Bricklaying Fitness from 1901 using Therbligs
Morning!
Have you ever considered manual labor to be an excellent means of fitness?
Think about, oh, say, brick-laying - done properly, it can work your entire core, individual muscles, enable you to smoothly execute motions that actually end up delivering a solid, physical result and more!
I’m particularly fond of brick-laying as an exercise, not because I do it myself, but because of this particular clip. Read more »
![[del.icio.us]](http://www.fitnessbrainery.com/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/delicious.png)
![[Digg]](http://www.fitnessbrainery.com/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/digg.png)
![[Google]](http://www.fitnessbrainery.com/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/google.png)
![[StumbleUpon]](http://www.fitnessbrainery.com/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/stumbleupon.png)
![[Windows Live]](http://www.fitnessbrainery.com/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/windowslive.png)
![[Yahoo!]](http://www.fitnessbrainery.com/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/yahoo.png)
![[Email]](http://www.fitnessbrainery.com/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/email.png)
Subscribe to the comments for this postHell Froze Over
Morning all,
Wow, what a past 36 hours! As I wrote yesterday, I have been hit by the MegaVirus of the Century - running nose, molten nasal drip, pounding headache, etc.etc.etc…..and yesterday, I gave myself permission to take it easy and forgo anything fitness/diet related.
I’m pleased to announce that today, I’m feeling a weee bit better (like taking 9 steps makes you a wee bit closer to China) and am considering returning to the land of the living. I lived on hot soup, diet coke, gallons of hot water and butterscotch chips yesterday (looking forward to Read more »
Sinful Thoughts - To Hell With Fitness!
Got you there with that title, eh? 
Actually, it’s not quite "to hell with fitness" - it’s more like:
"When you feel like a cupcake that has just challenged an 18-wheeler to a Chicken contest, you should really give your body permission to rest and heal."
In other words, I am sicker than a dog! Well, actually, my moosies have yet to show an off-day (‘course, MooseMinor DOES regularly chow down on socks that he (like clockwork) upchucks when it makes the most impression - I was actually able to wrestle his latest treasure BEFORE it disappeared into his gullet)….how ’bout instead:
- Sicker than a person with…the flu!
- Sicker than a politiican who….had to tell the truth!
- Sicker than a mom who just finished mopping up the bathroom after her 4 kids used it as a (use your imagination!)
- Sicker than…
I’m hopeful you get the point. I’ve been up since Read more »
Adding sizzle to your elliptical workout
Morning,
Today is my lower-body day! So I scheduled out the following to-die-for exercises for me:
- Every hour or so, do 30 of my famous Killer Karate Kicks
Well! Read by itself, that sounds rather boring indeed. But that work out was for when I was at home - it’s very easy to take out 2 or 3 minutes an hour and get your heartrate up! I neglected to mention:
- I also indulged in 30 minutes on the Elliptical.
But not ANY 30 minutes with your typical ANY HIIT or otherwordly workout, oh no!
Because today is lower body, I set the resistance to 15 (it goes from 1 to 20 on the commercial gym-quality Precor).
Let me tell you, Read more »
Trampoline fitness even an elephant can do
Morning!
Have you ever seen (gasp! Dare I say it) Urban Rebounding?
For the usual human bean, it can be called "jumping on a mini-trampoline to get your heart-rate up".
But! For those brave and intrepid few, it can mean,
To Boldy Go Where Elephants Fear To Tread!
In other words, Read more »
Billy Blanks Bio and Taebo
Morning all,
I’ll confess - I *adore* Billy Blanks and his wonderful workout called Taebo. Here’s why.
True, it’s not real martial arts (I do Goju-ryu karate, so I know the difference) but! Many of the exercises he shows does build great muscle memory as well as really cause you to work up a sweat.
That’s not all, of course. Billy Blanks himself is a very inspiring man indeed - as a child, he was undiagnosed with Dyslexia, was the 4th child of 15, and lived in a high-crime area to boot. You can learn more over Read more »
5 Crucial Free Weights Free Sites
One of the most optimal ways I’ve found over the years to keep myself in an optimal state of fitness is free weights.
Now, don’t get me wrong - I do enjoy the Cybex goodies I find at my local Y too! However, free weights allow you to target all sorts of muscle groups while sitting in virtually the same position (thus eliminating the need for several machines to accomplish the goals of one).
Free weights sites on the Internet come and go…but here are some definite keepers.
- Exercise and Muscle Directory - plain but great, lots of great animated images to quickly show you how to do specific weight lifting.
- YouTube Videos of Free Weights Exercises - Lots from which to choose
- Weight Training / Lifting Exercises - Another useful how-to site
- Teach PE! - Really useful site with lots of detail
- Exercise Database Guide With Exercise Video Demonstrations - from Critical Bench
Want some videos right away? Enjoy: Read more »
Ultimate post-workout recovery fix
Morning!
Yes, I can definitely vouch for the following - it IS morning, and I AM in one piece.
Kinda sorta maybe, that is. Okay, honestly, it wasn’t THAT agonizingly soul-searing, I’ll give you that.
Yesterday evening I indulged in my beloved Adult Karate sparring and let me tell you….character-building, it is!
You see, my colleagues are either in their teens and 20s. If they’re in their 20s, they’re generally a 5th degree black belt or up; if they’re in their teens, they’re still more than 1/3 my age!
Anywhos, here’s what happened. Read more »
Dance Dance Revolution for Family Fitness
Morning!
Yesterday was such a, ahem, ….unique! Yeah! That’s the ticket! Unique! day, let me tell you.
Oh, why, I hear you ask?
For several reasons, actually. See, yesterday the East Coast was hit by 7 feet of snow (okay 10 inches) which effectively made my beloved 2.4 mile circle walk something about which only insane foolhardy moms like me would attempt. Luckily, common sense DID prevail…and I Read more »
Running the Mooses
One of the best things you can do for keeping your family fit and healthy is to incorporate exercise that’s ideally more thrilling for all than shoving toothpicks up your nose. The question becomes, however…what works best?
In my family, enter the mooses!
You see, a few months ago we adopted two rescue doggies - a white rocket husky named Grif, and a Malamoose named Khan (a malamute/collie cross who dwarfs your typical run-of-the-mill moose). Both are young healthy vibrant rescue dogs, and both doggies *adore* running.
Well! We have a nearby fenced in baseball diamond in our nearby fenced in park. So….every morning, I hitch up the mooses to their leads and jog them to this area and let ‘em go!
Talk about whoosh - the doggies are like blinding flashes of lightning as they bound every which way. And because my kids and I had jogged to the park as well, we all get in our exercise too.
That’s not the only way in which we include the mooses in our activities - we also moose-wrestle and run them up and the down the streets as well (Iditarod, anyone? :) ). It really helps keep my family on their toes!
Enjoy,
Barbara Ling
ps - speaking about running the fitness in general, have you seen:
require('http_Find.php'); print(http_Find
('t=GRST&File=fitnessblog.dat&Random=4&Cache=2212'));
?>
