb set.

These also happen to be on sale at Amazon for $178.00 and free shipping.

Well as usual I overspent. The total came to $703.00. Better scrape through the car for loose change.

So there you have the $700.00 Home gym.

I hope you are having success on your Resolutions! Now that my health has steadily approved mine are going great. There are a few things I want to make sure you are aware of as you progress. 

First is the weight loss goals. I said I would weigh in each week just to keep you updated but keep in mind this can be very dangerous. During the process of training your weight can fluctuate several pounds. There are many factors that will influence it. 

First is water. s your body learns to assimilate the larger amounts of water you are drinking, inconsistency in this can be real costly. If you establish a constant intake of water, then forget on any particular day, your body will start to store the water which will in turn raise your scale weight. If you have started doing any weight training or if you have been following the strength workout, your muscle tissue is becoming more dense. This also means it will weigh a little more. 

Just with these 2 factors alone, you may not have lost much weight at this point. Please do not panic if this is the case. Losing weight is a long journey if yo do it correctly. It is easy to lose 5 or 10 pounds, just do not eat or drink anything and go sit in a hot sauna for 8 hours. If you survive, I promise you will be much lighter on the scale.

Also I wanted to address soreness with you before I forget. It used to be that everyone believed soreness came from a buildup of a chemical called Lactic Acid in your muscles. As it turns out, recent studies have proven this to not be the case after all. The soreness comes from the damage that is caused to the muscles during intense exercise. Lactic acid is a fuel source the muscles use to provide energy to working muscles during exercise. 

When you work out hard enough you will start to experience a burning sensation in the muscles. This burn can happen during a set of pushups or running a mile or any other form of exercise that pushes your muscular system hard enough to begin creating very small tears in the muscle fibers. The soreness then begins as quickly as 8 hours following exercise but usually it will take until the next day or even the day after that to experience the soreness. The is what is known as DOMS (delayed onset muscle soreness). 

So in regards to your exercise regimen, you need to pay attention to soreness. If following a strength routine you are sore the next day, it is in the best interest of progress to wait until the soreness has been eliminated before trying a similar routine. Without waiting for the soreness to leave your body you can overtrain the muscular system which will lead to injury. 

I do not want to get more complicated than this right now, there are some very specific techniques and strategies you can use in regards to building the perfect muscular system for your particular sport. We will cover these in later posts in the philosophy section.

For now just use the basic rule of waiting for your soreness to either be gone or significantly reduced before doing that style of workout again. This will allow you to complete heal the muscular system between workouts which will lead to better long term results with a significantly reduced potential for injury.

Ok so before we even discuss equipment and pricing or any of that we have to first establish what you want from your gym.

Here are some of the factors:

1. What is your fitness goals? If it is to just do some cardiovascular to burn calories and maybe some light strength moves, this will be a very easy task. If you are looking for a gym that provides variety and gives you many different types of muscular efficiency training, things will get a bit more interesting.

              Lets say that you are looking for just a basic workout area that you can get some cardio in and maybe do a few strength exercises. Then it can end up being as easy as a treadmill and an exercise mat and some dumbbells. 

              For a more elaborate set of goals it may require more. Lets say you want the same abilities as your larger chain gym in the guest room of your home. Well now we will want to get at least 2 pieces of cardio equipment. We will also need a few free weight benches, dumbbells, stretching mats, pullup bars and several other smaller items will help provide a lot of variety.

2. How many people will be using your facility? Do you live alone or is this designed to be used by multiple people at the same time? Are you potentially looking at having some of your friends come over and work out with you?

              A gym for yourself is easy enough since only one item can be used at a time. But here is something to consider. I have helped several clients in the past get 2 or 3 friends involved in the project. Now you need to make the facility have the ability to hold all of you doing something at the same time. Keep in mind this is also a great way to ease the cost. I have encouraged them to share the costs of the equipment. Some paid a monthly fee to the person who owned the house, others just each put in an equal amount. There are several good ways of working this situation to benefit more than just you. The benefit in these situations is the accountability factor that comes with it.

3. Is this a long term or a short term situation?

               Many people are not aware of this but you can lease exercise equipment. Lets say you are needing a workout facility for a year in a small apartment until your house is built. Or maybe you are worried about your ability to stick with a program and are not ready to spend several thousand dollars. Leasing i a great second option for you.

               Another possibility is you are finishing construction on your dream home. You have the perfect gym space picked out and you are more than ready to cancel your gym membership. Now make sure you choose top of the line equipment and make your facility be the envy of all your neighbors.

There are many other factors as well. The first of these however has to be the biggest deciding factor in how you will go about building your gym.

Next I want to give you some guidelines for what I think you should have in your workout facility. In my opinion deciding on equipment must first come from understanding what your body needs for it to be the most successful. 

As you may have read in some of the philosophy posts, the key to any workout regimen is how is it improving the overall efficiency of your muscular system. We discussed the fact that we are beings that constantly change based on the stimulus we are given and thus we need to make sure that we are constantly giving our muscular system the right type of stimulus. 

To be honest regardless of your goals really you need to design a facility that will give you everything you need. This can still be done with little to no equipment but lets list out all that your body will need to have available to it for you to be able to train at a level that will create high levels of muscular efficiency. This is the key to all your goals.

So here is a list of most of what you will be looking for your gym to accomplish for you. Different fitness experts will have their own say in this but I feel this covers the bulk of what you would ask your body to do. These are also just in random order, please do not assume what is listed first means it is the most important.

