Thursday, August 21, 2008
Energy Night!
Thank you girls for all your energy! I needed it last night and you girls delivered! I do not have a video this week due to the fact I was a one woman show but next week there will be one. Thanks to those that have shared their personal stories. I would still like to get more emailed to me (zumbahappens@gmail.com). Remember that it doesn't have to be about exercise and you don't have to have your name on it. Just give me the guidelines of what you want and I will do it. We all have inspiring stories so let us here about them!
Saturday, August 16, 2008
Personal Story
This is Veronica Ernest. From the time I met my husband to the day my first child was born I had gained about 100 pounds. I couldn't move or breath and I didn't like the way I looked. I wanted to be able to play with my son so I decided to lose weight. I lost about 35 pounds in a year and a half on my own then, I joined weight watchers. I learned to eat healthy and exercise and I lost 18 pounds in ten weeks. I got pregnant with my second child and gained 40 pounds. Six weeks after she was born I joined weight watchers again. I've lost my baby weight plus 20 pounds, and I've kept it off. I'm not writting this because I I'm trying to get people to join weight watchers, I'm just saying it helped me.My friend, Rachel Page, told me about Zumba and after the first class I was hooked. I've been going to the classes about three times and week and doing other cycling and strengthening classes and my body has toned up and changed like I never thought possible. I feel so strong and I love my new muscles. I love the energy I have. I especially love the looks I get from people I haven't seen in awhile.I know people look at me and think that I've always looked this way and that I've always had this much energy but its not true. I've attached a before picture and you can see my after at Zumba!
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Zumbalicious!
Here is our new routine! I mess up twice but I think you can get the hang of it. Have fun learning this in the comforts of your own home and next week you can show off your stuff!
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Calories needed to lose weight
There are approximately 3500 calories in a pound of stored body fat. So, if you create a 3500-calorie deficit through diet, exercise or a combination of both, you will lose one pound of body weight. (On average 75% of this is fat, 25% lean tissue) If you create a 7000 calorie deficit you will lose two pounds and so on. The calorie deficit can be achieved either by calorie-restriction alone, or by a combination of fewer calories in (diet) and more calories out (exercise). This combination of diet and exercise is best for lasting weight loss. Indeed, sustained weight loss is difficult or impossible without increased regular exercise.
If you want to lose fat, a useful guideline for lowering your calorie intake is to reduce your calories by at least 500, but not more than 1000 below your maintenance level. For people with only a small amount of weight to lose, 1000 calories will be too much of a deficit. As a guide to minimum calorie intake, the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) recommends that calorie levels never drop below 1200 calories per day for women or 1800 calories per day for men. Even these calorie levels are quite low.
An alternative way of calculating a safe minimum calorie-intake level is by reference to your body weight or current body weight. Reducing calories by 15-20% below your daily calorie maintenance needs is a useful start. You may increase this depending on your weight loss goals.
The best thing to do for your body is to watch what you eat. You need to write down everything you eat in a day so you can look back on it and evaluate your food intake. Make your self a food log and keep track everyday. Make sure you are eating 6 times a day rather than 2 or 3 times. The more you eat healthy foods all day long the faster your metabolism becomes. Don't starve yourself from treats. Eat one small one a day or wait till the weekend and reward yourself for how good you did during the week. Make sure you cut back on the carbs and sugars. A good rule of thumb is don't eat them after 4:00 pm. Eat your bread for lunch but stay away from it at dinner. Same goes for your treats during the week. Have one after lunch but hold off on the sugar after dinner. The last important thing is drinking tons of water. You will not lose weight if you are not drinking enough water everyday. It is essential to weight loss. Get a larger water bottle and commit to drinking it and filling it up 3 times a day. These guidelines are not to difficult and if you drink your water and keep a food log you will see results.
If you want to lose fat, a useful guideline for lowering your calorie intake is to reduce your calories by at least 500, but not more than 1000 below your maintenance level. For people with only a small amount of weight to lose, 1000 calories will be too much of a deficit. As a guide to minimum calorie intake, the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) recommends that calorie levels never drop below 1200 calories per day for women or 1800 calories per day for men. Even these calorie levels are quite low.
An alternative way of calculating a safe minimum calorie-intake level is by reference to your body weight or current body weight. Reducing calories by 15-20% below your daily calorie maintenance needs is a useful start. You may increase this depending on your weight loss goals.
