According to a recent study, static stretching, such as ‘stretch and hold’ improved hamstring flexibility than dynamic range of motion exercises (swinging one leg from side-to-side or bouncing) in athletes who are college-aged with and without hamstring injuries.

Athletes who participate in aerobic exercises frequently experience increased flexibility after doing static stretching.

Final Thought
Static is better than dynamic.

Source: BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders, 10: 37, 2009

One of my main concerns in bodybuilding is overtraining. Overtraining is when you train too hard or too frequently for your body to recover from your workouts. There are a lot of symptoms that I use to tell if I am overtraining and they are:

1. Chronic fatigue

2. Overly sore joints and muscles

3. Willingness to go to the gym

4. Lack of appetite

5. Insomnia (lack of sleep)

6. Reoccuring cold or sickness

What is Overtraining?

When you are lifting heavy weights your muscle fibers tear and then while you are resting, through proper nutrition and sleep, they get bigger and stronger (hypertrophy). If you overtrain, your muscle fibers tear and your body does not have enough time to heal the muscles before you go back into the gym and tear the fibers again. This is overtraining!

If you overtrain your muscles, it will not grow in size or strength and can actually get weaker or smaller. Usually the most overtrained muscles are the biceps AKA ‘guns’. Everyone wants a big bicep. They want to intimidate other guys and attract the ladies when they flex. So what do they do? They go in their garage and train the biceps for an hour with 30 sets! Then their biceps don’t grow so they train longer and with more sets and eventually they overtrain and give up lifting weights.

How to fix overtraining?

By deloading, what is deloading? Well pretty simple, either you lower the weights you are doing by 10-30% (thats about 5-15lbs.), lower the number of reps/sets and focus on your form of the exercise or completely stop working out the bodypart[s] that is overtrained for a week or even up to a month(depending on genetics) . Also remember to eat more and take your multivitamins.

I always tell my clients, “make it look pretty!” If you want to exercise and receive good results, you must keep a good form of the exercise. One of the factors when keeping a good form during exercise is stabilize your core muscles.

People who tend to exercise on unstable ground or unstable surfaces like training on BoSu ball or foam pad, their capacity for maximal core muscle contraction decreases in order to compensate for balancing. It takes away from stabilization in order to perform the exercise properly.

For example, holding a pair of dumbbells and stepping on to a BoSu ball to do shoulder press is not a walk in the park. You will struggle to stay on the BoSu ball let alone get a ‘good set’ done. On the other hand, doing the same dumbbell shoulder press on a solid ground will give you much better shoulder workout.

Final Thought

Ditch the Bosu ball or balance board and make it look pretty.

(Source: International Journal Sports Physiology Performance, 4: 97-109, 2009)

The most effective thing to do when you’re serious about building your Abs is to select exercises that trigger the abdominal muscles. At the same time, you have to decrease activation of the hip flexors and focus on the spine. Scientist measure muscle activation levels during certain exercises. During this process, scientists place electrodes on a muscle belly. The muscles that work the hardest display increased electrical activity in the EMG.

Kevin Parfrey, a Canadian researcher, compared hip flexor muscle activation during twelve different variations of sit-ups. And the Winner is….

Bent-knee sit-ups, with out feet support

This is very similar to the good old sit up except it’s with out feet support (with out some one holding your feet down or tucking under things) with the hands flat at your sides, sliding  during a curl-up. This is the king of the sit ups and crunches, it produces the most abdominal muscle activation — it also decreases the movement of the hip flexors, isolating your abs.

So, the next time you do curl-ups, try separating the large six-pack muscle (rectus abdominis) and decrease the activity of your head, neck and shoulders. This form of exercise overloads and isolates your abdominal muscles, without overloading your sensitive neck muscles and spine.

Applied Physiology Nutrition and Metabolism, 33: 888-895, 2008

Even after the first research (Instability Training: Does It Work?) done by Journal Strength Conditioning Research concluded that there is no difference between muscle activation other than core muscles, people still believe “this half ball” gives them better results.

Our core muscles sustain and provide the base for good lower and upper body movements. Jeffrey Willardson and colleagues from Eastern Illinois University discovered that there is no difference from performing dead lifts, overhead presses, bicep curls and squats on the BOSU balls than it is on solid ground.

How to ‘Effectively’ Perform Exercises

In order to effectively perform the exercises just mentioned above, you have to stabilize your core muscles during whole body, intense weight training. When people exercise on unstable surfaces, the capacity for maximal core muscle contraction reduces.

According to many, BOSU ball training is nothing but a fitness trend! You’re better off ditching the BOSU balls and train on solid ground.

Source: International Journal Sports Physiology Performance, 4: 97-109, 2009