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Posts Tagged ‘Upper Body Strength’

The Best Way To Enhance My Vertical Leap : Make A Focused Coaching Program

July 29th, 2010 Blog Writer No comments

Are you making an attempt to gather some info about the best way to increase my vertical jump you have come to the right place.  You are attempting to get better because you and your team depend on you being the best athlete that you may be.  When eating your Wheaties isn’t really enough, you should be taking a look at your coaching program.  The exercises that you include in your coaching program may wish to be modified, or at a minimum you may need to add a couple more centered exercise that will help you boost your vertical distance.  Most sports depend on your speed and your strength, and you tend to concentrate more on your speed and your upper body strength than you do your lower body strength.  

Ways To Increase My Vertical Jump with exercises?  

If you currently have a few exercises included in your coaching program that target your legs you need to step it up.  Add some more exercises, and add some more weight and reps.  Do not be a sissy, but do not get carried away either.  Try adding some of the exercises mentioned below.  

Leg lifts are necessary to building strength in your thigh muscles.  Start with a few reps and low weight amounts.  As you progress in your coaching you’ll be able to increase the quantity of reps and weight that you’ll use.  This is the telltale sign that your quads are getting stronger.  Leg lifts target all four of the muscles that make up your thigh muscles.  

can I Increase My vertical Jump With Squats?  

Calf raises focus on building strength in your calf muscles.  Normal calf raises can be made more beneficial by adding ankle weights or a curl bar and a touch of weight.  You may take your calf raises to a higher level by performing them as double calf raises.  Double calf raises are virtually the same, except you aren’t slowly lowering and then slowly raising back up.  You are slowly lowering and quickly raising back up, then slowly lowering again.  

The squat will work on your thigh muscles and your calf muscles if you change the structure a bit.  Ordinary squats involve a straightforward up and down motion, with weight.  Your new squats will involve you changing the direction that your toes point ( in, out, left, and right ) but also sticking out one leg and using the other to raise and lower, then switching.  You should also be raising all the way up to the end of your toes for final stretching.

Click Here exercises to increase your vertical, to see the no. 1 rated vertical jump program. More on Jumping Exercises

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How To Get A Six Pack With Fast Ab Workouts For Women

December 12th, 2009 Blog Writer No comments

If you are a woman and you would like to tone up the abdomen and lose fat around the waist you need to make sure you are going against the predominant myths on what are the best Abdominal Exercises for Women. Burning fat throughout the abs is not about doing thousands of countless crunches to isolate the muscles in the abdominals. The most effective way for a woman to lose fat is to stick to to a full body workout routine that works all muscle groups in more complex movements designed to raise your metabolism much higher.

Simply doing isolating crunches for abs just doesn’t burn many calories and the real secret to great abs is about their visibility by having a thin skin fold measurement on the belly which comes from fat burning more so than the actual development of the abdominal muscles. Abdominal exercises for women when done properly can give a full body workout giving not only development in the abs but also a synergistic fat loss effect to make the abs visible.

Exercise Ball for Abdominal exercises
You have probably seen pictures of people doing crunches on an exercise ball or even done them yourself. Unfortunately this is about the extent of what anyone does with this piece of equipment. There are actually dozens of easy to advanced exercises for abs that women can use this for. The crunch on the ball is one example and can be a better loss of fat exercise than doing crunches on a mat because of the stabilizing effort it requires in the hips, obliques, and thighs. This leads to more overall calories being burned.

Another great ab exercise for women on the exercise ball are variations of the pike. This is where you put your feet up on the ball and get into pushup position. This will require some upper body strength and stabilization but that is also what makes it a better overall exercise. One method is to get into this position and then bring your knees to your chest rolling the ball towards you. Once you crunch yourself into this position then extend yourself back into the starting position. This is a fantastic exercise for the lower abs.

Abdominal workouts with the Abdominal Wheel
Another very simple piece of equipment that can be kept at home is an abdominal roller or “Power Wheel”. This is another often neglected exercise because so many people prefer the crunch. The abdominal wheel has handles on each side and you simply roll yourself forward while on your knees and then back to the start position. This is another exercise that has several variations, requires many stabilizing muscles, and will burn more overall calories leading to more efficient fat loss.

Ab Exercises for Women with the best Abdominal Exercises for Women.

