I ran 6.2 miles this morning after seven days of not working out. I had to ease into my run and it took a few miles to do that. I just returned from a week in the ghettos of Kingston, Jamaica, where I took my two oldest boys to work with the Missionaries of the Poor. Needless to say we didn’t get out for a run (although they did some push ups every night). Whenever I take more than a few days off I am always struck by how quickly my fitness level seems to fade. It’s as if all the work of months takes only a few days to undo. This is actually not the case, however. [Read more…]
After a Week of No Exercise it’s “Easy Does It”!
August 8, 2011 by 5 Comments
Take a Nap…and a Quote of the Week
August 1, 2011 by 1 Comment
Quote of the Week: The best cure for insomnia is to get a lot of sleep. W.C. Fields
There is always something extremely frustrating about learning how much sleep deprivation, even in small amounts, can affect us negatively. I mean how many people do we know who don’t like sleep? Most of us like it and would like more of it, but usually because of kids, jobs, and the demands of life, we just don’t sleep as much as we should! So I thought I would hand out a little bad news, but report a little good news as well. First the bad…
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Quote of the Week: “Vanity of Vanities, and All is Vanity”
July 7, 2011 by 7 Comments
“Vanity of vanities, said Ecclesiastes,… and all things are vanity…”Ecclesiastes 1:2.
“We can’t take them with us when we die.” This is something we might think of in terms of our material possessions, yet it also pertains to something else as well…our bodies. If we are fitness enthusiasts we tend to care about our bodies…maybe too much at times. Yet, in terms of the spiritual world, they are fleeting too. I think it is good, every so often, to contemplate vanity. Its counterpart, pride, is said to be the root of all of our sins, and is one of the Seven Capital Sins. We can fall prey to this sin when we place too much importance on our appearance. Let’s face it, one of the main reasons most of us exercise is because of the way it makes us look. Sure, there are plenty of other good reasons; health, wellness, mental and emotional well-being, and so on. We all know that exercise keeps us strong and healthy throughout all the stages of our life. But the bottom line is that for many of us, the main motivator for working out is our physical appearance. The definition of vanity (often called vainglory) is excessive pride in one’s appearance. Also… clinging to things without solidity and permanence (such as physical beauty). [Read more…]
The Rule of 70
July 1, 2011 by 2 Comments
A lot of people ask two questions: 1. How much of weight loss comes from diet? and; 2. How much of weight loss comes from exercise? These are very good questions. While important, they ignore another component – genetics. Our DNA certainly plays a key role in the size and build of a person. In our family, I have really seen how this is manifested in our children. Even with the same parents, not all of our children are built the same. So, after considering the genetic aspect, then it comes down to diet and exercise, which are the two components we can control. While it might be easy to assume that it would be about 50/50 (diet/exercise), I think it is really more like 70/30, which is why I call this the “Rule of 70”. [Read more…]
What is Best After a Workout…Water or Sports Drinks?
June 25, 2011 by 3 Comments
I ran 10 miles with my friend Susan this morning on a trail near our house, and by the last two miles I was seriously dragging. When I finished the run, I felt terrible… my legs were heavy and I felt sluggish. Lucky for me, my son had left a Gatorade (Fierce Grape) in my car and I drank it shortly after I finished. It tasted great, and I was amazed at how quickly I recovered. If we are exercising outside this summer, we are bound to sweat more than usual, and when we sweat we lose more than just water from our bodies. Our sweat contains minerals, which are also lost. Should we be replacing those with an energy drink? Is it more important during the summer months to drink sports drinks, like Gatorade? I guess the best answer is that it really depends. [Read more…]
Fitting in a Workout While on Vacation
May 31, 2011 by 4 Comments
I am writing this in the airport waiting for our return flight from Florida, where my husband (James) and I got away for four days. While there, we fit in some exercise. James is not the exercise enthusiast that I am, but he does like to run and is wonderfully supportive of me and my fitness “habits”. So while we were away, I ran three times (twice with James along Beach Road in Jupiter with beautiful ocean views, and once by myself for 8 hot, humid, and flat miles). I also went to a Kettlebell/TRX class taught by a friend, Josephine Bunn. Technically James and I did this together, since he dropped me off, went to Dunkin Donuts, and brought me coffee and a donut after the class (as I said, he is very supportive). Of course without our children with us, it was easy and fun to fit in a few workouts while on vacation. However, this is not our typical vacation (it was the first time we have gotten away for more than an overnight in 22 years). The other 99% of the time that we get away our children are with us. Yet, I still manage to squeeze in fitness most of the time. So with summer fast approaching, and the start of family vacations, I am sharing five ways to fit in a workout while away…or not! [Read more…]
Posture, Posture, Posture!
May 23, 2011 by 2 Comments
If I was in real estate, my mantra would be “location, location, location”. In the field of fitness, it needs to be “posture, posture, posture”. As someone who does not naturally have good posture, I am amazed, and a little worried in fact, about the implications of bad posture. Not only does posture effect fitness performance, it can also be a precursor to injury if it is not properly aligned.
Bad posture is really an alignment problem. Dr Rothbart, author of Forever Free from Chronic Pain, uses the analogy of a car to explain the posture issue. He says that when the suspension of a car is unevenly distributed across surfaces of the tires, some parts receive more weight than other parts. This causes the tires to wear unevenly. The thread is worn down until performance is affected. In the same way, when we have bad posture, our body’s weight is unevenly distributed across the joint surfaces of our ankles,knees, hips, back, neck and jaw. Some of these joints receive more weight than others, causing them to wear unevenly. Ultimately this affects efficiency and performance, and can even eventually cause chronic pain. [Read more…]
Dynamic Stretching…Best for Pre-Workout
May 17, 2011 by Leave a Comment
What is the first thing many people do before they go for a run or begin a workout? Stretch! This has been drilled into our thinking. If there were deadly sins of running, not stretching would be on the top of the list. It is common to see runners standing, holding one foot behind them, stretching their quads, or sitting on the ground doing a hamstring stretch. We have been told to hold the stretch for 15-90 seconds, and not to bounce. These kind of stretches are known as static stretches, and they are what we have been taught to do. As a runner, I have never been very disciplined about stretching, and so I was interested in what many coaches and trainers are now saying is a better kind of pre-workout warm up. Some people call it dynamic stretching, and if you show up at a track meet or a basketball game these days, you will likely see athletes continuously moving rather than staying in one place stretching before competition. [Read more…]
Life is a Balancing Act! Why Balance is Crucial for Fitness
May 11, 2011 by 1 Comment
Did you ever think about the fact that about 40% of the time that we are walking around, we are on one foot? Balance is crucial, regardless of how athletic you are. Just think about what happens as we get older, and our balance is not as good as it once was. We begin to take shorter strides to compensate for our lack of balance. Hence, one reason for the shuffle that we sometimes see in elderly people. The balance is not as good and therefore stability is off. It isn’t too hard to see why balance is such a crucial component for fitness, too. [Read more…]
My Least Favorite Exercise? Anything That Starts With the Word “Plyo”
May 10, 2011 by 5 Comments
Yesterday morning I decided I needed some kind of group exercise. I wasn’t up for working out alone and I didn’t want to run two days in a row. I knew I couldn’t do too much arm work with my bad shoulder. There is a small group that meets at 6 a.m. to do P90X at a neighborhood gym, and I figured that was a good option. I got there a little late (not that surprising) and they were already into the warm-up. There are usually about five or six people who show up, but yesterday it was me and three men. By the time I grabbed a mat and started to join in on the warm-up, I heard Tony Horton say this was the “mother of all P90X workouts”, Plyometrics. Oh, great. [Read more…]
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