Zumba

If you love to dance, this exercise is a must try! The latin inspired fitness dance class took sports gyms by storm in 2008. According to the official Zumba® website, “Zumba® Fitness was created in the mid-90’s by Colombian native Alberto “Beto” Perez, a celebrity fitness trainer and choreographer for International pop superstars. Inspired by the traditional cumbia, salsa, samba and merengue music he grew up with, Beto paired his favorite pulsating Latin rhythms with the red-hot international dance steps his clients loved and Zumba® Fitness (Spanish slang for “to move fast and have fun”) was born!” Click here to find the nearest Zumba class to where you live.

Pilates

Pilates really works your core and creates a leaner looking midsection. It will teach you how to suck in your beer gut without having that “sucking it in” look on your face in pictures. If you are naturally thin and are looking for a way tone up, this is an awesome exercise that will even make you look taller! For beginners you will most likely just use a mat and your own body weight. You will break a sweat, but this is not a heart pumping exercise. You may not even realize the muscles you are using during class, but you will definitely feel it the next day. I personally have noticed the slimming and toning effects after just as little as 2 classes. If your school doesn’t offer Pilates classes, you can check out a few of my favorite routines for free here. On average, Pilates burns about 330 calories per hour.

Yoga

You probably are familiar with Yoga, but what you may know is that although it doesn’t provide a cardio workout, it does help weight loss efforts. In a recent study, it was revealed that yoga may help you lose weight and keep if off better than a low carb or low fat diet as a result of it’s the meditation effects. The meditation allows its practitioners to feel confident in their skin and achieve a healthier lifestyle. Those that were on a low calorie, low fat, low carb whatever, lost weight initially but were unable to keep it off as time went on. The yogi’s adopted a healthy lifestyle that allowed them to make wise food and exercise decisions. It also will give you an awesome body as a result of holding difficult poses. It does wonders for your arms and abs, making it a great form of exercise for tank top season! It’s also relaxing and is proven to combat stress and depression! On average it burns about 200 calories per hour.

Spinning

Seen in many movies like the opening scene from “The Sweetest Thing,” spinning is definitely an acquired taste. I will honestly admit I have never taken a class because I do not like bikes. However, it is an awesome workout for burning calories like crazy. In the words of my sister, “It’s a super cardio workout.” If you wanna lose weight, take this class. If you need a challenge, take this class. The high intensity workout can burn you about 700 calories in an hour (based on a 140 lb woman). If you want to try out your biking likability, try this 4 minute bike workout that will give you an idea of how much you like the bikers burn!

Other classes to check out at your school are kickboxing, bootcamp style classes, hula hooping, stip tease aerobics and cardio classes. For more free workout videos delivered weekly subscribe to my YouTube channel, DietHealth. Did I mention we give out free gifts to our subscribers each month, from free food to healthy recipe books and fitness DVD’s?

You can also follow me on twitter (DietSarah) and ask any fitness questions you may have! See you next week!

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.

And if those muscle heads at the gym intimidate you or you don’t want to deal with a gym at all, buying sets of dumb bells at varying weights are all you need to work out at home or in your room.

I know people who have been discouraged because they insist that they’ve bulked up when the truth is that they’ve built muscle under the fat stores that they haven’t lost. In the first couple of weeks that you start a weight training program, the scale will show a slight weight gain, but the scale doesn’t accurately track your progress – the fit of your clothes and how you look in the mirror are the true indicators.

Despite what’s been pounded into our heads about working out from infomercials and just plain false information, there is no such thing as spot reducing, no miracle instant cure and ‘toning’ just isn’t going to happen.

Muscles either get bigger or get smaller. You get stronger or you get weaker. We mistakenly use the word ‘tone’ to mean ‘get lean.’ So if you want those stronger muscles to show, then the only way to do that is to lose body fat.

Let’s go back to the arms scenario. Genetically, we are all preprogrammed to store fat in certain places first and unfortunately the last place you gain fat is the last place that you lose it. To lose fat on your arms, you can’t just work your upper body. What hinders our progress is looking at our body in parts, because if that is how you see it, then that is how you will work it. We need to shift our perspective and work the whole body in order to make the changes that we want to see.

There are three components to making those muscles show:

1) Weight training

2) Cardiovascular exercise

3) Healthy diet

Weight training is the absolute best thing that you can do to make real changes to your body. It will not give you instant results but over time, it is the most effective because the more lean mass that you have, the higher your metabolism. A pound of muscle burns about 60 calories per day. A pound of fat burns about 5 calories per day. Five pounds of fat is the equivalent size of a grapefruit; five pounds of muscle take up the space of a tangerine.

Cardio is also key but keep in mind that you can do cardio to your heart’s content, but if you aren’t properly fueling your body, then you’re shortchanging yourself. Your basal metabolic rate is the number of calories that your body burns if you don’t move all day. Whatever that number is, you should NOT go below that.

To help you along further, websites like Calorieking.com and Fitday.com are great tools for figuring out how many calories are in the foods that you eat and calculating how many grams of fat, protein and carbohydrates that you’re eating per day.

Working out doesn’t mean that you can eat whatever you want; it means that you don’t want any kind of nutritional deficit by eating the foods that are devoid of the nutrients that your body needs.

This website looks daunting I know, but someone recommended it to me and it really gives some great tips. You don’t need to go in and be able to bench 100 pounds. Work at your own pace and you’ll be amazed at the changes you see and how strong you can become.

I like to break it down this way:

Day #1: Chest, shoulders, back

Day #2: Legs and abs

Day #3: Biceps and triceps

As an example for day one, I recommend trying the following moves:

For shoulders: the shoulder press or rear delt row with free weights.

For the chest: the bench press, using free weights or the machine

For the back: dumbell shrugs, the lat pull down machine, and the barbell bent over row.

What’s great about this website is it shows you how to lift properly. Correct form means better and injury free results.

Alternate the muscle groups that you work and do not underestimate the importance of resting; you actually build lean mass while you are at rest.

So get your weight lifting gloves and get to work! In four to six weeks, you will be thrilled with the results.

Ah! I know this may seem scary and sudden for some. I agree. After a bitter cold and snowy winter, I suddenly realized that I need to get my backside into tip top shape for this clothing season.

Well, luckily, our friends over at fitsugar.com have provided a fabulous workout just for that backside of yours. And, it’s only four minutes! No matter how stressed you are with finals and papers, you can squeeze four measly minutes into your day to do these exercises.

Check out the video first to watch a girl demonstrate the workout, or do it along with her in your dorm or apartment. If you’re more of a gym girl, take the printable version with you to the gym. Trust me, your ass will thank you later.