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Best Weightlifting Routines for Soccer

July 30th, 2008 Author No comments

Best Weightlifting Routines for Soccer

They don’t call them “soccer moms” for nothing. Soccer has become one of the most popular team spots and athletic activities among kids and teens today. And if you really want to see them improve their game, and prevent injuries, you should have your teen age soccer players get into a good weightlifting and strength training routine.

Soccer is a sport that uses many muscle groups. It is physically demanding, requiring great stamina and aerobic abilities combined with explosive burst of strength and power for running and kicking. Weightlifting improves all of these areas. Of course soccer require lower body and leg strength for kicking, jumping and running. Upper body strength is needed for shielding the ball and defending against opponents. Now maximum strength is good for a soccer player, being strong is certainly never going to hurt your game. But maximum strength is not what its all about – just being strong enough to say lift a heavy weight as in weightlifting, doesn’t say anything about your speed -and in soccer speed is as important as strength. So yo must weight train with workouts that are designed to increase your speed as much as your strength.

The best way to train for speed and strength for soccer or really any sport for that mater is to apply a concept that is called plyometrics. Plyometrics basically uses the theory that a muscle that is sufficiently stretched before it is worked out will contract that much faster, faster contractions faster movement – in essence more speed! But plyometrics work by taking existing strength and converting it into speed and power though more efficient contraction of muscles, so the initial strength must be there first. Therefore, still most soccer coaches sophisticated enough to understand plyometrics and apply the techniques to their players still recommend an effective program of all around strengthening though weightlifting first.

Of course the areas of the body you will want to most strengthen as a soccer player are the legs, hips, thighs, calves, back and glutes. For weightlifters that spells Squats -squats are probably the single most effective weightlifting exercise for building up lower body strength, power and endurance. Leg lifts; leg presses and hamstring curls should also be part of the regular weightlifting routine for any soccer player. Circuit training is recommended for soccer players this allows them to work many muscle groups in an appropriate order, and even simulates the switching of one muscle group to another, which is often the case during a soccer match.

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Cross Training and Weightlifting

February 12th, 2008 Author No comments

Cross Training and Weightlifting

Weightlifting in and of itself is a great sport. But no matter what sport you are into, or whatever you may be training for, there is not a game on the planet that weightlifting cannot improve. We all know how weightlifting can improve general health and fitness, the body benefits in so many ways be increasing strength and muscle mass. But because of the very nature of weightlifting, and the ability to target specific muscle groups with specific exercises, you can cross train by weightlifting to strengthen arms, legs or any other part of the body to perk up your game.

All pro athletes will weight lift as some part of their training routine. Obviously power hitters and other baseball players improve upper body strength with weight training. Ironman triathletes workout with weights doing squats and deadlifts to enhance lower body and leg strength to help in swimming and biking, and not to mention to improve stamina. Track and field stars will weight lift and weight train because of the way weightlifting promotes lean muscle mass and low body fat percentage. Winter sports are no exception, speed skaters and skiers alike know the benefits of leg lifts and leg presses. And of course football players and wrestlers will strength train and use weightlifting routines and techniques that are almost indistinguishable from a bodybuilders or powerlifter.

So whether you are a pro, semi-pro or someone just trying to get in shape, however you train or workout you are not getting the max if you are not weightlifting too. Cross training just makes sense on so many levels. Variety is the spice of life and so it is true for working out. You will improve health, strength and stamina by cross training No one exercise even weightlifting can “do it all”. While of course I have a certain bias toward weightlifting and feel it is the number one all- purpose way to live a happy and healthy life, even lifters have to “cross train”. Just for healthy and safe lifting you know we all recommend doing 15 – 20 minutes of aerobic exercise prior to ever lift session. That right there is “cross training”. Also if you really want to get and keep a lean and mean physique, weightlifting alone won’t do it. It doesn’t matter how tight you make that six pack – no one will see how ripped it is if it hiding under a layer of body fat. Cross training with cardio will help to burn fat.

Now I know a lot of you get really psyched up about lifting, and there is no greater natural high then after you get those endorphins flowing after a good pumping session, but lets face it, weightlifting, like any exercise routine, if you do the same thing over and over again can get a little boring. Cross training gives you the opportunity to not only improve overall health and fitness, but shake things up a bit and break from your routine so it doesn’t get tedious.

As with any exercise routine before you plan on adding any kind of cross training activity to your current workout, check with your healthcare professional or personal trainer for its suitability.

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