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Article: Unexpected Smoothie Ingredients, Beating Yoga Burnout, and More
Unexpected Smoothie Ingredients, Beating Yoga Burnout, and More
Better EDUCATION in Strength Training
Better EDUCATION in Strength Training
The emphasis on education is based on the fact that I have lost count of the number of clients that i have that were injured by “certified” personal trainers. The level of education required to become a “certified” personal trainer is pretty much a high school diploma-if that. Personal training is a great field for those finding it hard to find jobs in this economy Most certifications can be finished over a weekend and require knowledge from their own cookie cutter text. There are great certifications out there. There are great self-educated personal trainers out there. These are the outliers in the bell curve of trainers however. A majority of these “healthcare” professionals have no idea what they are doing. Personal trainers can keep you from going to the doctor or they can send you there immediately. With rising healthcare costs, personal trainers and their preventative role in someone’s life can drastically decrease one’s healthcare costs over their lifetime. For example- a trainer can implement a program that can decrease your risk of costly surgeries, lower your risk for cardio-vascular disease ( number 1 killer in America), lower your risk for cancers, and decrease your need for medications. All these factors can costs you hundreds of thousands of dollars over a lifetime. So paying a trainer 50 to 150 dollars a week can be an AMAZING investment in your physical and financial well being.
Unfortunately- i would contend that about 90% of “certified” personal trainers mean well but truly do not understand how dangerous they can be. Big gyms hire these trainers by the 1000′s every year to generate more revenue and profit. This is unethical and needs to be addressed. Programs at Universities all over the country are educating personal trainers in Exercise Science. This 4 year bachelors program teaches facets of health that no certification could ever compete with. Unfortunately, college is costly and big gyms will hire you with or without an Exercise Science Degree.
Personal Trainers that go to school for Exercise Science are going to be on the forefront of an emerging healthcare field. Prevention of diseases, quality of life as we age and other positive benefits of active living are becoming common knowledge. As people realize the intricacies of a effective and safe workout program, they will turn to the “professionals”. Are these professionals the Big Gym Hired “certified” trainers or are they trainers that went to school and learned the ins and outs of proper and safe training of multiple population types.
I am not calling all personal trainers out as being bad trainers. I am simply challenging them to become better educated trainers. Do more continuing education. Take anatomy and physiology at your local community college. Apply for a loan and go back to school. We must all work harder to educate the public of this emerging healthcare profession. That is what it is.. it is can be the most important of all healthcare professions, in that it will keep people alive and healthy longer.
I recently read somewhere that we could lower our country’s healthcare costs by 75% if everyone got up and moved more. SEVENTY FIVE PERCENT!!! Be the educated personal trainer that teaches those people move properly!
By: Christopher Tolisano LAT, ATC
Your Brain on Spring- Fuel and Move. Repeat. Burn Calories. Get Lean.
Your Brain on Spring.
Spring is humans active time. The sun is shining. Snows melting. Creatures foraging. Fruits budding. Most of human history- we survived harsh long winters in order to make it to spring to make babies.
Putting components of this time of year into your nutrition and exercise program will help you to reach all your fitness and weight-loss goals.
A few nutritional tidbits for
Tell your brain it is Spring, and enjoy the healing capabilities of the human organism. Rebuild fresh cells all day long. Increase strength. Improve mobility with function. Use habit changes to tell the brain that these muscles we don’t use all day( because we are sitting for more than an hour a day) need to be used and used often. Keeping these muscles maintaining a perfect anatomical position of your skeleton are imperative to moving more naturally and with less to no pain. You can do this but first these muscles are gonna need fuel….and lots of it.
Fuel the muscles, strengthen the muscles, keep increasing the fire that is your metabolism. Keep putting kindling on bonfire and it burns hotter ( more calories! )
Vegetarians: Eat a lot of natural snacks, fruits, veggies, rice, beans, gluten free ingredients, lots of nuts and seeds are also great fuels! Quinoa is a great alternative fuel source that is also a complete protein( has all the amino acids for muscle strengthening and leaning )
Everyone else: All that plus some fish, poultry, red-meat, pork.
Water: yes. and lots of it. 99% water, 1% of other refreshments.
Consistency, consistency, consistency. The brain likes consistency and stresses about inconsistencies. These stressors from inconsistencies ( mixing and matching fad diets all your lifetime are very stressful to your brain ). Now we do need some stress- especially from moving and strengthening…this stress adds to growth and healing of your body.
Tell your brain that it will have fuel to do its job-which is keep you alive. The brain is an amazing resource manager- and its really good at saving calories to keep you alive in times of starvation. There wasn’t always a Publix on every street corner. 99.9 % of human history we had to be efficient with our calories because sometimes, we didn’t eat any thing for a while.
These times when caloric intake was low, the brain found ways to keep you alive longer- and usually that means shutting down the most metabolically active tissue in the human body- muscle. Saving fat on top of that allowed us to last through harsh winters when caloric intake got even lower. We had to make it till spring when the fruits started budding,and the critters came out to pro-create (and we hunted them for their rich sources of fats and proteins). Generally-if we could last the winter, then the spring was our time to hunt, gather, and pro-create as well!
By telling your brain that it is spring and it is gonna have all the calories it needs for muscular strengthening, cardio-vascular improvements, natural movement patterns for months on end when we were hunting and gathering. This is when the brain starts to really burn fat and make you stronger, faster, and more pain-free. This is where the human organism is truly amazing at healing, and adapting to the natural environment. Add modern advances in medicine, and that is why we can live healthy, active, and free of aches.
