JUNE 2, 2008

WORD TO THE WISE A thing to think about is to alternate the order and type of your exercise activity. When you do the same exercises in the same order over and over again, your muscles get used to that and they become efficient and aren't challenged as much, leading to plateaus in strength gain and weight loss. My opinion is to change it up each time you exercise so you should continue to see results as you challenge your body differently and force it to adapt.

Forget that long hike. Four 10-minute strolls will do more to lower your blood pressure than a 40-minute walk. That's what Indiana University researchers report in the September 2006 issue of the Journal of Hypertension. They compared the effects of the four short walks to one long walk in reducing blood pressure in 20 people with a condition known as prehypertension. A person with prehypertension would be "135 over 90." This elevated blood pressure level usually progresses to high blood pressure, which is often associated with heart attack, heart failure, kidney failure, stroke and blindness. The researchers found that while the short walks and the long walk decreased the participants' blood pressure by the same amount, the effect lasted for 11 hours after the short walks, compared to seven hours after the long walk. (Prevention)

Circuit training is a great way to do resistance training and aerobic training in one workout. You select a certain number of exercises, and go from one exercise to the next with little or no rest, until you've completed all of them. A circuit can be set up any way--it's fun to be creative. You can do a full body circuit, a lower body circuit, core circuit, upper body circuit, etc. By doing the exercises consecutively, your heart rate stays in the aerobic zone, at the same time developing lean muscle tissue. (SparkPeople)

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