Being Well
Exercise Basics
Season 1 Episode 4 | 25m 57sVideo has Closed Captions
Everything you need to know about how to start a safe and effective exercise program.
This program discusses everything you need to know about how to start a safe and effective exercise program.
Problems playing video? | Closed Captioning Feedback
Problems playing video? | Closed Captioning Feedback
Being Well is a local public television program presented by WEIU
Being Well
Exercise Basics
Season 1 Episode 4 | 25m 57sVideo has Closed Captions
This program discusses everything you need to know about how to start a safe and effective exercise program.
Problems playing video? | Closed Captioning Feedback
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Learn Moreabout PBS online sponsorshipcoming up next on being well it's something we all know that we need to do exercise on a regular basis for some the idea of starting can be daunting enough there's so much information out there so where do you start today's show is designed to provide you with the information than the tools you need to get started with a regular exercise program my guests include certified personal trainer Jim DiNozzo and exercise physiologist Lori Richardson both of them have helped many people get started on the road to lifelong fitness that's coming up next on being well so stay right here you you Jim and Lori thank you so much for joining us today we're going to talk about how to get people off the couch and get started in an exercise program something that the two of you are I know very educated about because you do it all the time let's talk first about a need for balance when you're starting an exercise program what kind of components do you need to be successful Lori and while you need a good aerobic component in it meaning getting the heart rate elevated and keeping it elevated throughout your exercise program walking jogging bicycling and I also feel like you need to have a good endurance strength training program two or three days a week and do full body not just a certain part which is a common misconception a lot of people will do one part of the body over the other upper body or lower body not usually both and then also a good flexibility program I think they all three have to go together in order to have a balance to exercise routine I also think you need to psychologically be prepared to do it and you know not just do it because someone else is telling you to so you have to be prepared to do it and then you have to want to do it and you know in our case people come in and they like to have that appointment and meet with us it helps them with their accountability and so I think that you have to be ready I've had people come in before and it just wasn't the right time from that too many things going on in their life and I do believe you should exercise every day but you know circumstances are such that maybe it's not the right time for somebody to be working with a personal trainer or maybe they can't commit at that time so I think that's important component to so in addition to getting your mind ready and and things ready time in your schedule you need some equipment and one of the most basic things are tennis shoes can you give us some advice on what kind of shoes to buy because there's all sorts of shoes out on the market what do what do you need to get started well I personally feel like the biggest problem with a lot of people as they get brand conscious they think Nike or they think adidas or they think saucony has to be the kind so-and-so has a pair they work great for them everybody's feet are different some over pronate some under pronate they roll in when they walk and each type of shoe has a dip support system and if you don't have the right type of shoe you can really really mess up your feet which in the long run could cause problems it may not be an immediate problem but down the line you can up having knee problems hip problems which will keep you from exercising all together so understanding and then the other thing with with the shoes is getting the right size a lot of people will get just the size they need where their toe is barely touching it when you exercise your feet swell and you have to have enough room in that toe box for your feet to have place to move so you need to go somewhere that they know what they're doing to be able to fit you for the proper shoe the proper size the way to watch you walk to see how you plant your feet all those to me that is one of the most important things with shoes one of the things that a lot of people don't realize is when you have a shoe for exercise it needs to be just for exercise you don't want to wear the same shoe when you go out wall to wall Mart shopping it needs to be dedicated strictly to the exercise and a lot of people don't want to do that cuz on the budget and I think a lot of people also think that if they're going to get a high quality shoe they have to pay hundreds of dollars and they don't necessarily again it just depends on the brand and any good shoe salesman and anybody that knows how to fit somebody for a good fitting shoe especially if it exercise shoe will be able to give them a range of here's the bottom line here's the top line here is in between I think and again this is for me and it took me a long time for me to finally say okay I'm going to shell out this amount of money but it has made the world of difference I've paid anywhere from fifty bucks up to maybe 90 or hundred dollars for a pair of shoes and I cannot say that that hunter dollar shoe is any better than the fifty-dollar shoe so it