I’d imagine that many of you will be diving into the gyms in the new year, maybe even down here in Exeter, if so hopefully I’ll bump into you! Now if you’re new to the gym, please please make sure you get yourself an induction by a qualified trainer, otherwise you could find yourself in lots of bother! For starters, the trainers will teach you how to perform the exercises correctly, how to pair them together to meet your goals and show you the proper selection of reps and sets, again based on what you want to achieve.
Here’s a very common exercise in the gym, it’s called the Seated Row – it’s great for developing the back muscles, particularly in the upper area, and if you sit in an office all day, the seated row can really help to pull the posterior muscles back help you look taller and more confident!
More exercises like the one below can be found within Training Buddy
A bicep curl is an isolation exercise
I wanted to do a quick post today to show you the difference between what we call compound and isolation exercises. It’s quite important to know the difference if you’re using weights which you should know by now are important not only for building muscle, but also losing weight, as the more muscle in the body, the less room for fat. If you’ve not implemented strength training into your programme then you need to, and I’ve got a great solution for you which I’ll come onto in a moment.
But first of all, what’s the difference between a compounds and isolation exercise?
A compound movement is where several muscle groups are being used at once. So, in the example below we have a press up. The press up is a big ‘pushing movement’ which develops the pectorals (chest), triceps (back of arms, or bingo wings!) and delts (shoulders). A compound exercise is great because when multiple muscle groups are recruited, you get more bang for your buck – perfect if you’re short of time and want to get the whole body exercised. By putting a series of compound exercises together in what we call a circuit, you can seriously increase the heart rate, which is ideal for fat stripping workouts.
Compound = Pressup
Now an isolation exercise is where one muscle group is being recruited, such in the example below of the tricep kickback. These exercises are great if you’re looking to build a certain area of the body, but if you’re looking to get overall strength, you can easily make do with big compound movements. In my bootcamps we tend to work large muscle groups (compound), which create more of a hormonal response, thus generating more fat stripping and weight loss cells.
It would take three isolation exercises to get the same benefit of the pressup. You would have to perform a tricep exercise, a shoulder exercise and a chest exercise. By executing compound movements, these are what we call functional exercises, movements that your muscles would require for day to day operation, recruiting multiple muscles, at different intensities.
Isolation = Tricep Kickback
Where isolation exercises are definately beneficial, I think they tend to be overused for many people who simply want to lose weight – bigger compound movents such as squats, deadlifts and the above pressup are fantastic for both. People get conditioned in the gym to working all of the isolation machines, where they could simply hit the compound movements and get the same results. Plus remember your rep ranges 15 for toning, 12 for size and 8 and lower for strength. Having said that, you need to work until you feel uncomfortable remember, let the lactic acid in the muscles build up until it’s like a balloon about to pop!
If you’re looking for more exericse demos, with all the muscles used then head over to http://www.strength-training-anatomy-exercises.com
If on the other hand you’re looking for specific fat burning workouts then one of which I would highly recommend is Craig Ballantyne’s Turbulance Training System which I have arranged you a $4.95 trial of.
A common problem among many newcomers to exercise is their wrist strength, and I see many more women with this problem than men. If you’ve not performed structured exercise before then don’t be surprised if the muscles in your lower arm become weak and you can’t hold heavy weights for very long. This can hinder exercises such as the dead lift, which often need much more weight than your grip can hold initially. I’ve worked with many who simply can’t hold light dumbbells when performing simple pressing movements, the hands twisting and turning out of control, leaving the exercise unsafe, especially when working individually. So what’s the solution when starting out as it can be very frustrating…
First of all you can build up gradually – be sure so hold onto weights as long as you can to develop the muscles and condition them over a period of time. Holding and squeezing a tennis ball regularly is a good option, but many people don’t force themselves to perform this regularly.
Another alternative are wrist curls, please see the animated exercise below which you can perform on a bench with a barbell.
Another more modern version is to grab yourself a Powerball – these smart futuristic looking tools really get to work on developing the wrist and forcing it to work under pressure, with the weight distribution and intensity being continuously moved around.
So, here are your exercise animations for wrist curls and reverse wrist curls, taken from Training Buddy, the exercise animation software.
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