While most people’s gym routines differ – I, for one, have always been an elliptical girl and hate the stationary bike – it’s safe to assume that almost everyone incorporates a “cool down” into their cardio program. After running for 30 minutes at 7 miles per hour, you’ll knock your speed down to 3 and spend five minutes jogging or walking before you hop off the machine. Many pieces of gym equipment even include a 5-minute cool down automatically, tacking it on to the end of your desired workout. All of this is supposed to prevent soreness or muscle damage and relieve strain on the heart.

According to University of Texas physiologist Hirofumi Tanaka, however, there’s no proof that a cool down has any positive benefits on the body. “Everyone thinks it’s an established fact, so they don’t study it,” he said in a recent New York Times article. The article notes the ambiguity of the concept as a whole, noting that it’s not even clear what a cool down is supposed to be or how long it should last.

Apparently, the cool down became standard gym practice after it was reported that muscles become sore after exercising due to the accumulation of lactic acid. This theory has been reported false, leading people to believe that reducing the intensity at the end of a workout (which was supposed to let the lactic acid dissipate slowly) is unnecessary. The article does note, however, that blood can build up in your legs and feet if you stop running (or biking or ellipti-cizing) shortly, making dizziness or even fainting a possibility. Read More »

There’s a great many things to do and places to see in this world of ours.  As humans, our lives are pretty short (and if you party like I do, it’s probably going to be even shorter).  So we have to prioritize!  We have brains for a reason and that reason is…reasoning (well, at least some of us use them for that purpose: see comment about partying above).  Let me be your voice of reason as I show you all the things you should be doing right here, right now.

It’s hard to be sure of what to eat these days.  Health reports come out with a study against a certain food one day and for it the next.  Do I eat the egg yolk or do I stick with the whites?  Are pomegranates that good for me?  How many more vitamins do I really need to take?  It’s confusing.  And I don’t like being confused about food.  I just like eating it.

Everyone’s heard the old adage, “Everything in moderation.”  Sounds pretty obvious, right?  You can eat your egg yolk (as long as you don’t eat five eggs a day) and not feel guilty.  Even dessert isn’t off limits if you don’t gorge yourself.  So this is why I’m going to give a shout out to something that has gotten a lot of bad press lately: meat.  It seem everyone is jumping on the vegetarian wagon, what with all the new vegetarian options out there.  Hey, I don’t have anything against tofu (I actually love tofu, but that’s a different story), but I have to defend my meat.  It’s delicious, packed with nutrition, and can be used in a million different ways.  Here’s why you should eat more meat: Read More »

Having now survived a full week of fat camp, I think I can safely say that I probably have never worked as hard in my life as I have since I got here. I’m incredibly out of shape (which adds to the difficulty), and it’s been a big change for me. It’s been a good change, however; I needed to get out of my comfort zone.

Prior to this, my comfort zone entailed usually half-heartedly participating in team sports and eating bad food. Here I cannot and do not get to do either of these things. The biggest issue for me has probably been waking up early to do a three mile walk each morning. Considering that, if left alone, I can sleep until 8 PM, getting up to do such an activity is a big thing for me.

I’ve really learned how to let myself go a little however, which I definitely needed to do. All my life, I have had no athletic ability and try to hide it at any cost. But for the first time, I now play sports such as soccer and basketball with enthusiasm (meaning I actually run instead of walk), which makes me feel great. I’m forcing myself to take full advantage of this experience (except for when I did a boxing class, taught by a former bodybuilder, and broke down and cried in the middle) and my body is constantly reminding me of that by keeping me sore all the time .

But it’s good sore, right?

Read More »

This month, Cosmo was especially recession conscious (there were, like, 6 whole articles!), featured a slightly disappointing interview with Leighton Meester (she’s just not as bitchy as Blair Waldorf) and their first ever scratch-n-sniff! But, by far the most…interesting article I read was “The Sex Detective is in!”

Now, the woman-in-trench-coat-peeping-through-blinds picture that accompanied the headline immediately got me excited for the juicy confessions of some private investigator. Boy was I wrong. Instead, Dr. Harry Fisch, author of Size Matters, decoded what size, shape, texture and taste (!!) mean when it comes to a guy’s libido. So, read on to find out what it means if…

…He’s Trim Around the Middle.

Cosmo Says: If the guy’s got a spare tire, all that extra fat will break down testosterone much faster than lean muscle, and “testosterone is the gas that drives the car. If it’s low…he’ll be tired, he’s not going to be able to exercise very much, he’s less likely to be in the mood, and his fertility will be lower.”

Kari Says: Interesting. I didn’t know a little extra padding could be so detrimental to a guy’s sex life. I mean, a huge potbelly is definitely going to lower a guy’s chances of getting laid, but I had no clue it would affect his performance/ potency when he eventually does bed someone. Testosterone must be pretty damn important.

…He’s Got Guns.

Cosmo Says: Yes, Kari, testosterone is pretty damn important. If you want to have great sex, find a guy who’s “trim and jacked” because all those muscles mean more testosterone. Also, tall, thin guys with bodies like noodles don’t produce as much, and some guys won’t produce a lot no matter how much they workout, those hopeless wimps.

Kari Says: Ugh, it’s nice to look at all those fake baked guidos glistening while they spot each other at the gym, but it’s another thing entirely to want to sleep with them. Even if they are producing mucho testosterone (and I’m not sure how black market steroids affect that hormone post-cycle), I think I might rather sleep with noodle boy and have mediocre sex than get my bump and grind on while jamming to house music. Just sayin’. Read More »

We are busy girls; there is no doubt about it. We’ve got class, and study groups, and student groups and work, and somewhere between all of that, we need to work out. And we need to get the most out of that limited time we have.

