Working out alone, day after day, can easily get boring. You may find yourself quitting your fitness routine after just a week or two, and with no one to hold you accountable, you’re off the wagon again. A simple way to remedy this is to find a partner with similar fitness goals to work out with. Try some of these tips for working out with a partner to keep you on track.
Before and after you work out, make sure that you stretch your limbs properly. Perform each stretch for at least thirty seconds. If you are unsure how to stretch, ask a licensed health professional, or consult an online website on the subject. When you stretch properly, you break up the lactic acid stored in your muscles and prevent soreness.
If you’re training for a marathon, keep this strategy in mind: start slow for the first third of the marathon, in the middle third run at a comfortable pace, and run slightly faster in the last third of the race. This will help your body maintain its strength and power the entire length of the marathon.
You should always hold your stretches. It does not matter your age, if you are not holding the stretch for at least thirty seconds, you are not maintaining your flexibility. The older you get, the longer you need to hold the pose to achieve the same result. Add thirty additional seconds if you are over forty.
When strength training or working with weights, try to keep your daily workout under 60 minutes. After an hour, your body responds to strength-building exercises by producing excessive amounts of cortisol. This hormone can block the production of testosterone and may actually impair the body’s ability to build and maintain muscle.
There are few exercises as great as kickboxing. Kickboxing requires a lot of physical movements and is a very good workout. This exercise is great for quickly burning lots of calories and building up your strength.
When trying to increase the muscles in your legs, a good way to do this is to try some lunges. Put barbells in each hand of any weight, and take a knee then extend your other leg out and take a knee with the other leg. This builds leg muscles.
A good way to try and recover faster is to work out the muscles that you had worked out the previous day, but lightly instead. This will act like stretching your muscles and will make blood travel faster through your muscles which will in turn deliver more nutrients to them.
Many people think that you should work muscle groups that are active in many of the same workouts. This is not the case. You should actually try and work out opposing muscle groups, for instance, triceps and biceps. While one is working out, the other has the chance to rest.
While playing any sport like basketball or baseball, you will notice that there is sometimes one or two finger that will constantly get jammed. When this happens, you should tape the finger to a neighboring finger and this will help to reduce the amount of jamming that will occur.
When you reach the age of forty, it’s important to start holding your stretches longer. At this age, your muscles begin to lose pliability. They need extra time in the stretch to get the same effect. A good rule of thumb is to hold stretches for half a minute, if you are under forty and for a full minute, if you are over forty.
As you can see, there are many great options for working out with a fitness partner. By finding a workout buddy and incorporating some of these ideas into your fitness routine, you will be more likely to stick with your routine and have fun in the process. Soon you and your partner, will be on your way to achieving your fitness goals.