Ready to strengthen, stretch, and break a sweat? This high-intensity bodyweight workout is a simple, effective way to work your whole body—without any machinery or extra equipment. From heart-pumping jump tucks to core-blasting mountain climbers, these supersetted moves will help build strength and boost metabolism with just body resistance alone. So take this workout to the park, the playground, or the living room floor—there’s no excuse to skip a workout again! If you need more detail on any of the moves below, check out our list of 50 bodyweight moves for explanations. To read more click here!
Michelle Spindler
The 20 Minute Body Weight Workout For Stronger Arms
If we’re looking for a great upper-body workout, we usually expect that we’ll need dumbbells, resistance bands, or kettlebells. But we have some awesome news: You don’t need any equipment for this 20-minute workout that seriously strengthens your arms, shoulders, and back. Follow along as Jaime McFaden, a personal trainer at Grokker, shares the best bodyweight exercises for defined arms and shoulders. You’ll do push-ups, dips, planks, and even animal-inspired moves like “bird dog” and “bear crawl” to work your muscles to the max. The circuit ends with a relaxing cool-down stretch and will leave you feeling stronger and more energized by the end. Ready? Just press play. To read more click here!
10 Reasons Running Is The Best Kind of Therapy
I’ve always hated running. Even more than that, I’ve always hated “enduring” anything — whether it be a situation, an emotion or a relationship that needed to end. In a moment of insanity, I started combining these two hatreds, running and enduring, and I’m a new woman because of it. Last October I started running regularly and it’s been one of the most inspiring, motivating, loving teachers I’ve ever had. Here’s why I love it, and how it can be yours too. To read more click here!
11 of the Best Workout Videos You Can Do Anywhere
No gym? No problem. Pop in one of these DVDs, fire up one of these apps or stream YouTube videos in your living room for a great workout in the privacy of your own home. No need to deal with crowded gym classes, music that’s too loud or instructors that go too fast for beginners. With each of these video workouts, you can exercise on your own schedule, add your own music (and adjust the volume accordingly) and progress at your own pace. Time to get your sweat on! To read more click here!
7 Things No One Ever Tells You Before Your First Cycling Class
We know cycling is a great workout, but let’s be real—no one wants to go out and ride a bike in pouring rain, freezing weather, or on a scorching summer day. Rocking out to T. Swift and Tiesto in a darkened room with a motivating coach? Now that’s more our style. While indoor cycling has been around since the early 1990s, the fitness phenomenon is still going strong. Most gym chains now offer classes and thousands of boutique cycling studios are opening around the world. (You’ve probably heard it called “spinning,” but that term is actually trademarked by Mad Dogg Athletics to identify the company’s particular type instruction and bike models. Other classes are technically called “indoor cycling.”) To read more click here!
18 Laws of Ab Training
Everyone, it seems, has an opinion on the best way to train abs. Whether it’s doing bodyweight ab exercises for higher reps to keep the midsection tight and trim, or weighted moves for lower reps to build up the bricks of the six-pack, the differences are as diverse as the qualifications of the fitness professionals who espouse them. They can’t all be right, can they? Training abs differs from the way you approach training other muscle groups. For one, abs have a higher ratio of slow- to fast-twitch muscle fibers than most other muscle groups. What’s more, even a little body fat can blur your ab definition, so any approach must also address diet. In my experience, there are a number of smart ways to approach your ab training, and others that don’t seem to be as effective. Bodybuilding.com asked me to compile a list of the most important ones, which we’re collectively calling “laws.” Hopefully you can walk away with more than a few nuggets that’ll enable you to train smarter on ab day. To read more click here!
8 Nutrition Tips for Women
Have you ever thought to yourself, “I know my diet isn’t perfect? Between family, work, and running around, I just feel tired a lot of the time. Maybe there’s something missing in my diet that would give me the energy I used to have.” If you answered yes, or simply feel that you could use more energy to get you bursting through each day, please take the next few minutes to learn these eight nutrition tips to improve your stamina and performance. Plus you’ll be getting information on the nutrients you need to fight the chronic diseases that are of increasing concern to women. If you have a friend that could use a boost, print this out for her. Busy women often find themselves skipping meals, eating “empty” snacks, skimping on vitamins and overstuffing with fat-free foods. Women also have to realize that what works for men may not work for them. We have different nutritional requirements. To help you meet those requirements, here are eight nutrition tips. Follow them, and your stamina and performance should improve, plus you’ll be getting vital knowledge about the nutrients you’ll need to fight some chronic diseasesthat are of increasing concern to women. To read more click here!
7 Tips to Rekindle Your Fitness Relationship!
You know how on Facebook you sometimes see “it’s complicated” under relationship status? That’s how fitness is for many people. It’s as if, somewhere in your heart, you know you want to be with fitness forever, but it can drive you gaga with all the ups and downs you have to deal with in the “relationship.” You and fitness might hit the rocks from a lack of excitement, stress, or very little reward for what you put in. Each of these could very well lead you to take a break and do your own thing. Everyone feels this way at some point—unhappy or less motivated about their fitness and health. I’ve fallen out of love with fitness more times than I care to admit, but that’s just life. The daily grind can interfere with health goals, our well-meaning friends and family members can keep us from achieving certain physique goals, and one errant cookie can make you fall to the Dark Side. Thankfully, it’s a lot less complicated than you’d imagine to revive a stale or inert fitness relationship. Start implementing at least one of these seven actions into your daily life to rekindle an old flame! To read more click here!
41 Hardcore Ab Exercises
Think you’re hardcore — or that you have a hard core? Prove it! These 41 midsection-mangling moves are some of the most advanced on the planet. They’ll help strengthen your torso from a variety of angles and in a variety of ways so you’ll be ready for all the movements initiated by your core — which is just about every move you make! To read more click here!
Empowering Questions to Help Keep Weight Off
When I started my weight loss journey six years ago, I topped the scales at 300 pounds. I spent the first 25 years of my life overweight, miserably bouncing from one fancy fad diet to the next in an attempt to drop the unwanted fat. All of them seemed to work for a few weeks, but then I gave up on the diet and myself. But when I embarked on the last weight loss trip — the one that worked, and stuck — I started asking myself important questions. I can almost guarantee I would not have sustained my 125+ pound weight loss these last six years if I hadn’t asked myself these five questions. To read more click here!
9 Questions Your Personal Trainer Wishes You Would Ask
When you hire a personal trainer, whether it’s for a couple of sessions or a long-term commitment, you want to get the most out of your time and money. Most of this depends on the trainer, who should know what to say and do to get you the results you want. But by asking the right questions, you can bring out your trainer’s best with topics they may not know are of concern for you. Check out the questions these top trainers would love to hear from their own clients and examples of how they’d respond. To read more click here!
How to Get a Good Workout on an Elliptical
Out of all the cardio machines, the elliptical probably gets the most side-eye. People tend to think it’s boring and ineffective (research even says so!) , and the go-to source for an easy, mindless workout, if even that. But it turns out there are plenty of science-backed benefits to the elliptical, like raising your heart rate even more than the treadmill and improving fitness just as efficiently as the treadmill or Stairmaster. What’s more, there’s actually a right and wrong way to use it. With the correct form and plan of attack, you can get a truly killer workout on the machine. To find out how to make the most of every stride, we asked top fitness experts for their best advice, plus an effective 20-minute workout. To read more click here!