How To Do Calisthenics (Part 2)

Folks, we are in part 2 of this article dealing with how to do calisthenics and here are the rest of the more popular ones.

Reverse Push-ups:

Place a bench (chair) behind your back and grip its edges. Make sure your hands are about shoulder width apart. For a more challenging work out, place your heels on another bench at a level higher than the bench you are holding on to. Bending your elbows, lower the body as far as you can toward the floor, then push back, locking out your arms to work the upper triceps. (Aka bench dips, invented in the absence of dip bars mostly found in gymnasiums)

Roman Chair Sit Ups:

Lock your feet under any of the following or whatever can suffice

1. A lowered portable pull-up bar

2. A firm bed or couch or chair.

3. A partner to grip your ankles and hold them in place.

Now fold your arms in front of you. Keeping the stomach tucked in, lower yourself to approximately 70 degrees from an upright position and now raise yourself back up and come forward as far as possible, intentionally flexing and crunching your abdominal muscles to increase the contraction. This is the first variation.

Variation 2:

In the second variations, upon raising yourself up make a swift twist first to the left and then the right and then lower back (this targets the oblique muscles and love handles)

Sprinting Spurt:

Sprinting is basically an anaerobic exercise. While jogging, perform a few sprinting spurts intermittently for 9-12 seconds then resume jogging at a normal pace.

Super Sets:

A set of two or more exercises performed in a row without stopping. The concept is after completion of a specific exercise say the push up, which engages your chest and triceps, to engage in another exercise say the leg raises which work your

Abs and legs while the upper torso is resting. A great way to kill time and push yourself!

Wide Grip chin ups:

Take hold of the chin up bar with an overhand grip. Make your hands as wide as possible. Hang from the bar, then pull yourself up so that:

(a) The back of your neck touches the bar

(b) The front of your chest touches the bar, and then lower yourself slowly to the starting position.

Windmills:

Have your legs extended sideways as far out as 3-4 feet. Bend over and stay as such. Straighten your arms out to each side and twist so that you touch your right hand to your left foot. Your arm should remain straight and point at the sky, at the same time look up behind you. Repeat the same motion on the other side touching the left hand to the right foot.

So there you have it folks, some of the more common Body-Weight Calisthenics you can do in the comfort of your own home, hotel room etc without the need for expensive gym memberships or equipments.

Of course, there’s always yoga y’know….

To Health

Foras Aje

Foras Aje is an independent researcher and author of Fitness: Inside and out, a book on improving physical and mental health naturally. For more information on natural health,news and breakthroughs visit his site at http://www.bodyhealthsoul.com/
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Energize Your Exercise Routines With These Really Simple Tips

Tip no. 1

Find Some Things to Do That You Really Enjoy. Doing exercise routines does not mean you have to spend boring hours at the local gym day after day. Also, you don’t need to buy expensive exercise equipments which you’ll never use anyway. Anything that gets your body mobile is much better than doing nothing at all. A simple exercise that you can do almost anywhere is walking. Jogging is another example. Whenever you play with your children in the yard, you are actually doing some exercise. Other things which you can easily do and which can be a form of exercise are gardening, cleaning your house, taking a walk in your neighborhood, climbing stairs, and swimming.

Tip no. 2

Always Schedule Some Time To Do Exercise. Sometimes the only way we could insert some exercise time into our busy schedule is to think of it as going to an important meeting. Many of us go through our daily lives taking care of other people and too busy earning money that we often deny ourselves of even a little free time. However, with a little effort we could make exercise become a part of our daily routine. Once we’re able to start doing it, we’ll find it much easier to do on a daily basis. We just have to determine which is the best part of the day for us to exercise. This varies with different people. Some people might want to do it in the afternoon. You, however, might prefer doing it in the morning, when you’re still feeling fresh. What is important is that you do it. As much as possible, do not let a day pass without doing an exercise. Why not ask a friend to do exercise with you? Sometimes you are much able to do regular exercise if you’re doing it with a friend.

Tip no. 3

Invigorate Your Day With a Simple Exercise. Feeling too tired to even to do a simple exercise? Try to do it anyway. You will be surprised at how a simple effort to exercise can make you feel energized and much more invigorated even after the exercise. Specially when you feel stressed, which is one of our body’s biggest energy sappers, a litter exercise can go a long way in helping to relieve your stress.

