WHY YOU SHOULD BE CROSS-TRAINING

I absolutely LOVE running, truly one of my most favorite things to do .  However, I only run 2-3 days a week.  WHY?  3 reasons: CONDITIONING, INJURY PREVENTION and ACTIVE RECOVERY. In an effort to improve my fitness and achieve my best physical form, I cross train. In order to avoid hitting a plateau, your muscles need to be challenged with different movements, different weights and different workouts. Pushing yourself out of your comfort zone and incorporating different resistance workouts and forms of cardio is the best way to get results and keep your muscles fresh. Cross training is a highly effective and productive way to workout. Because you are combining several different workout strategies, you are going to improve your conditioning, avoid injury and engage your muscles in active recovery. Cross training is gaining popularity for many reasons.  Read more about my top 3 reasons below:

• CONDITIONING: Instead of asking your body to do the exact same thing over and over, you surprise your muscles by performing a variety of movements and exercises. You can even further change you workouts by increasing the intensity, number of reps, duration, pace, switching up the order of exercises, etc. Variety and change ask more from the body and produce increased muscle capability and improved fitness performance. Cross training is not designed with one specific goal in mind, but rather to improve your overall fitness. Cross-training is comprehensive. You can gain muscle, lose fat, improve your cardiovascular strength, improve speed and performance; conditioning your body to perform at it's optimum level.

• INJURY PREVENTION: The most common injuries I see are overuse injuries as a result of continuously doing the same activities and workouts. It doesn't matter if it is running, biking, lifting or plyometrics. Constantly performing repeitive movements and exercises can stress your body and wear down your joints, ligaments, muscles and tendons. By mixing up your routine, you give the over-used parts of your body a chance to rest and the under-used a chance to strengthen. Cross training is a great way to avoid injuries and keep your body healthy!

• ACTIVE RECOVERY: Active recovery is the practice of using an alternative type of training to recover from your primary training method. For instance, many professional football players do swimming workouts and pool resistance exercises to actively recover from their on-field practices and traditional weight room training. In addition to the conditioning and injury preventing benefits of active recovery, it has been show to actually speed up recovery by increasing blood flow and the delivery of nutrients to stressed or damaged muscle tissue.

Get out there and try something new!  Switch up your workouts and I think you will be pleasantly surprised by the results!  You will see an improvement in your overall fitness, avoid injuries and be able to maximize your efforts by engaging in active recovery!  HAVE FUN! : )

PUSH THROUGH YOUR PLATEAU WITH INTERVAL TRAINING

Whether you have hit a plateau in your weight loss, are bored of your cardio routine, are wanting to increase your endurance and speed or are just wanting to burn some fat and get lean...interval training can make it happen! Try these interval routines and let me know how it goes! Your treadmill workout will be anything but boring! HAVE FUN!!!

Getting Started

Before beginning any of the intervals below, warm up for 5 minutes with a slow jog or quick paced walk to get your blood flowing. When you are moving at your active recovery pace, always keep the incline at 1% or higher to simulate road running, as treadmills are almost always at a slight downhill grade when they are in the ‘neutral’ position of a 0% incline.

Side Shuffle
You are going to start this interval at a lower pace, around 3.5-5.4 on your treadmill speed setting. Walk for 2 minutes. Holding the side rail, turn your body to the side and shuffle your feet in a side stepping motion. Don't grapevine, but get in an athletic position, almost like a high squat as you side shuffle. Continue the side shuffles for 2 minutes. Walk or jog forward for 1 minute and repeat on the other side. Continue for 30-45 minutes.

Hill Walk-Low Run
Begin at a jog for two minutes at a 6.0-6.8 pace. At the end of the two minutes, drop the speed to a brisk walk and raise the incline to 7%. Walk for another two minutes, maintaining a pace that is quick, but does not force you to hang on to the rails as you move. Repeat the intervals, bumping up the incline by 1% each time you hill walk. Continue for 30-45 minutes.

Hill Run
See the above hill walk-low run, but maintain the jogging speed for the entire workout. Raise the incline for only 1 minute and increase by .5% each time rather than a full percent.

Sprint to Jog
Set the treadmill at a relatively easy jogging pace, around 6.5 on the treadmill speed. Jog for 1-2 minutes. Then, raise the speed to 7.0-7.5. This high interval speed should be difficult to complete toward the middle of your workout and/or during each interval. Match the length of the sprint with the recovery (1 minute for each or 2 minutes for each), then recover at 6.5 again. Repeat as many times as desired.

Incline Sprint
Set the treadmill at a relatively easy jogging pace, around 6.5 on the treadmill speed. Jog for 1-2 minutes. Then, raise the speed to 7.0-7.5. You are now going to match the incline to your speed. If you are running at a 7.0 on the treadmill speed, raise the incline to 7.0. Run for 30 seconds on the treadmill then jump your feet to the sides and recover for 30 seconds. Increase you pace and incline 0.5 every 5 minutes until you are at your max. Drop it down to where you started and do it again! Continue for 30-45 minutes.

Incline and Sprint Combo
Set the treadmill at a relatively easy jogging pace, around 6.5 on the treadmill speed and the incline to 1%. Jog for 2 minutes, then, raise the incline to 2%. Every 2 minutes you are going to raise the incline another % until you reach 10 minutes and 5% incline. At 10 minutes, drop it down to a 0% incline and increase your pace to a sprint around 7.5. Sprint for 5 minutes then slow it down and start it again. Continue for 45-60 minutes.