Walking is much more preferable than running or jogging because it creates less stress on your joints, including hips, knees, and ankles. Remember to properly warm up before and cool down after every walking session...your muscles will love you for it! So what are we waiting for? Get to twenty miles a week and then see where it takes you. Think of the joy of going to Nordstrom’s and having to buy all those new clothes and for the right reasons for a change. Take a step in the right direction and do it by walking.

Advice for Those Just Starting to Work Out

If you are new to exercise here are some of the most important things to keep in mind.

Take It Easy At First - If you are the ambitious sort, it might be tempting to pour a lot of effort into your workouts right away. But the fact of the matter is that taking it slow is the best thing to do in the beginning. If you have been sedentary for most of your life, you muscle simple aren’t accustomed to the kind of stress that can be caused by intense workouts. In fact, doing too much too soon might even cause muscle cramps. Moderate exercise will be more than enough at first. As you become more accustomed to physical activity, you can try doing things that require a bit more physical exertion.

The Soreness Goes Away Over Time - If you do not have a lot of experience with exercise, you will probably be sore for a day or two after working out for the very first time. Everyone gets sore once in a while, but it is most noticeable and most pronounced in the beginning. In fact, don’t be surprised if you have difficultly doing simple things like walking and lifting small objects for a day or two after your first workout. Don’t worry though, over time, as you become more accustomed to exercise, you experience the soreness less and less.

Try a Bit of Everything - There is a whole wide variety of exercise available to you, and if you are just starting gout, it is to your benefit to try a little of it all. Perhaps one day you should try walking, and the next try a bit of weight lifting. Or you might try jump roping or plyometirics. By trying out the cornucopia of exercise out there, you can help understand what kind of exercise that you enjoy the most. At the same time, you help teach yourself just exactly how it feels to exercise.

Diet Too - Unfortunately, no matter how hard you work out, it won’t help you much if you mostly eat junk. It is just way easier to intake calories than it is to burn them off. And no matter how hard you work, you simply aren’t going to achieve the level of fitness that you want if you ignore what kinds of foods that you eat. Be sure to reduce the amount of refined sugars and saturated fat in your diet. It also helps if you eat five or six smaller meals throughout the day, rather than three large ones. This will help keep your metabolism up, as well as give you a lot more energy.

Fitness Expert Chris McCombs is a Personal Trainer in Hollywood California. While walking out of a burrito joint Chris discovered a radical approach to burning fat at a rapid rate which he helps people all over do today. Chris is also a personal trainer marketing expert and helps personal trainers and other people in the fitness industry to triple their income and cut their work hours by more than half.

Exercise In Moderation

Plan to start off your program of choice with a slow build up of your repetitions so that your muscles and joints can slowly begin to accept the new strains on their capabilities. Too much too soon and you can cause severe muscle damage and create an environment where exercise becomes difficult if not impossible to maintain. As you work on your plan over time you will gradually build on your repetitions and your muscle and joints will respond more naturally. In addition, you will manage inflammation much better as this too must be kept in check as you either work on a muscle program or perhaps an endurance profile of improvement.

As you increase your exercise resistance through heavier weights, increased repetitions or perhaps a longer running program your body will respond and continue to improve. A key area to consider now is your hydration and vitamin intake. Along with key check points on your hydration you can also consider natural food supplements such as the acai berry juice which is carried in the United States now.

Adding a nutritionally balanced food program is not unlike fine tuning an engine. The body works against itself as it walks, runs and lifts weights. Naturally this can increase inflammation in your joints which the body will need to repair through rest and in some cases prescribed medications. Inflammation is quickly becoming a leading topic of discussion in all areas of chronic disease and overall health and wellness concerns.

There are many studies ongoing and even some completed that are linking inflammation to many potential diseases of the joints and muscle groups. Whether you fight the pain from inflammation with natural food supplements or pain killers you need to consult your physician for a proper diagnosis at all times. Never perform surgery on yourself.

Building up your tolerance to longer running distance or heavier weights for muscle increase can be done safely and efficiently if moderation is understood. There is no rush to a finely tuned body and to short cut the process, as many athletes today are attempting with steroids, is potentially dangerous. All too often you see top athletes get hurt and rush their therapy so they can return to the lineup.

In many cases you see the same athlete go down with new injuries as their bodies are not fully recovered and by favoring the old injury you put too much stress on other parts of the body thus placing too heavy of a load factor leading to break downs. Proper nutrition is always a key ingredient so do your home work and check out supplements that are proven and please get an ok by your personal physician on what ever you choose to do.

Fitness Variety Drives Positive Results

It’s not the answer because we live in a world that welcomes free competition and thus Mickey D’s, The Colonel and all the ice cream parlors and our beloved advertisers are going to push their products to all levels of the population. So, we accept the powers of the evil fast food empires and attack them via our own fitness plan. So, lets focus now on creativity and longevity. In order for a fitness plan to work it needs to change from time-to-time. Walking 10,000 steps a day is great and it WILL be a force against all evils when it comes to your daily intake and fuel burning capabilities to fight off the carbs and thus fat and excessive sugars from remaining in your body and thus in your blood stream attacking your internal organs silently.