Tip no. 4

Reduce Boredom by Mixing up Your Exercise Routines. Things that you do over and over again are bound to become monotonous, and, what’s the word, oh yes, routine. Same thing goes with exercise. As soon as exercise becomes just one of your daily routines, you’ll become too bored with it that you’ll likely stop doing it. To avoid this, you need to change your workout routine. Once you get tired of running, try walking. If you get tired walking, start cycling. If you’re doing weight lifting, try to alternate this with some cardiovascular workout during the week. If you enjoy sports, why not go bowling with your friends. Or a game of tennis every now and then. Basketball is also a very good form of exercise.

Tip no. 5

Never Start Your Exercise Without Warming up First. Whatever kind of exercise routines you choose to do at a workout session, always start with stretching to warm up your muscles. Your muscle tissue are less likey to incur any damage during exercise if you first do some stretching. Stretching also helps to pump up your heart and keep your blood flowing. Even just a few minutes of stretching will go a long way in making your exercise invigorating and enjoyable.

Burn stomach fat fast - Weird Tips to Lose Abdominal Fat. Amazingly simple exercise routines you can do at home - Simple But Highly Effective Exercise Routines.
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Exercise And The Brain

If you ever needed another good reason to exercise, I’ve got one for you:

Exercise makes your brain bigger.

Actually this isn’t entirely accurate. To be more specific, exercise was found to increase brain size slightly, but far more important to increase “spatial reasoning.”

This is the ability to recognize patterns, remember phrases, numbers, and so-on. This was discovered by researchers at the Universities of Chicago and Pittsburgh.

It is also one of the most important factors to the prevention of Alzheimer’s and dementia.

My mom suffered with dementia the last ten years of her life. But unlike most dementia patients she was fully functional thanks to exercise. She drove and had a mind that was unbelievably sharp right up until an accident injured her beyond the ability to exercise.

After that, she mentally went downhill rapidly. Thankfully, she passed in peace… and she had ten wonderfully active years thanks to her willingness to take up weight training at the age of 71.

She eventually walked up to 3 miles per day and trained in the gym 3 days per week.

That kept her mind sharp, along with fish oil and N-Acetyl L-Carnitine, a wonderful brain nutrient.

Once again, we see the power of exercise. It increases the QUALITY of your life.

Quantity is no where near as important to me as quality.

The links at the bottom of this newsletter are to my books on exercise. Pick the one that appeals to you most and take action.

Your brain will thank you, as will the rest of your body.

One of the best ways to start exercising when you are over 40 is by using the routines covered in “Fit Over 40″.

This book profiles 53 different men and women, age 40 to 80, all sharing their workouts, nutrition plans, and mental empowerment techniques.

It is a MUST-HAVE for anyone wanting to begin exercising or improve their level of fitness after the age of 40.

For a freee fat-burning course from Fit Over 40, go here –

Click Here for the  Free Fatburning Course

Getting Started With Fitness Training

One of the hardest parts of any fitness program is getting started.
It is so easy to just sit around doing nothing and it takes some degree of motivation to get started exercising.
Many people find that joining a gym gives them the motivation they need to get started and follow through with regular workouts.
The reality is that most of the people who join gyms never complete their membership.
Gyms actually base their costing on the fact that the majority of people will never use their membership regularly.

Why is this so?
There are many reasons why people don’t exercise regularly and that can range from inconvenience to boredom.
When you are deciding what to do to lift your level of fitness it is wise to honestly think about your personality and where your strengths and weaknesses lie.
If you are a person who can motivate yourself then a home gym might be the best solution as it will offer the convenience of allowing you to train whenever you like and you won’t need others to motivate you.

If, on the other hand, you find it difficult to motivate yourself then a membership at a gym might be a better solution.
Paying for the membership might be all that is needed to ensure that you will attend classes and often we can get motivated by those around us and challenge ourselves to improve and compete with others in the gym.

Alternatively, you might be a person who prefers to go for a run or a walk rather than lift weights.
No matter what you are capable of doing, there is only one action that you need to take however small that might be initially and that it to get started with some form of fitness training sooner rather than later.

Fitness will add to your overall well-being and the more exercise you do the fitter you will become and the more likely you will be to continue with a fitness program.

There is never a better time to get started than right now.