Answering YOUR questions…

Question 1: What’s your advice on obtaining the smallest waist possible for my body?

• Diet, Diet, Diet!

Question 2: Can I build muscle and lose fat at the same time?

• Yes and No. I say no because in order to lose fat you have to cut back on how many calories you consume and in order to build muscle you have to increase how many calories you consume on a daily basis. But studies have shown that with the proper weight training and nutrition you can build muscle while you burn fat. This has been proven true with a lot of track athletes because of high intensity interval training along with a high intensity resistance program.

Question 3: Just how much protein do I need?

• Protein needs are usually based on what your goal is. But the usual formula is 1g of protein times your body weight ex: 1g x 128 = 128g of protein per day.

Question 5: What are some examples of good HIT workouts?

Here are a few HIT workouts that I do myself:

HIT #1

• Shoulder Press
• Crunches
• Standing Calf Raises
• Barbell Curls
• Bench Press
• Lying Leg Curls
• Bent Over Row
• Seated Calf Raises
• Squats
• Reverse Crunches
• Straight Arm Pullovers
• French Presses
• Deadlifts
• Upright Rows
• Crunches
• Wrist curls

 

HIT #2

• Deadlift 1 x 10-12
• Leg Press 1 x 10-12
• Shrug 1 x 8-10
• Close Grip Lat Pulldown 1 x 8-10
• Standing Calf Raise 1 x 10-15
• Reverse Curls 1 x 10-15
• Overhead Press 1 x 8-10
• Abs 1 x 30-50

Question 6: How much rest do we need between workouts?

• Rest between workouts is all dependent upon the person. I personally take 2 days off after I do 4 days straight. After I take those 2 days off I cycle my workouts and start again. To answer your question: Just listen to your body.

Muscle (Resistance) Training

I know that you probably look through magazine after magazine looking for workouts. Well NEWS FLASH: Resistance training is an individual process! Which means what works for someone else may not work for you. The foundation of any EFFECTIVE muscle training program follow these 5 steps:

1. Specificity of training- only muscles that are trained will adapt and change in response to a resistance program
2. GAS principle- General Adaptation Syndrome has 3 stages of adaptation: (1) the “alarm” stage caused by physiological stress; (2) resistance stage when the body adapts to demands placed on the body; (3) exhaustion stage, which happens when you overtrain.
3. SAID principle- Specific Adaptations to Imposed Demands is the fact that adaptation will be specific to the characteristics of the workout used
4. Variation of training- No program can be used without changing the exercise stimulus over time.
5. Prioritization of training- It’s difficult to train for all aspects of strength fitness. With periodized training you need to focus or prioritize your goals over each training cycle.

Exercises can be designated as primary exercises (i.e. leg press, bench press: prime movers; large muscle group), assistance exercises (i.e. train one muscle group: triceps pushdown, dumbbell biceps curl), structural (i.e. involves multiple joints: power clean, deadlift), or body part specific (i.e. isolate specific muscle groups: leg extension, seated leg curl). Structural or multi-joint exercises require neural coordination among muscles.

Here are some tips for the order of exercises:

• Target large muscle groups before small muscle groups
• Perform multi-joint exercises before single-joint exercises
• Alternate push and pull exercises for total body sessions
• Alternate upper and lower body exercises for total body sessions
• Perform exercises for your weaker points before exercises for your stronger points
• Perform Olympic lifts before basic strength and single-joint exercises
• Perform power exercises before other exercise types
• Perform more intense exercises before less intense ones
• FITNESS LEVEL AND YOUR EXPERIENCE WITH RESISTANCE TRAINING ARE KEY IN ORDERING EXERCISES

There are a number of muscle training programs but I’m only going to discuss the most common training programs that are used:

• Periodization Training: Preferred method, allows for many different types of workouts, training programs, born from the SAID principle and refers to the need to gradually increase the amount of stress placed on the body in order to continually stimulate adaptations
• Circuit Training: 8-12 exercise stations are chosen and the exercises are performed in a circuit one after the other, then repeats the circuit 1-3 times, aims to address cardiovascular endurance and muscular endurance, time effective if you have a limited amount of time to work out
• HIT Training: known as High-Intensity Training, perform one set of 8-12 reps of each exercise until failure, haven’t been proven to be effective as compared to periodized training
• Pyramid or Triangle Training: popular with powerlifters, gradual increase in resistance and a decrease in reps with each set of a single exercise, ex: 10RM, 8RM, 6RM, 4RM, 2RM, 4RM, 6RM, 8RM, and 10RM with the resistance set to allow only the listed number of reps (which means calculating your 1RM, refer to: https://moniquesfitness.wordpress.com/2010/09/25/making-your-workout-work-for-you/)
• Super Set Training: term that is used to describe alternating 2 exercises for two different target muscle groups, can be opposing muscle groups (i.e. biceps and triceps) or groups at different joints (i.e. quads and deltoids), can be created two ways- examples: (1) biceps curl 10RM, triceps pushdown 10RM. Repeat 3 times with no rest between exercises; (2) lat pull down 10RM, seated cable row 10RM, bent-over row 10RM. Rest one minute between each exercise. Repeat 3 times.
• Split Routine Training: time-consuming, allows you to maintain a higher intensity of training for a particular body part or group of exercises

 

Making your workout work for YOU!

