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The Underrated Full Body Exercise (that looks a little silly)

The Underrated Full Body Exercise (that looks a little silly)

by | May 27, 2024 | Blog, Exercises, Functional Fitness, Workouts

I know it looks a bit silly….

And I’m not expecting you to go into the middle of your commercial gym weight room floor and start doing it…

But the Towel Taz is an amazing, and deceptively hard conditioning drill that can be a great way to mix up your cardio sessions without all the impact and even put an emphasis on your upper body and core.

It can get you moving in every direction and be done no matter your fitness level.

And it doesn’t require fancy equipment.

Heck you can grab your comforter or even a sheet off your bed if you don’t have a moving blanket.

But I do want to break down the benefits of this amazing move because it can be done without any fancy equipment and is deceptively humbling!

The first reason I love this move, despite how silly it looks, is that it can be used with a variety of intervals to achieve different conditioning benefits.

You can use a heavier moving blanket and easily gas yourself out with quick 10-20 second sprints.

Or you can even learn to use it for more aerobic capacity building longer interval durations of even 1-2 minutes.

But no matter your fitness level you can vary the intensity and intervals you work in to get benefit from this exercise.

And it can really be tailored to what you want to work on – whether you want to focus more on intense quick bursts or more endurance!

And unlike so many of the conditioning drills we do, it gets you moving in every direction while being a full body drill!

When you often think about cardio, our first thoughts are often of running or biking.

If we’re thinking about bodyweight interval workouts, we may start to consider the basic burpee or jump squats, which really still are moving us only in one plane of motion.

And while I think there are some great variations of these moves that can be used to twist and turn and work in every direction, the Towel Taz is a great way to do this without the impact of jumping!

You shuffle laterally as you shake the towel up and down.

Or side to side.

You can circle.

Move forward, backward.

You’re not just moving in one direction like we are with running and riding and your whole body is working.

There is a lot of freedom to the movement, whether you want to make it more core intensive, rotating side to side as you move around…

Or you want to make it more shoulder and arm intensive, shaking the towel up and down.

And it conditions not only your lungs, but so many of the muscles that pay off for other sports.

That towel becomes way heavier than you’d expect and you’re going to feel your arms and shoulders.

This can be a great drill to help keep your shoulders healthy, while improving your conditioning for swimming, not to mention any fight sport.

You may even be surprised by how much it improves your upper body lifts, improving the strength endurance of your shoulders.

And by moving in every direction, you may feel your agility and even reaction times to cut, twist and turn improve. You see your balance and stability improve from your ankles up to your hips.

It also will add diversity to your routine as so many of the cardio moves we do are lower body focused.

While no, we can’t spot reduce an area and just do a thousand tricep exercises to try to lose the bat wing, this move does come in handy for that little extra fat loss benefit when our lifts and nutrition are dialed in.

Studies have shown that more fat is mobilized from areas AROUND the muscle we work. We just then need to UTILIZE that mobilized fat…and a little cardio focused on those areas strategically may make that 1% improvement.

Do your upper body lifting session then finish it off with a killer 30 on 15 off series of Towel Taz while making sure your nutrition is on point, and you may be surprised by how much that helps with that last little stubborn bit!

The Towel Taz can also be helpful if you’re not able to do some of the higher impact conditioning drills or lower body cardio exercises.

If you’ve had a lower body injury and have to reduce impact, you may feel limited in your conditioning drills.

This move can be done seated if needed or even by stepping or quick cuts to move around.

Honestly, this silly looking move is well worth the stares you may get.

And can be a great option if you’re training at home and looking to mix things up.

It is incredibly functional in how it asks us to quickly engage muscles and have so many things work in unison in every direction.

No it’s not a functional movement pattern you will directly do in everyday life, but the benefits of the mind-body connection, conditioning improvements and strengthening in every direction really will have you feeling fabulous.

Now I just wanted to add some quick tips to implement this move….

Use a big and heavy towel. Moving blankets are ideal as they won’t whip you and they have some weight to really challenge your upper body and core.

Focus on quick movements of both your upper AND lower body. While you may shake the towel up and down, shuffle and step in every direction.

If you even swing the towel side to side, focus on walking forward and backward.

Force your upper and lower body to work independently in different directions but together!

Make sure you focus on that exhale as you shake the towel and focus on a speed that challenges you for the intervals of work you’re performing.

If you’re doing 20 seconds, max out.

If you’re using this for 1 minute, consider more of a 65-75% of your max effort pace to push yourself to feel out of breath but be able to work the entire time.

But as much as you may be shaking your head no at your screen, give this move a chance.

It’s humbled many an MMA fighter and you may be surprised by how much it improves your conditioning to even be able to lift more, run faster and cycle further.

You may even be shocked at how much you see improvements in your ability to quickly react and move in every direction!

What untraditional exercises do you love?

Want more workout and nutrition tips? Subscribe to my YouTube Channel…

–> Redefining Strength On YouTube

 

15 Reasons To Build Muscle

15 Reasons To Build Muscle

by | May 12, 2024 | Blog, Exercises, Workouts

While cardio is important, we NEED to focus on building muscle with our training as well. And no, challenging yourself with heavy weights will NOT make you bulky…

But it may be the secret to you feeling like your leanest, strongest self till your final day on this planet…

Whether you’re a runner…

Want to achieve that six pack…

Or simply want to chase after your grandkids…

You need to prioritize building and maintaining muscle in your training.

Here are 15 reasons why you should care so much about that strength work and those muscle gains at any and every age.

#1: Muscle helps you look leaner.

If you’ve ever felt like you lose weight but don’t see any more definition and even just look skinny but soft, it’s because you’re not focusing on building muscle as you lose fat.

You may even be sabotaging yourself from looking more toned by seeking to lose faster on the scale. 

