We all want healthy hearts and we want to do everything we can to maintain terrific cardiovascular health. The old, traditional notion is that in order to strengthen the heart, you need to elevate your heart rate for an extended period of time by participating in specific “cardio” activities, like jogging and biking. But keep in mind that when you go for a jog you’re using your legs and swinging your arms – you’re not working your heart directly. Instead, you’re placing a direct demand on your muscles, which in turn are placing the demand on your heart. Your heart cannot differentiate between the effort from riding a bike or doing squats. It simply responds to the demand for oxygen and nutrients from working muscles.
Recent studies have shown that the heart can be improved more efficiently by placing intense demand on the muscles via strength training and interval training, rather than through steady state activities. This is incredibly valuable information because while steady state activity might end up strengthening the heart, the orthopedic side effects can be terribly destructive.
As a city’s population expands there is an increased demand for services such as better transportation, infrastructure, food markets and so on. Conversely, when a population shrinks services begin to disappear. The efficiency and functionality of your body also depend on supply and demand. Your cardiac function, like the transportation system of a metropolis, is dependent on the need for that function. The more muscle you build, the further out you build your city—and the more tracks, freeways and bus routes your body must construct in order to meet the increased demand. In the same way, your cardiovascular system must become stronger and more efficient as you build muscle, in order to transport nutrients to the cells. Additionally, not only does the cardiovascular system improve, others improve too, including your nervous, endocrine, skeletal and digestive systems.
How Can the Power of 10 Help With Diabetes?
Simply Stated – Better Insulin Control
If you are pre or destined to be a diabetic, there are many things you can do to stave off the disease. If you have diabetes already, the Power of 10 can help you get your diabetes under control. To burn more fat, it’s essential to keep your blood sugar levels low. A Power of 10 workout will deplete your muscles of stored sugar, aka, glycogen, and in essence increase your muscles' appetite for sugar. In conjunction with a low-carbohydrate diet, and with your muscles sucking up any remaining sugar, insulin levels are suppressed – and that’s a good thing. It triggers your stress hormones, adrenaline, and epinephrine to activate a process to metabolize large amounts of fat (aka triacylglycerol) to be used for fuel. Too much blood sugar, however, derails this process. Your insulin will block fat metabolism and will instead direct that sugar to be stored as fat.
The key to improving your bone density is strength training. Building muscle directly increases bone density by putting increased stress on the bones, making them stronger, healthier, and less prone to fractures and breaks. Not only does increased bone density slow the devastating bone loss associated with getting older, it also helps to counteract any future loss by building additional bone matter.
How – You Ask?
Muscle building spurs the osteoblasts which are the crucial cells responsible for building new bone mineral. Your new muscle mass will also serve to protect your bones, guarding them against injury and cushioning the blow in case of a fall.
There are numerous benefits from resistance training to improve bone density, which to name but a few, are increased bone mineral density, increased strength, and an increased ability to perform activities. You can read more from a recent study, “The Benefits of Strength Training for Bone Density.”
We all say that we want to lose weight but really what we want is to lose that flab. We have good news and a dose of reality. Exercise alone is not going to be enough to accomplish that goal. No amount of exercise alone can make up for an unbalanced diet, high in the empty calories found in carbohydrates and sugar that we’ve come to exist on these days.
InForm Fitness can certainly help you achieve your weight loss goals with the Power of 10 strength building exercise system as it forces the body to use your excess fat as fuel.
By building up your muscle we can help you to lose weight. Muscle makes up of over 40% of our total body mass and is the greatest consumer of your body’s energy stores. By adding 5-10 lbs. of muscle, you can burn a whopping 300 extra calories a day staying sedentary. That’s great news right? But the caveat is that you will only lose fat and weight if you also “eat to lose.” Healthcare professionals recommend a diet that is low in sugar and grain-based carbohydrates, such as pasta, bread, rice, and cereal.
How Can InForm Fitness Help?
We can help improve your game in several ways. First of all with our once-a-week, 20-minute workout you won’t be spending all your spare time at the gym. That means more time on the course perfecting that swing. The strength building you will get from the Power of 10 workout will reduce your risk of injury that would otherwise take you out of the game.
Strength training with InForm Fitness not only improves your muscle strength but it also improves your joints, providing a better shock absorber able to protect you from common injuries sustained from sports activities. Should you become injured or require surgery for some reason, you’ll discover another benefit from our workout – reduced recovery time. You will recover faster when your bones and muscles were at peak performance prior to any injury sustained.
Golf and other sports related injuries are either cumulative (overuse) or acute (traumatic). The impact and stress of the repetitive motion of the swing is sometimes hard on the muscles and joints. Talk to one of our trainers to develop a routine that will support your love of the game by keeping you on the course and off the couch.