By Jocelyn Crawley

It seems clear that two primary reasons people exercise are to become physically fit or lose weight. Although these are both venerable goals, exercise can have other health benefits that make engaging in physical activity even more advantageous than one previously thought. Here are three:

1. Exercise Boosts Energy Levels.
In discussing this fact, the MayoClinic explains why it is the case. In essence, exercise transports oxygen and nutrients to the body’s tissues and helps your cardiovascular system work more efficiently. When your heart and lungs work more efficiently, you have more energy. Thus in addition to developing a slimmer and shapelier physique, exercise gives you more energy to perform other tasks like grocery shopping or washing the car.

2. Heart Disease And Stroke Prevention.
According to NutriStrategy, exercise can play a role in preventing heart disease and stroke. This is the case because daily physical activity strengthens the heart muscle, lowers your blood pressure, raises your high-density lipoprotein (HDL) levels and lowers your low­-density lipoprotein (LDL) levels. Additionally, physical activity improves blood flow and increases your heart’s working capacity. All of these things play a role in keeping the cardiovascular system healthy and preventing heart disease and stroke.

3. Ability To Manage Stress.
In his discussion of the correlation between stress levels and exercise, 2006 Fitness Educator of the Year Len Kravitz cites the research findings of Hassmen, Koivula & Uutela regarding the matter. The findings indicate that people who have reached substantive levels of fitness through exercise are more capable of managing stress than those who are less physically fit. Moreover, Kravitz notes that the findings of the researchers indicate that higher levels of physical fitness are associated with lower levels of stress. Ultimately then, those who exercise and become physically fit are 1) better able to manage stress than non-exercisers and 2) less likely to have a great deal of stress.

As an avid exerciser, I find myself pleased with the physical results that come from subjecting my body to cardiovascular activity four to five times a week. Yet knowing that this physical activity can prevent degenerative diseases and enable me to combat stress makes exercising an even bigger priority for me. And I think it should be for you, too. Good luck!

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By Fitday
Why must some of the most joyous times of the year also seem to accompany flu shots and days stuck with a cold? Well, they don’t have to! Here are a few tips to go winter after winter without having to buy a box of tissues.

1. Rethink What “Holiday Goodies” Means
It might seem like something your taste buds don’t want to hear, but you should try to eat healthfully over the holidays and keep the not-so-good-stuff for you at bay. Which is better: to eat a few well-chosen “treats” in moderation, or to go overboard and get sick during chunks of the winter? This winter remember to:

• When eating foods, keep towards lower glycemic foods like yogurt, apples and peanuts, that won’t quickly spike your blood sugar.

• Avoid excess caffeine, alcohol and foods with higher saturated and trans-fats.

• Keep intake of whole fresh fruits and vegetables up, and utilize new and creative ways to get these healthful heroes into your holiday “goodies.” Instead of chocolate chip cookies and candy canes, try a bowl of assorted berries with slivered almonds, light whipped cream and unsweetened cocoa powder. Instead of ranch dressing for veggies, try a spicy bean dip. These kinds of thoughtful changes will not only be enjoyable, but will ensure that you get a lot of disease-fighting fiber, antioxidants and plant-based nutrients.

• Avoid foods with refined sugars as they offer far more harm than benefit to the body, and can really run you down and make you tired.

2. Vitamin D
There’s been some controversy over whether Vitamin D3 (cholecalciferol) assists with immunity. Certainly for those who have successfully used it for years to abate their colds and flues, there’s little doubt regarding its effectiveness. This vitamin is made in your skin after sun exposure. So in the darkness of the winter, you’ll have to replenish it by eating fortified foods, fatty fish, or using supplements. Be sure to talk to your doctor before starting a Vitamin D supplement to find out the correct dosage for you.

3. Avoiding Stress
The biggest enemy to health over the holidays is stress. Stress elevates cortisol levels that will, if left elevated, inhibit the immune system. While stress is seemingly everywhere at every turn, the good news is that there are many ways to fight it or greatly reduce it. Making an effective plan to handle shopping, parties and cooking, and delegating these tasks will go a long way toward stress reduction. Meditation or pray, getting extra sleep, spending time with loved ones and in nature, and finding quiet time just for yourself may also help.

4. Exercise
Keeping fit during the winter months does several things-It keeps stress levels down, gives you more energy to handle the holidays, helps prevent extra holiday pounds and helps prevent disease. So find ways to fit it in. Go for long walks, hit the gym, and counting every step while Christmas shopping.

These tips, along with others you’ve heard such as keeping hands cleaned and avoiding touching your face, will go a long way to keeping your holidays as healthy as possible!

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By Amy Norton

Twenty minutes of exercise may help kids with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) settle in to read or solve a math problem, new research suggests.

The small study, of 40 eight- to 10-year-olds, looked only at the short-term effects of a single bout of exercise. And researchers caution that they are not saying exercise is the answer to ADHD.

But it seems that exercise may at least do no harm to kids’ ability to focus, they say. And further studies should look into whether it’s a good option for managing some children’s ADHD.

“This is only a first study,” said lead researcher Matthew B. Pontifex, of Michigan State University in East Lansing.

“We need to learn how long the effects last, and how exercise might combine with or compare to traditional ADHD treatments” like stimulant medications, Pontifex explained.