Because when we look to lose weight faster, we often do so at the cost of losing muscle.

And muscle is what helps us see that definition and look more toned. 

So even if your goal is fat loss, you want to focus your workouts on building lean muscle. 

Don’t slash your calories lower or turn to only cardio workouts!

#2: Muscle helps you KEEP the fat off.

Ever lost weight to feel like it just creeps back on? 

Getting older and feeling like your metabolism has slowed down?

This is often due to the fact that we’ve lost muscle!

And in losing muscle, we aren’t burning as many calories at rest. Not to mention resistance training also increases our metabolic rate.

So to help maintain your results, focus on building muscle to train harder, tackle more physical challenges and even better use the nutrients in your food, especially as you get older!

#3: Strength training protects and strengthens your skin.

With aging, we may find our skin becomes more papery and thin. 

But resistance training has actually been shown to improve our skin health. It increases our skin’s elasticity or the ability for it to bounce back as well as even our skin’s thickness!

This not only keeps our skin looking younger, and helps us fight against loose skin, but also even avoid seeing an increase in cuts and bruising as we get older. 

But focusing on strength training and building muscle isn’t just about looking fabulous, it’s also about moving your best! 

#4: Muscle powers our movements!

If you want to be functionally fit till your final day on this planet, you need to focus on building muscle.

It helps us maintain our capacity to move well and remain independent, decreasing our risks for falls and fractures.

Muscle is really the key to be able to conquer any physical challenges that come our way! 

Whether we want to get down and up off the ground playing with our grandkids or we’re an endurance athlete looking to set a PR and improve our speed and our endurance, muscle is the magic we need! 

#5: Muscle keeps our joints healthy.

Muscle supports our joints.

The stronger our muscles, the better the joint support and protection we have. 

Focus on building muscle with exercises that move you in every direction to keep your joints stable so you avoid the range of joint injuries we see adding up as we get older. 

This strength work to build muscle is especially key if you want to be able to train hard to build your leanest, strongest body ever or continue to even compete in sports you love. 

Not to mention this stability improves your balance, which helps you avoid falls and injuries!

And this strength work can even help ease the discomfort of any arthritis development as you get older.

#6: More muscle means stronger bones! 

Too often we just let ourselves get old.

But through building muscle, we can really keep ourselves feeling younger and stronger. 

We can help ourselves prevent so much of what we just write off as happening with age…like osteoporosis and a greater risk of fractures.

Do your resistance training, even if your strength work is more bodyweight based. 

Because not only does this strength work build strong muscles to protect your bones, it can actually improve your bone mineral density and promote bone development! 

This is even more essential for us ladies as we go through menopause!

And not only does muscle help you look fabulous and move better, it also improves your health in so many other ways… 

#7: Muscle improves your blood sugar levels.

Muscle helps increase insulin sensitivity.

Basically through resistance training and building muscle, you are then better able to handle carbs and move sugar into your muscles for storage.

This can be especially key during menopause when we are at greater risk for insulin resistance and even diabetes.

Along with being able to regulate your blood sugar levels better…

#8: Muscle also helps keep your heart healthy!

Strength training and building lean muscle can help you reduce your risk of cardiovascular disease and issues. 

It can help lower your blood pressure, lower LDL or bad cholesterol as well as your triglycerides, increase HDL or the good cholesterol and even improve blood circulation.

And while, yes, cardio workouts are key for heart health, too often we don’t recognize the importance of resistance training and building lean muscle. 

Recent studies have found a link between lower muscle mass and higher risk of cardiovascular issues.

So include resistance work and focus on building that lean muscle for your heart health. 

#9: Muscle improves our immune system!

More muscle means a larger reserve of amino acids, or the building blocks of protein which helps your immune system respond quicker to infection or disease.

This helps you not get as sick or stay sick as long. 

Muscle also helps reduce inflammation as weird as that sounds, since building muscle is about creating trauma to the muscles so they have to repair and grow stronger. 

But having on more muscle can help us reduce levels of chronic inflammation, which not only helps us stay healthy, but helps us reduce our risk for age related diseases, such as some cancers.

Now the important thing to note with this is…you can only build muscle and train hard if you are paying attention to your recovery. 

Under recover and you’re going to sabotage your immune system health instead.

#10: Muscle also aids in better recovery from injury and even disease.

Part of this goes back to the benefits muscle has for our immune system.

Muscle also plays an important role speeding up our recovery because it promotes blood circulation and aids in efficient nutrient transport or getting the areas of our body what they need quickly to rebuild. 

And while it’s great that muscle can help us recover, more importantly it can help us better AVOID injuries and illness in the first place.

In the process of building muscle we strengthen other connective tissues such as tendons and ligaments.

But if you are currently injured, don’t keep pushing through the pain.

Training around the injury or issue, to keep your system strong, is key.

This strength training releases myokines, which are messenger molecules from muscles released during and after your workouts. 

These molecules boost the immune system and have anti-inflammatory properties, which is why muscle can be so key in our recovery!

#11: Strength training improves mood and anxiety.

While I know we often hear about the “runner’s high,” and many enjoy running for the mental benefits, strength training also has been shown to really improve mood and reduce levels of anxiety and stress. 

Part of this is due to the fact that our muscle plays an important part in our overall endocrine system function. 

And that system helps control and regulate our body’s metabolism, energy level, growth and development, reproduction and even our response to injury, stress and mood.

This is even extra reason to include muscle building workouts in your routine, especially during menopause when changing hormone levels may impact our mood and anxiety levels, not to mention make it harder to build and retain lean muscle. 

#12: Muscle helps you feel more energized.

Having more muscle means you are better able to create fuel from the carbs you consume. 

And this is partly because more muscle means more mitochondria.

