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In case you wondered, this is me.

Jumping jack

2. Carlos Soto
"The fastest way to get in shape is using your own body weight while doing plyometrics (jumps). Try the following plyometrics exercise The Spiderman: Begin in a wide squat position, hands in front of you (like spider-man). bend over so that palms are flat on the ground, jump legs back into a push-up position. Do one push-up and then jump back into a squat. Make sure you land flat-footed. Stand up and do a jumping jack. Repeat 15 times daily."

3. Spartak Delas
"The absolute best and most efficient way to become as fit as you possibly can quickly is to hire a good trainer, even for just one session. You'll find that it's well worth the money! You don't need to spend months and months researching trainers. As long as he or she is certified by a nationally recognized organization such as NASM, ACSM, or ACE and has a couple of years of experience, you should be fine. The most important thing is that you like your trainer so that you're looking forward to the sessions."

4. Nerijus Bagdonas
"When I need to get in shape quickly, I cut all carbs (except some fruit and veggies) and replace them with lean protein (fish, egg whites with protein shakes and some chicken). Every meal has vegetables and some fruit. I rev up my metabolism by doing two workouts a day, cardio first thing in the morning and lift later in the day. The workouts are very intense with little or no rest between sets. I drink a gallon of water a day and little alcohol. When I reach my desired weight or body fat %, I stay there for as long as possible to get my body used to it. I transition to a new diet slowly so I don't retain too much water and let my body adjust."

5. Patrick Cohen
"If weight loss is your goal determine to climb every flight of stairs you encounter each day instead of taking the elevator. Climbing stairs burns as many calories as medium-paced running but are a lot easier to fit into your everyday life. Also, find those old pants that you just love but no longer can fit into and hang them somewhere in your home where you'll always see them. Seeing them over and over will motivate you to eat less."

6. Julia Derek

"Nothing will get you quicker into shape quicker than doing something your body is completely unfamiliar with. This is because your body gets used to whatever athletic activity you put it through after about a month and won't burn as many calories while doing it. In other words, if you've been running on the treadmill for the last three months, start swimming or spinning for extra burn power."

7. Rob Pasetsky
"Eat 5-6 small meals per day to increase your metabolism. Since a pound of fat is 3,500 calories, you need to exercise more than 2-3 times per week if you want to see quick results. 5-6 times per week is optimal."

8. Gerri Pinzon

"Warm up jumping rope for five minutes and then do the following interval three times daily: 20 lunges each leg, 30 crunches, 10-20 pushups, and finish with a four-punch combo (boxing technique videos) on a boxing bag 20 times. This intense workout will whip you into shape."

9. Clayton James
"Three great moves that will get your body ready a new year in no-time: Three sets of 15 push-ups, three sets of 15 lat pull downs, and three sets of 15 squats. Do one of each exercise with 30 sec breaks in between. When you've finished one circuit of push-ups/latpull downs/squats, take a 1 min break and continue with circuit two and three. Repeat this full-body routine three times a week and you'll see a difference within a month!"

10. Jade Alexis
"Combining strength training with cardio is the fastest way to get in shape. It builds muscle while boosting your endurance. Add a cardio activity such as 1 minute of jumping jacks between all weight-training sets; this will elevate your heart rate, turning your workout into both a strength training session and a cardio session. Other cardio activities to do between sets include: jump rope, step ups, squat jumps, squat-thrusts and high knees/heel kicks running in place."

By Alex and Sherri McMillan, Special to The Oregonian
Friday December 26, 2008, 10:48 PM

From all-time great runner Emil Zatopek: "When a person trains once, nothing happens. When a person forces himself to do a thing a hundred or a thousand times, then he certainly has developed in more ways than physical.

Is it raining? That doesn't matter. Am I tired? That doesn't matter, either. Then willpower will be no problem."

So as you outline your health and fitness plan for 2009, what will you do to challenge yourself?

Consider how much discipline it takes to work out three to five days a week. Think about how hard it is to keep stretching beyond comfort zones and how challenging it is to exercise at high intensities. Consider the self-resolve required to eat healthy foods and drink lots of water when temptations surround us everywhere we go.

But if you have the courage to respect your body -- the temple that houses your mind and spirit -- achieving your goals will not be far away.

It says a lot about who you are when you invest the time to take care of yourself. It says you respect and love yourself enough to do the things necessary to be at your personal best.

Each time you get into the gym for a workout on a day when you just don't feel like exercising, you grow a little stronger as a human being. Each time you go for a run or walk on a cold winter's day when you just feel like staying under the warm, cozy covers, you strengthen your character. When you endure a tough workout, it enables you to persevere through other challenges in your life.

Working on improving your physical conditioning will not only enrich your life and make you a better person, you'll also become a better parent, a better spouse, a better and more productive worker, and a better friend.