really just depends on you and the brand that works best for you alright so once you got the shoes you got your mind right now it's getting actually serious about doing the program and I know one of the first questions people will say how many days a week how long do I have to do this what I try to tell people if they're just interested in general fitness is really focus on the process and if you're too concerned about just reaching your final goal sometimes they want to say well I like it for example I had one lady come in she was three weeks from a class reunion and she wanted to lose 50 pounds and I asked her where she was you know months ago instead of three weeks ago and I just think there's some people are under an illusion that they can get things real fast because that's the kind of society where we want things right away and I'm a big believer that the process has to be correct and if it is it's going to be a slower process but you're teaching people life to lifestyle skills and habits that is going to get them to their goals and then keep them there so there's really no quick fix when you come to us and it's a hard question to answer but as a general rule I like to see people exercise and at least three or four times a week gets just a general rule more than that if possible but for most people that I talk to three to four times a week is probably the best commitment you're going to get out of them and you know go along with that with with that is that you have people that have never exercised a day in their life I always tell them baby steps if you are having trouble fitting it especially if the reasoning behind why they aren't exercising is because they don't have time well I'm not somebody that sympathizes with that because we all have 24 hours in a day and how we choose to spend those 24 hours makes a difference now some of that time is accounted for with work and there are some commitments that just can't be taken care of but if it's a priority to us we will find the time for it and so if they're really struggling trying to figure that out I always tell them start conservative try one day a week and do it consistently one day a week when you're consistently getting that day in then let's look at your schedule and figure out a second day I'm with Jim I three to four days a week minimum I would definitely say that but if for those that are really struggling saying I just I don't have the time getting them to at least commit to one day week and making them accountable for that day is what's really important I mean if you're talking going by Surgeon General and the guidelines they say a minimum of four to six times a week to get general health 30 minutes at a time if people really want to gain even more than that they need to go 60 to 90 minutes four to six times a week but again telling something that that is never exercised that they need to do six days a week for 90 minutes they'll lose them they'll walk right back out the door you scare em away so in that time does that include the cardio portion the strength training portion and stretching portion or do you try and break those up again it probably depends on what your goals are we do we test and assess everybody and most people coming in the door they're looking for general fitness some of them have exercised and they've developed some habits some haven't but what we do is we test an assessment and we look for things such as muscle imbalances sometimes they have little orthopedic issues they don't even know about and we're big in the movement so we watch their movement skills and if we see that they can't perform certain basic movements we know there's problems so that automatically becomes part of the programming for us so that's a big part of the equation and then so we have what we call our remedial part of the program and then we look at what do they need and then what do they want because sometimes they say well I want this but they may need something else too so we always want to give them what they want as long as the goals realistic and we can we think we can deliver but you want to make sure that you you put other things the program we I think flexibility is important and these are just general rules cardiovascular is important strength training is important some people if they're really weak and let's say they have a job that requires them to have a little bit more muscular strength or muscular strength endurance then we may emphasize that a little more in the program but obviously for cardiovascular health and things you want to have that as a component too so it just really it really depends I don't want to say you know I mean clinically speaking or the guidelines say this but realistically with the people that we see it varies but but there is a component there and we may combine them we use heart rate monitors where we'll have people do circuit training where they're doing various exercises and drills and movement drills throughout the whole work out and then they're doing interval training on an elliptical or treadmill or bicycle so we try to combine all of it so what if someone is watching and they say oh I'd really like to exercise but I got bad knees I don't think I can do anything well when I what I get tickled at is somebody will walk in and say I want to join your exercise program but I can't do that and they'll point directly to the treadmill my first instinct is to say well why well I've got a bad knee and my my you know my ankle hurts but yet I watch them walk out to their car I watch them walk everywhere they're going so one of my biggest things is the