Why athletes should treat the brain like a muscle

By Amanda Loudin

After back surgery three years ago, 31-year-old environmental scientist Danielle Cemprola had become a frustrated runner, suffering from a sense that she might never return to her former level of performance. Having run 44 marathons pre-surgery and six after, she had all but given up on eking anything more from the physical side of training. That’s when she decided to work on her mental game, something she says has made all the difference as she preps for an upcoming marathon.

While elite athletes have long honed their mental skills, Cemprola, who lives in Greenville, S.C., is joining a growing number of amateurs delving into the power of the mind. These athletes are working on their confidence, motivation and the mind-body connection to overcome obstacles and reach new heights. “Finding the limit of your potential as an athlete involves proper mental training along with the physical,” says Joanna Zeiger, former Olympic triathlete and author of a book on mental toughness called “The Champion Mindset.”

Some of this increased focus on mental training stems from the fact that some amateur runners are approaching a finish line of sorts. “As athletes, we’re at the point of marginal returns from physiological sports enhancement,” says Brad Stulberg, journalist, columnist and co-author of the upcoming book “Peak Performance.” “So the next legal [non-doping] frontier is the mind.”

Upping the power of the brain

One of the areas where athletes struggle the most is negative self-talk, which can be a big hindrance to progress, says Denver-based sports psychologist Justin Ross. “I have clients keep a mental log along with their physical log,” he says. “They record their state of mind during training, what they do when things get tough, and how these responses shape their behavior.”

Armed with the awareness of their behavior, Ross can work with athletes to flip the negative chatter. “I have them come up with three positive ‘I am’ statements to begin the day,” he says. “Then in the evening, they finish off with three gratitude statements specific to their training.”

Zeiger says the consistent practice of repeating strong words or sentences can go a long way. “Write it down so that you can go back to it,” she says. “Then whenever you hit a rough patch, pull those words out so that you can overcome any negativity you’re experiencing.”

Cemprola has tried a wide array of tools to boost her mind’s role in her athletic success. “I have read sports psychology books, listened to motivational podcasts and worked on visualizing race day,” she explains. “I even found a video of the marathon course on YouTube and watch it several times a week to familiarize myself with spots that might be difficult for me.”

Zeiger is a fan of visualization. “It’s important to spend time picturing positive outcomes, seeing yourself racing strong, crossing the finish line with your arms in the air and carrying out your race strategy to perfection,” she says. “I also encourage athletes to practice disaster visualization — imagining hitting a rough spot and envisioning how they will get through it.”

Another difficulty athletes encounter is tying success to external gratification. “Eventually, you run out of good races and if your whole self is tied up in those results, you’re setting yourself up for disappointment,” says Stulberg. “Instead you need to remind yourself what is real and what can’t be taken away. That balances out what you can’t control.”

Sometimes this means stepping away from chasing a particular goal, says Zeiger. “When the pursuit becomes all-encompassing, everything you do is detrimental,” she explains. “This is when you need to step back and switch focus — maybe try a new distance — so that you can gain back your confidence.”

Positive messages

Mental training can also involve practicing your response to pushing hard in training for a better outcome in racing. “It doesn’t feel good to go hard,” says Ross. “But if you practice positive self-talk in these moments instead of negative, you can excel, and not beat yourself up afterward thinking you could have done better.”

To get the most of your mind’s power, it’s important to treat it as a muscle, says Stulberg. “The mind gets tired just like the body and if it isn’t given a break now and then, it can’t function at its top level,” he explains.

This means forgoing the temptation to focus on metrics every single time you head out to train. “You have to incorporate some meta-easy runs, leaving the watch at home and running by feel,” Stulberg says.

Since putting her mental training plan into place, Cemprola has “negative split” her last three races — meaning she’s run faster on the back half than the front — not an easy result to pull off. “I focus on finishing every run strong, training my brain to believe that I can be strong at the end of any run, even a marathon,” she says.