He noted that there’s been a lot of research into the relationship between habitual exercise and adults’ thinking and memory, particularly older adults’. But little is known about kids, even though some parents, teachers and doctors have advocated exercise for helping children with ADHD.

So for their study, Pontifex and his colleagues recruited 20 children with diagnosed or suspected ADHD, and 20 ADHD-free kids of the same age and family-income level.

All of the children took a standard test of their ability to ignore distractions and stay focused on a simple task at hand – the main “aspect of cognition” that troubles kids with ADHD, Pontifex noted. The kids also took standard tests of reading, spelling and math skills.

Each child took the tests after either 20 minutes of treadmill exercise or 20 minutes of quiet reading (on separate days).

Overall, the study found, both groups of children performed better after exercise than after reading.

On the test of focusing ability, the ADHD group was correct on about 80 percent of responses after reading, versus about 84 percent after exercise. Kids without ADHD performed better – reaching about a 90 percent correct rate after exercise.

Similarly, both groups of kids scored higher on their reading and math tests after exercise, versus post-reading.

It’s hard to say what those higher one-time scores could mean in real life, according to Pontifex, who published his results in The Journal of Pediatrics.

One of the big questions is whether regular exercise would have lasting effects on kids’ ability to focus or their school performance, he said.

And why would exercise help children, with or without ADHD, focus? “We really don’t know the mechanisms right now,” Pontifex said.

But there is a theory that the attention problems of ADHD are related to an “underarousal” of the central nervous system. It’s possible that a bout of exercise helps kids zero in on a specific task, at least in the short term.

Parents and experts alike are becoming more and more interested in alternatives to drugs for ADHD, Pontifex noted. It’s estimated that 44 percent of U.S. children with the disorder are not on any medication for it.

And even when kids are using medication, additional treatments may help them cut down their doses. Pontifex said future studies should look at whether exercise fits that bill.

“We’re not suggesting that exercise is a replacement, or that parents should pull their kids off of their medication,” Pontifex said.

But, he added, they could encourage their child to be active for the overall health benefits, and talk with their doctor about whether exercise could help manage ADHD specifically.

“Exercise is beneficial for all children,” Pontifex noted. “We’re providing some evidence that there’s an additional benefit on cognition.”

SOURCE: bit.ly/RR5Dh3 The Journal of Pediatrics, online October 19, 2012.

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ARTICLE BY JILL BARKER

Although there’s still some controversy, studies show benefits to maternal health

The idea that pregnant women employ caution while exercising is born of the belief that physical activity is harmful to the developing fetus, mother or both. Yet there is very little evidence that exercise is unsafe for either mom or baby.

Still, many women, and some health care practitioners, are wary about exercising during pregnancy.

Some of that concern can be traced back to an overly cautious set of recommendations presented in 1985 by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, which suggested, among other things, that pregnant women keep their exercise intensity below a heart rate of 140 beats per minute.

Criticized for a lack of scientific evidence and for failing to differentiate between sedentary and physically fit women, the guidelines were modified in 1994 and again in 2002.

The most recent guidelines, the 2008 Department of Health and Human Services Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans, don’t use heart rate as a measure of intensity.

Instead, they recommend that women accumulate 150 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise per week. They also acknowledge a different set of circumstances for physically fit women:

“Healthy women who already do vigorous-intensity aerobic activity, such as running, or large amounts of activity can continue doing so during and after their pregnancy provided they stay healthy and discuss with their health care provider how and when activity should be adjusted over time.”

The Canadian guidelines, published in 2002, are somewhat different still, using heart rate as a guide to intensity but offering two sets of recommendations based on a woman’s level of fitness. They also suggest that sedentary women wait until the second trimester to begin an exercise program.

Michelle Mottola, director of the R. Samuel McLaughlin Foundation Pregnancy Lab at the University of Western Ontario, was instrumental in the development of the Canadian guidelines. According to her, the recommendation was based on the premise that first-trimester fatigue and nausea might cause novices to abandon exercise before making it a habit.

But even that guideline has some wiggle room, provided the pregnancy is without complications.

“If she is feeling okay, even if she has never exercised before, there’s no reason why a pregnant woman (in her first trimester) can’t go out for a walk,” Mottola said.

This plethora of guidelines, combined with past biases, can lead to confusion. And the fact that not all obstetricians are pro-exercise and up to date with the latest research makes it tough for pregnant women to decide which level of physical activity is best for themselves and their baby.

Yet armed with the right information, women can open up a discussion with their physician to create a personalized set of recommendations based on their health and fitness.

One of the best reviews of the benefits of physical activity during pregnancy was published this summer in the journal Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise. Written by Mottola and colleagues from the U.S. and Norway, Health Benefits of Physical Activity During Pregnancy: An International Perspective synthesized the latest research on exercise and its effects on mother and child. Not only does it offer a wealth of information, it also suggests that exercise is a vital part of maternal health.

According to the review, one of the primary benefits of physical activity during pregnancy is its role in preventing excess weight gain, which Health Canada claims affects 55 per cent of overweight women and 41 per cent of those of normal weight. The consequences of this include an increased risk of gestational diabetes, which has been linked to heavier newborns and childhood obesity.