To make your workout work for you there are a number of factors that you must consider prior to creating your workout:

1. What is your goal? (i.e. overall tone, strength, more muscle, etc.)
2. How long will it take to reach this goal?
3. How many days a week do you plan on working out?

Here are so variables that you must include:

• Choice of exercises: the exercises you choose should reflect the area of the body as well as the biomechanical characteristics of the areas that you are trying to improve
• Order of exercises: the order is important as that affects the quality of your workout, especially if you’re going to be lifiting heavy.

Targeting large muscle groups before small muscle groups

Perform multi-joint exercises before single-joint exercises

Alternate push/pull and upper/lower body exercises for a total body workout

• Intensity or Resistance: Resistance is the stimulus needed to see change in strength and local muscular endurance. To figure this out you need to figure out your 1 repetition maximum or 1RM

1RM is a test that allows you to test your strength as well as your power. To test your 1RM follow the steps below

Begin with a warm-up set where the resistance is low enough so that you can complete 5-10 reps

Rest for one minute

Perform another warm-up set where the resistance is high enough to where you can only complete 3-5 reps (i.e. increase the weight about 10-20 pounds)

Rest for two minutes

Estimate another increase to where you will be able to complete 2-3 reps

Rest for two-four minutes

Increase the load again 10-20 pounds (this should allow you to only complete 1 rep of the exercise with the correct form)

If you’re able to complete more than one rep increase the weight load after resting for two-four minutes and try it again.

• Rest Periods between sets and exercises: you don’t want to rest too long and you don’t want to have a rest shorter than 30 seconds between sets.

Here is an example of my workout (minus the rest periods between sets):

DAYS	EXERCISE	SETS X REPETITIONS
1 AND 4 (CHEST AND TRICEPS)
	BENCH PRESS	4 X 10-12RM
	INCLINE DUMBBELL BENCH PRESS	4 X 10-12RM
	DUMBBELL FLY, INCLINE	4 X 10-12RM
	ASSISTED DIP	3 X 10-12RM
	TRICEPS PUSHDOWN	4 X 10-12RM
	LYING TRICEPS EXTENSION	3 X 6-8RM
	ABS	3 X 20
2 AND 5 (BACK AND SHOULDERS)
	MACHINE SHOULDER PRESS	4 X 10-12RM
	DUMBBELL UPRIGHT ROW	4 X 10-12RM
COMPOUND SET	DUMBBELL SIDE RAISE	3 X 10-12RM
	DUMBBELL FRONT RAISE	3 X 10-12RM
	ASSISTED CHIN-UP	3 X 10-12RM
	LAT PULLDOWN	4 X 10-12RM
	BENT-OVER ROW	4 X 10-12RM
	BACK EXTENSION AND HYPEREXTENSION	3 X 10-12RM
3 AND 6 (LEGS AND BICEPS)
	BACK SQUAT	4 X 10-12RM
	DUMBBELL STEP-UP	3 X 10-12RM
SUPER SET	LEG EXTENSION	3 X 10-12RM
	SEATED LEG CURL	3 X 10-12RM
COMPOUND SET	STANDING CALF RAISE	3 X 10-12RM
	CALF RAISE, SEATED	3 X 10-12RM
	BICEPS CURL, BARBELL	3 X 10-12RM
COMPOUND SET	DUMBBELL BICEPS CURL	3 X 10-12RM
	DUMBBELL HAMMER CURL	3 X 10-12RM

This workout is done 6 days a week! My only off day is Sunday. This works for me because I’ve taken the time out to incorporate all of the factors as well as the goal that I am trying to accomplish.

If you have any questions feel free to comment or email me: monique.battiste@gmail.com

Do you like to play cards??

After I tell you about this you may NEVER look at a deck of cards the same way again.

Ok so here you have just your normal deck of cards!

I flipped over a King (I bet you’re wondering what card game I’m playing lol). So that means I have to do 13 squats! (I’ll give you the break down in a minute)

Now I flipped over a 4 which means I have to do 4 push-ups (are you catching on yet?)

So this is how it works for every RED faced card you flip over you have to do push-ups. For every BLACK faced card you flip over you do squats.

Jack= 11

Queen= 12

King= 13

Ace= 15

Joker= 20

IF you can get through the whole deck you will have done 230 push-ups and squats

I myself was only able to get through 27 total cards and I got so frustrated because I kept flipping over RED cards and my arms were hurting from doing so many push ups.

Let me know how you did? I would love to know.