What in the World is a Level Change???

Hey everyone! During this article we will have a brief discussion about what a level change is, what exercises accomplish it, who should be doing them, and why you should be doing them.  First, a level change is a general term that we attribute to any exercise in which you flex from the hips and knees to drop your weight towards the ground that is followed by an extension from the knees and hips to bring your weight back to a standing position.   This flexion and subsequent extension is done simultaneously through the two joints that being used is what make these exercises level changes.  There is a wide range of exercises that meet these criteria.

The most basic and common level change exercises are squats and lunges.  Even though these exercises are different in their execution they both meet the criteria and engage similar muscles.  Main muscles that are used during a level change exercise include glutes, quads, along with the core and postural muscles,  Other exercises that can be used to ramp up to squats and lunges are wall sits and step ups. By using the latter two exercises it will give your body a chance to get used to the level change motion before increasing the load put on your body.  With that being said let us go over who should be doing these motions.

The short answer is EVERYONE!!!!!! The level change is one of our 5 fundamental movements.  These movements are MANDATORY for anyone who wants to be healthy and have a complete training program.  This does not mean that everyone should be doing squats or lunges.  This means that everyone should find a way to accomplish level changes in their workouts.  The personal decision on what exercise to do should hinge on what you personally need the exercise to accomplish.

Level changes help build bone density, promote hip mobility, increase the connection between mind and body, and also can increase strength and endurance in the targeted muscles.  The goal of every exerciser should be to master the highest form of all fundamental movements and build the rest of your workouts from there.  Make sure that you personally do level change workouts at least twice per week and watch the results roll in!!!

If you need some help with your workouts, or want us to take a look at your form shoot us an email at joshmaness@highlycalibratedfitness.com so we can get in touch and help you out!  Until next time, find your push and never say sorry!

What Part of Fitness Should I Use Today?

In the wide world of fitness there are so many different ways to turn.  You have mobility, strength, endurance, not to mention the mental battle just to stay on the program that you are currently doing.  Today we will take a simplified look at mobility, strength, and endurance and how you can apply these modalities to your everyday fitness routine.  

MOBILITY

Mobility refers to the consistency of the range of motion of all of your joints in your body.  Flexibility training is a way that you can gain more mobility through a given range of motion.  .  Another way we can work on our mobility is to use active range of motion training.  This is when you take a given joint slowly through its entire range in the hopes of bringing more blood flow to the joint resulting in a greater range with each repetition that is done.  According to the American Council on Exercise, or ACE, for flexibility or mobility training to be the most effective it needs to be done around 20 minutes a day for 5 days per week.  Next let's tackle strength.

STRENGTH

When we are talking about strength we are talking about our ability to move an object or load a single time.  The goal of strength training is to increase the load in which you are lifting over time through a given range of motion.  For example if you can squat 30 lbs on day 1 a good goal would be to lift 35 lbs on day 10.  The frequency of strength training depends on which muscle groups you are training.  For simplicity sake if you are doing full body strength workouts then you have to wait 24 hours before doing your next workout.  Remember strength refers to lifting an object 1 time.  Finally we have endurance.

ENDURANCE

Endurance refers to the ability to lift or move in a plane of movement repeatedly over time.  This can mean running for a set distance or lifting a weight up and down for a set of repetitions.  Endurance is training your cardiovascular system to be able to repeat the motion over and over again while efficiently regenerating energy to keep going. This type of training can be done every other day up to 5 days in a week. When thinking about which modality to use remember the definition of each.

MODALITIES AND GOALS

Correctly choosing a modality is all about knowing yourself and setting a goal that reflects the modality that you are going to be using.  If your goal is to be able to stay up later with your kids or grandkids then we need to work on your endurance so your body uses fuel more efficiently.  If you are having trouble at a new job lifting heavy boxes onto a shelf then work on your strength.  Finally if you are stiff all the time or you find yourself losing abilities like looking over your shoulder when you back up in your car then the work needs to be more on your mobility.  

A good program utilizes all three of these modalities to help you reach a specific goal.  Remember to match the modality to the goal not the goal to the modality.  The things in fitness that we like and are good at are not usually the things that we need to work on.  Get into the hard stuff! Let it help you grow!

If you need help integrating any of these modalities into a program that will help you meet your goals, set up a free consultation on our website today!

Effective Training

    EFFECTIVE TRAINING

 

Effective training should increase your breathing volume, lower your resting heart rate, and make you feel overall better.  Keep these aspects in mind as we explain overtraining and undertraining.