Women who gain excess weight during pregnancy are also less likely to take it off postpartum. This is especially significant as those extra pounds are not only likely to stick around between pregnancies, but are compounded by more excess weight gain during subsequent pregnancies. Researchers believe this may be the start of the obesity cycle that leads to the birth of larger-than-normal babies who have an increased risk of carrying that extra weight into adulthood.

By contrast, regular exercise during pregnancy increases the chances of delivering babies of healthy weight who are more likely to grow into healthy children. And contrary to old theories, there is no evidence suggesting that exercise will lead to premature births or babies with low birth weight.

That said, there are plenty of unanswered questions regarding exercise during pregnancy. No minimums or maximums regarding the intensity, volume and duration of exercise needed to benefit maternal and fetal health have been established. And there is limited information about the effects of exercise during all three trimesters, which could result in revamped guidelines based on the stage of pregnancy.

Until then, Mottola encourages women to be active during pregnancy. She also suggests they listen to their body and talk to their physician should exercise cause any discomfort or undue fatigue.

“Most of the decisions about exercise pregnancy are common sense,” she said.

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Article by By GRETCHEN REYNOLDS
The value of mental-training games may be speculative, as Dan Hurley writes in his article on the quest to make ourselves smarter, but there is another, easy-to-achieve, scientifically proven way to make yourself smarter. Go for a walk or a swim. For more than a decade, neuroscientists and physiologists have been gathering evidence of the beneficial relationship between exercise and brainpower. But the newest findings make it clear that this isn’t just a relationship; it is the relationship. Using sophisticated technologies to examine the workings of individual neurons — and the makeup of brain matter itself — scientists in just the past few months have discovered that exercise appears to build a brain that resists physical shrinkage and enhance cognitive flexibility. Exercise, the latest neuroscience suggests, does more to bolster thinking than thinking does.

The most persuasive evidence comes from several new studies of lab animals living in busy, exciting cages. It has long been known that so-called “enriched” environments — homes filled with toys and engaging, novel tasks — lead to improvements in the brainpower of lab animals. In most instances, such environmental enrichment also includes a running wheel, because mice and rats generally enjoy running. Until recently, there was little research done to tease out the particular effects of running versus those of playing with new toys or engaging the mind in other ways that don’t increase the heart rate.

So, last year a team of researchers led by Justin S. Rhodes, a psychology professor at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology at the University of Illinois, gathered four groups of mice and set them into four distinct living arrangements. One group lived in a world of sensual and gustatory plenty, dining on nuts, fruits and cheeses, their food occasionally dusted with cinnamon, all of it washed down with variously flavored waters. Their “beds” were colorful plastic igloos occupying one corner of the cage. Neon-hued balls, plastic tunnels, nibble-able blocks, mirrors and seesaws filled other parts of the cage. Group 2 had access to all of these pleasures, plus they had small disc-shaped running wheels in their cages. A third group’s cages held no embellishments, and they received standard, dull kibble. And the fourth group’s homes contained the running wheels but no other toys or treats.

All the animals completed a series of cognitive tests at the start of the study and were injected with a substance that allows scientists to track changes in their brain structures. Then they ran, played or, if their environment was unenriched, lolled about in their cages for several months.

Afterward, Rhodes’s team put the mice through the same cognitive tests and examined brain tissues. It turned out that the toys and tastes, no matter how stimulating, had not improved the animals’ brains.

“Only one thing had mattered,” Rhodes says, “and that’s whether they had a running wheel.” Animals that exercised, whether or not they had any other enrichments in their cages, had healthier brains and performed significantly better on cognitive tests than the other mice. Animals that didn’t run, no matter how enriched their world was otherwise, did not improve their brainpower in the complex, lasting ways that Rhodes’s team was studying. “They loved the toys,” Rhodes says, and the mice rarely ventured into the empty, quieter portions of their cages. But unless they also exercised, they did not become smarter.

Why would exercise build brainpower in ways that thinking might not? The brain, like all muscles and organs, is a tissue, and its function declines with underuse and age. Beginning in our late 20s, most of us will lose about 1 percent annually of the volume of the hippocampus, a key portion of the brain related to memory and certain types of learning.

Exercise though seems to slow or reverse the brain’s physical decay, much as it does with muscles. Although scientists thought until recently that humans were born with a certain number of brain cells and would never generate more, they now know better. In the 1990s, using a technique that marks newborn cells, researchers determined during autopsies that adult human brains contained quite a few new neurons. Fresh cells were especially prevalent in the hippocampus, indicating that neurogenesis — or the creation of new brain cells — was primarily occurring there. Even more heartening, scientists found that exercise jump-starts neurogenesis. Mice and rats that ran for a few weeks generally had about twice as many new neurons in their hippocampi as sedentary animals. Their brains, like other muscles, were bulking up.

But it was the ineffable effect that exercise had on the functioning of the newly formed neurons that was most startling. Brain cells can improve intellect only if they join the existing neural network, and many do not, instead rattling aimlessly around in the brain for a while before dying.

One way to pull neurons into the network, however, is to learn something. In a 2007 study, new brain cells in mice became looped into the animals’ neural networks if the mice learned to navigate a water maze, a task that is cognitively but not physically taxing. But these brain cells were very limited in what they could do. When the researchers studied brain activity afterward, they found that the newly wired cells fired only when the animals navigated the maze again, not when they practiced other cognitive tasks. The learning encoded in those cells did not transfer to other types of rodent thinking.