Mitochondria create fuel to energize you from the glucose you eat and the air you breathe.

More muscle also means improved circulation. 

And this allows your body to function better and use your energy supplies more efficiently.

Not to mention, you’ll also see improvements in your energy levels because muscle and strength training can also positively impact your sleep. 

Which is my next big reason you should care…

#13: Building muscle improves your sleep.

Some interesting research has shown that resistance training may not only improve the quality of your sleep but even the quantity you get. 

So not only may it help you sleep longer, but get more deep, restorative sleep.

One reason it is believed that resistance training may even beat out aerobic training for sleep benefits, although both help, is that lifting stimulates growth in muscles cells boosting both testosterone and growth hormone levels in the body. 

Both of these hormones have been linked with better, deeper sleep.

This again can be an extra reason to focus on building muscle, especially during menopause or as we get older, where we may see our sleep quality and quantity decline. 

And can also contribute to better brain function as well! Which brings me to my second to last key reason…

#14: Muscle helps keep our brain healthy.

From the mental challenge that resistance training provides…

To the benefits that muscle has on our circulation and blood flow…

To even the release of myokines which can have an impact on overall brain function…

More muscle has been shown to be connected to improved cognitive functioning or brain health. 

And maintaining more muscle, while continuing to strength train, as we get older has been shown to decrease our risk of dementia.

Not to mention if you’re experiencing brain fog during menopause, you may find this symptom reduced by focusing on strength training and building muscle. 

Basically, more muscle means you’re going to feel, look and move your best till your final day on this planet.

And this is the most important overall reason to care about building muscle…

#15: More muscle means a longer, healthier, better life! 

Whether it is conquering any physical challenges you set for yourself…

Whether it is moving well to stay independent till your final day on this planet…

Whether it is avoiding illness, injury or disease…

Or even simply feeling more energized, healthier and happier…

Muscle is truly magical.

So focus on that strength work at any and every age to feel your most fabulous!

Ready to build that lean muscle and feel your most fabulous at any and every age? Check out my 1:1 Online Coaching!

–> Learn More About Redefining Strength’s Coaching

JUST A FEW STUDIES:
Skin: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10290068/
Resistance Training Benefits: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22777332/
Sleep: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7718168/
Muscle-Organ Crosstalk: https://academic.oup.com/edrv/article/41/4/594/5835999?login=true#323027942

 

#1 Reason Your Workouts Aren’t Working (And How To Fix It)

#1 Reason Your Workouts Aren’t Working (And How To Fix It)

by | Mar 24, 2024 | Blog, Exercises, Workouts

Stop stringing together random moves. Stop just pulling random workouts that feel hard.

If you want results, your training sessions need to be designed with purpose.

You need to create routines that are actually focused on your goals.

Because training hard and training hard in a way that pushes you forward aren’t the same thing.

One is wasted effort.

The other is progression.

That’s why I want to go over the key factor in creating a workout plan that actually works as well as 3 amazing training techniques to help you build your leanest, strongest body ever!

Because there isn’t just one way to do things or one best workout.

No one best move.

No one best training split.

We need to stop ask what we “should” ideally be doing to start.

Instead we need to ask ourselves, “What is realistic for me based on where I am RIGHT NOW?”

Because even what used to work, may not fit our body or lifestyle now.

Ultimately what dictates what we need as much as our fitness goals is our schedule.

To see results, you have to design for the time you have.

DESIGN FOR THE TIME YOU HAVE:

Many of us have thought, “How many days a week do I need to train? For how long?”

We’ve sought out some ideal, but this stops us from designing for what is actually realistic for our schedules.

When we design for the time we have over getting caught up in some ideal of 1 hour a day, 6 days a week, we can create a routine we can actually be consistent with.

And consistency is key.

Honestly…Inconsistency is the biggest results KILLER.

Yet so often we set ourselves up for inconsistency in our workout routines by focusing on doing more or some ideal over first assessing what is truly realistic for our routines.

And that inconsistency has such a huge impact because your weekly schedule is built on everything working together.

When you design for 6 days a week, you’re using training splits, workout designs and even moves based on having all 6 days a week to train. 

Miss one of those days and the whole system isn’t going to give you the same benefit. 

That’s why you want to first ask yourself…

“What schedule is realistic for me?” 

When you’re looking to start a new routine.

Once you know your timeframe, how many days a week and for how long, you can then select workout layouts, moves, training variables that make the most out of your timeframe.

Because if you have 3 days a week to train you can use full body splits to hit areas 2-3 times whereas you may use more hemisphere splits alternating upper and lower to get the same volume and frequency over the week if you have 6 days to train. 

Design so that you don’t miss things and the system can work together!

Not to mention so often just because you have an hour to train doesn’t mean you should just add in MORE to fill the time.

If you have an hour, that can allow maybe for isolation moves for stubborn areas or extra rest to lift heavier.

But an intense speed or power workout still shouldn’t be made longer just because you have the time.

A intense sprint or HIIT workout SHOULD be short. 

So once you know your schedule, don’t forget your goal for your training progression. Sometimes you won’t need to use the time just because you have it!

That’s why, with designing for the time we have, it’s key we also stop seeing our workouts as strength OR cardio.

We will often even BLEND both to see the best results based on our schedule and goals!

STRENGTH-CARDIO CONTINUUM:

When thinking about our workouts, we need to think of strength and cardio not as an either or thing in our training, but more as a workout design continuum we can use to our advantage.

Because whether you’re doing what we more traditionally call cardio, which is that steady state endurance type activity….

Or even that more traditional, more low rep slow lifting we call strength…

You’re working an energy system, which is technically having an impact on your cardiovascular health AND your strength and muscle.

And working along this continuum can help you see amazing body recomp while truly designing for the time you have!

