|
|
| When you come to my office, you will discover a complete range of options, including guidance on customizing your workout program to most effectively support your body and spinal correction protocol.
Now available! Physical Training sessions. These can be general training for people with spinal problems (gym trainers are sometimes fearful of working with people with "back problems") or sessions to carefully go over how you customize your workout. $300 for six sessions ($50 each).
Below are some of the handouts from my office. On the rehab page you will see some of the "in office" handouts prescribed to my patients. If you are looking for your prescribed handout, go to "Rehabilitation procedures". Exercise - Articles Exercise, How Much?
When I was young and first moved to Oregon, I worked in fish packing houses and found a local Tae Kwon Do group. That, plus my surfing (in between those notorious northwest storms) was my exercise program.  Boy, this was awhile ago! Over time, most of my surf buddies got jobs on commercial fishing boats. I knew how to handle boats; but I also knew what they were doing. I knew what those boats looked like and the ocean they went out into. It scared me, justifiably. Every year a few boats didn’t come back. But my friends all came back (praise the lord). Not just that, but they were all bigger, heavier. Some were much bigger, all muscle. Good gracious, these guys looked like gorillas! I finally sucked it up and got a job on a shrimper. I thought, “yeah, this will work. The running and swimming didn’t make me muscular. Surfing hasn’t made me big, martial arts hasn’t made me superman. Commercial deckhand, yeah, that’ll do it”.  Ahh, the glory days, yeah, right. Check the fish slime. A rare sunny day, where we could take a picture without ruining the camera. I gained 10 pounds. My weight went from 135 to 145 pounds. I also developed almost every overuse syndrome in the book at a time when no one knew what “carpal tunnel” was. Eventually, a much smarter, ten year program of Body Building (3 days a week) added 20 pounds (that’s right, 2 pounds a year!). Genetics, I’m the poster boy for hard gainers. Lousy training advice was the standard. I wish I had known then what we know now. You don’t need to make all the same mistakes I made. So how much is too much? Clearly, some people thrive on a 24/7 with 18 hours hard labor and 6 hours sleep. Then, there are us mere mortals.
Train smart and you can accomplish much more than you think in a remarkably short time. You can spend 15-20 minutes a session, 2 days a week doing 10 basic resistance exercises, 2 sets at 10-15 repetitions per set (get that weight high enough so it’s difficult to finish all those reps). Add a few minutes of aerobics, maybe 5-15 minutes on the same days and one more day a week of almost any serious exercise that suits you. That could be your weekly pick up game. That’s a complete program! You can customize it to suit your lifestyle and still get a lot of benefit. Women…you stand to gain a lot from those weights. Don’t be afraid of the resistance exercise.
Men…you get all pumped up. Don’t overdo it. Watch the nutrition and get enough rest, sleep and recuperation time. Otherwise you will develop some nasty surprise overuse pains.
For me, it’s my much too infrequent Surf sessions. My aerobics is Martial Arts. After 20 years of taking and teaching, I just do an aerobic warmup and maybe a heavy bag workout once a week. I also use a bicycle for transportation when I can. I like my 24 hour membership, because they can supply most of my facilities. I don’t need to buy weights, machines, figure out where to put it…It’s nice to work out in the high energy atmosphere also.
EXERCISE defined/categorized Isn’t all exercise the same? Not even. You may be just starting a program, you may have enjoyed the benefits your workout schedule, or you may be planning to “take it to the next level”. You will want to understand different kinds of exercise and how they contribute to our health.
