Workout Exercises

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If you do a  resistance band training session at home it is easy to forget to include a few stretches first to warm the muscles up and get them ready for exercise. It is easy to think that resistance band training is not as serious as lifting heavy weights but it not a good practice to skip the warm up.

Why Stretch Muscles Before a Resistance Band Routine?

Stretching warms and loosens the muscles to prepare them for exercise.  One of the most common causes of athletic injury is failure to warm up muscles resulting in torn muscles and even torn ligaments which are harder to repair and sometimes require surgery. Some easy movements like swinging your arms, stretching arms overhead, jogging lightly in place and side to side movements of the core area will get some of your muscles loosened up. Then begin a disciplined warm up that stretches large muscle groups, paying particular attention to arms, legs, and core. Hold each stretch for 8 to 10 seconds and then release.

Simple Stretches For a Resistance Band Workout

Arm warm-ups: Interlace your fingers and push both arms out in front of you with palms facing you, hold, then switch so palms are facing outwards and hold. Lift your arms up overhead, clasp your elbows, hold and then release.

Leg warm-ups: Do walking lunges, holding each lunge for a few seconds. With one foot in front of the other, your front foot should be flat on the ground, knee bent at a right angle over your ankle. Your back heel should be raised, with leg straight. You should feel the stretch in your gluteal muscles, your front quadriceps, your back leg hamstring and your calf muscles.

Core warm-up: Stand with legs apart, feet firmly planted and facing forward. Soften the knees. Bend at the waist with hands down on the floor in front of you. Plant the right hand on the floor, raise the left hand to point to the ceilng and twist at the waist. Hold. Then lower slowly and switch sides.

Resistance bands give you more of a workout than you might think – it’s not smart to underestimate the power of these thin, rubbery cords, so learn the basics of stretching and allow a couple of minutes before and after your resistance band workout to nurture your muscles with a few warm-up and cool-down stretches.

When people talk about strength training most of us automatically invoke images in our mind of muscle-bound men with ripped bodies lifting twice their body weight above their heads. But strength training doesn’t have to automatically imply heavy weights. Resistance bands are a great way to introduce strength training into your routine. Not only that, but they are safer and easier to use than weights and more accessible to a greater number of people.

Health Benefits of Strength Training

The body has over 650 muscles and most of us only use a few of those each day. If you don’t use your muscles they get weaker and become ineffective at supporting the body’s primary movements. That’s why elderly people sometimes have trouble walking or lifting everyday objects.  Everyone can benefit from strength training. It helps to improve bone density,  important for fighting osteoporosis (which by the way affects men as well as women). Weight training helps to develop muscle mass and reduce stores of fat in the body. This in turn boosts your metabolism, improves the way your body processes foods, reduces your blood pressure and helps you looks younger physically and stay agile as you grow older.  Looking better will boost your self-confidence but strength training will itself help to energize you and increase your potential for maintaining a positive attitude. It boosts your immune system and makes it harder for you catch cold or come down with the flu. If you suffer from back pain, or if you have trouble walking, weight training is a low impact way to tone muscles in the lower and middle back where backache often begins  -  but make sure to check with your doctor first to find out if anything else is wrong.

How Resistance Bands Help with Strength Training

The easiest way to convince yourself that resistance bands help with strength training is by doing a couple of exercises with one. A very basic resistance band exercise involved stepping on the middle of the exercise band squarely so it runs underneath both feet. Now hold a handle in each hand and pull up as you would if you were doing bicep curls with a set of free weights. I guarantee you will feel the effect of this exercise right away. By the way keep your back straight so you don’t put stress on the back. If it’s too easy and you are not feeling the resistance, move your feet further apart to shorten the length and increase the resistance on the band.

Weight training with resistance bands is suitable for everyone, whether you are young, old or somewhere in between.  What’s more, if you are a little advanced in years, or still recovering from an injury,  you don’t have the common danger associated with weight training of inadvertently dropping a weight on your foot or your chest.  All in all, resistance band strength training is a simple and cost  effective way to counteract the natural aging process.

Ladies! Don’t you just hate using those huge, unwieldy machines at the gym that are built for men? Do you hate trying to figure out how to adjust them after a 230 lb guy just finished chest pressing 175 pounds? Some women prefer working with free weights such as dumbbells and kettle weights simply because they are easier to manipulate. Resistance bands are also a very popular option for women.

Resistance bands are often used in group exercise programmes such as aerobics, strength training and boot camp programmes because of their flexibility and effectiveness. You can use them to exercise just about any part of the body and because they are lightweight and easy to manoeuvre many women prefer them over free weights or cumbersome gym equipment.