            Most exercisers have experienced both overtraining and undertraining.  Many less exercisers have ever truly experienced effective training.  Overtraining means that you are doing more movement, more volume (weight multiplied by repetitions), or more flexibility in your training than would elicit the highest amount of adaptation from your body.  Conversely undertraining is when you are not doing enough movement, volume, or flexibility to elicit any adaptation from your body.  The consequences of both under and overtraining are very similar.  Both categories will decrease your breathing volume, heighten your resting heart rate, and make you feel overall worse than you did before you started the exercise program.  Both overtraining and undertraining can lead to injury.  After understanding the effects of this type of training now consider training intensity and duration or exercise.

 

TRAINING INTENSITY

            When thinking about how to adapt these principles to your exercise program you can use two approaches to gauge exercise intensity.  RPE or Rate of Perceived Exertion, refers to how you would rate how hard you are working on a scale of 1 to 10.  Any training in the 1-4 range would be considered undertraining, while training in the 9-10 range to be overtraining.  Effective training in the range of 4-9 can be used for various desired goals or outcomes from exercise.  The second approach to intensity of exercise is to use heart rate data. 

You can get this heart rate data by using a wearable such as a garmin or fitbit, or by estimating your heart rate at set points during your exercise bout.  First you need to get your max heart rate.  This is found by 220-age.  For example I am 29 so my max heart rate is 191.  This number represents the absolute 100% of my heart rate capacity before my heart does not beat in an effective manner.  In simpler terms, you do not want to be consistently training at this level.  From there we can say that 90-100% of max heart rate would be considered over training, while 0-40% would be considered undertraining.  The exercise that stays within that 40-90% range can be used for various desired goals or outcomes from exercise, which can be tolerated for different durations or length of time.

 

DURATION

As a rule of thumb the lower you are in the effective training ranges of RPE and Heart rate range the longer your body can sustain that exercise bout.  Now with that being said the difference between how long you can sustain 60% of your max heart rate or a RPE 6 and how long you can sustain 80% of your heart rate max or a RPE 8 is a large gap.  For a seasoned marathon runner 60% can mean 4 hours or more while 90% can only be held for about 3-4 minutes.

 

HOW IT WORKS

For the average exerciser sustaining 60% of a max heart rate for 20-30 minutes is a great goal.  Also for the average exerciser sustaining 80% of a max heart rate for 20-30 seconds is a good goal as well. 

When we are talking about the average exerciser we mean someone who has at least worked out 1 time per week at least for the last 3 months or 3 days per week for the past month.  No matter who you are, feel free to use this template to scale how far into your program you are! Have fun and remember to stay safe!!!!!!!!

Manufacturing Motivation

Ability Appropriate Exercise

    The subject of ability appropriate exercise refers to taking an ability centered approach to fitness exercise choices. This differs from the traditional approach of first taking a look at the individual goals of the exerciser then taking the evaluation information into account as secondary information. In the ability centered approach we first take into account what the individual is able to do now and calls for the individual to meet certain ability benchmarks before moving into more goal centered exercises. This approach will not only yield the highest level of results for every person who uses it, but it also minimizes any risk of injury that the individual will come across in their fitness journey. Please understand the appropriate exercise choices for your ability level now does not mean you cannot progress to more advanced levels of exercise, this approach just gives you a roadmap of how to effectively get there without getting hurt or wasting time. Choosing the correct intensity, duration, and modality for the level of fitness each individual is currently at will be the fastest and more effective way for individuals to reach their goals. Good exercise choices are a key piece of effective programming. It is close adherence to these effective programs that will give you results time and time again.

    You will want to use this approach to either evaluate what you are currently doing in your exercise program or as a starting point and template for building your first effective exercise program. The approach can be used at the beginning of the exercise choice process to guide you to the correct exercise choices or at the end of a cycle on any exercise program to evaluate the effectiveness of the program that you have just completed. By taking the later approach, the easier the sample program in this article is for you the better fit the program you are currently doing is for your current fitness level. This approach will benefit people from all fitness levels. It gives advanced individuals a chance to see if the foundation they have built will be effective enough for continued progress, while also giving beginners an idea of where to start and how it will influence their future progress.