Exercise, on the other hand, seems to make neurons nimble. When researchers in a separate study had mice run, the animals’ brains readily wired many new neurons into the neural network. But those neurons didn’t fire later only during running. They also lighted up when the animals practiced cognitive skills, like exploring unfamiliar environments. In the mice, running, unlike learning, had created brain cells that could multitask.

Just how exercise remakes minds on a molecular level is not yet fully understood, but research suggests that exercise prompts increases in something called brain-derived neurotropic factor, or B.D.N.F., a substance that strengthens cells and axons, fortifies the connections among neurons and sparks neurogenesis. Scientists can’t directly study similar effects in human brains, but they have found that after workouts, most people display higher B.D.N.F. levels in their bloodstreams.

Few if any researchers think that more B.D.N.F. explains all of the brain changes associated with exercise. The full process almost certainly involves multiple complex biochemical and genetic cascades. A recent study of the brains of elderly mice, for instance, found 117 genes that were expressed differently in the brains of animals that began a program of running, compared with those that remained sedentary, and the scientists were looking at only a small portion of the many genes that might be expressed differently in the brain by exercise.

Whether any type of exercise will produce these desirable effects is another unanswered and intriguing issue. “It’s not clear if the activity has to be endurance exercise,” says the psychologist and neuroscientist Arthur F. Kramer, director of the Beckman Institute at the University of Illinois and a pre-eminent expert on exercise and the brain. A limited number of studies in the past several years have found cognitive benefits among older people who lifted weights for a year and did not otherwise exercise. But most studies to date, and all animal experiments, have involved running or other aerobic activities.

Whatever the activity, though, an emerging message from the most recent science is that exercise needn’t be exhausting to be effective for the brain. When a group of 120 older men and women were assigned to walking or stretching programs for a major 2011 study, the walkers wound up with larger hippocampi after a year. Meanwhile, the stretchers lost volume to normal atrophy. The walkers also displayed higher levels of B.D.N.F. in their bloodstreams than the stretching group and performed better on cognitive tests.

In effect, the researchers concluded, the walkers had regained two years or more of hippocampal youth. Sixty-five-year-olds had achieved the brains of 63-year-olds simply by walking, which is encouraging news for anyone worried that what we’re all facing as we move into our later years is a life of slow (or not so slow) mental decline.

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Beauty Acquired By Exercise!

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Article By ALICE PARK

Exercise does a lot of good things — it burns calories, helps keep your weight in check and lowers your risk of heart disease, stroke and diabetes. Now add one more thing to the list: physical activity can change your DNA.

Unlike the aberrations and genetic mutations caused by carcinogens and toxins, exercise-induced alterations to DNA are more like tune-ups, helping muscles to work better and more efficiently. What’s more, these changes occur even after a single 20-minute workout.

Juleen Zierath, a professor of physiology at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, reports with her colleagues in the journal Cell Metabolism about these very early changes that muscle cells undergo the first time you get off the couch and into the gym. The researchers worked with a group of 14 young men and women who were relatively sedentary, and asked them to work out on an exercise bike that measured their maximum activity levels. The participants also volunteered to give up a little bit of muscle, from their quadriceps, in a relatively painless biopsy procedure performed under local anesthesia. The researchers took the biopsy of muscle cells once before the participants exercised, and again within 20 minutes afterward.

Using the biopsied samples, researchers compared the activity in a series of muscle-related genes before and after exercise. More genes were turned on in the cells taken after the exercise and the participants’ DNA showed less methylation, a molecular process in which chemicals called methyl groups settle on the DNA and limit the cell’s ability to access, or switch on, certain genes. By controlling how much methylation goes on in certain cells at specific times, the body regulates which genes in the DNA are activated — that’s what differentiates the development of an an eye cell, for example, from that of a liver cell.

Methylation also helps to prime muscle cells for a bout of exercise, getting them to pump out the right enzymes and nutrients the muscle needs to get energy and burn calories while you’re pounding the pavement during that mile-long jog. “We are trying to get at the early messages that the muscle is [receiving in order] to say, ‘Something is happening here, we need to coordinate so we can get more enzymes and more machinery on board so we can cope with the demands of this exercise,’” says Zierath.

The more intense the exercise, she says, the more the methyl groups are on the move. She and her team were able to see this firsthand by comparing gene activity in participants who also agreed to exercise at two different intensities over a period of a week. On one visit, they were asked to cycle until they reached 40% of their maximum capacity; on another occasion, they biked until they reached 80% of their maximum. The muscle biopsies following the 80% sessions showed a lower concentration of methyl groups — and therefore more RNA, which is the first byproduct of gene activity — than samples taken after the 40% sessions.

To confirm the role of exercise on gene expression in muscle, the scientists then studied how calcium affected the entire system. When muscle cells start to gear up for intense activity like exercise, they release calcium, which fuels the contraction process. When the scientists blocked calcium production, the effect disappeared, and the muscles didn’t contract as much.

