Top ten tips on managing fitness alongside a hectic lifestyle

Steve Harrison, National Lead Tutor at Premier Training International, shares his top ten tips on managing fitness alongside a hectic lifestyle:

1. High Intensity interval training to make the most of your precious time
The post exercise effects on your metabolism are hugely dependant on the intensity you achieve during your workouts (not necessarily how long you work out for!); do short 1-2 minutes of very hard efforts (ideally 85% plus of your maximum effort) and have equal 1-2 minute easier rest periods between each exercise. Repeat this 5-10 times for 20 minutes to maximise both your results and your work vs. life balance.

2. Hit the weights! 
Weight training alongside a nourishing eating plan is a sure fire way to increase your muscle density, and your muscle density is directly related to your metabolic rate. In short, increase your muscle density with large compound (multiple joint) free weight exercises and you will improve your ability to shed your excess fat stores every minute of every day! For a good result try aiming at exhausting your muscles per exercise in about 8-10 reps and doing at least 2 or 3 sets per muscle group with 1 minute rest between each new set.

3. Using your legs as spot reduction is a myth! 
When your body starts to release its excess fat stores it does so from where it can afford to let it go (remember fat is a valuable commodity to your body so it won’t let go of it unless it is sure it can cope without it), therefore working your arms does not burn away arm fat. So, to have the greatest impact on your body’s fat burning, work the larger muscles as they have a greater overall impact, and will cause your body to lose the fat from where it decides it can afford to.

4. Get jumping! 
If you don’t have time to visit the gym or don’t like the heavy metal, you still want to be achieving muscular overload and creating a situation stressful enough to make sure your muscles are going to have to adapt to recovery effectively. This is where the jumping comes in; the speed and momentum achieved from jumps increases the exercise intensity exponentially, and, not only is it good for power, but the ability to safely and smoothly decelerate every jump before repeating ensures your muscles are being stressed greatly.

5. Get some home equipment so you can maximise your daily time schedules
Current highly effective pieces of kit that are brilliant and recommended for home use are TRX suspension training, ViPR functional training tool, Kettlebells, Hydrobags and Medicine Balls. These tools are all great for short sharp interval routines, which we know are great for us! Have a look at www.wolverson-fitness.co.uk to find out more about these products.

6. Stay supple 
Ensure that you stretch regularly, after every training session as a minimum, to keep your joints and skeleton from suffering aches and pains due to muscle tightness. Remember all muscular activity/workouts cause adaptive shortening and create tension in the muscles, so to avoid this and causing distress and injury to your body you must prioritise your stretching after every workout and add in extra sessions each week too, where possible.

Also, flexibility work will allow your muscles to adapt from every session faster and speed up your recovery rates; this means faster results and also more energy for you to feel happy and vibrant every day.

7. Eat! 
If you’ve used it you need to rebuild it; ensure you have enough fuel in your tank to perform the increased demands an exercise regime will demand upon your body. If you under eat and over train you are on a fast track to destruction, just ensure that your food intake is wholesome, and nutritious.

8. Keep a balanced diet
Avoid high sugars, limit any need for starchy carbohydrates, ensure you are receiving enough good quality fats and proteins, source your food locally and strive to know how it was farmed/produced as quality is everything in health eating; and last but not least ensure you truly are getting enough water at regular intervals throughout the day!

9. Set yourself goals
We are so busy in our lives meeting KPIs and targets at work, and then fail to utilise their effectiveness in our own lives. Truly and honestly ask yourself what you want from your body, create a top 5 objectives and then start to work towards achieving them one by one. You may need help on this route - through a personal trainer, a fitness website, or perhaps through some research.

10. Live to love your life everyday!
Perform a light 10 minutes exercise regime that is quite easy every morning to increase your energy levels for the day. A light jog or mini outdoor session is perfect to inject your lungs with fresh air, get your blood pumping, elevate your hormonal state and yet not cause any undue fatigue; it makes you feel great!

Remember if you feel great, you make other people feel great too, and then this spirals – it’s infectious!
Life takes its toll on us everyday; don’t let it beat you and get you down. Take everyday as a new challenge, look forward to each new obstacle and keep records of how you keep achieving, as it makes us all feel great!

It only takes a few minutes; the key to physical success is quality, intensity and unquestionable progression not quantity, duration or frequency. Every second counts, enjoy every one of them!

How to use household items to get fit – written by Steve Harrison

Pillows
Pillows are good for instability and balance exercises like one leg squats, the thicker the pillow the harder it will be to balance; this is great for ankle and core stability benefits.

Basketball/football
As a replacement for medicine balls - placing a ball under both hands as you perform push ups works your core harder than when you do them on the floor. A ball is also great to perform a straight arm plank on where you hold onto the ball and then try to keep your body steady as you balance for as long as possible – remember to maintain normal breathing patterns.  The Figure of 8 pass is great too; hold the ball in front of you, pass it through your legs around one side then through and to the other side, perform a many as possible in one minute.

A towel
For stretches - while lying on the floor, loop a towel behind one ankle. Grab the towel from both ends, and bring the towel and leg towards your chest to stretch out your hamstrings.