The best thing to do for your body is to watch what you eat. You need to write down everything you eat in a day so you can look back on it and evaluate your food intake. Make your self a food log and keep track everyday. Make sure you are eating 6 times a day rather than 2 or 3 times. The more you eat healthy foods all day long the faster your metabolism becomes. Don't starve yourself from treats. Eat one small one a day or wait till the weekend and reward yourself for how good you did during the week. Make sure you cut back on the carbs and sugars. A good rule of thumb is don't eat them after 4:00 pm. Eat your bread for lunch but stay away from it at dinner. Same goes for your treats during the week. Have one after lunch but hold off on the sugar after dinner. The last important thing is drinking tons of water. You will not lose weight if you are not drinking enough water everyday. It is essential to weight loss. Get a larger water bottle and commit to drinking it and filling it up 3 times a day. These guidelines are not to difficult and if you drink your water and keep a food log you will see results.
Thursday, August 7, 2008
July Drawing
Congratulations to Melanie Mickelson she won our July drawing. She won a free smoothie from Emerald City and a Zumba sweat towel. Thank you Melanie for coming to Zumba and having such great energy throughout our classes! We have been having some issues with aerobic shoes leaving marks on the floor and the owner is getting worried that her floor (that is made for bare feet) may be getting ruined. So in saying this, please check your souls and if you have black souls please try to wear something else unless they are dance shoe type souls. Thank you for your understanding. We want to stay at the dance studio but if we are doing damage to there floor they will ask us to leave so please just be aware of this problem. Thanks again!
Thursday, July 31, 2008
We Love the Cha-Cha!
Marti said that lasts night class was great. Sorry there was no prize, that is my fault for not getting that to her. So next week we will do the drawing before class starts for the month of July. We recorded after class was over last night and thank you to the ones that stayed for the recording. This song is "Oye Como Va" by Santana. You can download this song from itunes and learn it from the video. Enjoy and see you next week! Don't forget to look often for new posts and you can even sign up to have an email sent to you when we make new posts to our blog. If you have questions please ask and I am always looking for new ideas for posts. Let me know!
Sunday, July 27, 2008
The Importance of Warm up and Cool down
WARM UP
The general warm up should consist of a light physical activity. Both the intensity and duration of the general warm up (or how hard and how long), should be governed by the fitness level of the participating athlete. Although a correct general warm up for the average person should take about five to ten minutes and result in a light sweat.
The aim of the general warm up is simply to elevate the heart rate and respiratory rate. This in turn increases the blood flow and helps with the transportation of oxygen and nutrients to the working muscles. This also helps to increase the muscle temperature, allowing for a more effective static stretch.
Static stretching is a very safe and effective form of basic stretching. There is a limited threat of injury and it is extremely beneficial for overall flexibility. During this part of the warm up, static stretching should include all the major muscle groups, and this entire part should last for about five to ten minutes.
Static stretching is performed by placing the body into a position whereby the muscle, or group of muscles to be stretched is under tension. Both the opposing muscle group (the muscles behind or in front of the stretched muscle), and the muscles to be stretched are relaxed. Then slowly and cautiously the body is moved to increase the tension of the muscle, or group of muscles to be stretched. At this point the position is held or maintained to allow the muscles and tendons to lengthen.
This part of an effective warm up is extremely important, as it helps to lengthen both the muscles and tendons which in turn allows your limbs a greater range of movement. This is very important in the prevention of muscle and tendon injuries.
COOL DOWN
Cooling down after exercise is just as important in reducing the risk of injury as the warming up process before exercise. Cooling down means gradually slowing down the level of activity. The major purpose of warming up is to prepare the body and mind for rigorous activity, whereas that of cooling down is to assist in recovery and to bring the body back to a pre-exercise or pre-workout state.
Cooling down also helps the heart rate and breathing to return back to normal. Cooling down after exercise helps prevent dizziness and needless pain. During a rigorous workout, the body experiences a number of stressful processes.
Muscle fibers, tendons and ligaments tend to undergo a lot of strain, and waste products build up inside the body. Cooling down after exercise, if performed correctly, will help the body flush the toxins and release the strains. Post Exercise Muscle Soreness, also referred to as Delayed-Onset Muscle Soreness (DOMS), is one of the areas where cooling down after exercise is most useful. This is the soreness that is generally faced the day after a strenuous workout. When exercise is suddenly stopped blood, and waste products like lactic acid (a chemical effect of muscular fatigue), stay in the muscles, which can cause swelling and pain. This process is frequently referred to as 'blood pooling'.
Cooling down after exercise helps in returning the blood to the heart in adequate quantities to relieve the muscles off lactic acid. The circulating blood also carries with it the oxygen and nutrients required by the muscles, tendons and ligaments for repair and growth. An effective process for cooling down needs to include three major parts to guarantee a complete restoration of the circulation system. These are gentle exercise, stretching and re-fuel. All of these three elements are equally important and none of them should be ignored or treated as unnecessary. They work jointly to repair and replenish the body after exercise. Dizziness, nausea and a 'worn out' feeling are usual symptoms of an inappropriate cool down process. For an effective cool-down, carry out a low intensity exercise for a minimum of 5 to 10 minutes and follow this with a stretching routine.
