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I bought me a Heart Rate Monitor awhile back and really hadn’t used it.  I noticed while I was teaching my light yoga class in Buffalo Gap that I couldn’t see my watch too much because my eyesight is not what it used to be because I find myself at the computer all the time anymore.  :) 

I switched wearing my regular watch to my Heart Rate Monitor watch so that I could see the numbers.
Well, since I have my heart rate monitor on I thought I would just see how many calories I am burning with all of my exercise classes that I teach.  I have been stunned, but I use the heart monitor to my benefit as well. 

I can usually burn about 750 calories on a great day just exercising or teaching classes. 

One of the reason that I wear this monitor also, is because that it really keeps my accountable for what I eat afterwards.  Have you ever noticed that people tend to eat way more than they burn after they work out.  They have the mentality that since they have worked out that they can eat anything they want to.  Okay, I know there are exceptions like Michael Phelps.  He can eat everything under the sun.  I am talking about us average folks who seem to just look at food and gain weight.

I also encourage my students and older folks to get a monitor so that they can see for themselves what they are burning and then they can adjust their meals accordingly.  This has helped tremendously for many of them.

All I am saying is get yourself a great heart rate monitor and start keeping track of those calories actually burned during your workout.  You will be amazed.

Don’t forget to workout to Power 90x, one-on-one with Tony, and the 10 minute Trainer with Tony.

He is the best.  i love him.

The more I see students come through my classes I am just amazed at how many of them have bad rotator cuffs.  This can really hender certain exercises.  This really disables them to do yoga, push-ups, plank positions, simple shoulder exercises.  Therefore, causes the students not want to exercise at all.  There are plenty of others things to do to stay fit. But here is a great exercise to help in the rotator cuff area.

Here is a great exercise that will strengthen your rotator cuffs.  I picked up this exercise from a fellow strength coach for baseball players.  You don’t have to play baseball in order to do this exercise.  Everyone uses their rotator cuff almost everyday for daily life activities. Okay, so maybe you don’t fish.  But, you get the point.  It’s not baseball.

So, here is goes.  Take a small dumbbell or say a can good out of the cupboard, only doing one arm at a time.  Stand feet shoulder width apart, hold the dumbbell with the right hand, now lift the right arm straight out in front of you( like you were going to do a front dumbbell raise), now hold it there parallel to the floor, your palm of your hand should be facing the floor, now make sure that your shoulder stays in socket, don’t let it protrude forward, retract it back and down, good, now draw small circles in one direction, I usually have my class do ten circles one way and then reverse.  Make sure that you breathe and two make sure the circles are not big ones.  Stay within straight out in front not to dip too low or too wide. Focus only the shoulder work.  Keep it close and tight. You should feel these pretty quick.  Now switch and do the other arm.  Depending on where you are, you can squeeze out a couple of sets. 

If you have injured your shoulder and only after you have been through therapy, this is a great exercise to keep the maintenance until you feel stronger to increase the weight, never, never go over say 10 lbs, due to the leverage on the weight that is place on the arm.  

If you have never had an injury this is a great preventive exercise.  Got to keep all the stabilizers strong.

Hope you try it.  Come back for the next shoulder exercise soon.

Remember “A year from now you’ll wish you had started today.”  No Excuses!

Have a great Sunday.

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pkayfit

Well, I should be getting ready to do my leg workout.  I am really trying to get myself pschyed out about this because I know it is going to be hard.  I am going to attempt to do the one-on-one with Tony today.  I really should do the Power 90x legs and back workout.  What I was thinking about is combining the two together and doing the leg part with the one-on-one and then do back part with the Power 90x.  I think I will do that and see what happens.  I have two TV’s to work off of.  I think it will take longer than an hour but hey, it is Saturday and cleaning house is the last thing on my mind.

Well, as I have been really working on my arms and thinking about the shoulder exercises that I have been doing with the Power 90x.  I found another exercise that I remember that I and my morning group has not done in a while.  Let me tell you that I normally change up the exercises weekly for them so that they and I don’t get bored.  This week was a whammie.  OMG, we worked out soooo hard.  They told me not to eat my oatmeal in the mornings cause I way too much energy.  Better than eating that donut (Susan) in the mornings.  :)  Their chests, legs, arms were all sore.  I have to be honest it kicked my butt also.  I was sore and still sore from all of exercises, especially in the chest area, where I went ballistic and did I don’t know how many push-ups with a down 2 up 2 as well.  My legs seem to be fine.  My shins are slightly sore, but not too bad today.  I will fix that problem here real soon.