So we run to the gym, hop on the treadmill for 45 minutes, pack our things and move onto the next item on our daily agenda: the shower. We don’t have time to waste on stretching – we’ve got beer and pizza calories to burn, baby. Stretching is just an extra little thing, anyway; it’s not that important.

That’s what I used to think, but it turns out that stretching can be the most important part of a workout. Well, if you don’t want to mess up your body and do want to see more obvious results. Read More »

[Exercise, health and fitness are an important part of every woman’s life. But how do you know if you’re doing it right? And what new findings, tips and advice will help you reach your health fitness goals? Kelly, our fitness guru, will keep you updated every Monday with the latest and most beneficial news and advice for your health and body. Even if it involves some...er...alternative workouts.]

Now, I know what you may be thinking: I’m the same lady who, a few months ago, wrote a blog about how I felt about the ladies of the pole. You know – strippers. Now, while I voiced my opinion on how I felt about my boyfriend visiting them, I did not (and made it a point not to) bash strippers for what they were doing (their job).

So, when my girlfriend called me up a few weeks ago and asked me if I’d like to try a new workout class, which happened to be Introductory Pole Dancing, I was game. Hey, if nothing else I could get a feel for what it’s all about and maybe learn a thing or two… Plus, I had heard it was great exercise.

So, for $15 bucks, I signed up for my 90 minute (very long class!) workout around the pole. Read More »

[Exercise, health and fitness are an important part of every woman's life. But how do you know if you're doing it right? And what new findings, tips and advice will help you reach your health fitness goals? Kelly, our fitness guru, will keep you updated every Monday with the latest and most beneficial news and advice for your health and body. We've covered cardio fitness before, but this week we turn our attention to the often neglected workout of weight lifting.]

While most people tend to focus on the right types of cardio to get their most successful workout on, it’s not the only way to tone, shape and define our bodies into what we want them to be.

Lifting weights can often get a bad rap; lots of women think that weight lifting is designated for those big, steroid looking macho men that hang around the gyms. But, little do some know, weight lifting is perfect for all shapes and sizes; it’s just a matter of finding what works for you.

According to the lovely safe-weight-lifting-for-women.com, weight lifting can help women:

• Have easier weight loss or weight maintenance

• A leaner, stronger body

• Improved appearance

• Better posture

• Lower blood pressure

• Increased resting metabolism rate

• Improved balance and coordination

• Stronger bones, and protection against osteoporosis

Bet you didn’t know that, eh? Read More »

I almost wish I lived in the 1500s so I could bang Michelangelo.

There, I said it, and I’m only a little embarrassed about it. I just returned from a two-week sojourn to Berlin and Florence, and the single most amazing thing I saw (and have perhaps ever seen) is Michelangelo’s sculpture of David.

Nothing has ever, ever made me want to get with somebody so much.

Until you see the sculpture in person, it’s easy to pass it off as a commodity. No picture can do it justice, and it’s hard to understand just how incredible it is without seeing it for yourself. The main thought going through my mind as I stood there looking at it, though, was, “Holy cow. How the hell could Michelangelo sculpt a man as anatomically gorgeous as this one? He must have used himself as a model, because the details are just too precise. Michelangelo must have been freaking hot!”

This might seem ridiculous, but trust me, it’s not. There are details on David that pictures just don’t show. The veins in the arms, the just-so rippling of the hip and thigh muscles, the soft framing of the bone structure in the hands…it’s all there, and I am convinced that no artist could ever create that kind of detail without using a reference. And when you’re sculpting a nude that’s the same sex as you are, the easiest reference to use is yourself.

Conclusion: Michelangelo must have been ripped. Read More »

Have you ever looked in the mirror and thought to yourself, “I don’t need to lose weight, but I totally want to tone up”?

Let’s say that you fixate on ‘toning up’ your arms and that you start doing bicep curls with three or five pound weights and a high number of repetitions per set. But after two weeks, you don’t see any results, so you give up.

Do you want to know why that didn’t work?

Because there is no such thing as toning up. All of those bicep curls that you do with three pounds weights? That starts you down the path that you want to go on, but what you’ve got to do is put down the puny weights and pick up those heavier bad boys.

If you were working with three pounds, move up to five; if you were at five, move up to eight and so on. Do 12 reps, rest for a minute, repeat the set and after another one minute rest, complete the final set of twelve. You don’t want to do two or three sets of 12 – 15 reps with such ease that you didn’t actually work the muscle.

Yes, the heavier weights can be intimidating but that’s no reason to stay away from them. Perhaps you’re afraid of ‘bulking up’. Well, fear not, because women simply lack the testosterone to bulk up and look anything remotely like those scary ginormous body builders. Read More »

My mom invited me to join her for a few sessions with her private Pilates instructor. Might I add that my mother did not mention to me that I would have to pay for half of said lesson until after the fact, which was quite a surprise to me. But, the money was totally worth it…even if I can’t really afford to do it ever again.

Not only did this woman work my muscles until they shook, but she taught me exactly what I needed to eat afterwards to optimize our one-hour session: protein and fiber. And she was so right.

Ever since that fateful day, I have been following my workouts with a big dose of protein and fiber. Sometimes it’s eggs and toast. Other times a little peanut butter on some whole wheat crackers. Usually, though, I don’t have time to make a hearty snack or meal after my workout (since I am usually running 20 minutes late to work as it is), so I depend on a good old protein/nutrition bar of some sort.

Let me tell you; if I eat one more freaking Luna Bar I am going to go crazy. Read More »