It can also help you work not only on your aerobic base but on your speed, power, work capacity, lactic threshold, recovery and so much more.

So we don’t want to see our workouts as either or to get better results.

We also need to be conscious of this continuum so that we aren’t just turning every strength workout into a cardio session, which could be fighting against our muscle gains.

When you design your workouts, stay focused on your goals, not just on making a session feel harder.

Because while a more metabolic strength session that’s more circuit based or even a timed set may be amazing for losing fat while retaining lean muscle during a fat loss phase, that same lack of rest or more metabolic element may be hurting your focus on muscle hypertrophy. 

Instead you may need to add in a bit more rest or switch it up to a superset or compound set design. 

The key is understanding that how we vary rest and cycle exercises in a workout, the overall workout design we use, and not only the types of moves we use, can impact the results we get – from the strength to cardiovascular benefits.

Not to mention we can use workouts that are a combination of some conditioning and strength work to our advantage, especially when we are short on time.

Because most of us DO need more efficient workouts to fit our busy schedules.

And too often not having enough time is our excuses for not being consistent with our training or seeing the results we want.

That’s why I wanted to share 3 training techniques that can help you not only get BOTH cardio and strength benefits but also be super effective in allowing you to see results while designing for the schedule that is realistic for you….

First, Use Interval Workout Designs For Your STRENGTH Workouts.

When we think of an “interval workout,” we think of a cardio session.

And, yes, this can make your lifting sessions a bit more metabolic.

You may find you get more out of breath.

But intervals can also be a great way to increase your training density, especially when you’re short on time to improve your strength and muscle gains.

By using intervals with more strength based lifting exercises, you can help yourself achieve amazing body recomp, building muscle, improving your work capacity and even your recovery.

You can use interval workouts whether you’re doing more of an anterior/posterior split or even full body routines.

But set an interval of work, generally a minute for more strength exercises is good, using an exercise and load that challenges you so that you are almost working past failure in that time. 

In back to back intervals even alternate areas worked so one muscle group can rest as you continue to use the time you have efficiently to work another area. 

But during each interval of work, because the goal of this session is still building strength and muscle, challenge yourself so you need to pause for a second or two.

This pause to completely more reps means you were challenging yourself with loads. And generally at that pause with traditional reps and sets, we would have STOPPED and moved on. 

But because we still have time in that interval to work, we do more!

This ultimately helps you lift more quality loads in a shorter amount of time, creating an amazing stimulus for muscle growth even when you need a quicker training session!

Interval strength work done this way, also implements the second training technique that can help you be more efficient in your workouts…

#2: Rest Pause Technique.

Rest-Pause Technique has many offshoots and usages.

But in its most basic form, you will perform reps until you need to pause, then rest for generally 15-30 seconds, before trying to eek out a few more reps with the same loads. 

In the interval work, you want to rest no more than a few seconds to keep moving.

With things like cluster sets, you may use this brief pause but with smaller sets that don’t fully take you to failure, but allow you to lift heavier than you would be able to had you just done all reps straight. 

But using this brief rest allows you to not only increase your training density, doing more reps in a shorter amount of time, but also often lift MORE weight in that same timeframe as you can go heavier for the same volume because of the rest.

You will find this improves not only your strength but also your muscle gains and even strength endurance.

And you may be surprised too by how much you see your recovery times improve in your other conditioning work even!

Now, this final technique I want to share goes against what we often think to do when we’re short on time and designing efficient workouts…

But I want to share it because it highlights how many opportunities and options there are out there to make things match what we need and progress over time.

Too often we get stuck feeling there is only one right way, and then miss out on an option that is different but could be the switch up we need.

Usually when we are short on time, we design our workouts to cycle areas worked. 

This allows one area to rest as another is worked.

So in a circuit or set back to back moves may be one upper then one lower body exercise instead of back to back moves for the same muscle group. 

But you may want to break this rule at times if you are really focused on those muscle gains, especially for stubborn areas.

This is where Post-Exhaust technique can come in handy, especially for more advanced lifters!

#3: Post Exhaust

With post-exhaust technique, you are working the same muscle group with back to back moves, usually using a compound exercise even followed by an isolation move to hone in on one of the muscles that was just worked. 

This can help you work past failure in another way and recruit more muscle fiber to improve your muscle growth and strength gains.

But because you’re doing a high volume of very focused work for an area in a short amount of time, it can help you see better results even when you’re workout schedule is more limited.

You aren’t giving an area a chance to recover yet you’re working at an intensity with the change up in moves that allows you to keep that quality of work.

By pairing these two moves together back to back as then you even cycle between pairing that target different areas, you’ll be able to use all 3 drivers of muscle growth very efficiently. 

BONUS: You can even do post-exhaust in an interval design, working the same muscle in back to back intervals!

And you may be surprised by how much you feel your blood pumping without doing anything you’ve usually thought of as remotely cardio! 

So just remember, there are lots of ways to use different moves, techniques, and workout designs to our advantaged based on the time we have.

And we don’t have to see our workouts as just cardio or strength.

But we need to make sure we design everything with purposed focused on meeting ourselves where we are at to move forward toward our goals.

And be realistic with what you need.

Design for the time you have!

Want amazing workouts designed to help you rock those results no matter your fitness level, schedule or the equipment you have?

Check out my Dynamic Strength program!

–> LEARN MORE

If You’re Not Building Muscle, Try These 5 Training Techniques

If You’re Not Building Muscle, Try These 5 Training Techniques

by | Jan 28, 2024 | Blog, Exercises, Workouts

We can’t out exercise our diet.

HOWEVER, while many of us have heard that diet is more important, I’d actually argue they both matter equally especially in that both need to work together.