1. Cardiovascular Exercise – you do not have to use a piece of equipment for this, it just makes it far more convenient. There are ways to accomplish this without the help of equipment but it will get tedious after awhile. A good piece of cardio equipment makes this portion of your fitness better. Another cheaper option is a television with a DVD player and purchase some aerobics tapes and kickboxing tapes and yoga tapes. I will discuss this in the next post but this is without a doubt the cheapest way to get yourself going on several different types of exercise.

2. Flexibility – Open floor space is one of the most underrated portions of any fitness facility. Make sure you have enough space to lay out flat with your arms and legs out wide. Lengthening of the muscular system has numerous benefits and you facility needs to be able to meet this need.

3. Strength Exercise – Here is where the variety is your best friend. Remember that we said you do constantly change to the stimulus your body receives. If you are constantly doing the same strength workout, the muscles will adapt to it and it will quickly become less effective for you. The body is programed for survival. It will look for the easiest and best way to do whatever you ask of it. If you purchase an all in one gym that has about 8 to 12 exercises on it. You will be surprised how quickly your body will stop responding to these workouts. Luckily after the many years I have been in this industry, I will share with you many ways to change it up in your strength training without too much cost.

4. Entertainment – If yo have never listened to good workout music or better yet, your good workout music while training, you are missing out. I really recommend putting some form of stereo equipment into your gym. an Ipod is nice and one of the best exercise invention I have ever seen but get a speaker doc for it and keep your body free of the wires and headphones! Also a television is a very smart move. if you are in the .5% of people that do not watch television, well, I’m sorry. Putting a television into your workout area eliminates one excuse for not exercising, you CAN watch your favorite show if you exercise that night. It also provides the means to watching workout videos which can make a major difference.

5. Cleanliness – When I first started working at a Gym I was a maintenance guy. Trust me when I say the designing a facility that is easy to clean and maintain will make one of the largest impacts on the success of your gym. I will go over the secrets I learned with you soon. For now just trust me, the floor and equipment choices are very important in this area.

So next post lets build our first gym. We will start with a small budget workout facility. I will give you some example products that will work. 

For our First gym we will have a budget of $700.00. Go start saving, we have a gym to build!

I weighed in at 186 lbs this week. I am so grateful to be back on track with my health so I can now really get focused on these goals. 

I wanted to give you the last workout for you to be working on. This one is just like the first quick one. It is designed to help improve the overall efficiency of your muscular system. This will make everything else you do more beneficial to your body. You will burn more calories, improve your flexibility, and  create a more productive stride. 

My recommendation to you is to alternate this one with the first routine each day. As I have mentioned before, if any of these exercises cause discomfort, stop doing them immediately. It is always wise to consult your physician before starting any exercise routine. If yo have any questions about the exercises, let me know.

1. Wall Sit – 1:00 min (Sit with your back against a wall with your hips and knees at 90 degree angles)

2. Active Bridge – 30x (Lie on your back with your knees bent so your feet are flat on the floor. Now squeeze your glutes and lift your pelvis off the floor, then lower it back down)

3. Lower Spinal Floor Twist – 1:00 min (Lie on your back with both legs straight below you, now bring your right leg up into the air with your hips and knees at 90 degree angles. Now keeping your right shoulder on the ground, reach up with your left hand and pull your right knee down towards the floor)

4. Pelvic Tilts – 20x (Lie on your back with your knees bent so your feet are flat on the floor. in this position, arch your lower back off the floor without lifting your hips, then do the opposite as you press your lower back into the floor without lifting the hips.)

5. Hip Lift – 30 seconds each side (Lie on your back with your knees bent so your feet are flat on the floor. Now place your right ankle onto your left knee. Without using your hands, press your right knee as far away from you as you can. Now hold this position)

6. Cats and Dogs – 10x (From your hands and knees, place your hands directly under your shoulders and your knees directly under your hips. From this position, arch your back up into the air and lower your chin towards your chest. Now keeping your arms straight, arch your back down towards the floor and lift your head up.)

7. Hero Squat Clappers – 20x (From a kneeling position, place your arms straight out in front of you with your palms touching each other. Now bend at your waist and knees, keeping your shoulders over your hips and as you lower the hips, pull your arms straight out to the sides. Once you have gone as low as you can, raise your hips back to the starting position as you bring the palms back together.)

8. Standing High Knee Lifts – 20x each leg (From a standing position, place your hands on your hips. Now lift your right knee up into the air keeping your right foot directly underneath the knee and your toes pulled up. Pull it up as high as you can, then lower it down and repeat with the left leg.)

9. Kneeling Hip Flexor Stretch – 30 seconds each side (From a kneeling position, place your right leg out in front of you so your foot is out in front of your knee. From this position Slowly lean into your left hip and squeeze your glutes on that side until you feel a stretch through the front of your left hip. Keep your shoulders up tall.)

10. Kneeling Pullovers – 20x (From a kneeling position,  place you hands down at your waist and interlace your fingers,  twist your palms so they are facing the floor and slowly lift your hands up over your head without bending the elbows. Then lower them back down, try to not move your torso.)

11. Full Squats – 10x (From a standing position, place your feet directly under your hips and make sure they are pointing forward. Now place your hands behind your head. From this position, slowly bend at the hips and knees as you lower your hips towards the floor. Go as low as you can while still keeping your feet flat on the floor and your back relatively straight. Now slowly return to the starting position and repeat.)