Here are two favourite exercises for women using resistance bands (remember to warm up and cool down by doing stretches before and after your resistance band workout):

Arms:

Stand in the middle of the band. Keep your back straight, your shoulders pulled back and down and soften your knees. Hug your elbows into your waist. Now, using upper arm strength, pull the bands up to your shoulders and lower. Do this slowly for 10-12 reps. After the final rep raise your arms almost to the shoulder and do 6 small pulses. For more resistance shorten the band by widening your stance on the band.

Legs:

Stand in the middle of the band with your feet at hip distance apart, holding the ends of the band in each hand. Spread your feet a little further apart, creating resistance in the band. Now sidestep across the room by moving your right foot to the right and your left foot to meet it. Keep the band taught between your feet. For more resistance pull up on the band with your arms to keep it taught. Move ten steps in each direction and then repeat.

Resistance bands come in various strengths so start out with lightweight bands and work up to the stronger ones. By varying the length of the band, doubling it up or anchoring it and stretching it out, there is a great deal of flexibility and variety you can build into your workout. This makes it is easy to tailor it to your own fitness level.

So ladies, no more excuses! If you want a great workout that you can do pretty much anywhere, pick up some resistance bands and get started.



Fitness instructors and personal trainers often tout the benefits of resistance bands. But can a three foot piece of rubber hose that fits in your pocket and costs about the same as a portion of fish and chips really give you the same kind of workout as a dedicated iron machine with its complex series of pulleys, stabilizers and adjustable weights that sets you back a couple of months’ salary? Surely a real man needs a manly machine for getting in shape and staying that way?

The answer is no. More and more men are learning that you don’t need to shell out a fortune to get a great home workout. It’s exactly because results from exercise bands are so good that personal trainers are quick to recommend them to their clients.

Terrell Owens, famous American football wide receiver uses fitness bands for strength training. Terrell has played professional football for the San Francisco 49ers, the Dallas Cowboys, the Philadelphia Eagles and the Buffalo Bills. Staying in shape is important to Terrell and fitness bands help him accomplish that. Juan Carlos Santana, fitness guru and founder of the Institute of Human Performance works with professional athletes, fortune 500 companies, fitness equipment manufactures and professional sporting organizations. He recommends resistance band training both for building muscle and aerobic conditioning. Tony Horton, fitness trainer to the stars and founder of several highly successful fitness programs including Beach Body and P90X, regularly incorporates resistance bands in his DVD training series.

Resistance bands are regularly used by sports trainers to help athletes train for specific sports. Working with exercise bands, athletes tone and build muscles that are not worked in their particular sport but vital to the overall functioning of the muscles that are. For instance in baseball, a fast pitch requires a strong arm, but the deltoids, rhomboids and other supporting muscles are also important.

Still not convinced? Okay, here’s a challenge. Grab yourself a resistance band and try the following – I challenge you not to feel the power of this exercise:

Resistance Band Squats

Stand on the middle of the band, holding one handle in each hand. Widen your stance until your feet are hip width apart. Use your arms to pull the bands up behind your back and over your shoulders holding your arms out in front of you. Now give me 20 squats. If that’s too easy, pick a stronger resistance band or pull tighter on the band to create more tension. If you are doing it right, I guarantee by the twentieth one you’re going to feel it.

What’s best for fat burning – interval training or cardio training? If you read a lot of fitness blogs you will see that expert opinions seem to differ on the subject. The truth might not be black and white. Interval training alternates high intensity cardio workouts with periods of reduced activity whereas traditional steady state cardio is more consistent. Some say that interval training is more likely to induce weight loss than moderate training at a steady rate. There is no doubt that interval training supports weight loss and there have been many studies to back up the results but that doesn’t mean a steady state cardio routine won’t work for you. One of my rules of thumb has always been that an exercise routine you can stick with and perform regularly is the best routine for you even if it is not necessarily the one selected by professionals for extreme results. It all depends what your goals are. After all today’s popular trend is tomorrow’s old approach and there is always a newer, better way to do something.

One advantage I will cite for interval training is that you can get a great workout in a shorter amount of time. The variety is also good for keeping the mind engaged on the exercise and relieving boredom. Interval training is a good stress buster because your mind is active the whole time thinking about timing and what exercise to move to next so you have less time to focus on things that might be worrying you. Running on the treadmill for an hour at a time gives you plenty of time to let your mind wander back to everyday problems. Exercise bands lend themselves well to interval training.

If you opt for steady state cardio training, experts recommend working up to the highest heart rate you can maintain and then try to stay there for 20 or 30 minutes or longer depending on your fitness level. Interval training can be used to introduce variety to your cardio workout but if a steady cardio workout is what you prefer there is no really good reason not to stick to it.

When you are working with exercise bands, a good plan is to start with 10 minutes of cardio (skip rope or running on a treadmill) then go into your resistance routines. End with 5-10 minutes of stretching. You can introduce interval training by alternating the easier exercises with the harder ones or by alternating one rep tightening the bands to add more resistance and one rep with the bands slightly looser to lessen resistance.