That’s when Zierath threw in some coffee — or more specifically, caffeine. Caffeine triggers the release of calcium, and can enhance the way methyl groups move aside to turn on the genes that help muscles contract. When she added caffeine to a lab dish containing cells from the leg muscles of rats, the muscle cells showed lower concentrations of methyl groups and more mRNA — a similar effect as seen after exercise — as she expected.

But, says Zierath, that doesn’t mean you can skip the workout for a cup of coffee instead. “Most of the physiological effect of the caffeine we drink is on the central nervous system, and not dispersed to all the muscles,” she says. “In order to get the same kind of effect we saw in the cells, you would have to drink 50 cups of coffee a day, which is close to the lethal dose. In my mind, half an hour of moderately high intensity exercise is sufficient to do the same thing.”

Alice Park is a writer at TIME. Find her on Twitter at @aliceparkny. You can also continue the discussion on TIME’s Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME.

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Article by GINA KOLATA
Exercise has long been touted as the panacea for everything that ails you. For better health, simply walk for 20 or 30 minutes a day, boosters say — and you don’t even have to do it all at once. Count a few minutes here and a few there, and just add them up. Or wear a pedometer and keep track of your steps. However you manage it, you will lose weight, get your blood pressure under control and reduce your risk of osteoporosis.

If only it were so simple. While exercise has undeniable benefits, many, if not most, of its powers have been oversold. Sure, it can be fun. It can make you feel energized. And it may lift your mood. But before you turn to a fitness program as the solution to your particular health or weight concern, consider what science has found.

Moderate exercise, such as walking, can reduce the risk of diabetes in obese and sedentary people whose blood sugar is starting to rise. That outcome was shown in a large federal study in which participants were randomly assigned either to an exercise and diet program, to take a diabetes drug or to serve as controls. Despite trying hard, those who dieted and worked out lost very little weight. But they did manage to maintain a regular walking program, and fewer of them went on to develop diabetes.

Exercise also may reduce the risk of heart disease, though the evidence is surprisingly mixed. There seems to be a threshold effect: Most of the heart protection appears to be realized by people who go from being sedentary to being moderately active, usually by walking regularly. More intense exercise has been shown to provide only slightly greater benefits. Yet the data from several large studies have not always been clear, because those who exercise tend to be very different from those who do not.

Active people are much less likely to smoke; they’re thinner and they eat differently than their sedentary peers. They also tend to be more educated, and education is one of the strongest predictors of good health in general and a longer life. As a result, it is impossible to know with confidence whether exercise prevents heart disease or whether people who are less likely to get heart disease are also more likely to be exercising.

Scientists have much the same problem evaluating exercise and cancer. The same sort of studies that were done for heart disease find that people who exercised had lower rates of colon and breast cancer. But whether that result is cause or effect is not well established.

Exercise is often said to stave off osteoporosis. Yet even weight-bearing activities like walking, running or lifting weights has not been shown to have that effect. Still, in rigorous studies in which elderly people were randomly assigned either to exercise or maintain their normal routine, the exercisers were less likely to fall, perhaps because they got stronger or developed better balance. Since falls can lead to fractures in people with osteoporosis, exercise may prevent broken bones — but only indirectly.

And what about weight loss? Lifting weights builds muscles but will not make you burn more calories. The muscle you gain is minuscule compared with the total amount of skeletal muscle in the body. And muscle has a very low metabolic rate when it’s at rest. (You can’t flex your biceps all the time.)

Jack Wilmore, an exercise physiologist at Texas A & M University, calculated that the average amount of muscle that men gained after a serious 12-week weight-lifting program was 2 kilograms, or 4.4 pounds. That added muscle would increase the metabolic rate by only 24 calories a day.

Exercise alone, in the absence of weight loss, has not been shown to reduce blood pressure. Nor does it make much difference in cholesterol levels. Weight loss can lower blood pressure and cholesterol levels, but if you want to lose weight, you have to diet as well as exercise. Exercise alone has not been shown to bring sustained weight loss.Just ask Steven Blair, an exercise researcher at the University of South Carolina. He runs every day and even runs marathons. But, he adds, “I was short, fat and bald when I started running, and I’m still short, fat and bald. Weight control is difficult for me. I fight the losing battle.”

The difficulty, Dr. Blair says, is that it’s much easier to eat 1,000 calories than to burn off 1,000 calories with exercise. As he relates, “An old football coach used to say, ‘I have all my assistants running five miles a day, but they eat 10 miles a day.’”

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Article by Denise Wang
Self-defense classes offer a number of benefits for people of all ages. You can take self-defense classes in gyms and community centers around the country. There are a variety of styles, moves and self-defense techniques, so do your research to find a style that fits you, and then find a qualified instructor in that style.

Safety
Self-defense classes teach you how to defend yourself in a variety of situations, according to the Prepare website. Knowing self-defense can help you feel less anxious in public. You will learn the basics of how to quickly disable an attacker so that you can escape, focusing on learning how to take advantage of time and space to make a quick getaway.

Exercise
Self-defense classes can offer exercise benefits such as muscle toning and strengthening, improved balance and coordination and an effective cardiovascular workout. Such classes also help you improve your overall physical condition, your mental approach to health and fitness and your chances of escaping from an attack, according to martial arts expert Joel Wasel. Various moves, kicks, punches, twists and turns used in self-defense or martial arts techniques also help increase flexibility, strength and stamina. Self defense teaches that it takes more than muscles to defeat an attacker, according to Master Instructor Sam Chan of Chan’s Kung Fu School.