    Beginners should be focused on 2 things, Isometric holds and the 5 fundamental movements. Isometric holds are commonly known as planks, glute bridges, wall sits, or any exercise where you are tightening muscle groups without any net motion occurring. In other words you are tightening without moving in any direction. These types of contractions serve to develop posture and balance in the musculature of your body. This helps to support proper movement of your joints and alignment of your body. The second focus is the 5 fundamental movements. These are Level Changes, Hip Hinges, Push, Pull, and Core is broken up into Isometric holds and rotational movements. Level Changes are squats and step-ups, or exercises where your hips are going up and down. Hip Hinges are commonly known as deadlifts. Pushes are traditionally bench press or pushups. Pulls are Rows and Pulldowns. Isometric contractions are the planks that are mentioned above. Finally rotational movements could be medicine ball twists or any movement where your torso is rotating over your hips from right to left. For a more in depth look at the 5 Fundamental Movements refer to the links below. The key to this focus is the variety of these movements.

    A good workout of a beginner is to pick 2 of each of these movements and set a timer for 90 seconds and just focus on getting more efficient with the movements during this time. This type of individual should stay with an RPE, Rate of Perceived Exertion, of 4-6 in order to keep risk of injury low. More information about RPE can be found in the links below. If something like this feels easy or you are looking for a bit more of a challenge go for the intermediate focus.

    Intermediate fitness level individuals should be focused on increasing the load through the 5 fundamental movements and doing the 5 fundamental movements in a variety of directions, while maintaining the progress made in the beginning phase of exercise. Increasing the load the body undergoes during each of the fundamental movements will begin the process of increasing strength and stamina in the muscular system while maintaining the muscular balance gained during the beginning phase. By doing the fundamental movements in a variety of directions you will continue to build joint integrity and lower your risk of injury before moving onto more aggressive forms of exercise in the advanced phase.

    A good workout template for an individual in the intermediate phase is to pick 2 of each fundamental movement and during your first set through the exercises set a timer for 90 seconds and grab a weight to increase your load during each exercise. During the second set through the exercises set the same timer for 90 seconds and without any added weight go through the movement in different planes. Forward, backwards, side to side, up and down are all good options and once again variety is key to a healthy body. The RPE for this level should be around 5-7 to make sure that you are pushing yourself to make changes to your fitness and strength levels while keeping risk low. Finally let me show you how the advanced phase of exercise works.

    Advanced fitness level individuals need to both focus on 3 things to keep their progress moving forward. First focus is continuing to increase their loads through the fundamental movements while staying in place. This ensures the continued increase of strength and endurance of the muscular system. The second focus needs to be to increase the load of the body with the fundamental movements in the different directions. This will begin to develop the strength and endurance of the muscles that complement our major muscle groups. Another way to think about this benefit is to think of it as mobilizing the muscle that you have developed and are developing to allow you to efficiently move in every direction. Finally the third focus of this advanced phase is to integrate speed and acceleration into your bodyweight movements. This is also known as plyometric training. The reason this focus is important is first because it is the next level of efficiency in bodyweight training and second because during plyometric training you are exerting a maximal amount of force during a very short amount of time which helps to increase your strength to speed ratio.

    A good workout in the advanced level is to once again pick 2 of each fundamental movements and in the first set the timer is set to 90 seconds and increase your load for the movement while staying in place. During Set two do the same movements with some weight in a variety of directions for the 90 second duration. Finally for set three set the timer once again for 90 seconds and put the weights down. Do each of the fundamental movements that you choose in a quick manner while leaving the ground when appropriate for the given exercise. The RPE for this type of exercise should be between 6-8 to make sure the workout is hard enough to make changes to your body but not so hard as to break your body down.

    Always remember that there are tons of approaches to fitness and exercise and please look to find the approach that works best for you. This approach is one very effective way to evaluate what you are currently doing in your exercise or just start to build your program from scratch. By choosing exercises that are geared towards your ability level regardless of age or other factors you will be spending your time on the exercises that will give you the biggest changes with the least of injury. Think of this as your sweet spot to train in. Your largest amount of positive for your least amount of possible negative. Secondly if you are doing exercises that are outside your ability level you are either at a high risk of injury not a high amount of return to your fitness level or you are not putting your muscles through enough stress to make any changes to that fitness level.

    Remember if you would like more information about either the 5 Fundamental Movements or RPE scales please refer to the links below. I look forward to continuing to engage with you all for all topics Movement, Nutrition, Modalities and Mindset! See you next week!


Links: 5 Fundamentals Intro Talk , RPE Scale Post



Tags: Movement, Selection, Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced, Workout, Builder