Range of Motion;
Perhaps the simplest, easiest and most underrated; range of motion exercises get your joints lubed and working before more aggressive exercise. These are a common part of traditional martial art warm ups and an excellent program for seniors. Stretching; Focusing on creating maximum muscle elasticity. The most common error is stretching joints (which usually need no stretching except in cases of contracture, a diagnosed condition often caused by injury). Yoga is traditionally the most complete stretching program, though yogis will be quick to point out that yoga is not only about muscle stretching. Aerobics; Resistance exercise that uses little or no weight (resistance is gravity or body weight) and has lots of repetition will tend to stress the cardiovascular system more than the muscles. Running and Dancing are prime examples, though many floor routines have been developed on this principle. Resistance; Add more weight and lo and behold, the repetitions go way down. Now the emphasis is on development of muscle strength and size. Body building is the paradigm. Resistance almost always focuses on “prime movers” which are surface muscles. They are easy to see and look great on the athlete (that’s you!). Balance; Proprioception is the fancy term. Muscles come in layers. The deep “paraspinal” layers primarily stabilize the body. They don’t kick into gear until you disturb the comfort zone! Traditional rehabilitation programs often failed because they did not address the deep muscle component. They are not so visible, which is why Power lifters don’t always look hugely muscular. This has been the latest fashion in workouts. In the gym, balance ball and wobble board protocols have emerged. Traditional dance, martial arts, gymnastics, skiing and surfing all stimulate proprioception. You may have gotten great benefits with a particular sport or program. As you consider how to get to the next level, understand these facets of training and how they contribute to your goals. Many advanced trainers and athletes are developing mixed training regimens. Billy Blanks’ Tae Bo was an early example. EXERCISE, Everything You Never Wanted to Know and More! Why do I say that? Some people think of exercise as something that they have to do. With a new approach you can "Just Do It"! Do exercise that is FUN! The key is to find something you love. The best exercise is the one you will do, because to achieve fitness, you have to make a commitment…for a lifetime Exercise is one of the three major components of Lifestyle Health. The first is Chiropractic. Additional physical stress requires efficient body function, maintained by Chiropractic Adjustments. Very important is Nutrition. You need appropriate nutrition to respond to exercise with a stronger body. Pick up a copy of our Food Pyramid newsletter (it's a plan!). Exercise is a part of the whole picture. All the parts are necessary for Optimal Health. . Some folks are competitive or like company. Join a group that shares your interests! Go to volleyball/basketball games and play! Join the local baseball league! Community programs can enhance your opportunities and lifestyle! Do you prefer to workout by yourself? Home workout options are vast. Indoors/Outdoors? Love to golf and hate the gym? Better to golf regularly than never use your gym membership. Some people love the synergism of the gym environment. Run, walk or bike. Have it your way! How often and how long? There are lots of formulas for heart rate, sets, repetitions and so on. With experience your body will guide you. If the program is new, you can expect temporary muscle soreness. Take vitamin C, drink lots of water and keep going. Start easy and build up, no hurry here. Your body will get stronger quickly. If you get sharp or persistent pain that increases with exercise then you may have an injury that needs to be checked out. See your Chiropractor, expert in Sports Performance! You are training steady, eating lots of fresh, whole foods. How often should you workout? Three days a week is a great to maintain good physical fitness and will allow you to grow in strength and skill. Six days a week is maximum and increases your risk of overuse injuries. Your body needs rest time. Don’t skip your sleep. With less frequent workouts and a good warm up, as much as two hours at a moderate to intense pace is reasonable. More frequent workouts need to be shorter, as little as 45 minutes. There is increase of risk of injury from inadequate warm up. Cross train! What does that mean? Over time, play different sports and do varied exercise programs. Why? It's fun, allows you to try more activities and more importantly, uses different muscle groups and strengthens different body systems. The disadvantage is sore muscles when you switch, but you can explore new activities while developing different parts of the body. Customized training programs are used in our practice to support spinal correction and maximize health! Your entire health can be changed, now and forever with a true Wellness Lifestyle! - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Archives of Internal Medicine February 14, 2007 — What could be some of the most welcome heart-healthy advice in a long time comes from Greek researchers who say daytime napping — taking a siesta — may add years to your life. Appearing in the February 12 issue, the study included 23,681 participants from the cohort of the Greek European Prospective Investigation (EPIC) into Cancer and Nutrition. Men who occasionally napped had … lower coronary heart disease (CHD) mortality; those who napped almost daily did even better, with a 37% (95% CI, 0.42 - 0.93) mortality decrease. So don’t give me any more grief about zonking out in the middle of the day, see… - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Hormones and Aging As I noted in a previous newsletter, the strongest stimulant for the much touted Growth Hormone was get down, sweaty, intense exercise. That didn’t go over too well at Rx marketing. Not much publicity on that article. So now I am reviewing another article on DHEA and testosterone. The testosterone was injected so I don’t recommend that. The DHEA is a hormone “precursor” that is orally supplemented. The author noted that one study showed significant improvement. Let me quote; “In one placebo-controlled trial of older adults with a reduced level of serum DHEA, supplementation of DHEA at a dose of 50 mg/day was associated with reduced levels of[4]: - Visceral fat;
- Subcutaneous fat; and
- Serum insulin.
|
Overall insulin sensitivity was improved in the DHEA group compared with those who received placebo.” Sounds pretty good, don’t you think? So why didn’t they get these results in other studies? I suspect that the missing ingredient is EXERCISE. You need to create a demand for anabolic steroids by gettin” down, then your body will use this stuff. It’s the same principle with all nutrients, such as protein and calcium. Americans eat tons of protein. How many have tons of muscle (the ones that work out!). Older women suck up calcium by the bottle. Which ones have increased bone mass (…the ones that exercise? YES!). http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/549531?src=mp
| |
|