There are many ways to vary your fitness plan. You can walk 3-4 days once a day or perhaps 2-3 times per day (its not impossible even in our hectic lives) with the remaining days you could ride a bike or use a treadmill or stair stepper. Swim for crying out loud. Those of us on the West coast or in warm climates around the world we can swim every day outside assuming you have the means or a nice neighbor.

So, you don’t have a bike? You don’t have the exercise equipment? Most major cities now have private gyms or even the YMCA. Setup a membership. You know the old business saying, “you have to spend money to make money”, well in this case you may need to invest in a membership in order to provide your body with the total solution for diet and weight management incorporated with a fitness program. The lists in most major cities is endless for private gym’s and or clubs. So, now you have it. You have outlined your plan perhaps you have even started your daily program. Congratulations. Now focus. Focus on the word daily. If you follow your plan (varied as often as possible) you will succeed. You can go to your office parties and social/family outings and enjoy all they have to offer. No need to over do it of course but why live in a calorie counting carb watching bubble. Not me. Not if I can help it and I can so we all can.

With the proper plan and with a small investment in a good walking shoe (more on this in a later article) and a good understanding of the proper food groups for the right combinations of fuel for the body you will be spending more time at your favorite clothiers downsizing for the right reasons. Get out there. Get going and discuss with your private physician as always when undertaking an exercise program. Look for more articles on the subject soon. Best of luck.

Sample Weekly Plan

Monday / Wednesday / Friday

7:00 am short walk for 30 minutes at 2-2.5 mph 10:00 am arm circles 5 minutes small and then 5 minutes large circles. Go ten rotations forward then ten reversed to loosen up the shoulders and wrists. Do this for a total of 10 minutes 7:00 pm short walk for 30 minutes at 2-2.5 mpg Tuesday / Thursday

7:00 am take a short 30 minute bike ride. Either outside or stationary 12:30p Take a 20 minute walk 7:00p Take a 45 minute walk

Saturday / Sunday

8:00 am long walk for 60 minutes at 2-2.5 mph 11:00 am lift weights or find objects under 5lbs that you can grip and use them in stretching your muscles if you don’t have access to free weights. Old law books are great! 7:00p another long walk for 60 minutes at 2-2.5 mph

You can adjust the above to suit your needs and schedules of course so use this as a guide to construct a program that makes your program a success. There really isn’t any excuse anymore unless we all give in to the meds and want that lifestyle. I don’t and I'm going to do everything I can to avoid it. So can you. As always, consult your medical professional for a review of your program and keep them in the loop as you progress. I'm sure they will be helpful as mine is.

The hardest thing you will ever do is not start a fitness program. The biggest struggle you will have is staying on the program over time. This requires variety so adjust your program over time and keep it fresh and challenging. If you walk and we highly recommend walking, then vary your path day to day.

Fitness Through The Seasons

A great example is outdoor exercising. Not only is this influenced by the seasons but also geographically. In the west you can just about workout outside every day (some exceptions for rain of course). On the east coast you can certainly choose to run in sub 30 degree weather but most will choose not to do so. We like to think of this as the attraction factor. The attraction factor is critical as it helps to setup and thus manage one’s enthusiasm towards repeatable exercising and adherence to your overall life fitness goals.

How often do you see the Television Ads where the healthy ads always seem to be on location somewhere near Los Angeles? It’s not by chance it’s a fact that everyone thinks of California as the healthy state (Florida is right in there as well of course!).

The land of the creative and fortunate to have been born/raised or moved to the sunshine have almost too many choices for outdoor activities year round. Sometimes this leads to being overwhelmed and it can create a failure to start or implement a fitness program.

Bike riding is probably one of the most misunderstood levels of exercising. People think they need a top of the line product to achieve maximum performance and results. Hardly, find yourself a solid bike within your budget.

Then find a course around your neighborhood that offers challenges (hills) and enough soft landings to properly maintain 30 minutes of solid riding. Bike riding can achieve much better results than just walking. We recommend this above and beyond walking if it’s feasible.

So, what to do when we are less than fortunate to live in a year round warm climate? You can invest in a home gym for starters and we have lots of information on our corporate web site for ways to research these options. There are also the private gyms, local community centers and all offers some level of performance that should be a good enough fit for your needs.

Swimming indoors is just as effective as outdoors. All across the US and Europe there are choices available to swim year round. Swimming is a great way to tone and maintain great body fitness with the least amount of muscle wear and tear.

In Today’s world there just isn’t an excuse not to exercise. Move that body and get yourself in shape to lead a healthy life style way into your later years of life. Today’s retirees have an enomorous task as their once beloved pensions and healthcare solutions are not what they had hoped. We can all take a step in the right direction by getting ahead of the health curve and get in shape early in life.

It’s never too late! Make sure you combine a healthy eating plan as well. Exercise requires solid fuel intake and a well balanced meal plan. In addition we strongly believe is a good (twice a day) natural supplement program. We like adding almonds and Mona Vie International’s acai berry juice to our daily plan. It provides a safe and healthy way to achieve 100+ percent of the RDA for our vitamins and antioxidant needs (and then some when it comes to the benefits of the Acai Berry!).