String/Rope 
Loop the rope over a solid base or through a wall hook, and then use as a suspension trainer like TRX, great for performing incline pull up exercises where you just lift your bodyweight up toward the rope, also incline reverse flyes where you pull your arms apart as you pull up to further engage your upper back musculature is also a great suspension training exercise.

Soup tins/milk cartons
Soup tins can be used for long lever arm exercises like lateral raises, squat and shoulder front raises and also to add some resistance to plyometric movements like jumping jacks and spotty dogs.

A book
a small pile of books is great to create a split level base to perform your exercises from, such as squats with one leg higher on the books, or press ups again with one arm higher up on the book; this split level stance will then dominate one side of the body more than the other so be sure to perform this on both sides to achieve balance.

Bungee cords/old tights
Stretching exercises - you can either make handles in the ends or just tie a knot, leaving space to loop your hands through. Step on the cord, and hold an end in each hand, then lunge forward and push your arms overhead, alternating legs every rep; or lunge sideways and rotate your arms across your body as you do so, again alternating legs every rep.

Chair
Chair Dips – great for the triceps, pecs and shoulders. Similar to bench dips at the gym - you simply use a chair instead.

Tennis balls/scrunched up socks
For grip strengthening exercises – simply squeeze a tennis ball or tightly rolled up pair of socks in each hand to strengthen your grip; aims for 10 second reps and perform 10-15 reps per hand; this is great to do whilst performing other lower body exercises at the same time.

Brooms/brushes
Can be used as barbells, great for good morning exercises, deep/low range of motion squats and lunges.

Paper plates or napkins
Can be used for gliding lunges when places beneath feet/attached to feet.

Elastic bands
Wrap an elastic band tightly around the outside of your fingers and thumb, then try to open your hand as wide as possible and hold out wide for about 5-6 seconds, repeat this 10 times per hand to help balance out wrist strength and lessen your risk of suffering repetitive strain injuries associated with the wrist, forearm and elbow.

Stairs
Obviously running up and down your stairs is a great cardio, aim for 6 steps up, 6 down; then every other step to the 6th high and down and repeat this interval pattern as many times as possible in 2 minutes.  Also for the more adventurous and quite strong persons – you could try to walk the whole way down your stairs head first on your hands and feet and then back up (backwards, feet first) if you dare.

Sofas
From your relaxed seated position lift both feet slowly until parallel to the floor, then pull your tummy muscles in as tight as possible and lower back down slowly; perform this very slow and controlled for best effect.  Also, place your feet on the sofa and get into front and side plank positions to add a decline angle to these exercises which will increase their difficulty.

Ceilings and floors
Floor to ceiling jumps – squat, lunge or even sit/lie down if you want a real hard challenge on the floor and then as fast as possible jump up and touch the ceiling with both hands (base of palms if you are tall enough); time how long it takes you to perform 15 reps.

Doors and handles
Open a door to 45 degrees, face the door holding onto both handles (both sides of the door) in both hands, then lunge forwards with your right legs while hingeing the door away from you as far as possible to your right with your arms, return to upright and perform again on the other side.

Tornado ball techniques and exercises - written by Ben McDonald

What are the attributes a fighter must have? Strength? Speed? Power? Flexibility? One thing that any fighter must possess in order to be successful is rotational power. All movement in the Octagon has some sort of rotational aspect. The vast majority of the time the transverse (rotational) plain is the least-trained plain of motion, yet it is the plain that most injuries take place in. But how do we train the transverse plane effectively?

The most effective tool on the market to work this movement is the 'tornado ball', which is essentially a medicine ball on a rope. Thanks to physics, the closer you hold the rope to the ball the easier the movements become. This piece of equipment will give you the power to throw cows over fences, so if you want to generate force and rotate with the power of a tornado, drop these movements into your sessions.

Side-to-side slams

1. Start in a kneeling position with the ball to one side of the body.
2. Dynamically arc the ball over your head and slam it into the floor. 
3. Bounce the ball from this position and arc it back over your head, slamming it into the floor. Repeat motion.

Note: For the hardcore try doing it while performing sit-ups.

Lying multi-directional slams

1. Start in a lying position with the ball on the floor above your head. 
2. Dynamically arc the ball over your body and slam it into the floor next to your left foot. 
3. Bounce the ball from this position and return it over your body, swinging it above and around your head and then across your body again, slamming it into the floor next to your right foot. 
4. Alternate directions.

Wall slams

1. Start in a standing position around eight inches away from the wall. 
2. Dynamically arc the ball across your body and slam it into the right section of the wall.
3. Let the ball bounce, dynamically arcing the ball back across your body and let it Bounce off the left section of the wall. Repeat.

Wall slams 2.0

1. Start in a standing position around eight inches away from the wall. 
2. Dynamically arc the ball across your body and slam it into the top right section of the wall. 
3. Allow the ball to bounce and rotate your body so the ball arcs across to the bottom left section of the wall. 
4. Let the ball bounce and bring the ball across your body slamming it into the bottom right section of the wall. 
5. Allow the ball to bounce and rotate your body so the ball arcs across to the top left section of the wall then repeat the exercise.