Staying consistent with this keeps your brain thinking it is spring. Tell your brain to work like it is spring year round( remember, we are not hiding in a cave until warmer weather- except if you live up north 
When you keep your blood sugar consistent throughout the day, this helps as well. Think that your a forager-and when you have good calories around- you need to eat them and burn them for fuel.
- To be Continued.
Christopher Tolisano LAT, ATC
BEST Method. Better Education in Strength Training.
The Barefoot Professor- Harvard’s Daniel Lieberman Research on Barefoot Runners
Harvard professor Daniel Lieberman has ditched his trainers and started running barefoot. His research shows that barefoot runners, who tend to land on their fore-foot, generate less impact shock than runners in sports shoes who land heel first. This makes barefoot running comfortable and could minimize running-related injuries
Modern footwear is expensive now and when the cartilage in your knees is gone.
Pronation.Underpronation.Supination. Orthotics. Arch supports. Air Cushions. Gel. Springs. ALL OF THESE ARE SALES GIMICS TO SELL YOU 150 Dollar Pairs of Foot Casts that limit your natural movement patterns we were born with. Humans are designed/evolved to run. But not with fancy foot braces that wear out in 500 miles. When you are running out and about take a look at a runner that is running towards you- if you can see the bottom of the soles, then they are heel striking. No amount of pronation correcting shoes will decrease the 7 times greater impact at the knees, impact transient of jarring your entire body weight to a dead stop at heel strike, or asking your IT band to stabilize every step you take (instead of your ankles- and you wonder why your IT is always tight). Moral of story- Start from scratch, and relearn how to run the way nature intended, not the way that “Big Shoe Company” sells the masses on “NEW TECHNOLOGY”. PS- there is a direct correlation in price of shoes and injury incidence. Yes, the more you spend- the higher rate of injury. Don’t believe me? Feel free to expand your horizons with this fun article:
Excerpt from the Book: Younger Next Year
According to the book Younger Next Year, “Being sedentary is formally classified as a major cardiovascular risk factor, increasing risk more than smoking or high cholesterol. Vigorous exercise cuts your risk of dying from heart attack by half.”
Still Stretching for Sciatica Pain? Maybe you should stop.
Sciatica is a common health issue that is usually overlooked within the healthcare community. Sciatica is when the sciatic nerve is impinged or inflamed causing radiating pain in the butt area and down the leg. One the the main causes of sciatica problems arise from the piriformis muscle, that lays over the sciatic nerve. When the bigger glute muscles do not support the skeleton like they should, the smaller, deeper muscles in the buttocks take over for them.
The piriformis muscle is one of the main culprits in doing a job it is not really supposed to do. When the piriformis becomes so strong and tight from doing a job it is not made to do it impinges on the sciatic nerve. When the piriformis is tight and overused it can cause long term sciatic pain. Stretching is a common treatment for this issue. Stretching is prescribed because of the tight piriformis muscle doing way too much work. But the stretching does not fix the issue of why the piriformis muscle is so tight. So people usually keep stretching for years and years because of the pain. The stretching temporarily relieves the pressure on the sciatic nerve, that is why stretching is usually always prescribed. When someone keeps repetitively stretching certain muscle groups, the body develops other muscular imbalances that can usually cause more structural disruption. When a person constantly stretches a muscle the muscle loses its supportive mechanisms and it actually makes the bony structures (bone) / joint that the muscle is attached to more unstable causing even more pain and possible inflammation.
A huge factor in why sciatica is so prominent in todays society is because humans sit down way too much. When humans sit, the big glute muscles relax and stretch out because of the ninety degree flex in the hip joint. Sitting literally tells the muscles in the butt not to work, since humans are not weight bearing when sitting the huge muscles that support the skeleton do not engage to keep us erect. So combine all the hours and days spent sitting, those combine to years that the glute muscles are not working. Remember when the larger glute muscles do not support the body like they are made to do, the smaller deeper butt muscles (piriformis) take over.
The repetitive pattern of sitting and telling the big butt muscles to go on a long term vacation makes the smaller butt muscles have no choice but to work. This repetitive motor pattern of sitting and disengaging the butt muscles can lead to sciatica pain, back problems and a whole array of other spine issues. So if long term stretching out the large glute muscles causes sciatica, why would someone prescribe stretching to fix sciatica?
Strengthening the gluteus maximus and minimus is a safe alternative to stretching for relief of sciatica pain. By strengthening the muscles that relax every time humans sit makes the smaller, deeper butt muscles work properly and go back to optimum length and tension, therefore relieving sciatica pain. The sciatic nerve can also be inflamed by compressed spinal nerves from the lower back. If you keep the same training protocol of not stretching and strengthening all the bigger muscles in the back of the body the compressed nerves that are causing sciatica pain could be relieved as well. The only surefire way to cure and prevent sciatica and other spinal issues from occurring is to keep the big muscles in the back of the body strong and supportive of the skeleton.
An exercise plan that is focused primarily on the posterior chain of the body and putting the skeleton back into proper biomechanical position is what is needed to relieve pain. Chronic pain all over the body is often corrected when the posture and skeleton are corrected. For treatment of sciatica pain emphasis on strengthening the lower back, glute muscles and hamstrings is what needs to be prescribed by a trained professional.
For more information on exercises, treatment and a free one on one postural assessment please contact:
Pete Salaga
BS CSCS
Best Day Fitness Studio
727 623 9996
Posted on:
July 11, 2012