people that say they can't do something because they're having a little difficulty now there's a big difference between arthritis discomfort or having a tear or something medically wrong with a knee if that's the case then you really need to have kind of a team of people working with that person if they are seeing their doctor the doctors aware that they've got in injury of some kind then you need to kind of figure out the plan are they going to do surgery are they seeing a physical therapist because if they are doing all those things then you don't want to interrupt what's already been started so it just depends you know if that's what's going on then you need to work side by side with those people to make sure that what you're doing goes coincides with what they're doing if you have something that comes in that says I have horrible arthritis and every joint that I have exercised has been proven to be the best medicine for arthritis and the problem with that and what was most discouraging for most people with arthritis is that it hurts to exercise but what they don't understand is they need to go to that point where it hurts or they can't take that any more than they need to back off a little bit then needed to start again and after they keep doing that and they keep being consistent with it at the point where that pain comes will will take longer and longer and longer to take take hold but the worst thing that they can do especially with arthritis pain is to be sedentary getting them up on the treadmill weight-bearing exercises a lot of people choose to do swimming or a bicycle and the reason they do that is because they don't feel the immediate pain from it those can be wonderful cardiovascular exercises but they're not accomplishing the goal of the weight-bearing if you unless you want to be wheelchair-bound you have to continue to put that weight on those those joints to continue to get the benefit from it and again if it's more of a orthopedic problem something that's been injured then they need to look at getting it taken care of before they they do any exercises well let's talk about the old no pain no gain theory is that true or is that just something people say I'm sure some people think it's true I don't I don't believe in doing that I mean earlier you were talking about starting an exercise program and feeling sore and whatnot but if the program is done correctly there should never be excessive soreness maybe a little bit you know because you do have to take the body to where it's a little uncomfortable and then the body will change and adapt but we think that the proper programming will take care of that and that's where I think sometimes when people come off a long layoff or they start an exercise program and they they go out there and do it themselves they can push too much too soon and they wind up feeling excessively sore in the camp was the next day and they say well gosh who would want to do this and I feel the same way who would want to do that but if you're following a progression and you're doing the right things you know you usually won't have that delayed onset muscle soreness like that but as time goes on and as people continue to exercise more you can reach a plateau and we talked earlier a lot of women yes will do that and what do you need to do to get off that plaque well that what most women and there are men in this as well but women tend to be a little bit more apprehensive they do the same workout routine they could even do it for years the same and blocks that they they go around I've done three blocks for five years and they just they get comfortable in their routines and they're not hurting themselves in either just not gaining anything more from it and I think the fear that some women have is that they leave the push too far they'll get sore or for their hurt themselves or they just don't know what they need to do my advice to them is take it slowly if your exercise of choice is going to be walking outside then you if you do the same four blocks now I want you to do a four and a half blocks I want you to push it a little bit more than that I'm with Jim on this no pain no gain is out it's not it's not then it's not the norm it's not what you should be doing and again as i was giving the example before with the Arthritis that's a little bit of a different situation they're going to have pain no matter what they do so just at that point what you need to do is get them moving the difference between no pain no gain is that a lot of people will go all out they will instead of starting a walking program they'll go from doing nothing to running right or they'll start weightlifting and instead of starting with a very low weight and a little bit higher reps they will and men are a little bit worse than this than women but there are women out there that do this too they'll jack up the weight and they'll do very small amounts of resistance because the weights so high and then they're so sore they can't do anything for a week well you've just defeated what you were trying to accomplish so getting people to understand where you're at exercise wise if you're already doing an exercise program and you're just wanting a little bit of a kick then you need to start to slowly add a little bit more in or go a little bit faster you can either go faster or longer it comes to endurance with weight training it's either adding another day or it's adding a little bit more weight or adding more repetitions it's getting them to take that next step and it really comes down to the accountability and it comes down to the willingness Jim made