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PLANK HOCKEY “Tap into the inner child in you and buddy-up with your best fitness pal,” says fitness expert Jenn Zerling (jzfitness.com!). “Grab a hand-sized bean bag and both of you make your way into a plank position. Place your hands directly under your shoulders, and balance on your toes with a wide stance (feet wider than hipwidth apart). Decide who will take the bean bag first, then use your arms as a hockey goal as you both aim to score points by sliding the bean bag through the others’ arms. Be sure to block the play with your hands. The first person to score 10 points wins the round! You’ll find this exercise a lot of fun as it works every muscle in your body from head-to-toe – including your mind.”
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MODIFIED BOX PRESS “This is a great way to hit your targets and ultimately shrink your shape,” says top trainer, author and former GB pole vaulter, Kate Staples (patrickholford.com). “This will blitz your chest, back and core muscles and help you melt away the lbs. Start by kneeling on all fours with hands shoulder-width apart and under your shoulders; knees and toes on the floor. With your elbows bent, drop your chest so you are nearly touching the floor. Then, straighten your elbows as you push back up to the starting position.
Continue this until you start to tire out. Make sure you stay focused on engaging your chest muscles, don’t lock your elbows and don’t arch your back. And, make sure you keep your breathing controlled and even.” -
CUT OUT THE CANE “Cutting out refined sugar can help shrink your shape,” says NOW Foods Nutrition Education Manager, Neil E. Levin (vitallife. org.uk). At four calories per gram, each level teaspoonful of sugar provides 16 calories. For example, a 12-oz. sweetened fizzy drink contains nine teaspoons of sugar, and provides 144 calories. At that rate, drinking one per day adds a llb every 24 days. Plus, the smallest amount of sugar can send your insulin levels through the roof so you start to store fat, not burn it. If you have a sweet tooth that can’t be tamed, try BetterStevia products, which can help you achieve your goal weight by swapping the sugar for a healthy non-caloric sweetener.”
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PUSH UP TO HIGH FIVE “This version of a push up is fun to do with your friends,” explains fitness expert Jenn Zerling (jzfitness.com). “If you can’t do full push-ups, no worries; drop to your knees and start there. Push-ups are a closed-chain exercise since they keep your hands connected to a surface. When executed correctly, this is highly beneficial for your shoulder girdle muscles along with your back, chest and core muscles. You’ll do a full push-up to straight arms and with one arm at a time give your buddy a high five, repeat and alternate hands. If you can’t do a full set of 10, stay in plank position and take out the push-up and wait for your buddy to join you in the high five. Keep your shoulders down and away from your ears, and your belly tight.”
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BATTLING ROPE WORKOUTS “These are an awesome way to tone your arms, build core strength,plus give you a challenging high-intensity, fat-burning interval that will blow the doors off your fitness,” says personal trainer Rob Jones (stridefit.com). “The rope – which is not your normal variety but instead a sturdy 1.5-2 inches thick, 15 foot long – is usually folded in two with the middle anchored around a pole, post, tree or threaded through some heavy kettlebells. On each end are robust handles that you grip and then use your arms, shoulders and core to throw through a variety of movements to create waves, spirals or whips with the rope. Depending on what rope move you focus on – slams, corkscrews, whips, waves, etc – battling ropes help build strength and condition from all angles in the muscles of your arms, shoulders and core, something pretty much impossible to get with standard free weights or resistance machine exercises.”
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EAT THE RIGHT FATS “Nutrition can help shrink your shape if you eat mostly healthy fats,” explains Neil E. Levin (vital-life.org.uk). “Your body craves fats primarily to obtain the healthy, nutritional ones: omega three fatty acids (from oily fish, flax, and other sources) and omega six fatty acids (from evening primrose oil, borage oil, and blackcurrant seed oil). If you can’t obtain these fats in good quantities, your body will tend to eat more fats in order to obtain them in smaller quantities from less healthy, dilute sources. Having the right balance of fatty acids helps you manage inflammation and whittle your waistline.”
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FIND YOUR SKINNY GENES “You have two genes that help you burn fat, called Sirtuin and Foxo,” says expert nutritionist Patrick Holford (patrick holford.com). “Sirtuin is nicknamed the skinny gene because it helps you to shrink, while foxo helps you stay young and is known as sweet sixteen; together, I call them skinny sweet sixteen. To shrink your shape you need to turn on these genes and you can do this eating a low glycemic load (GL) diet, especially with lower calories on alternate days, alternating strength or resistance training and aerobic exercise. Supplementing the mineral chromium and the antioxidant resveratrol also helps, as does eating less meat and very little dairy. Eat in a way that keeps your insulin level low, as a tiny bit of sugar, refined carbs or a sugary drink switches on another gene called DAF-3, otherwise known as the grim reaper.”
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