Great arms or Flabby arms?

Get great arms with these simple exercises

Your arms are a vital part of your body. If you’re not strong enough, it is easy to mistakenly use your back an get injured. Everyone can benefit from basic strength training and arm exercises and luckily, they are pretty easy to do. Here are some of the best exercises that will help you get great arms, whether you are a man or a woman.

First, lie on the floor and stretch completely out. Hold a dumbbell in one hand, reach straight up and support your arm with the other hand. Gently lower the dumbbell back towards your head. Please keep in mind that if you have sweaty hands you should be wearing gloves for this exercise. Do not use weights that are too heavy for you. Do a complete set, and then switch arms. This is called a lying arm extension.

Now, you can go to an old stand-by, the pushup. Yes, I’ve gotten sick of puchups with my 100 pushup program, but it’s still a great exercise. If you are just starting out, you can try the bent knee pushup, or you can go full out. Remember to keep your body straight and avoid scooping your back. You’ll want to imagine a line from your feet to your head and your back should fit right against this line. Lower yourself slowly and bring yourself back up. Repeat as many times as you, gradually increasing the amount of repetitions as you get stronger.

The dumbbell curl is a great way to really work those arms. Place a dumbbell in each hand and put your arms down at your sides. Your palms should be facing in front of you. Slowly raise the dumbbell in one hand until your elbow is completely bent. Return the arm to the former position and then bring up the other arm using the same motion. Your goal is to be able to switch from arm to arm without stopping. This is sometimes called the no-rest curl and it is very good at building strong and toned biceps. If you are a woman, start off with lighter weights and work your way up.

If you want to have a better all around upper body, you can also do shoulder presses and pull-ups. You’ll want to use the right machine for your shoulder presses and make sure that your form is good. Don’t set the weights too high at first, or you may injure yourself. Instead, use a lower resistance and build your way up. If you don’t have a machine, you can get the same benefit by using dumbbells.

Stand up straight, with your feet slightly apart. Hold a dumbbell in each hand at the level of your shoulders. Push one up until your arm is completely straight, and then bring it slowly down. Repeat with the other arm. You can also do both together if you prefer.

Building strong arms takes some time and unfortunately, I can’t figure out a Lazy shortcut to them. I may have to change my name – or stick with just normal arms.

Photo Credit: frecklescorp

Push-ups

I started Week 5 of my pushup program on Monday. I failed miserably. At the end of the 4th week, I did my exhaustion test and completed 43 push-ups. This is a big improvement from the 20 I did in my initial test or the 34 that I did at the end of week 2. However, to be 2/3s through the program and be less than half my way to 100… it hurts. Worse yet, I when I went to week 5, I found that by just more than 40, I was put into a column that made me start with 40… and then do another 32 after a minute of rest… and another 95 over the 3-4 minutes. Let’s not even get to day 2 and 3 when you have to three more levels added (and less time) – at least the repetitions go down. I’m at the point of being all push-upped out and the only thing that is the least been interesting to me is that I can more than twice as many as when I started.

Body Stats

When I measured myself today, I had the following stats:

• Weight: 170.5 pounds
• Body Fat: 19.8%

I think is pretty much in line with where I’ve been in the past. I’m pretty disappointed by this number as well, since I’ve been swimming and eating right for the most part.

Nutrition

I think I’ve been well in this area. It’s not perfect, and is far off from some my best weeks. However, after following the nearly 700 comments on my MonaVie article, I’ve realized that I should adds some pomegranite-blueberry-acai juice and other similar things. Since there are still a lot of liquid calories, I have 4 ounces in the morning and 4 ounces in the evening – mostly as a way to just boost my antioxidant levels. I also have a small piece of dark chocolate with it. I’ve been mixing in some good old fashioned fruit and a glass of red wine as well. The rest of my food I try to get from lean protein like chicken. I have slip-ups and they are usually in the form of one side dish a day.

Exercise

With the pushups really getting me down, I haven’t been doing them as much. I did get 60 laps of swimming in a couple of days this week. I usually do more, but one day the pool wasn’t heated. Another day it was just extremely cloudy and I wasn’t sure it was safe for swimming.

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The reason that circuit training gets its name is because you will do two circuits of each type of exercise. For example, you’ll do one circuit of cardio, before moving immediately into one circuit of strength training. By keeping your heart rate up and not stopping, you’ll be able to get a much better workout and you’ll see results a lot faster. I find that the benefits of a cardio workout and circuit training is one way to get the best of both worlds.

When I was first starting out with circuit training, I found it best to use six exercises for each circuit. Each exercise will have a different time frame, from thirty seconds to more than five minutes. You may need to adjust these times when you are first starting out. As always, before starting your exercises, you might want want to warm up – get the blood flowing. I’ve found that 5 minutes of brisk movement and stretching really helps loosen me up. Your final routine should include stretching to minimize any post workout pain.

