Here’s my newest fitness rant, and one which is one of the biggest problems with most personal trainers and most of the media.

It’s to do with Core Stability.

When this term first started getting some headlines back about 10 years ago lots of people jumped on the idea that they could train and help people work on their core stability.

During this time we saw the proliferation of Pilates as it moved from a niche training regime almost exclusively used in the dancing arena to a mass participation fitness class designed to give anyone who participated in a class a ‘dancers’ like body.

We also saw the popularisation of stability balls and balance objects. As well as classes and equipment that claimed to be training your core stability – like some of those infomercial products.

Well it just doesn’t happen like that, the biggest problem is the ’spin doctors’, those people who look at the research and think I can use this to promote x, y or z.

In the majority of cases the people who spin it don’t actually understand what the science behind it all means and to what extent that can be utilised by the general population.

I’m not going to go into a whole long description of what core stability actually is as that would probably require some 1000’s of words.

Suffice to say what most people mean when they are talking about core stability, can better be classified as core strength – subtle differences in the two but very important ones.

Hope you enjoy it.

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It’s been a while since I posted, but here’s my latest fitness rant.

It’s the last of the deadlift rants and yet again one I see being done incorrectly not just by general gym goers, but by body builders and athletes alike.

In the New Year I have far more posts already planned so keep an eye out for those.

In the mean time if you are in to ‘Hardcore Workouts’ then you might want to check out this blog –

The Hardcore Workout

Here’s today’s rant!

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Here’s the next fitness rant and the second about deadlifts.

I first became aware of people doing deadlift like this (incorrectly that is) when I was playing professional rugby.

You would find some of the more ego driven rugby players lifting the deadlift like this so that they could feel really good about themselves and state that they could deadlift ‘x’ kg.

So take note if you want to lift weights from the floor with the correct technique.

Until next time.

Remember train hard, train smart, make every rep count.

Alex

If you want to see the correct technique then visit my other site Weight Training Technique by **clicking here**

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You would not probably believe the number of people that ask me that question.

If I got a £1 for every time…..blah, blah, blah (you know the rest).

I’m not sure where the ‘cardio is best for fat loss’ comes from but it is probably because some media types took some of the research out there and spun it into a story with out fully understanding what the research was actually doing.

So here is the truth as is known to a number of top fitness professional:

‘The best way to burn fat is to do interval cardio training rather than long slow boring cardio’.

It buns more fat, you get it done quicker and get the results you were looking for.

Listen to my rant on this below.

Remember train hard, train smart, make every rep count.

Best wishes,

Alex

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NB. Before you wonder what a man could know about the following, I did a project and presentation during my MSc on pre and post pregnancy exercise.

If you’ve just given birth then you are probably very aware that your body is definitely not looking as good as it could at the moment….understatement of the year I know.

Exercising to get rid of the excess weight and fat is by no means an easy task, but it is simple (I’ll share with you a fantastic programme later on). There are a number of things you have to be aware of before you start on a programme.

Your doctor or mid wife will give you the initial amount of time you should wait before starting any type of physical activity.

Usually this is between 4 and 8 weeks for a natural birth and 12 weeks or more for caesarean births.

There is a very good reason for both these recommendations.

Firstly, regardless of the type of birth you had, your body will have produced a hormone called relaxin. This hormone has the specific task of relaxing (hence the name) the ligaments in the pelvis which allow for the birth canal to become wide enough for the baby to leave the womb.

The problem with this hormone is that it does not distinguish between the pelvic ligaments and the other ligaments of the body. This means that if you start exercising too early you run the risk of damaging areas of classic instability like the knees or the low back, where the ligaments are too lax to control the stresses you may place upon them.

Secondly, if you had a caesarean birth you will need time for your abdominal muscles to heal and knit together. Unfortunately there is no fast tracking here, it will take time for the stomach muscles (which act to control all the forces through out the body) to heal from the incisions made during the procedure.

There are certain exercises you can do whilst waiting however. Exercises that strengthen the pelvic floor muscles are really important not just for helping with post birth problems such as incontinence but for strengthening the inner unit muscles that help with spine stability.

These muscles do not work like the big muscles on the outside of the body, so squeezing them as hard as you can is not the goal here.

Deep stabilising muscles like these work at 30% of maximal voluntary contraction (MVC). That means that if you were to squeeze your pelvic muscles 100% and then relax them by half, and then by half again you should be at about 25% MVC.

These muscles work like this because they need to work all day every day and are endurance based muscles.

If you don’t know how to contract these muscles already, how do you use them? Well that is quite easy, next time you are using the toilet to pass water try and stop mid flow. You’ve just used your pelvic floor!

So let’s say you’ve got past this initial 8 to 12 week period what next.

The best thing I can recommend to people is to use a plan and stick to it.

My friend Holly Rigsby has come up with the perfect programme. If you think it’s for you though I would wait until Monday 14^th to order it because she’s going to have a 3 day bonus sale where she’ll give you 5 extra bonuses to get you in the best shape of your life in 2008.

So go and check out the site, even download her great free report.

Whatever you do, do not order it until Monday or you’ll miss out on the extra bonuses. But make sure you get it by Wednesday because you’ll miss out otherwise.

Here’s the link again Fit Yummy Mummy (and she is living proof that you can be).

Just look at what one of her successful yummy mum has to say:

“I wish that I would have found Holly Rigsby’s Fit Yummy Mummy Program years ago as it would have saved me over 10k a year on my Personal Trainer! Holly has a clear understanding of how to get strong yet lean and gives you step by step advise. This the way you can change your lifestyle for it fits with your personal schedule BUT still manage time to take care of yourself. Seriously, if YOU do not take care of yourself, who will? I highly recommend the Fit Yummy Mummy Program to everyone as I have implemented her workouts into my routine and have seen great results.” ~ Posh Mama, San Francisco, CA Founder of Posh Mama Online Magazine and Social Network

Now there are no more excuses.

Until next time,

Train hard, train smart, make every rep count.

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