Short Cut to a Toned Tum?
THEY claim to tone muscles while you sit or stand, but are electronic muscle stimulation (EMS) devices like Slendertone really an adequate replacement for time at the gym? In a study at the University of Wisconsin that was conducted on behalf of the American Council on exercise, the physiologist Dr John Pocari found that, in terms of buttock strength and gluteal endurance, regular use of Slendertone was as effective as performing the quadruped hip extension exercise. However, Pocari points out that the EMS devices only target one area, so you’d still be better off exercising.
The muscle rub - does massage work?
SPORTS massage is a favourite therapy of exercisers looking to ease tired limbs. Proponents claim it speeds up recovery by increasing blood flow to enhance the removal of lactic acid. But a new study in the journal Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise found the opposite to be true, suggesting post-exercise massage impairs recovery rather than improves it. Professor Michael Tschakovsky, from the School of Kinesiology and Health Studies at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, recruited 12 healthy young men and asked them to them exercise their forearm muscle to exhaustion by squeezing a specialized handgrip at 40 percent of maximum force for two minutes without rest. Afterwards, massage did not increase blood flow to the tired muscle as expected, but reduced it. In fact, every massage stroke seemed to cut off blood flow to the forearm muscle. Overall, less blood reached the massaged muscle, compared with the amount that flowed to the forearm when participants did 10 minutes of active recovery exercises.
Core Stability Myth
If there is a Holy Grail of fitness to have emerged over the past decade, then it has to be the pursuit of core stability, the strengthening, toning and honing of the muscles that wrap around our midriffs like a corset. Celebrities including Kate Winslet, Sharon Stone, Gwyneth Paltrow and Beyoncé have swarmed to classes such as Pilates, in which the central message is that the deeply embedded muscles in our trunk must be strong if we are to look good, stand up straight and have bodies that move freely and without pain. They hold the spine in place, we are told, and prevent back pain by allowing us to move as nature intended. Few gym workouts are conducted without the instruction to “engage” the core by pulling in the belly button and sucking in the stomach; we ignore the core at our peril. But among exercise scientists there is growing dissent about whether the pursuit of a strong core is worthwhile or even safe. Pilates and other classes that concentrate on core strength had been favourites of dancers and gymnasts for years. But they were not to become a fitness phenomenon until the mid-1990s, when a study by Australian scientists researching the causes of back pain produced a groundbreaking discovery. Read more at The Times
Motivate Yourself Into shape
Name your personal favourite kick up the backside trigger for wanting to lose weight. Is it an impending wedding? Perhaps a fear of baring all in a bikini on the beach or the prospect of a school reunion? Most of us have one and they are often the catalyst for a realisation that things have gone too far coupled with a desire to do something. There is nothing like a looming date to focus the mind on calorie-counting and the body on sweating more than it has been used to. But will it work? Psychologists have their doubts, claiming that body-shape anxiety is often an ineffective motivational tool and that some women become so fixated on their appearance that it ultimately limits their ability to get in shape. Read more at The Times
Why Yoga Won't get you Fit
They are the workout choices of the A-list, who claim they owe them their toned and honed bodies. In the yoga camp, we have Madonna, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jennifer Aniston and Christy Turlington, while Claudia Schiffer, Jamie Lee Curtis and Jemima Khan swear by Pilates. But are these relatively gentle gym activities really what they seem? Some fitness experts now believe that consumers are being lulled into a false sense of security that super-fitness and weight loss are achievable without too much sweat, and claim that yoga and Pilates alone are not the key to an A-list body. Read more at The Times
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Short Cut to a Toned Tum?
02 September 2010 -
The muscle rub - does massage work?
02 September 2010 -
Core Stability Myth
22 August 2010 -
Motivate Yourself Into shape
22 August 2010 -
Why Yoga Won't get you Fit
22 August 2010
 'An Official 2012 Fitness Guide for Women.'
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'50 ways to get fit outdoors.'
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