With the warm up out of the way, it’s time to look at the techniques. One way to start is with the cardio portion of the training. First, often times, I like to start with some simple squats – using no resistance or weight. I focus on proper form and making sure that I’m not bouncing on the way down or up. I try to do these for about minute. Next, I may jump rope for a minute or move into lunges.

When doing lunges, you still want to focus on using the right form. The knee should never cross the plane of your foot. Hold each lunge for thirty seconds and then switch sides. I then switch from lunging to walking, jogging, or running (depending how Lazy I am currently feeling) for the next five minutes. You’ll want to build up your intensity and then slow it back down at the end of those five minutes.

For my last two exercises in this circuit, I would recommend doing pushups for about a minute. You don’t need to do 100 pushups like I’m trying to do. I then finish off with some jumping jacks. Congratulations – you’ve just completed one circuit!

Your options for circuit two will depend on how experienced you are with strength training. If you’re just starting out, you can repeat the same exercises above, but add a few light weights. The plank is also a great exercise for this circuit as is the back extension. Remember, each circuit should be identical in the amount of time spent.

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Body Stats

I’m going to have to fill out an incomplete on this one. While I’m on the road, I don’t have my scales with me. I’m not sure I want to weight myself anyway.

Nutrition

I didn’t eat as well as I hoped this week. I brought a lot of healthy snacks with me on the trip, but since I’m out of the hotel and into the time-share I have access to a better kitchen. You’d think this would be a good thing. In some ways it was, but in others it allowed me access to convenience foods like Easy Mac.

Exercise

I had been swimming everyday. However, this time-share’s pool is packed with kids at all hours of the day. There’s a fitness center, but I hadn’t been wanting to go since it’s getting tougher to do my 100 pushups program. I missed Day 2 of Week 4 on Wednesday and did it on Thursday. I’ll try to do day 3 tomorrow and hopefully do the next exhaustion test on Monday of next week.

With the progress I had been making this was a disappointing week. It is still better than the average week I had six months ago – at least that’s a good thing.

Here’s my overall body update:
Overall Body Stats
I have measured my body in the morning two weeks in a row now. When do I consider it an actual streak?

• Weight: 170.0 pounds
• Body Fat: 18.95%

I gained a half pound this week… well within a little water weight error margin. I dropped my body fat from 20.05% to 18.95%. That’s a very healthy gain, but I’m trying to temper my excitement. It too, is within the fluctuation a body experiences every day, so I need to focus on things in the long run.

Exercise
I had a good week of exercise. Even though I had a set-back with my 100 pushups program, I did more than any previous weeks. I also swam four days this week pushing myself to do 60 pool lengths twice.

Today, I’m thinking about skipping the 100 pushups program on purpose. I’ve already failed for the week, so my thinking is, let’s switch things up. What about going to the gym and doing bench presses, butterflies, and lat pull-downs? My body can’t be expecting that. With two days of rest before I start the pushups again, I should be stronger and ready to battle.

Eating and Nutrition
This week I discover that I really like dry, roasted edamame, perhaps the most perfect I’ve seen in some time. It’s almost pure protein and fiber. In fact, I got a little addicted to it and found myself occasionally missing meals in favor of it. My biggest concern is that there is some hormone risks with soy in men.

Outside the edamame, I’ve been very good at reducing net carbs, while increasing protein and fiber in my meals. A couple of times I upped my red meat in hope that it would combat the risks of soy. Okay, that might be what I’d telling myself as I really like red meat.

That’s all I have for this week, it seems I’m on the right track, but next week gets more difficult when I search for hotel friendly food.

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It started on Sunday night. My wife said, “Honey, I think I’d like to try that 100 pushups thing as well. We can do it together. Will you wait for me to do it?” I had suggested it to her way back when and this seemed to be a reasonable request, so I agreed. Monday came along, and I did my typical swimming routine in the morning. I got a little lost in my work and looked up to see my wife had come back from her Body Pump class at the gym. Now I knew she wasn’t going to be in any condition to do her push-ups, but I asked to make sure. I was right, she would have to start the program another day. As far as health goes, if you are going to skip exercise for more exercise, that’s hard to argue with.

So there was the change-up… I had switched my swim and push-up routine. That lead to the sinker… I had used up so much energy swimming that I couldn’t complete Day 7 of the program.

Maybe it wasn’t the swimming. When I look at the program I think there might be a flaw. At the end of week two, I did 34 push-ups in my exhaustion test. That set me up for a week three, where I start off with a set of 25. That 25 in the first set took it’s toll by the 4th set when I could barely do ten. There was no hope of me finishing off with another 25. It got me thinking. What if during my exhaustion test, I had been able to do 26 push-ups? That would have put me in the range to do 25 and the start end, pretty much the maximum effort I would give if I just had to do one set.