Also you can either carry on with the current exercise while gradually slowing its intensity, or jog or walk briskly for a few minutes, making sure that these activities are lesser in intensity as compared to the exercise previously performed.
During the cooling down process, after the heart rate has been lowered, stretch all major muscles, particularly the ones that have just been worked on. Every stretch ought to last for at least eight seconds, with longer stretches and repeats for those muscles that feel particularly sore.
The last part of the cooling down after exercise process involves the re-fuel, just as proper nutrition is needed before exercise to provide the fuel needed for activity, the body requires nourishment for the after exercise process of building muscles so water, minerals and carbohydrates are all needed.
As you have read, warm up and cool down are just as important as your aerobic workout. So the next time you think about arriving late or leaving a class early make sure you know of the side effects your body might have if neither of these or one of these is not done or incorporated into your daily exercise routine.
The general warm up should consist of a light physical activity. Both the intensity and duration of the general warm up (or how hard and how long), should be governed by the fitness level of the participating athlete. Although a correct general warm up for the average person should take about five to ten minutes and result in a light sweat.
The aim of the general warm up is simply to elevate the heart rate and respiratory rate. This in turn increases the blood flow and helps with the transportation of oxygen and nutrients to the working muscles. This also helps to increase the muscle temperature, allowing for a more effective static stretch.
Static stretching is a very safe and effective form of basic stretching. There is a limited threat of injury and it is extremely beneficial for overall flexibility. During this part of the warm up, static stretching should include all the major muscle groups, and this entire part should last for about five to ten minutes.
Static stretching is performed by placing the body into a position whereby the muscle, or group of muscles to be stretched is under tension. Both the opposing muscle group (the muscles behind or in front of the stretched muscle), and the muscles to be stretched are relaxed. Then slowly and cautiously the body is moved to increase the tension of the muscle, or group of muscles to be stretched. At this point the position is held or maintained to allow the muscles and tendons to lengthen.
This part of an effective warm up is extremely important, as it helps to lengthen both the muscles and tendons which in turn allows your limbs a greater range of movement. This is very important in the prevention of muscle and tendon injuries.
COOL DOWN
Cooling down after exercise is just as important in reducing the risk of injury as the warming up process before exercise. Cooling down means gradually slowing down the level of activity. The major purpose of warming up is to prepare the body and mind for rigorous activity, whereas that of cooling down is to assist in recovery and to bring the body back to a pre-exercise or pre-workout state.
Cooling down also helps the heart rate and breathing to return back to normal. Cooling down after exercise helps prevent dizziness and needless pain. During a rigorous workout, the body experiences a number of stressful processes.
Muscle fibers, tendons and ligaments tend to undergo a lot of strain, and waste products build up inside the body. Cooling down after exercise, if performed correctly, will help the body flush the toxins and release the strains. Post Exercise Muscle Soreness, also referred to as Delayed-Onset Muscle Soreness (DOMS), is one of the areas where cooling down after exercise is most useful. This is the soreness that is generally faced the day after a strenuous workout. When exercise is suddenly stopped blood, and waste products like lactic acid (a chemical effect of muscular fatigue), stay in the muscles, which can cause swelling and pain. This process is frequently referred to as 'blood pooling'.
Cooling down after exercise helps in returning the blood to the heart in adequate quantities to relieve the muscles off lactic acid. The circulating blood also carries with it the oxygen and nutrients required by the muscles, tendons and ligaments for repair and growth. An effective process for cooling down needs to include three major parts to guarantee a complete restoration of the circulation system. These are gentle exercise, stretching and re-fuel. All of these three elements are equally important and none of them should be ignored or treated as unnecessary. They work jointly to repair and replenish the body after exercise. Dizziness, nausea and a 'worn out' feeling are usual symptoms of an inappropriate cool down process. For an effective cool-down, carry out a low intensity exercise for a minimum of 5 to 10 minutes and follow this with a stretching routine.
Also you can either carry on with the current exercise while gradually slowing its intensity, or jog or walk briskly for a few minutes, making sure that these activities are lesser in intensity as compared to the exercise previously performed.
During the cooling down process, after the heart rate has been lowered, stretch all major muscles, particularly the ones that have just been worked on. Every stretch ought to last for at least eight seconds, with longer stretches and repeats for those muscles that feel particularly sore.
The last part of the cooling down after exercise process involves the re-fuel, just as proper nutrition is needed before exercise to provide the fuel needed for activity, the body requires nourishment for the after exercise process of building muscles so water, minerals and carbohydrates are all needed.
As you have read, warm up and cool down are just as important as your aerobic workout. So the next time you think about arriving late or leaving a class early make sure you know of the side effects your body might have if neither of these or one of these is not done or incorporated into your daily exercise routine.
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