And so often we don’t place enough importance on proper training because we’ve only seen our workouts as a chance to burn more calories.

But our training shouldn’t be about the calorie burn.

It should be about building muscle.

When we focus on better movement and building strength and muscle in our training, we create true muscle growth.

Without proper stimulus, no matter how you eat, you won’t build muscle.

So while our diet is especially important to lose fat, and important to make sure we fuel our training sessions to gain…

Our workouts have to be designed strategically if we want to improve our body composition.

And this honestly means going against what most of us have always done to lose weight…

Instead of more cardio, we often need less.

And we need to stop turning our lifting sessions into simply cardio workouts – cutting out more rest and adding a ton of volume.

Now note…I’m not telling you that cardio isn’t important to your health and that you can’t do it if you enjoy it…

I do want to make it clear that to build muscle so we can lose fat faster, we can’t default back into this cardio, calories, do more training mindset.

That’s why I want to share 5 training techniques to help you build muscle, which in turn will boost your metabolic rate and help you look leaner faster…

Training Technique #1: Focus on double progression.

If it challenges you, it will change you.

But just because your workout feels hard doesn’t mean you’re creating a consistent progression so your muscles have to adapt and grow stronger week after week.

That’s why it’s key we not only progress the movement, adding weight, slowing down the tempo, doing a harder variation, but also adjust our exact reps to create that week over week progression.

Using these two forms of progression to complement we can ultimately move more loads over our training sessions, resulting in faster and better gains.

Often when we have a workout there will be 8-12 reps listed.

Let’s say right now you’re doing 12 reps of front lunges with 20lbs dumbbells and you manage that for all 4 sets you have assigned.

It feels hard.

Good.

But you’re at the top of the rep range so next week, GO UP in weight or progress the move in some way.

If you can still do 12 reps that first round, go up in weight for that next step until you can’t do 12 reps.

Let’s say on your 3rd round, you hit 8 reps with 35lbs dumbbells. Maybe you stick there for the final round.

The next week instead of going up in weight, you try to get out 9 or 10 reps. Once you can again do 12 reps, you again want to go up.

This double form of progression is the perfect way to max out the loads you can lift with volume and truly make sure you’re challenging yourself to create that muscle growth!

Training Technique #2: Train areas more frequently with the same but different.

Studies have shown that training an area 2-3 times a week can be optimal for muscle growth.

This doesn’t mean do 1000s of reps multiple times a week. It means definitely dropping volume a bit per session to increase the frequency and spread it out.

This allows for often more QUALITY volume as you may notice you are fresher for all the exercises and sets spread out over more days over doing that same volume in one.

This also allows you to use a diversity of movements and tools to work the same muscles.

And this can be key because changes in posture and position alone can impact even what aspects of a muscle are worked.

For instance a Romanian deadlift works the hamstrings through hinging at the hips. A seated leg curl works the hamstrings with knee flexion with flexed hips while a bridge and curl works the hamstrings with knee flexion with extended hips.

All three are different postures that address different aspects of that hamstring muscle group. And including three different moves over the 3 days can be key for optimal gains.

So don’t repeat just the same move 3 times a week. Consider different types of movements, ranges of motion and even different tools!

Training Technique #3: Combine rep ranges in a single workout.

If you want to gain muscle, you want to use a variety of rep ranges combined.

This can not only help you build strength and improve your strength and endurance and recovery, but even target stubborn muscles and push them past failure to see better results.

Some of you may have seen my 6-12-25 workout progressions in previous YouTube videos and podcasts, but this design is so fabulous because it does include maximal strength, hypertrophy and strength endurance rep ranges in a single series – moving from compound to more isolation exercises.

This helps you get in that quality of movement while isolating those more stubborn areas.

So don’t fear higher reps. Don’t fear lower reps.

Include a diversity in a single session even.

But be conscious of the types of moves you use with each.

Often in our workouts we want to go more compound to more isolated, with heavier lower rep work first and the higher rep, more isolated work later to work a muscle fully to fatigue.

However, like in the 6-12-25 and even compound burners, you can use 2 or even 3 rep ranges combined to lift heavy for lower reps then right after isolate that muscle that is already fatigued to recruit more muscle fibers with higher rep work.

And note, while you will go “lighter” with higher rep work, you aren’t going light.

Especially when you are working with higher reps, to push yourself, consider using a weight or variation you have to pause to get out 5 more and hit in the middle or top of the range.

That need to pause and do 5 more past failure is so key to those amazing gains!

Training Technique #4: Do more timed workouts.

Too often when we want to lose weight, our workouts get longer and longer as we add in more and more.

But this often just burns us out and leads to a lot of wasted volume.

By doing intervals or work or even timed sets, we can increase our training density without our workouts getting longer.

We can focus on that quality work and create that density by just trying to do MORE in the time set out.

I find that often when I use intervals over having do count a certain amount of reps, I eek out reps I wouldn’t have done had I been able to stop at 6. I end up doing 8 because I have the time and have to work through it…even if I have to pause for a second.

I also find I’m focused and more intentional over just rushing through because I can’t finish any faster.

And when it comes to timed sets or circuits, like Density Sets, you can lower the reps and increase the weight and keep moving the entire time to actually lift more quality loads without your workouts getting longer.

So consider timed intervals of work or timed sets to help yourself really push with each rep over simply doing MORE.

Especially since so many of us complain we don’t have enough time, why not plan for what you have and really be intentional and focus on quality with every rep!

Honestly the only reason our workouts should ever get longers is because we have the time and do more mobility work OR have increased rest periods to lift heavier with lower reps or to do more high intensity true sprint work.

Workouts become longer because of recovery not because we’re doing more work!

Training Technique #5: Vary intensity of workouts and type of drivers.

For the best results, some workouts should feel easy. Not every workout should slaughter you.

