• If people are not active in sports or physical education (in other words doing something that challenges their stability and ability of muscles to react), they start to lose balance at the age of 15 or 16.
• After the age of 70, nearly 85% of people die from complications due to breaking their hip.

If those aren’t reason enough to incorporate core and functional training into your exercise program, perhaps learning more will convince you.

What is Functional Training?

Functional training is defined as “activity that trains movement” and includes: balance training, stabilization training, core training, and dynamic movement training. The result of functional training is agility – improved reactionary forces where your body has the ability to compensate for changes in your center of gravity and can move quickly and efficiently. In other words, if you’re falling or suddenly caught off guard, your body is trained to react quickly, meaning you are less prone to injury. Exercises promoting core strength and stability improve or maintain posture and alignment as well as challenging balance and equilibrium.

Core training is different than just training your abdominals. Although the abdominals are an important part of your core musculature, true core training is a more integrated approach; it combines strength, balance, agility, and flexibility of the muscles that control the entire trunk and spine. Regular conditioning of the core muscles is essential to prevent injuries, correct posture, and making you more efficient with all that you do.

Functional training is about QUALITY of the movement, not quantity!

It is said that the average American watches 4 hours of TV per day! That is astounding! When is the last time that a television show changed your life for the better? The TV can be a huge distraction and can hinder your progress and dreams in any area of life. If you want to stay on track, avoid the TV during times when you could be exercising or being more active. Hiding the remote control, unplugging the TV, or even putting the TV in the closet can help lessen the possibility of avoiding your exercise, eating foods, and watching hours of TV instead. The fewer distractions and temptations in your home and surroundings, the better your chances are of reaching your healthy goals.

So, to sum it up -

Don’t let the TV (or anything else for that matter) keep your health and wellness dreams from becoming reality.

TV programs and newspaper articles published today frequently emphasize the benefits of getting off the couch and going for a walk to achieve heart benefits. While walking or exercising at the gym without working up a sweat might make you feel better, it will rarely help in achieving the weight loss, fitness and toning results that most are searching for.

Interval Training

Short bursts of intense intervals will give you the desired results in less time. It is important to choose exercises that get the heart rate up and make you feel slightly uncomfortable for a short period of time to achieve maximum weight loss and muscle tone.

Barry Seneri
practicing interval training on the treadmill

Kick Up the Training Intensity

The idea is NOT to go to the gym and run on a treadmill as fast as you can for as long as you can. Rather, you should choose some cardiovascular-based exercises or mix in some running intervals to get your heart rate into the uncomfortable zone every few exercises. If you are able to carry on a normal conversation throughout your entire workout, you need to add some intensity! Aim for exercises that use large muscle groups and more than one muscle group to burn even more calories in a shorter amount of time. All of the added sweat and heavy breathing from kicking up the intensity will get you the results you’ve been searching for.

Intense Interval Cardio Training

Interval Cardio Training is style of cardiovascular exercise in which the intensity varies for the duration of the session. ‘Intensity’ is defined by the individual’s perceived level of exertion. You can think of your intensity as a number that coincides with your effort on a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the hardest. The scale can go something like this:

1- Extremely Easy - the amount of energy it takes to get up from a chair

5- Moderate Effort - activity that you can do for 30+ minutes

7- Challenging - you can do the activity, but it is difficult to sustain

8- Difficult - the activity demands some focus, and it’s getting hard to hang in

9- Very Difficult - the activity takes all of your focus, and you pray it’s over soon

10- Nearly Impossible (But Not Quite!)- you’re thinking of a happy place, which is just about anywhere compared to where you currently are…you can’t possibly push any harder

Simple. Right? You can apply this ‘perceived level of exertion’ to any activity. Take a look at the following sample workouts:

Warm up at YOUR Level 5 Intensity for 3 to 5 minutes before all of these workouts.

1. Go to Level 9 for 1 minute, then back down to Level 5 for 1 minute.
   Repeat 3 to 5 Times.
2. Start at Level 6 for 1 minute. Go to Level 7 for 1 minute. Go to Level 8 for 1 minute. Then, go to Level 9 for 1 minute.
   Repeat 3 to 5 Times.
3. Start at Level 7 for 30 seconds. Go to Level 9 for 30 seconds. Go to Level 10 for 30 seconds. Walk for 1 minute. Repeat 3 to 5 Times.