Okay, for the exercise.  Now, you can have a 3-lb, 5-lb, and maybe up to 10-lb. 10-lb is really pushing it.  Start off in a shoulder press position.  Making an “L” with your arms on the right and the left side.  Think of it as “Stick up position”  Okay now, start with the right arm, press up for 8 reps (remember when coming down you want to bring back to that “L” position and no lower), now bring both bent arms to the middle in front of your face, keeping the elbows in front of you and close together as you can, (try not to let the elbows flare out, maitaining the “L”), now press up with both arms together for 8 reps, now come back to the “Stick up position” and press the left arm up for 8 reps, go back to center and press up for 8, break it down to do 4 reps the whole thing and again break it down for 2 reps and that my friends is one set. 

Thanks to my sadistic friend Mindy, who is just fun.  I just give her all the credit because I don’t want anymore cussing my name for that exercise, even though I teach it to get a whine out of my classes.  I love it.  It works, I am telling you, you should try this.  If you need a little somethin, somethin, to have a change and feel that lovely burn.

Well, let me go start getting Tony to kick my butt.  Why? Why?  Somebody just smack me.

Okay, here I am, on week number four.  I am a little depressed since it doesn’t look like I have dropped anything.  On the other hand, I feel good about myself in the fact that after last week’s shoulders and arms I am stronger.  I can definitely do more weight. 

I received my one-on-one with Tony and viewed it with much excitement.  It looks pretty darn exhausting.  I am crazy enough to try it.  Heck yeah!  I will probably just do it once.  ;)  If Tony can get extremely exhausted I know I will probably regurgitate which is really appealing.  Well, we will just see.

Okay, this week is suppose to be like a little one, but you know I feel like I have not done enough since I did have to bonk on a few days because of other things I have got going.  I am going to start running again in the morning before my Yoga class.  Just 30 minutes I think ought to do it.  So, that means I will have 3 activity things going on back to back.  Um! I think that should work.

Did you know that there is a way to run?  I taught a summer jogging class.  The techinique and the breathing are really important for running.  Now, we all should be able to run if we don’t have jacked up knees like I am seeing in younger kids these days.  What the heck people.  Arms are suppose to be by your side and hands nice and relaxed.  The stride should be a nice confrontable stride with heel toe, heel toe, not flat footed.  Ouch! :(  The body should not be straight up but slightly leaning forward to help the body propel forward. The breathe should come through the nose and the exit the mouth.  Nice and deep and not choppy.  There you go.  Of course when you get towards the finish line you should speed it up lenghten the stride pump the arms and get going.

Next week, I am going to try the doubles routine.  That means I will do a workout in the morning about 7:30 and then proceed with my other workouts and come back in the p.m. and do another one.  This is really suppose to jump start my butt and get me where I need to be.  Wish me luck.

Okay, so I did my shoulders and arms yesterday in the afternoon before my TurboKick workout.  Well, I was so sad that no one showed up.  You ever get the feeling that you are not good enough or that you are a bad teacher.  That for sure is not me.  I hate it when people don’t show.  I really take it personally.  I know I shouldn’t but I do.  I am so passionate about fitness that it kills me that people don’t put themselves first and don’t feel like they have to exercise to live.  Living is what it is all about.  Feeling good about yourself is what life is about.  Not hearing the words from the doctor telling you “You need to workout or you will die”, that should be enough for some people.  I still did my TurboKick workout by myself so that I could practice a round to teach next Tuesday.  I needed the cardio anyhow.  Then, I taught the Body Chizel class right after that.  We did one exercise for upper body, then one exercise for middle, and then one exercise for legs.  Then, started over again.  It was pretty intense.  My arms were on fire.  I had to use a smaller weights though, cause I knew right after my workout with Tony, they would be dying.  I am getting stronger though.

Well, Monday I taught my Body Chizel class to my normal morning group. Did I say normal?  They are definitely special.  They make me laugh.  We did some shoulders about two sets. We did standing alternating shoulder presses for about 16 and then put them together and did another 16.  We did front raises alternating for 16 and then put them together for another 16.  We did rear flys alternating for 16 and put them together.  Okay, so we did two sets of those.  After the two sets I really like to feel the burn in the shoulders.  I love it, love it when they moan and whine.

So, here is what you do.  Take the arms straight out like you are making a “T”.  Take the hand and flex them, another words, point the fingers up toward the ceiling and palms facing out.  Now, draw circles for 20 counts one way and the reverse for 20, after that point the fingers down with palms facing in towards the body, and do the same thing.  Make sure you are breathing.  This little exercise freakin burns and develops those pretty shoulders we like. Your arms and shoulders feel like rubber after that.  My class gets to stepping around, it is fun to watch while they are just trying to draw circles. 

Try it.  You will like it.