Because if you don’t recover, you can’t train at a true 100% intensity.

Not to mention, if you’re tearing down muscles constantly, they can’t regrow stronger.

It’s a cut. If you’re constantly working and picking off the scab, it’s not going to heal back!

You’ve got to give it time to heal…although unlike a cut we do want to reopen the wound to make our muscle feel pushed to adapt more and more!

So over the course of your week, vary what areas you are working. Give muscles time to recover.

And vary the intensity of your workouts. This helps areas recover while still driving growth. And it also helps you MENTALLY stay focused and push hard when you need.

We can’t mentally make ourselves extremely uncomfortable every session or we will burn out. So having a workout or two each week that isn’t taxing, especially programmed on busy days, can actually help you get more quality work done overall for the week.

And those recovery sessions can help you move better in future workouts.

So vary intensity!

And this doesn’t just mean easy or hard workouts. It also means varying the types of movements and what driver of muscle growth you use as some create more muscle tissue damage and take longer to recover from.

For example, maybe one day you do a deadlift, another a hip thruster and the 3rd day you include only mini band work for your glutes.

These all use different drivers of muscle growth and allow you to train your glutes 3 times that week and go hard in each session without just constantly beating your body down!

So consider the types of movements you’re using and even the tools!

WARNING: Stop seeking to be sore.

I mean this because if you vary intensity and use different drivers or muscle growth, you won’t be sore all of the time.

GOOD!

Soreness is not an indicator you worked hard enough.

And while it can feel good and satisfying at times to know you pushed, not being sore doesn’t mean you didn’t work hard.

Honestly, you shouldn’t constantly be sore if you’re truly creating progression to build.

Over the weeks of your workout progression, you should feel like you can even do more, more easily without getting sore.

Because soreness is often just an indicator we did something new or different.

That we didn’t give ourselves enough recovery.

That we focused only on the eccentric and mechanical tension as a driver of muscle growth.

That we aren’t eating enough.

Or hydrating well.

Constant soreness actually means we’re probably not doing something we need to see results.

So focus on that clearly mapped out progression you repeat and track those numbers to see progress instead of just pushing to be sore!

Looking for amazing workouts to take your training to the next level and help you see fabulous body recomp results?

Check out my Dynamic Strength Program!

 

How to Lose Fat AND Gain Muscle At The Same Time (Step By Step)

How to Lose Fat AND Gain Muscle At The Same Time (Step By Step)

by | Jan 2, 2024 | Blog, Diet, Workouts

What should I do first…I want to build muscle and lose fat?

The great thing is…

You CAN do both at the same time!

But how you do that may depend on where you are currently in your fitness and body composition journey.

While you can achieve both goals, you do need to set a primary focus as that will impact how you adjust your diet to start.

That’s why in this video I want to break down two different nutritional approaches to body recomp whether you want to lose fat as you retain and gain lean muscle or you want to gain muscle as you maintain your level of leanness while potentially getting even leaner!

And then I want to share a bonus workout tip to help you make sure your diet and workouts are working together.

Now if you’re thinking, “But I heard this wasn’t possible to lose fat and gain muscle at the same time.”

I’m going to let you in on a little secret…

It is possible.

It just takes embracing something that so many of us want to run from…

A habit so many of us have labeled boring and tedious and hard…

Tracking macros! 

Now before you just write this off and click back saying tracking macros isn’t for you, I want to explain why it is so key and a SIMPLIFIED approach that can yield amazing results…

So that person that has said to you…“You can’t lose fat and gain muscle at the same time?”

It’s probably because they’ve always dieted by just cutting their calories super low. 

They lost weight, but probably often have also lost muscle in the process.

They may have even gotten skinny without really looking more toned. 

So they decide they want to build muscle to get more defined, so they eat in a surplus. 

They end up, yes, putting on muscle. But also gaining fat. 

So they then go back in a calorie deficit, repeating the same rollercoaster over and over again. 

They may try a bigger deficit to lose faster or a bigger surplus to gain.

More is better right?

WRONG.

These bigger extremes may actually lead to their body composition becoming WORSE.

It is because while we can lose or gain weight simply by creating a calorie deficit or surplus, we aren’t controlling for what we are losing or gaining. 

We aren’t controlling for fat loss or muscle mass retention.

This is something we CAN control by adjusting our macros.

And one macro in particular – our protein intake. 

Increasing our protein intake is key.

High protein diets have been the only diets shown to not only help us retain lean muscle but even GAIN lean muscle mass while in a deficit. 

And increasing your protein intake while in a surplus, due to the thermic effect of this macro, can help you avoid gaining unwanted fat while making it easier to build muscle due to the extra energy consumption.

So if you’ve struggled to embrace tracking macros in the past but really want to see those defined abs and arms…

It’s time to start tracking…at least your protein intake!

While in a calorie surplus, you may get away with slightly lower protein intakes than in a deficit as long as you are consuming enough carbs as well as instant fuel, going even higher while in a deficit due to the fact that you’re not really consuming enough of anything is key. 

While you may consume about 30-35% of your calories from protein in a surplus, you will want to bump that to more like 40% of your calories from protein while in a deficit. 

Starting out don’t worry where your carbs or fat fall.

Just first only focus on that protein intake.

Doing this alone will lead to amazing results and you’ll be surprised by how much you see those inches being lost and the definition popping through in your progress photos.

But that high protein really is what yields that body recomp magic. 

So even if you’ve been resisting tracking macros, set that percentage to hit of your calories from protein and adjust the current foods you eat through small tweaks to see results.

Here’s a video that has 7 tips to help you easily bump protein!

But before you decide on exactly what protein percentage to use, you have to determine your calories.

Which should you be in – a calorie deficit or a surplus? 

