Let’s work with the simulators! (A handbook for beginners) # 2
Published April 17, 2011 | 
Exercise Bikes
They are perfectly well developing your stamina, strengthen your cardiovascular system and at the same time train the muscles of the legs and back. 40 minutes of brisk ride on such a bike can burn as much as 500 calories!
- the on-board computer will show you the distance you have passed, with what speed and momentum and how many calories you have really lost. More modern models of bikes also have interactive heart rate programs that automatically regulate the load.
- There are usually used six levels of difficulty (although there can be thirty of them!). Only the first three are to be considered as quite safe for the self-exercising with the pulse area from 120 to 160 bpm. The remaining three are for the trained athletes under the watchful eye of a trainer. You can gradually increase the levels. The beginners need from two to three weeks for each new level (with two or three sessions per week).
- The overweight cyclists need a special bike, with a back support, on which he is exercising in an almost supine position on a more comfortable seat. It is much more convenient to pedal and just sit on this miracle. And the load on your back is much less.
Steppers
They simulate the process of climbing the stairs and thus successfully carry out not only the functions common to all the cardio, but also more actively train the muscles of legs and pelvis. The latter makes them particularly interesting for women. Unpretentious mini-steppers consist of pedals and a simple counter for steps and time. The closer you get up to the bottom of the pedal, the more difficult it will be to put it in motion – that’s the whole “program”.
- Expensive steppers have a computer that regulates the load, measures the pulse and gives the frequency of steps and rhythm. Such steppers occupy some space. They have handles or hand levers, which load the top upper body.
- If not so long ago it were steppers that were at the peak of the simulator fashion, but now they yielded the palm to the elliptical trainers.
Elliptical Trainers
In fact, this is a kind of “mixture” of a treadmill, an exercise bike and a stepper. The trainee interchanges foot or pedals with an elliptical amplitude. It is believed that such an “elliptical step” intentionally activates a variety of problem areas and especially the leg muscles, buttocks and thighs. These simulators give the possibility to move back, working the areas which are “unreached” by fitness.
- the handles allow you to engage in parallel exercises of muscles of the chest, arms and back. This is a good thing but it creates a significant burden on the joints and generally requires considerable energy. It is recommended only for strong athletes.
- The computer of the elliptical trainers gives the possibility to set the distance, the training time, the optimal value of the pulse. Some regimes were created specifically for fighters with cellulite. Maybe you will not say goodbye to this plague once and forever but in any case, such exercises on elliptical trainers will be much more effective than anti-cellulite creams.
Let’s work with the simulators! (A handbook for beginners) # 1
Published April 17, 2011 | There is a cardio and strength training simulators. With the help of the first one can get rid of the excess deposits of fat. Well-thought exercises on the strength simulators can pull the weaker muscles. Is it convincing?
Just for the skeptics we will continue the agitation. “Only by exercising with simulators – says the fitness manager of the sports club “Smolensky Passage”, Dmitry Zhirnov – you can correct your shape in full. The maximum effect is achieved by a combination of cardiovascular trainings with strength ones. So you can lose the excess weight and strengthen the cardiovascular and respiratory systems, and work out the problem areas. It is better to start with the cardio and give them 50-60 per cent of the training time, while 40-50 per cent are to be given to the strength load.” Now the details.
Cardio simulators
A beginner who for the first time enters the gym, can very easily get lost. However, do not think for very long, go to the so-called cardio zone – in any case you’ll have to start with your “heart”. Cardio exercises improve your stamina and hence the intensity of the training. Those who dream to lose weight will not do without cardio! It is known that those become thinner who expend more calories than they “eat”. It is the cardio of sufficient intensity that allow burning the maximum amount of ill-fated “units.” To know exactly – you have a chance to see on the screen, which have many cardio. You can, of course, just jump to the music or run the stairs in your own entrance and you will also lose weight, but to organize an effective training session on a “smart” machine is much easier. The cardio zone can have two or three dozen different units for health promotion. All of them are divided into four main types: treadmills, exercise bikes, steppers and elliptical trainers.
Treadmills
They are popular not only because of their fame, of “super fat burners.” Running is an absolutely natural form of physical activity that does not lose its usefulness in closed rooms and even has many advantages over the usual jogging along the gassy city streets. And namely: lack of ferocious dogs and inconsiderate car owners and always good weather – “dry and sunny.”
- Treadmills can be divided into mechanical and electrical.
Mechanical are good only for their compactness (many can be interfolded) and a lower price. You will have to “push” the track by yourself. It is clear, that if the runner is tired, the exercise is unlikely to be intensive, and her body is likely to adopt an unnatural tilt that will clearly bring no benefit.
- The electric treadmills the workout is more effective. By changing the angle of the track and its speed, you can adjust the load. The interactive pulse programs installed in modern treadmills, allow the computer to adjust the load independently.
- It is interesting that experienced trainers advise to pay attention not to the computer freaks – although they also are important – but to the presence of the additional depreciation. Modern models are equipped with shock-absorbing cushions, the reduce percussion action which is so harmful to the spine and joints. To some extent the burden on them is quenched by special materials from which the famous fitness firms make the treadmills.
A simulator instead of a sofa
Published April 17, 2011 | Oddly, but in the developed countries, that have been always amazing us with the exercise craze, only 10 per cent of the population regularly attend fitness centers. In Russia there is no such statistics but, according to the experts, the assessment of the situation, even with 1 per cent can be an exaggeration. And the emerging trend of today to have a mini-gym in the city apartments and country houses, worths any appraisal.
So, a simulator in the home environment. It would be incorrect to consider this piece of furniture in terms of its compliance with the style solution of the interior. The design of the sports equipment has its aesthetic beginning. Their creators are not oriented to classics or modern. In any simulator the structure of the materials, the plastics of the shapes, the harmony of colors – all are aimed at maximum effectiveness for humans. By the way, it was noticed by the stylist that the ultra modern stimulator in harmony both in a luxurious bedroom, furnished in the Empire style and in a very ascetic attire of the “Japan’s” interior that is now fashionable all over the world.
However, the current approach to the theme of “home gym” is characterized by the interest of harmony not only in design but in the spirit and body of the settlers. Today, nobody needs to be convinced of the benefits of regular exercises. However, to force you to do at least exercises in the morning, alas, can only a few of us. But the presence of the simulator encourages and even requires at least occasionally use it for its intended purpose.
Today almost every settler can afford to have a stimulator together with a wife and a dog. On the sports market there is a wide range of options of different prices and categories. It is wiser to postpone the purchase of an expensive sofa or a home theater system for a new apartment, but a simulator – albeit a cheap and a bulky one is definitely to be bought. Incidentally, these two things: price and size, or rather your financial capacity and the available space to accommodate this equipment, will ultimately determine what exactly you get for improving your health at home.
There are a lot of simulators of known brands in the sports markets. Conventionally, they can be divided into two main groups: strength and cardio. The last are used for trainings related with heart work. A treadmill, a stepper, the elliptical, rowing or cycling simulators allow a person to drive his body into a certain mode, optimally adjust the heart activity and burn excess fats. However, despite the widespread popularity of the cardio they are not universal in the load. Cycling does not involve the upper body. The treadmill slightly involves the shoulder and pectoral muscles. The rowing stimulator partially activates hands and legs. That is why one stimulator is not enough. There is required a symbiosis of strength and cardio-training machines. And then the question is often not so much in price, but much in the square meters, which the settler can allocate for a mini-gym in his apartment.