FitSugar

Are You Strong on Muscle Knowledge?

FitSugar — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 08:00:06 -0700

Your body is full of them - in fact you house more than 650 of them - but how well do you know your muscles? Take this short quiz to see if your muscle facts are your strong suit.

Take the quiz

Muscle Types: Slow Twitch vs. Fast Twitch

FitSugar — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 10:00:02 -0700

Don't like sprinting? Blame it on your muscles. Deep within your skeletal muscles you have different twitch fibers. Although this makes it sound like your muscles are textured like different knitting stitches, in truth the muscle twitch fibers ultimately look the same, but they work differently.

Slow twitch fibers (aka type I fibers) are the part of the muscle made for endurance activities like walking, running, and biking long distances. These are the muscles of tai chi. Fast twitch (aka type II) muscle fibers are made for quick bursts of movement, like sprinting or kicking a soccer ball.

Our genes determine if we have more of one type of fiber over the other. Regardless, you need to work them both. One way is to vary the speed of your lifting, adding fartlek into your runs, or doing a change-up with weights and repetitions when strength training. To do this, try lifting a lighter weight for more reps, then a much heavier weight for fewer reps.

Feeling twitchy? Go on, work out, and strengthen all your fibers - fast and slow.

How Muscles Are Made

FitSugar — Thu, 09 Aug 2007 08:45:00 -0700

With all this talk about strength training and weight lifting, I was curious to know how muscle is truly made. Here's what I learned from the trainer at eDiets, and I am going to share it with you.

Training effectively by using enough weight to sufficiently overload a muscle, micro trauma and micro tears are created in the muscle. The muscle then goes about repairing itself, and to do so the body uses many resources to make this rebuilding a reality. One of the resources it uses is the body's own natural human growth hormone.

Human growth hormone must access stored body fat to help repair the muscle. So making stronger muscles uses fat!!! It may take many strength training sessions, before you add one pound of pure muscle to your body. Nutrition, training, recuperation and stress levels all play a part in the process. If you eat excessively, your blood sugar will remain elevated and sabotage your efforts, so nutrition is truly an important component for success.

Does Muscle Turn to Fat?

FitSugar — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 13:30:00 -0700

Get in Gear: PlateMates

FitSugar — Wed, 30 May 2007 02:30:00 -0700

If you're looking to tone up this summer, using dumbbells is a great way to get results. I've noticed that for certain exercises, like bicep curls, I can use a heavier weight, but since I have a torn rotator cuff, I need a lighter weight when doing side dumbbell raises.

I've discovered something that has solved my problem. Instead of buying tons of different sets of weights, check out PlateMates. They are hexagon-shaped weights that attach to any metal weight securely with 3 superstrong magnets. Use them with solid metal dumbbells, Olympic bars, power blocks, or stack weight machines.

You can get either a pair of 5/8 lb or a pair of 1 1/4 lb weight plates ($23.99), so you can add a bit more weight to your dumbbell when you're working muscle groups that you want to work harder. It's called "microloading," and it's a safe way to avoid injury to muscles and tendons when increasing intensity for toning, strengthening or physical therapy.

Fit's Tips: Check out your local fitness store to see if they sell PlateMates so you can try them out for yourself. Or you can order them at bodytrends.com.

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A Week In Review: FitSugar Round up

FitSugar — Sat, 05 May 2007 04:00:00 -0700

You have got to try this yoga pose: Extended Side Angle. Work your legs while stretching your side - it feels great.

Today, May 5th is Pilates Day. Hopefully there is a studio participating near you so you can check out the method.

If you are looking for a new suit, check out these sexy backs by Speedo.

Evangeline Lilly's beauty is not Lost on us. Read what she does to keep looking so great.

Do you eat Hot Pockets? You might want to read this nutritional breakdown of them before you nuke your next hot pocket.

Here's the skinny on some not-so-healthy health foods.

Do you know which drink has less calories, a mint julep or a margarita.

Want to see if the city you live in made it on the list of the top 10 cities with the most smog.

There are seven habits of healthy people. Hopefully your habits would make the list.

May is all about Skin Cancer Awareness. Get a free skin cancer screening.

See what a pound of muscle can do for you.

Definition: Isometric Exercise

FitSugar — Fri, 04 May 2007 09:30:00 -0700

We all have exercises we avoid and for me it is isometrics. Isometrics basically means holding the taxing positions so the joint angle and muscle length do not change during the contraction, the work. Holding a yoga pose, holding an elbow plank, holding bridge pose, holding a bicep mid-range, trying to push a wall. When you do isometrics you are really working the endurance of the muscle, the slow twitch fibers. Isometric training is a great way to target toning specific muscles. The one drawback to isometric training is that it doesn't strengthen the muscle through a range of motion, since you are not moving the joint. Remember, isometrics is a part of a strength training regimen, not the only component.

Just as it is good to mix up your cardio training, it is also a good idea to vary your strength training methods too. So try some isometrics.

What can one pound of muscle do for you?

FitSugar — Thu, 03 May 2007 12:52:55 -0700

One pound of muscle burns how many calories a day?

The Good News: Muscle Never Turns into Fat

FitSugar — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 03:00:00 -0700

Time and time again I overhear someone saying: I used to workout but ever since I stopped, my muscles just turned into fat. Does this happen? Let's set the record straight...

Lucky for us, this is not how muscles and fat work. Basically a muscle is a muscle and fat is fat, one can never be the other. Muscles are what moves your body so therefore without muscles, your body would not be able to move at all. Muscles use fat for energy to contract (move your body). This is why the more muscle you build, the more fat that is used up -- Don't worry though, this doesn't mean you need to become the Incredible Hulk in order to burn fat, you just need to work your muscles.

Isn't that good news? Now get out there and do some resistance training already.

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Applied Kinesiology: It's All About Your Muscles

FitSugar — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 15:45:00 -0700

The other day my friend said "My chiropractor used applied kinesiology to discover that I had too much mercury in my body. They did some tests on my muscles to find out." Huh? This was news to me and I was intrigued, so I went home and hopped on the beloved internet to find out more about it.

Applied Kinesiology is a newcomer to the field of healing, but its roots can be traced back through centuries of ancient Chinese medicine. It involves studying a person's movements as a way to examine how his or her body is functioning (or not functioning).

Using muscle testing, they assess your posture, your gait (the pattern of how a person walks), and test your body's range of motion. If they find a muscle that is unbalanced, they'll work to figure out why it's not functioning properly.

This information is analyzed along with standard methods of diagnosis such as your clinical history and laboratory tests. The hope is that by studying the WHOLE person, the doctor can then determine the best form of treatment for you.

Treatments include joint manipulation or mobilization, various myofascial therapies (this involves gentle sustained pressure to injured or inflamed muscle tissues), cranial techniques, meridian therapy (like acupuncture and reflexology), evaluation of environmental factors, and nutrition.

This is definitely considered an alternative approach to healing. Only people trained in applied kinesiology are allowed to perform it. Many chiropractors, naturopaths, medical doctors, dentists, nutritionists, physical therapists, massage therapists, and nurse practitioners are becoming trained to complement their current practices, so if you are interested in having a session, ask around to find out who is the most qualified.

I'd like to think that since your muscles are part of your body, there has got to be some truth to studying them in order to encourage healing. Of course, many people think applied kinesiology is just a bunch of pseudoscience garbage, but it's worth a shot, right?