Increased Self-Confidence
Training in self defense helps people, especially women, develop more confidence in themselves and their surroundings, according to Wasel. Self-defense training helps you learn to be more aware of your surroundings and to be prepared for the unexpected at any time. Knowing that you have the ability to defend yourself often helps you more fully explore the world, meet new people and find new ways to engage with others.

Social Interaction
Self-defense classes give you an opportunity to gather with peers, meet new people and develop new friendships. Many self defense classes are made up of people in different age groups or with different ethnic or cultural backgrounds, which can help you build a greater tolerance and understanding of other cultures. Martial arts and many self-defense disciplines teach the importance of respecting differences, honoring your elders and showing respect and tolerance of others.

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Article by SydneyJohnston
If you get in your car in Los Angeles to drive to New York, do you just pull out of your driveway and start down the road? Or do you get a map and plan your route? The answer is obvious – careful planning pays off. So if your goal is to become fit, lean and strong it’s important to know exactly what you need to do to reach this goal. Here are some valuable tips to include in any plan which will help you arrive at your goal safely and efficiently.

Tip #1: Be Alert For Opportunities All Day Long
Focus on becoming stronger because there are myriad opportunities throughout the day to strengthen your body. As simple an effort as walking up the stairs to the third floor, rather than taking an elevator, will eventually produce a noticeable effect. Yes, weights lifting, exercise machines and structured sessions are powerful – but so are simple activities carried out every day.

Tip #2: Rest Is Just As Important As Exercise
Make certain you value and allow rest and recovery time. Many believe that if an intense workout feels good and will build muscle quickly, then the smart thing to do is to exercise even more. Muscle builds when exercise tears the muscle down, because it recovers as newer, stronger muscle. Without that recovery time, your muscles absolutely cannot increase in size or strength. Beginners usually start with three workouts per week and the duration and frequency can increase as they grow in strength and power but your body will respond more quickly and more dramatically if allowed to rest during strenuous activities.

Tip #3: What’s “Best” Is What You Will Persist In Doing
There is a constant and ongoing war among fitness experts about whether free weights or weight machines are superior. As far as you are concerned, whatever works best for you is the right choice. If you love competing with the weights on a machine then by all means choose that option. If you despise machines, but eagerly grab that set of dumbbells, then go for it. There is no point whatsoever in choosing exercises that you hate and won’t stick with, no matter what the ‘experts’ say.

Tip #4: You Didn’t Arrive At Your Current Condition Overnight
If you’re flabby and overweight – in other words, totally dissatisfied with the condition of your body – always remember that you didn’t get there overnight. In other words, impatience is a huge mistake. It requires years of neglect and misuse to create problems in your body and it will take some time to repair them. Exercising for a week and then quitting because there are no visible changes is foolish and short sighted. Not only that, but more failure will further erode your confidence and increase the sad condition of your body. You can drastically shorten the time it takes to achieve superb conditioning by using wisdom and discipline but you won’t see changes by 5PM on the first day.

Tip #5: “Compound” Exercises Are More Efficient
Consider that “compound” exercises will get results faster than those exercises that use only one muscle or one muscle group at a time. Yes, your abs may be a disgrace but focusing only on an ab machine won’t pay the dividends of full body exercises. And always remember that exercises which work multiple muscle groups will build fitness much faster – and that’s what we all want, isn’t it?

Tip #6: Don’t Exercise Mindlessly
Don’t exercise of mindlessly. If you pay close attention to your muscles and your body while working out, your results will be much more powerful. On the surface, that doesn’t seem to make sense. But famous, skilled athletes and bodybuilders have stated time and again that they can literally direct their muscles as they see fit.

Tip #7: Natural Sleep = Health and A Fit Body
Get as much ‘natural’ sleep as possible, meaning that drugs and sleeping pills interfere with the natural repair of the body that occurs every night. When we sleep, growth hormone, or HGH. is released into our bodies. HGH stimulates healthy growth, cell repair and the regeneration which is necessary for muscle development. Growth hormone is naturally produced by the body and many athletic scandals have occurred because athletes were building their bodies with the use of artificial HGH. Synthetic growth hormone, even when legal and prescribed by a doctor, can have dangerous side effects. You want to maximize your production naturally and this is done while we’re asleep.

Tip #8: Pepperoni Pizza Is NOT The Perfect Diet Food (Sorry!)
The perfect diet for an athlete or body builder centers around proteins, certain fats that include essential fatty acids (EFAs) and complex carbohydrates like vegetables, fruits and whole grains. Most fitness experts recommend eating multiple small meals rather than three larger ones. This keeps the metabolism working constantly and is less likely to result in fat or overweight.

Tip #9: Water, Water and More Water
Drink lots and lots of water. Water keeps your muscles hydrated which makes them work more efficiently and helps them recover more rapidly. It’s important to know that soft drinks, tea and coffee generally dehydrate the body so don’t assume they are helping your muscles. They’re not.

Superlative fitness requires self-discipline and long term dedication to your goal. Anyone who is going to make this kind of serious commitment naturally wants to reach their goal as quickly as possible and to do this we must be efficient. Following these rules will speed you to your ideal body as quickly as possible.