And that depends on your main focus.

While the goal is to lose fat as you gain muscle or gain muscle as you lose fat, you have to have a primary target.

What is your main focus?

This will be based on your current leanness level. 

Are you currently basically as lean as you’d like and would like to add more muscle while just staying lean? 

Or do you have more weight to lose but really want that muscle definition especially to stay strong as you get older?

If you’re already lean, consider a calorie surplus to focus a bit more on gaining muscle without any fluff. 

If you’re not yet at your weight loss goal, consider a calorie deficit to start to help you lose fat without losing muscle. 

Exactly how great a calorie surplus or deficit you create can also impact the results you get and be based on where you are in your fitness journey. 

If you have more weight to lose, 500 calories is the most extreme you want to go with a deficit below your maintenance. But this is really aggressive and best only done if you have more than 50lbs to lose and aren’t as active.

Otherwise to help focus on losing fat without also costing you muscle, consider a deficit of only 100-300 calories at max. Think closer to 300 if you have over 15 pounds to lose and more like 100-200 if you have less than 15 pounds are are super active!

If you are already basically as lean as you’d like or even as thin as you’d like although you wouldn’t mind more definition, you will want to consider a small surplus. 

Since you don’t really have energy stores to tap into, and you want to be able to push hard in your training to create that progression and stimulus for muscle growth, the extra calories will help you make sure you’re retaining that lean muscle. 

Think 100-200 calories above maintenance unless you’re truly as lean as you’d like and really increasing your activity level – then go 300-400 calories.

Especially if you are just coming out of a deficit, slowly increase those calories only 100 at a time! 

As essential as your diet is to losing fat and gaining muscle at the same time, the best results happen when our diet and workouts work together. 

And without that stimulus for muscle growth in our training, we won’t see our nutritional changes fully pay off. 

That’s why I wanted to share a bonus tip with you about what workouts are best to see body recomp.

Bonus Tip: 

Now you may be thinking, do I need workouts for fat loss or for gaining muscle.

And I had a client even email me recently, “How do I know if a workout is for fat loss or building muscle?”

My email back said, “A good fat loss workout should be focused on building muscle.”

Muscle is metabolism magic. 

Our training shouldn’t be about burning calories in our sessions and feeling destroyed.

It should be focused on building lean muscle. 

We need that training stimulus for growth if our diet is going to have an impact. 

And the more muscle we have, the more calories we will burn during the day, making it easier to lose fat.

Muscle stokes our metabolic fire and helps us avoid metabolic adaptations as we lean down. 

So your training should be focused on building lean muscle no matter your aesthetic goal focus.

Sure if you love endurance sports, you don’t have to ditch them. 

But even then strength training will only help you get stronger at what you love.

So focus on building strength in your training no matter what.

And for a great workout design to help you see those strength gains, check out my 6-12-25 protocol.

–> 6-12-25 Workout Technique 

This is an amazing way to build muscle and strength no matter you age!

Using these tips you can build muscle and lose fat…or lose fat as you gain muscle. 

You can see the body recomp you deserve but you need to TRACK.

What gets measured gets managed so we can adjust and see better results faster!

Ready to achieve amazing body recomp, losing that stubborn fat?

Join my Metabolic Shred!

7 Big LIES About Exercise and Aging

7 Big LIES About Exercise and Aging

by | Oct 9, 2023 | Blog, Exercises, Functional Fitness, Mindset, Workouts

The best way to feel and look old really quickly is to stop doing all the things that kept you healthy.

Too often we hit an age that we deem “old” and stop pushing ourselves the way we used to in our training.

Heck I even found an article on WebMD about exercises to avoid after 50 and it said…

“Lifting weights is a great way to build muscle strength, but when you’re over 50 there is no reason to push yourself too hard.”

I’m sorry….NO.

While we can’t change our age, at any time we can make changes to move and feel our best.

And the best way NOT to see results is NOT to challenge yourself.

Use it or lose it.

Getting older doesn’t mean you now should stop pushing yourself to conquer new challenges or step outside your comfort zone.

Getting older actually makes it even more important that you do so that you stay healthy and strong till your final day on this planet!

That’s why in this video I want to refute 7 reasons I often hear people use as excuses not to push themselves outside their comfort zones when it comes to their strength training once they hit whatever age they believe to be “old.”

Myth #1: I shouldn’t push myself too hard. 

I can’t even describe the spasms my face wants to go into stating that myth even for the 100th time.

No wonder we’re seeing more injuries, more cognitive decline…

No wonder we think aging just means gaining weight and getting out of shape?! 

We’re promoting attitudes that perpetuate that!

I don’t care if you’re 20 or 90, you need to CHALLENGE yourself with your training to keep pushing your body to adapt and grow stronger and MAINTAIN your strength. 

Sarcopenia, or muscle loss, is so prevalent because we’ve too easily adopted the belief that we don’t need to push ourselves with our training. That with age we deserve to be lazy.

But if you want to stay strong and fit and even mentally with it till your final day on this planet, you NEED to push yourself to feel worked in your workouts. 

This doesn’t mean every session should slaughter you. But it shouldn’t be that way at any age. 

But every single workout you do want to create that progressive overload and do something hard.

We build and retain lean muscle through pushing our bodies to do more than they could the previous session!

Myth #2: X Move Is Bad And Dangerous. 

You can get hurt training at any age.

And as someone who has learned a lot since their early meathead days, I would say we actually end up being smarter in our training as we get older as we often appreciate the value of just moving well over letting ego dictate what we do. 

BUT no matter our age we have to stop just demonizing exercises. Or blaming exercises for aches and pains.

Squats don’t hurt your knees.

Bad squats or recruitment patterns with loads you haven’t earned do. 