Exercising regularly, eating well and taking the time to relax and nourish your body will make you feel happier. It will provide you with more energy than you have ever known. It will give you greater stamina, mental toughness and make you a clearer, stronger thinker. It will make you more patient and loving.

There are 168 hours in a week. Surely each and every one of us regardless of our hectic schedules can carve out four or five of them to care for our bodies and work on mastering our physical state.

And remember that a missed workout is much more than just a missed workout.

When you miss a workout, you don't just stay at the same level you were at -- you actually take a few steps back. Every time you miss a workout, you have done something to strengthen the habit of not working out. When you've made the promise to yourself to exercise so many times per week and then you break that promise, you start to lose trust in yourself.

A missed workout fuels self-doubt and makes that negative habit stronger. Miss enough workouts, and eventually that negative habit of not working out will replace the positive habit of exercising that you have worked so hard to cultivate.

Every time you fail to do the right thing, you fuel the habit of doing the wrong thing. So the next time you're trying to justify pressing the snooze button and skipping your workout, or working through lunch instead of taking a walk break or heading right home after work instead of stopping at the gym, don't do it. Don't even think about it.

Remember results are not guaranteed, they are earned.

Ask Julia - To Lose Weight - Should I Start With Cardio or Weight Training? Q: I really need to lose about 40 pounds, but am confused as to whether I should start with cardio or weights. I'm a 42-year-old homemaker, 5'5 and 170 pounds. Fitness is something I haven't pursued seriously until recently when I started doing the elliptical machine for half an hour every weekday morning. This makes me feel good and I have already lost five pounds in less than three weeks (used to be 175) without even cutting down on what I eat. Some people tell me I should do weight-training to lose weight, but isn't it better to first do cardio to get rid of all the fat on top of the muscles before you start toning them? I'm confused.

The main reason you want to combine cardio with weight training is because muscle tissue needs a heck of a lot more calories to sustain itself than fat. This means you don't need to/shouldn't cut your calories much. For a woman your age and height, you should try to stay between 1200-1500 calories/day to lose weight efficiently - while at the same time work out, doing both cardio and weight training. I think a good approach for you would be to lift weights using full-body exercises (not just arm curls and shoulders like so many women do), especially focusing on back, chest, shoulders, legs, and butt. You can learn about such exercises in fitness books or by using a good personal trainer a few sessions. Weight Training for Dummies is a good and fun book. Stick to three sets of every exercise, 8-12 different exercises, and 12-15 repetitions per set. To be successful, try to do at least two weight training sessions a week (three is even better) and two-three half-hour cardio sessions. In order to avoid plateauing, mix up the order of your weight training exercises.

Good luck!

(Copied from the New York Times)
By GRETCHEN REYNOLDS
October 31, 2008

WHEN DUANE KNUDSON, a professor of kinesiology at California State University, Chico, looks around campus at athletes warming up before practice, he sees one dangerous mistake after another. "They're stretching, touching their toes. . . . " He sighs. "It's discouraging."

If you're like most of us, you were taught the importance of warm-up exercises back in grade school, and you've likely continued with pretty much the same routine ever since. Science, however, has moved on. Researchers now believe that some of the more entrenched elements of many athletes' warm-up regimens are not only a waste of time but actually bad for you. The old presumption that holding a stretch for 20 to 30 seconds - known as static stretching - primes muscles for a workout is dead wrong. It actually weakens them. In a recent study conducted at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, athletes generated less force from their leg muscles after static stretching than they did after not stretching at all. Other studies have found that this stretching decreases muscle strength by as much as 30 percent. Also, stretching one leg's muscles can reduce strength in the other leg as well, probably because the central nervous system rebels against the movements.

"There is a neuromuscular inhibitory response to static stretching," says Malachy McHugh, the director of research at the Nicholas Institute of Sports Medicine and Athletic Trauma at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City. The straining muscle becomes less responsive and stays weakened for up to 30 minutes after stretching, which is not how an athlete wants to begin a workout.

THE RIGHT WARM-UP should do two things: loosen muscles and tendons to increase the range of motion of various joints, and literally warm up the body. When you're at rest, there's less blood flow to muscles and tendons, and they stiffen. "You need to make tissues and tendons compliant before beginning exercise," Knudson says.

A well-designed warm-up starts by increasing body heat and blood flow. Warm muscles and dilated blood vessels pull oxygen from the bloodstream more efficiently and use stored muscle fuel more effectively. They also withstand loads better. One significant if gruesome study found that the leg-muscle tissue of laboratory rabbits could be stretched farther before ripping if it had been electronically stimulated - that is, warmed up.