The post 9 Ways To Improve Your Body As Quickly As Possible appeared first on Alliance Training Center.

Article by Craig Freudenrich, Ph.D.
You can help your body to exercise better by eating the right foods. You know that muscle metabolism involves the phosphagen system, glycogen-lactic acid system and aerobic respiration. The major fuels used are glucose and glycogen. So, if you want to do well, whether you are competing or just exercising for well-being, you should try to increase the stores of glycogen in your liver and your muscles. Athletes eat solid, high-carbohydrate diets (breads, pasta) the night before competition, and liquid, high-glucose diets in the morning before competition. Sports drinks containing glucose are good to drink during competition to replace fluid and help to maintain blood glucose levels.

Call Us NOW At (619) 425-0888 To See How You Can Get Your Own Customized Meal Plans Along With A Training Regimen That Will Change Your LIFE For The BETTER!

The post Diet and Exercise appeared first on Alliance Training Center.

Article by LifeOptions
Why is exercise important to me?
No matter how old you are, exercise can make you stronger, more flexible—and keep your heart healthy. If you stay fit, you will be more able to do things, like go food shopping or visit friends.

Exercise gives you energy. Think of your body as a rechargeable battery. Exercise recharges you! It helps control blood pressure, too. If you are diabetic, exercise can lower blood sugar. It aids circulation and helps you sleep. Exercise can also help keep your bones healthy. Mood lifting chemicals are released in your brain when you exercise. So exercise can fight depression and help you feel more positive about your life.

How should I start to exercise?
First, tell your doctor that you want to exercise. He or she can make sure you do not have any special problems that would be made worse by a workout.

After checking with your doctor, write down a goal you would like to reach. Goals might be walking around the block without stopping, bike riding with your family, shopping at the mall with a friend, going dancing or joining Alliance Training Center!

Make an exercise plan that will work for you. What kind of person are you? Do you prefer to do things alone, or would a group help keep you motivated? Write down how often you will exercise, what time of day, and for how long. Start with small blocks of time, like 10 minutes every other day. Increase it by a minute or two each week.

How will I know exercise is helping?
It takes time—a few weeks or a few months—to feel better with exercise. Start a log or notebook. Keep track of when you exercised, what you did, and how it felt. You will be able to see your small but steady progress. This can keep you from getting discouraged and quitting. Once you reach your goal, set a new one. Exercise should become a long-term habit. It can also be fun!

Can people in wheelchairs exercise?
Yes. There are many stretching and strengthening exercises that can be done in a chair. Moving the arms (and legs, if possible) can help strengthen the heart. Using hand weights can build muscles.

Where can I find more information about exercise?
Call Alliance Training Center NOW at either of our locations: Chula Vista (619) 425-0888 | El Cajon (619) 258-2550

The post Just the Facts: Exercise for Life appeared first on Alliance Training Center.

Article by Mayo Clinic staff
Want to feel better, have more energy and perhaps even live longer? Look no further than exercise. The health benefits of regular exercise and physical activity are hard to ignore. And the benefits of exercise are yours for the taking, regardless of your age, sex or physical ability. Need more convincing to exercise? Check out these seven ways exercise can improve your life.

No. 1: Exercise controls weight
Exercise can help prevent excess weight gain or help maintain weight loss. When you engage in physical activity, you burn calories. The more intense the activity, the more calories you burn. You don’t need to set aside large chunks of time for exercise to reap weight-loss benefits. If you can’t do an actual workout, get more active throughout the day in simple ways — by taking the stairs instead of the elevator or revving up your household chores.

No. 2: Exercise combats health conditions and diseases
Worried about heart disease? Hoping to prevent high blood pressure? No matter what your current weight, being active boosts high-density lipoprotein (HDL), or “good,” cholesterol and decreases unhealthy triglycerides. This one-two punch keeps your blood flowing smoothly, which decreases your risk of cardiovascular diseases. In fact, regular physical activity can help you prevent or manage a wide range of health problems and concerns, including stroke, metabolic syndrome, type 2 diabetes, depression, certain types of cancer, arthritis and falls.

No. 3: Exercise improves mood
Need an emotional lift? Or need to blow off some steam after a stressful day? A workout at the gym or a brisk 30-minute walk can help. Physical activity stimulates various brain chemicals that may leave you feeling happier and more relaxed. You may also feel better about your appearance and yourself when you exercise regularly, which can boost your confidence and improve your self-esteem.

No. 4: Exercise boosts energy
Winded by grocery shopping or household chores? Regular physical activity can improve your muscle strength and boost your endurance. Exercise and physical activity deliver oxygen and nutrients to your tissues and help your cardiovascular system work more efficiently. And when your heart and lungs work more efficiently, you have more energy to go about your daily chores.

No. 5: Exercise promotes better sleep
Struggling to fall asleep? Or to stay asleep? Regular physical activity can help you fall asleep faster and deepen your sleep. Just don’t exercise too close to bedtime, or you may be too energized to fall asleep.

No. 6: Exercise can be fun
Exercise and physical activity can be a fun way to spend some time. It gives you a chance to unwind, enjoy the outdoors or simply engage in activities that make you happy. Physical activity can also help you connect with family or friends in a fun social setting. So, take a dance class, hit the hiking trails or join a soccer team. Find a physical activity you enjoy, and just do it. If you get bored, try something new.