And unless you don’t ever plan to sit down to a toilet again, it would be in your best interest to learn to really control and retrain that squat movement pattern as much as you can!

If you want to be able to do a movement or maintain your mobility, you need to train that movement pattern in the gym!

Regress to progress.

Training only leads to injury when we haven’t earned a move or misuse a move. 

By doing a move that doesn’t match your needs and goals, you can get injured at ANY age. 

Often the fact that we even did moves with ego when we were younger, is what has now led to the aches and pains we even have.

But training isn’t dangerous.

We need to even see the gym as an opportunity to PRACTICE proper movements so that we are at less risk for injury in everyday life. 

The gym is a perfect place to learn to move well. 

Just don’t be afraid to regress to progress and focus on intentionality with your movement to earn those advancements! 

Because if you train smarter and not just harder, you put yourself at less risk for injury getting up and down of the ground or lifting that box!

Myth #3: I shouldn’t lift too heavy.

First off, what is too heavy?

A weight you can’t lift?

Something you can’t lift with proper form?

If that’s the case, you shouldn’t EVER lift too heavy.

But if you don’t challenge your muscles, you won’t create that stimulus for muscle growth. 

And we want to do everything we can to promote that environment for growth as we will find it gets harder and harder to build muscle the older we get!

But especially as we get older we need to focus on maintaining maximal strength. 

That means NOT shying away from lower rep, heavy weight work in our training.

Maximal strength work means we are better able to prevent falls and fractures and are not only stronger, but have more lean muscle mass which keeps our bones healthy and helps us look leaner. 

So lift heavy for strong bones and a lean physique! 

Stop defaulting to only doing 15-20 rep work with lighter loads.

Push those heavy weights as you earn them and build up to keep yourself strong and your metabolic rate higher! 

Myth #4: I have (insert health concerns here). 

We always want to address injuries and health concerns with our training routines.

But this should be the case at any age.

However, too often, as we get older and more health concerns may pop up, we see this as a reason to stop pushing hard in our workouts or train at all. 

When often training will help us improve our health and can even combat many of our symptoms!

Strength work can help reduce chronic inflammation. It can reduce our risk for osteoporosis. It can improve our cognitive functioning.

It can help us sleep better to recover from illness faster.

It can help us maintain our bone health. 

It can even help us retrain movements and strengthen muscles to overcome injuries. 

It can help us move and feel a whole heck of a lot younger. 

Overall, strength training is linked with a 10%–17% lower risk of heart disease, total cancer, diabetes, lung cancer and death from any cause. (According to a review study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine (2022; 56 [13])) 

Yet so often we let health concerns stop us instead of finding a way to strengthen around them. And THAT is what makes us feel older so much faster!

Find ways to regress moves and address what you need to focus on feeling the correct muscles work.

Design workouts around your schedule based on the intensity you need. And start back slow. 

But the key is to START and to focus on building, meeting yourself where you are at!

Myth #5: I shouldn’t do awkward moves. 

As we get older, we are less willing to make ourselves feel uncomfortable or awkward or even bad at something.

When we’re young, we embrace it more as we encounter new things on almost a daily basis even. 

But as we get older, we don’t like to push to do new things that feel awkward and uncomfortable. 

The thing is…we need to.

Those awkward moves improve our mental health.

They also keep our mind-body connection strong which allows us to react more quickly in everyday life. 

Many even improve our balance and core strength, especially if they are single sided moves! 

And these moves help us even build muscle, creating progression in different ways, changing the range of motion, stability and even tempos.

They challenge not only our body but even our mind to keep us younger and healthy!

And ladies, studies have shown even greater benefits from physical activity in terms of our thinking speed as we get older! 

Myth #6: I can’t build muscle. 

Yup. It does get harder to build and retain lean muscle as we get older.

But trying to use this as an excuse to not even try?

NOPE!

It is even more reason to push hard and lift heavier! 

It’s also a reason to cut back on the chronic cardio, which can not only cause more inflammation and joint issues, but lead to us struggling even more to build and retain lean muscle. 

Instead we need to do everything we can to combat the fact that we don’t have the optimal hormone levels for muscle growth Any exercise we once did and we don’t utilize protein as efficiently. 

We need to do everything we can to focus on lifting heavy, challenging ourselves and pushing hard in our training while including adequate recovery. 

This is the only way we can build muscle and at least make sure we maintain what we already have as the more we lose through inactivity, the more we will struggle to get it back the older we get!

Myth #7: I can’t recover as quickly so I shouldn’t do as much. 

We may find that our recovery does change as we get older, especially even during menopause when our sleep may be impacted more.

But this is all the more reason to train with purpose and design intentional workouts that we can be CONSISTENT with. 

Because the more inconsistent we are, the harder we make it on ourselves to recover.

We don’t often realize that, as we’ve gotten older, we actually are less consistent in having that set gym training routine.

And that inconsistency can make every workout feel new to our body, so we are constantly getting sore.

Make sure to set a schedule you can be consistent with. 

Then don’t randomly string together moves or workouts without a plan.

Create a set schedule you repeat for a few weeks so you can slowly progress and build each week.

This will help improve your recovery over always feeling beat down.

Plus, including mobility work and not feeling pressure to do wasted volume may not only help you recover faster but even build strength more efficiently from your training. 

Often less is more and too often, when we’re younger, we do more just because we can or because we’re trying to out exercise our diet.

So see this as an opportunity to make some changes that lead to even better gains!

Define aging on your own terms.

Stay strong till your final day on this planet by never stopping to push yourself and challenge yourself. 

Include those strength workouts that make you uncomfortable but that meet you where you are at to see fabulous muscle and strength gains at any and every age! 

For an amazing community of women building their leanest, strongest bodies at any and EVERY age, join my Free Facebook Group!