Where do I go from here?
It makes little sense for me to go to Day 8 today. Instead, I will repeat Day 7. If I get Day 7 down, I’ll move to Day 8 on Friday. Next week, I’ll restart this week again in hopes of doing days 7, 8, and 9. If successful, I’ll move onto Week 4.

I’m pretty disappointed have to repeat this week 3. At the same time, I realize the benefit of building up a stronger base that will help carry me through the rest of program.

Photo Credit: Doug Greenberg

Today, I did the end of week two exhaustion test. I was hoping to pull off a 42. I figured that would put well on track to hit 100 at the end of week 6 (I’m figuring some diminishing returns will happen). I thought about taking a day of rest, but a friend mentioned that he discussed it with Steve and it would be okay to do the exhaustion test today. I was happy with that, because I wanted to stay on the same schedule, M, W, F. If I waited until Sunday to do the exhaustion test, I wouldn’t be very good at Monday’s next work out.

Perhaps due to some lingering tiredness, I was able to do only 34 pushups. I say only, but that’s a solid gain compared to the 20 initial ones I did.

Here are some links that I liked this week from the Fitness Health Network:

Looking For A Little Healthy Inspiration – NCN had a bad week and it looks like he broke one of his 99 Changes – Giving Up Sodas. It touched me that he drew strength from the rest of us.

Cut One Soda A Week – Jim suggests that you cut a soda a week. It amazes me how many people still drink full calorie soda. It makes sense if you are worried about the artificial sweeteners, but if not, at least switch to diet.

5 Tips to Prevent Elbow Injuries – Jim, meet WeightLadder… You’ve got problems, he’s got answers.

Overall Body Stats
I woke up this morning and measured my body fat. As I always do, I used two scales – one that uses Bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA) from my feet, Tanita Body Fat Scale – and one that uses it from hands – Omron Handheld Fat Loss Monitor. I find that they give me fairly different numbers, so I average them together to get the best overall pictures. In the future, I hope to add my Wii Fit age in, but I find that it varies wildly depending on the exercises it gives me.

When I measured myself today, I had the following stats:

• Weight: 169.5 pounds
• Body Fat: 20.05%

Exercise
I had one of my best weeks of exercise in a long time. If I didn’t, I’m not sure that I’d be posting this. With my apartment fixing the pool, I got to experience the great exercise that swimming is. I swam Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday doing 20, 30, and then 40 laps each day.

I continued with my 100 pushup plan (official website). I already wrote about Monday’s effort. Wednesday, Day 5, of the plan, went better than I could have imagined. After the first four sets, I thought I was done. I didn’t see how I was going to get 15 or more in the last set. I decided to take a new approach. I picked 23 as my goal. Though I was almost done at 12, I found a way to reach back and get the adrenaline to hit 23.

As my “mentoress” would say: I just realized something… something that really never occurred to me before… I’m gonna win. I’m am going to be able to do 100 pushups.

Eating and nutrition
I tried to focus my efforts on low carb, high protein eating this week. I didn’t really focus on this until Wednesday after I got a chance to go shopping. I am aware of the dangers of eating too much protein, but I still believe it’s the best way to go. I had two very large chicken breasts throughout the day. Unfortunately my plan got derailed by headaches, which usually come whenever I try to limit carbs. Perhaps I need to ease into it a little bit.

I also remembered to take a multivitamin every day this week. It’s the first time I’ve done that in a long time.

It’s very much baby steps at this stage, but I’m making progress and being healthier than I have in some time.

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What is the 100 Pushup Program?

You can find out more about the 100 Pushup Program at the official website. I’m not 100% sure if it’s scientifically proven to work. However, I checked with my doctor and she says I’m fit enough to give it a shot. (I didn’t have any doubts, but I like to check anyway, you should think about it as well before you start a health-fitness program.) The idea is to start off with a small amount of pushups and over the span of six weeks gradually build up to the time where you can make a good run at 100 consecutive pushups. Where do I start? You start with an initial test to see how many pushups you can do to start the program. On my initial test, I got to 20 before I tired. My muscles weren’t particularly tired, but my breathing was off and I just had to stop and breathe better to continue. I think I probably could have done another 6 more, but I’m okay to start with 20. With that information I was ready for day one. Day one Yesterday was day one. I did 5 sets of push-ups. The sets had 10, 10, 8, 6, and 16 push-ups in them. The first four sets are dictated by the program, while the last one varies from person to person. That last one is supposed to be the most you can do before tiring. I was very happy to be able to hit that 16 number. It gives me confidence that I’ll be able to get through this week – though the end of the week looks difficult with repetitions of 15, 13, 10, 10, and 15+ on the docket. I will try to continue Monday, Wednesday, and Friday workouts. I will supplement that with some juggling for exercise, and follow that up with some Wii Fit.

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