To raise the body's temperature, a warm-up must begin with aerobic activity, usually light jogging. Most coaches and athletes have known this for years. That's why tennis players run around the court four or five times before a match and marathoners stride in front of the starting line. But many athletes do this portion of their warm-up too intensely or too early. A 2002 study of collegiate volleyball players found that those who'd warmed up and then sat on the bench for 30 minutes had lower backs that were stiffer than they had been before the warm-up. And a number of recent studies have demonstrated that an overly vigorous aerobic warm-up simply makes you tired. Most experts advise starting your warm-up jog at about 40 percent of your maximum heart rate (a very easy pace) and progressing to about 60 percent. The aerobic warm-up should take only 5 to 10 minutes, with a 5-minute recovery. (Sprinters require longer warm-ups, because the loads exerted on their muscles are so extreme.) Then it's time for the most important and unorthodox part of a proper warm-up regimen, the Spider-Man and its counterparts.

"TOWARDS THE end of my playing career, in about 2000, I started seeing some of the other guys out on the court doing these strange things before a match and thinking, What in the world is that?" says Mark Merklein, 36, once a highly ranked tennis player and now a national coach for the United States Tennis Association. The players were lunging, kicking and occasionally skittering, spider-like, along the sidelines. They were early adopters of a new approach to stretching.

While static stretching is still almost universally practiced among amateur athletes - watch your child's soccer team next weekend - it doesn't improve the muscles' ability to perform with more power, physiologists now agree. "You may feel as if you're able to stretch farther after holding a stretch for 30 seconds," McHugh says, "so you think you've increased that muscle's readiness." But typically you've increased only your mental tolerance for the discomfort of the stretch. The muscle is actually weaker.

Stretching muscles while moving, on the other hand, a technique known as dynamic stretching or dynamic warm-ups, increases power, flexibility and range of motion. Muscles in motion don't experience that insidious inhibitory response. They instead get what McHugh calls "an excitatory message" to perform.

Dynamic stretching is at its most effective when it's relatively sports specific. "You need range-of-motion exercises that activate all of the joints and connective tissue that will be needed for the task ahead," says Terrence Mahon, a coach with Team Running USA, home to the Olympic marathoners Ryan Hall and Deena Kastor. For runners, an ideal warm-up might include squats, lunges and "form drills" like kicking your buttocks with your heels. Athletes who need to move rapidly in different directions, like soccer, tennis or basketball players, should do dynamic stretches that involve many parts of the body. "Spider-man" (see video) is a particularly good drill: drop onto all fours and crawl the width of the court, as if you were climbing a wall. (For other dynamic stretches, see the sidebar below.)

Even golfers, notoriously nonchalant about warming up (a recent survey of 304 recreational golfers found that two-thirds seldom or never bother), would benefit from exerting themselves a bit before teeing off. In one 2004 study, golfers who did dynamic warm-up exercises and practice swings increased their clubhead speed and were projected to have dropped their handicaps by seven strokes over seven weeks.

Controversy remains about the extent to which dynamic warm-ups prevent injury. But studies have been increasingly clear that static stretching alone before exercise does little or nothing to help. The largest study has been done on military recruits; results showed that an almost equalnumber of subjects developed lower-limb injuries ( shin splints, stress fractures, etc.), regardless of whether they had performed static stretches before training sessions. A major study published earlier this year by the Centers for Disease Control, on the other hand, found that knee injuries were cut nearly in half among female collegiate soccer players who followed a warm-up program that included both dynamic warm-up exercises and static stretching. (For a sample routine, visit www.aclprevent.com/pepprogram.htm.) And in golf, new research by Andrea Fradkin, an assistant professor of exercise science at Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania, suggests that those who warm up are nine times less likely to be injured.

"It was eye-opening," says Fradkin, formerly a feckless golfer herself. "I used to not really warm up. I do now."

You're Getting Warmer: The Best Dynamic Stretches

These exercises - as taught by the United States Tennis Association's player-development program - are good for many athletes, even golfers. Do them immediately after your aerobic warm-up and as soon as possible before your workout.

STRAIGHT-LEG MARCH

(for the hamstrings and gluteus muscles)

Kick one leg straight out in front of you, with your toes flexed toward the sky. Reach your opposite arm to the upturned toes. Drop the leg and repeat with the opposite limbs. Continue the sequence for at least six or seven repetitions.


SCORPION

(for the lower back, hip flexors and gluteus muscles)

Lie on your stomach, with your arms outstretched and your feet flexed so that only your toes are touching the ground. Kick your right foot toward your left arm, then kick your leftfoot toward your right arm. Since this is an advanced exercise, begin slowly, and repeat up to 12 times.

HANDWALKS

(for the shoulders, core muscles, and hamstrings)

Stand straight, with your legs together. Bend over until both hands are flat on the ground. "Walk" with your hands forward until your back is almost extended. Keeping your legs straight, inch your feet toward your hands, then walk your hands forward again. Repeat five or six times.

Check out Martha's useful nutrition blog at CityGirlBites

By Darshan Goswami, M.S., PE, from the web site: Mercola.com.