that point you know there are some people that will come in and here's what they want but it may not be what they need and getting them to see that and to listen to you is is not always easy variations i think the spice of life too if you do the same thing over and over again what we see is they get overuse injuries and this happens a lot with people who like to do endurance training like a lot of running cardiovascular exercise outside they'll run and they'll do the same thing over and over again and then they get these overuse injuries and it's very important because the body can adapt to any stimulus and so what you need to do is constantly change and very the stimulus and so they still if their goal is still to get in good cardiovascular shape or do cardiovascular training or endurance training they can change them you know the type of exercise are doing so maybe your jog in a pool or you swim one day instead of jogging three days or you bike one day something where you're still taxing the system but you're not doing the same thing over and over again because the body will reel it will break down the same repetitive movements all the times and that's important because I see that a lot i see people coming a lot of inflammation and pain just because they won't vary their exercise routine and you do do you recommend a day of rest absolutely okay for the body to recover a little bit and you know when he was talking about people doing the same repetitive stuff you know one of the things i tell them is if they won't give up their let's say they run they jog or they want to start running or they want to start jogging I always tell them don't do it every day you know maybe do a little bit one day take it a couple days off do it again and in between do something different and we were talking earlier about some people that do one type of thing biking or running cross training is a phenomenal way to use the muscles that you don't use predominantly in your given choice of exercise but you're also working other muscles that will only help those muscles even more and so if you have somebody that bikes all the time if they start doing a walking on a treadmill or doing elliptical you might be surprised at how much better your biking will be because as you've worked other areas and so getting people to understand once they start a routine don't get into that Plateau don't get into that rut where you're doing only one thing and being single minded you have to be able to branch out again starting getting something started in exercise is getting them started and then getting them to start to add a little bit more to it and that there's really no finish line it is a continual thing exercises a lifetime thing it's not a quick fix and it is a lifestyle choice that we can choose to make or not make but the results if you make it you know can be very positive I have a couple of questions here real quick before we wrap up sports drinks and water you know you need water I stay hydrated while you're working out when do you need a sports drink instead of water I think most people need to take in more water we see so many people are coming they think they're hydrated and they're really not especially now it's starting to get warm out I'm not a big fan of the sports drinks I'm not necessarily against them but what we tell some of our athletes is dilute on fifty percent water to fifty percent sport drinking with some people they like the taste and that helps them stay hydrated they'd say well I don't like water you know I'd rather have some flavor that's fine too but I really don't think you need as much of that stuff and then when you look in there it's a lot of the sugar and its really stuff that it's going to really harm your performance oh I don't like this one of the cautions that I would give somebody because there's all different ages of people that are wanting to start an exercise program is to look at your medical what your own health is if you're somebody that's on any kind of heart medication for blood pressure for cholesterol any of that kind of stuff yet to be very careful with sports drinks because I think we lose the importance of what a sports drink is they were originally designed for elite athletes that they would lose a lot of their electrolytes very important electrolytes during their competitions and so they would have to have something that would quickly replace those well a lot of times people that are using the sports drinks don't need to be using them and they could be getting too much of their electrolytes in which will throw off the muscle contractions and just become very dangerous for some people and you have people that are on pills that are already having some of electrolytes being if they're not on it electrolytes pairing water pill can actually be taking in way too much of some electrolytes and it just as a very dangerous situation and I'm with Jim I'm not a very big fan of them for the general public there is a place for them and I think that those that know that there's a place for them are the ones that probably should be using them and probably aren't be aren't using them but there's a lot of people that don't drink nearly enough water the general rule of thumb is eight to twelve eight to ten out our cups a day for general public and the more active you are you need even more than that you're talking like two cups to 3 cups before your exercise but a cup and a half to two cups every 15-20 minutes of a pretty good cardio and maybe even two or three cups after your exercise and I guarantee you most people aren't doing that okay lots of