No. 7: The bottom line on exercise
Exercise and physical activity are a great way to feel better, gain health benefits and have fun. As a general goal, aim for at least 30 minutes of physical activity every day. If you want to lose weight or meet specific fitness goals, you may need to exercise more. Remember to check with your doctor before starting a new exercise program, especially if you have any health concerns.

The post Exercise: 7 benefits of regular physical activity appeared first on Alliance Training Center.

Power is king. Improve your power and dominate your competition with these simple and effective movements.

In this 6-part series, I will briefly explain the essential pieces that comprise a complete strength and conditioning program for a MMA athlete.

The six components are:
1. Dynamic Warm-Up
2. Explosive Movements
3. MMA-Specific Resistance Training
4. Flexibility
5. Energy System Development
6. Regeneration Time

While we may not include all six components into every single session, they are the foundation for our complete 8 to 10 week camp.

Power – The amount of work performed per unit of time, or simply: force X velocity. I don’t think there is any argument that training power is a very important piece in a complete program. A powerful body is crucial for the sport of MMA. To throw a punch, defend a takedown, shoot a single, land a head kick; these all require power to be effective. Try to take your opponent down slowly and without any power behind it and you’ll be face first on the canvas.

The placement of power movements in my routines will vary:
→ I will use them as part of a medicine ball circuit early in the workout (video below).
→ I will use them as a stand-alone exercise during a session.
→ I will use them at the end of a 2 or 3-exercise complex. An example would be a set of deadlifts followed by a set of broad jumps.

For this article, I’m going to show you a common medicine ball power circuit I do with many of my pro MMA fighters. In our system, we traditionally perform these movements right after our dynamic warm-up and before any other strength training or accessory training scheduled for the day.

For these movements I like to use non-bounce “dead” or “jam” balls as opposed to a bouncier, rubber ball. While I like bouncy medicine balls for their deceleration properties that is not my training goal in this phase. When we are talking about power, we want to focus on the speed of the movement. The dead balls allow us to really drive up the kinetic chain (feet to legs to hips to shoulders to hands) and throw the ball as hard as possible without having to worry about it coming back. For example, try a med ball rotational wall throw with the two different types of balls and see the difference for yourself. You cannot fully explode with the bouncy ball as you have to be concerned with rebound. Again, I love this deceleration concern. In fact, I use bouncy med balls, slosh pipes, Kamagon balls, etc., all the time in my sessions. I just simply don’t use them here. With the dead ball, you can focus on the task at hand, fully load the hips and glutes, and drive the ball into the wall to achieve maximum speed and power.

For sets and reps, I typically have the guys perform 6-10 reps, 2-3 sets. If we are scheduled to do some additional strength training (think squat, deadlift, presses, pull-ups) afterwards, I won’t go too heavy on the volume here. I have played with different set/rep schemes and this seems to work best for most of the guys. If we did 5-6 sets, some of the guys were a bit tired for the rest of the workout and if we just did 1 set, we really weren’t seeing too much carry over into the ring. Of course there are many other factors involved; the rest of the exercise program, the rest of their training for the week, nutrition, sleep, girlfriend, stress, (aren’t those last two the same thing?), etc. My point is what works best for one may not be ideal for the other. These are currently some of the top movements we are using with the medicine ball. Give them a shot and improve the power in your game.

About Doug
Doug Balzarini is currently the strength and conditioning coach for the Alliance MMA Fight Team in Chula Vista, CA. He is also the founder of DBStrength.com, which provides fitness-related articles and education. Previously, Doug worked at Fitness Quest 10 for 6 ½ years as a personal trainer, strength coach, and Operations Director for Todd Durkin Enterprises (TDE).

A Massachusetts native, he earned his Bachelor’s degree in Exercise Science with a minor in Business Management from Westfield State University. Since moving to San Diego he has completed some graduate work in Biomechanics at SDSU, obtained an ACE Personal Trainer certification, the NSCA-CSCS certification, TRX instructor training, EFI Gravity instructor training, LIFT Sandbag Certification, Spinning certification, FMS training, and received his CPR/AED instructor status. He has also appeared in dozens of fitness videos, written numerous fitness articles, completed a MMA Conditioning Coach certification program and has competed in multiple grappling tournaments.

Prior to working at Fitness Quest 10, Doug worked for the American Council on Exercise as the Continuing Education Coordinator where he was responsible for managing over 400 continuing education providers.

For more information please visit www.dbstrength.com.

The post Critical Component Series – Power (2 of 6) appeared first on Alliance Training Center.

www.DBstrength.com Clip of a recent “play” day down at Mission Bay… The goal? Get around the apparatus without touching the ground. Great grip strength training routine. A possible ‘American Ninja Warrior’ tryout in my future…

The post Grip Strength Training At Mission Bay – American Ninja Warrior Style *VIDEO* appeared first on Alliance Training Center.

Quick clip with UFC athlete Brandon Vera showing a full body circuit using the TRX suspension trainer and the RIP trainer down at Alliance Training Center.

The post Strength Training at Alliance Training Center with UFC Fighter Brandon Vera appeared first on Alliance Training Center.

[flv:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M3OiKzryi4I 460 289]

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