Shiny happy people holding weights...

Sometimes reading about fitness can make us crazy.  Well, me, anyway.  Exercise articles tend toward a couple of themes:  back to the basics or new revolutionary technique, all of them equipped with enough exclamation points to weigh down all but the strongest stick figures.  What is a body to do?

Shockingly, the answer is:  both.  Some basic exercises are crucial.  Squats, lunges, pushups or bench presses, and rows make my list.  We need to do some kind of cardio and everyone has a favorite basic, whether it is walking, running, biking, swimming, or the like.

However, doing the same routines over and over again forever does not serve us.  Personally, my brain gets bored before my body does, but the boredom is a real problem, whichever kind comes first.  Our bodies learn what we do; we grow from new movement patterns.

Yes:  do the squats and run the miles.  But also, every once in a while, do a heavy weight workout, a Tabata routine, or a jump rope session.  Happy bodies are engaged bodies.

Friday Exercise: Flies

Stickie really likes flies because they not only make her strong but also give her a great stretch at the same time.  Also, she gets to do them lying down.

To begin, she lies on her back on a bench.  She holds a dumbbell in each hand with her arms extended over her chest (not her face!).  She keeps a slight curve in her elbows, as you can see from the picture on the right, in which you are looking at her from the head end of the bench and her arms look like parentheses.  Stickie prefers to leave her feet on the bench because it feels better for her lower back, but it would be just as correct for her to place her feet on the floor.

On an inhale, she lowers the weights out to her sides, maintaining the curve of her arms (as in the lower right side picture).  As she exhales, she lifts the weights back to the starting position.  Depending on the weight she chooses, she will do a set of 10 to 12 reps. She usually does three sets.

At the end of the set, Stickie will lower the weights to her chest close to the sides of her body by bending her elbows.  Keeping the weights at her sides, she will lower them toward the floor and drop them.  Under normal circumstances, she does not need to drop them, but she is practicing for the time when the weights might be too heavy.  It is unsafe to open her arms wide and then drop the weights; she could easily tear a rotator cuff muscle in her shoulder that way.

On days when Stickie wants an extra challenge, she can perform this exercise using a stability ball.  In that case, she rolls out on the ball until her head and neck are supported by the ball and she needs to use her abdominals and gluteals to keep her body in a bench-like position.  Then she proceeds to do the flies from there.

Thursday Book Report: Pilates Anatomy

Obsessed with anatomy?  Me?  Yeah, ok.  This week’s book is called Pilates Anatomy, by Rael Isacowitz and Karen Clippinger.  As one would expect from the title, the book covers anatomical issues relative to the traditional Pilates mat exercises as well as some more fundamental ones used to prepare for Joe’s series.

This book focuses on the muscles involved in each exercise.  There is only incidental discussion of how the bones move.  For some people this will be a good thing, for others a defect.  Both ways of thinking about the movements work, but in slightly different ways.  (I did read a book that suggested moving from the synovial fluid, the blood, the lymph, and other surprising body parts.  I’ll save that one for another day…)

I liked the analysis of the mat exercises and anyone wanting to improve technique could find plenty to work with in this book.

Inside Out, Upside Down, Round and Round

Working out in the gym is awesome.  It is rarely too hot or too cold.  The cardio machines let us control all kinds of factors and may even let us watch television.  The dumbbells and barbells are easily gripped, if not easily lifted.  The weather doesn’t matter.  We don’t even have to be entirely awake to work out.

Unfortunately, heavy things in real life are rarely shaped like dumbbells and barbells.  The desk that needs to go from one room to another may not have anything resembling a good place to grip for lifting and holding.  Real life running and biking and skiing involve actual hills on which we cannot change the incline and the tracks are not always smooth.

I love the gym, but it is not an end in itself.  It is a tool that gives us what we need to tackle the real world, the one out there with the sunshine and wind and pebbles, the one where we need to lug laundry and library books and awkward computer bags.

Play inside, but don’t forget to play outside, too!

Backups are important

A lot of us have back pain.  If we are injured, we just have to suck it up until it is healed, but the daily, free-range, garden variety back pain we can minimize with good habits.

What does our workspace look like?  Do we constantly have to slump forward to see our computer screens?  Do our chairs allow us to sit comfortably on our sit bones?  Do we still hold the phone between our shoulders and ears?  Many people pay attention to how keyboards affect wrists and hands, but all that other stuff is important, too.  Good sitting posture involves having our ears lined up over our shoulders, which are lined up over our hips, but most of us end up sitting with our heads jutting forward, our shoulders rounded, and our lower backs looking more Quasimodo than we would probably prefer.

Our cars aren’t much better.  Taking the time to figure out where the headrest should be to keep our necks in good alignment is worth it.  Consciously choosing to sit up straight helps.  Also, having a ball like a tennis ball or lacrosse ball or yoga ball to slide under a hip or roll on a thigh or stick between the seat back and the space between our shoulder blades can transform commute torture into something bearable for the body at least.

Finally, we need to remember our core.  We spend plenty of time, culturally, talking about abdominals for good reason:  they are a crucial part of our core.  However, the muscles of the back are also important.  Strengthening the erector spinae and the deep back muscles via exercises like back extensions and deadlifts will complete the core circle.

The posture exercises with the books on our heads are optional.

Yelling "Argh!" also engages the abdominals

Frustration can be a useful tool.  Not a pleasant one, but useful.  Frustration with how tired we are, or how chubby we look in photos, or how hard it is to run for the bus can motivate us to get started on a fitness program.  The exercise burns away the frustration, reduces stress, and begins to address the problems that were frustrating us.

But there are other kinds of frustration that we can use.  When we get injured and can’t do our usual activities, frustration can help us try something new that we can do.  The frustrating process of rehabilitation can allow us to develop more mindfulness and more precise form so we don’t have to repeat the process after another injury.

Then there is the kind of frustration that comes from other sources entirely, like maybe the kid who takes 45 minutes to put on clean underwear, pants, and a shirt, or the person in the car ahead of you who does not appear to have passed driver’s training, or the family member who left us without toilet paper in the bathroom.  Frustration does generate energy and there is no better way to get rid of it than by taking it out on the treadmill, the weight rack, or the yoga mat.

It’s all fuel.  Use it!

Friday Exercise: Side Plank

Having mastered the plank last week, Stickie has progressed to the side plank, which will strengthen her obliques.  She begins lying on her side on the mat with her lower hand underneath her shoulder.  She can choose whether she prefers to have her feet one in front of the other or stacked on top of each other.  Either way, she will end up resting on the sides of her feet when she presses away from the ground by straightening her lower elbow.  She keeps her shoulder stacked over her wrist on the weight-bearing side and her body in a nice straight line from the top of her head to the soles of her feet.  Like the plank, the side plank is an endurance exercise:  she will stay up in the position as long as she can keep good form and then repeat on the other side.

As a variation, Stickie can raise herself up with her forearm on the mat perpendicular to her body if her wrist prefers that position.  When Stickie wishes to make the pose more difficult, she extends her upper arm and/or upper leg toward the ceiling.