"Don't worry, be happy." This sounds like such a simplistic phrase, but there is great power and wisdom in it. This tells us to focus on what we want rather than what we don't want. When we focus on what we want, our actions take us nearer to our goals in life.

One way to guide your life toward happiness is simply to count your blessings. Dr. Myers points to research showing that people who pause each day to reflect on the positive aspects of their lives (for example, their health, friends, family, education, freedom) are more likely to experience positive feelings and happiness.

These are the principles I use to be happy. They work for me, and I hope they work for you:

1) Improve your relationships with friends and family - Happiness starts at home. Start by improving your relationship with your parents, brothers, sisters, and children. Smile when you greet them, do things for them, don't allow them to get angry with you. Maintaining healthy loving relationships and friendships can promote happiness. Remember that love makes you beautiful.

2) Be an optimist - Optimism generates good feelings.

3) Develop a genuine smile and laugh a lot - Act happy - It works. Smile into the mirror for a half hour without stopping. Smiling makes you happy and the more you smile the more happy you become. We all like people who smile. It also makes us more attractive.

4) Pray - Become religious or spiritual - This only works if you believe in God. If you want to be happy then ask God to make you happy. Prayer helps you accomplish things.

5) Be generous and share with others - Give more than you receive because being generous will make you happy.

6) Treat time as a friend - Don't watch the clock.

7) Exercise your mind - Keep yourself busy with some new project or ideas.

8) Work your body - Exercise regularly. Studies show that aerobic exercise is an antidote for mild depression and anxiety. "Happy minds reside in sound bodies," says Dr. Myers.

9) Have fun in life - Keep cool under pressure.

10) Pursue achievable goals.

11) Have high confidence in yourself.

12) Respect the disadvantaged.

13) Age gracefully.

14) Give compliments - Take every opportunity to be complimentary. Want to make someone like you? Every time you meet a person smile and give them a compliment.

15) Be honest - With honesty comes openness. People respect honest and open minded people.

16) Keep an open mind - Most people seem to think that they know everything that they need to know. There's plenty of wisdom to go around.

17) Treat difficulties as challenges - Life's an adventure and every obstacle in life is one of its challenges. Treat life as a game. What fun would a game be if you could never lose?

Conclusion

Being happy is really a choice we make. The secret of Happiness is simple, very simple - what is it? You decide if you want to be happy! Happiness is free. You can feel happiness, this very minute, if you so choose.

If you continue to focus all your energy and attention on what you want, you'll soon find yourself happy. Realize now that true happiness results from sharing generously of yourself, your mind, emotion and spirit, with all those who come in contact with you.

Be an optimist.

Do kind deeds for others unselfishly. Explore the deeper resources within you by praying to God from your heart. Through sincere prayer and mindful meditation you will attain the highest achievement in life - the discovery of your eternal happiness with God.

We need to set our goals wisely and to develop happy-thought strategies and to surround ourselves with encouraging and positive people.

Pursuing truth, wisdom and a virtuous life - or just getting on with the duties and chores of daily life at work and home, often brings happiness as a by-product. My ultimate goal is to bring happiness to all my friends, family and all souls that come in contact with me. How can I possibly accomplish this?

Simple...I sincerely hope that after reading this message you will SMILE for me. That will make both you and me happy!

This month's exercise is a full body exercise good for intermediate to advanced exercisers. (Beginners - focus on becoming proficient doing lunges and bicep curls as separate exercises first, then put them together using very light weights.) Full body strength exercises - or compound exercises - are a great, time-efficient way to build muscle while burning the maximum amount of calories. Because you are using your entire body, your heart rate will go up high. If this doesn't make sense to you now, don't worry: after you have performed the exercise, it will. Make sure you move your belly button toward your spine throughout the exercise so that your core is activated. In doing this, you'll get a great abs workout too while protecting your lower back.

The following three photos from ptonthenet.com, an educational Web site for fitness professionals, show you exactly how to perform an anterior lunge with bicep dumbell curls. Maintain good posture throughout the exercise with shoulder blades retracted and depressed, good stability through the abdominal complex, and neutral spine angles. While maintaining total body alignment, step forward descending slowly by bending at the hips, knees, and ankles, keep most of your weight in the forward leg and AVOID letting your back knee touch the ground. In the deepest part of the lunge, perform a bicep curl and lower the weight slowly. Use your hip and thigh muscles to push yourself up and back to the starting position.

Start with a weight which is lower than you think you can handle and do 20 to 30 repetitions with this weight. When you feel certain you are mastering the exercise, you can begin challenging yourself with a heavier weight and fewer reps. Three sets of 12-18, alternating legs, should be your range for general strength training. You can also choose to do 10 reps with one leg at a time. Good luck!

Beginning

Middle

End