good information and I hope it gets people started on a exercise program and on the road to a healthy lifestyle we'll be back with more being well right after this don't go away this week's being well demonstration segment will show you some exercises to combat muscle and balance and weakness we'll also talk about how you can use interval training in your workout routine and we're going to be doing some remedial exercises today what I mean by remedial is the exercises that Doug is going to perform are actually going to help address some muscle imbalances that he had when he came in the first exercise we're going to do is a remedial exercise and we call this the Swiss ball bridge to knee flexion and doug is going to get down here and demonstrate he's going to lay down on the floor and this is known as a Swiss ball some people call it a physio ball or an exercise ball but it's a 55-centimetre ball doug is going to lay down and what he's going to do is his knees are going to be slightly bent and he's going to elevate his pelvis off the floor roll the ball to him by flexing his knees and then extending the knees and bringing the hips back down to the starting position and as he does this exercise he's engaging the the glute muscles the hamstring muscles and stabilizer muscles of the pelvis and lower back those muscles tend to be very week throughout the population doesn't matter what your job is we tend to see people coming through the door then all this is known as the posterior chain posterior chain or all the muscles in the in the posterior the back side of the body that tend to get weak and so by performing this exercise he can increase his strength and thereby remediating balance that he has another thing people don't realize is many times knee pain is caused by weak hamstrings and gluteal muscles because people get quadricep dominant and so Douglas quadricep dominant when we test and evaluate and when he came in and so this is a good exercise for that the next exercise we're going to do works the posterior side of the body too but this time the focus is going to be on the neck extensors and the retractors of the of the shoulder the scapula and the lower trapezius muscles ones that tend to bring the shoulders back because as I stated before the forward head forward shoulder position is very common throughout the population especially people who have jobs where they're sitting or there in front of a computer like Doug does so Doug's going to perform this exercise the name of this exercise is a Swiss ball prone T exercise and Doug's going to lay over the ball and takes a little bit of stabilizing a little effort to stabilize there on the ball he's going to take dumbbells and what he's going to do is he's going to bring the dumbbells out away and then back down and we return this way good and then he's going to turn him the other way and supinate and if you notice he's supinating then he's pronating his hands what that does is just emphasizes some of the muscles a little bit differently in the posterior part of the lower back and the shoulder there's a very good exercise it actually works the rotator cuff muscles to posterior deltoid muscles the rhomboid muscles and the lower trapezius muscles all of those muscles are very important in keeping the shoulder blades back especially the rhomboids and the trapezius lower trapezius muscles these muscles tend to be weak when Doug came in he was especially week in this area so we really had to focus on these types of remedial exercises before he can move on and do other exercises that work the anterior part of the body because those muscles are already shortened from the sitting in the forward head and shoulder position that he's in every day when he's in front of the computer so a lot of what we do is make sure that we look and find any imbalances that someone may have and then remediate those imbalances and then take them through the regular exercises that someone would do as part of a regular program it's very important to understand too that muscular conditioning and strengthing is very important but so is cardiovascular conditioning one of the things that Doug is doing is he is performing interval training where he performs a series of three exercises in a row of resistance training and then he comes over and does a 60 to 90 second interval to train his cardiovascular system and so in a little over one hour we can get the best of both worlds where he's getting cardiovascular conditioning and also muscle strengthening and conditioning so it's a good way to combine them especially if time is an issue and you can only train let's say three days a week four days a week or even twice a week it's a very good way to combine the workout and get what you need in an hour or so and that's what we're doing here with Doug as part of Doug's exercise program we are training the full body this is a lower body exercise it really is full body exercise but emphasizes the lower body he's doing an assisted split squat where he's inside a power rack and he's using the safety catches on the power rack to assist himself through the exercise as he moves through the range of motion and this works the glutes the hamstrings the quadriceps all the lower body I hope today's show has provided you with some valuable information and practical advice for starting your exercise program whether you choose to join a club use a personal trainer or team up with a friend adding regular exercise into your daily routine can have lifelong positive results for being well I'm Lori Casey you
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