At the end of the day, it’s the mental training that can deliver the extra edge many athletes seek. “Everyone has a physical limit,” says Zeiger. “But the mind is infinitely malleable.”

reprinted from the Washington Post

This Is The Number 1 Reason So Many People Hate To Exercise

by Anna Quinlan

Every week, it seems, there’s a new study or article addressing how much exercise we need to stay healthy. Some studies bear good news: Just 30 minutes three times per week! Other studies are more damning: an hour a day if you want real results. Perhaps the most common publications are the ones trying to reinvent the mousetrap of physical exercise, hoping to offer a shortcut or a “new and improved” program that will make the workout more appealing or the commitment more manageable.

But they’re all missing the point.

If all the research agrees that physical exercise is important for our well-being, and human nature has taught us that we’ll probably find an excuse to avoid doing something we don’t really want to do, wouldn’t a more valuable question be, how can we find an exercise program that we actually enjoy?

Whether it’s 30 minute bursts or multi-hour Saturday sessions, in a dark studio or under an open sky, breathless and high-intensity or gentle and graceful, what I’ve learned from all my years of sweating is that the best way to do it is however you actually want to do it.

Whenever someone asks me what type of workout they should do, whether they’re hoping to lose weight, get toned, or prep for an upcoming event, my answer is always the same: Well, what do you want to do? I always, always start with desire.

I’ve started so many workout programs that I absolutely hated. I’m a sucker for research, though, so when I heard that high-intensity interval training (HIIT) was the latest and greatest way to do cardio, I vowed to make treadmill sprints a part of my weekly routine. Never mind the fact that I hate the treadmill. When hip-hop classes popped up everywhere, promising to sneak an hour-long workout into what felt like a party, I tried those, too. Never mind that I have absolutely no rhythm.

And guess how long I stuck with those programs? Not long. It’s not the fault of the research — they’re effective workouts in their own right for anyone who keeps showing up. It’s my own fault for thinking I could force myself to do something that I just wasn’t that interested in.

It took me a while, but once I realized the value of desire, my whole relationship with exercise changed. Instead of feeling like a chore, it became a choice. Instead of a means to an end, it became an event in itself.

I started by committing to be active in some way — any way — most days of the week. I picked the activity that felt right that day. I ignored the research. I ignored whatever new fad workout the starlet du jour was obsessed with. I didn’t worry too much about the numbers, about how many minutes or calories or pounds were involved.

I began to create a list of the kinds of exercise that I actually enjoyed: bootcamp classes with friends, hot yoga, anything at the beach. Instead of following a rigid plan with certain exercises prescribed each day, I chose what sounded good that day. After a particularly stressful day at work, banging it out at boot camp helped me blow off steam. After I hit a big goal at work, I rewarded myself with a long, leisurely walk at the beach, and I didn’t beat myself up for refusing to break into a run. On days where I knew my excuses were about to choke out my willpower, I got my butt to yoga, where I knew that, if I just showed up, the instructor would take care of the rest.

When I stopped thinking about it as exercise, but rather activities that I enjoyed, when I stopped thinking of it as a program that I had to follow, but rather a choice that I got to make based on how I felt that day, it became easy to stay active. From there, from letting my desire lead the way, I began to find even more activities that I liked.

After enough bootcamp classes, I realized that I could plan out my own weightlifting circuits, and I discovered how empowering it was to push myself to lift heavier weights. Walks at the beach led to runs at the beach, which led to runs on trails, which eventually led to obstacle-course races. Hot yoga led to Vinyasa yoga, and now no week feels right without a day or two on that yoga mat.

What I’ve learned is that desire often begets desire. If you try to force yourself to do something you hate, you’re likely doomed before you even start. By answering the question of what you want to do, though — whether it’s ballet or hiking or Pilates or swimming or walking with a friend or having tantric sex, for crying out loud — by starting from there, you set yourself up to actually stick with it. And if you stick with it, you just might expand on it.

Let’s stop overthinking it. We’re lucky to have these bodies that can move so freely and feel so deeply, and wanting to take care of them is part of our humanity. If you’re beating yourself up about the last workout program that you didn’t stick with, I beg you to forgive yourself. If you’re thinking about vowing to start a new program that feels like punishment, I beg you to reconsider.

Yes, commit to taking care of yourself, but do so in a way that recognizes that you are, in fact, yourself. You won’t find me on a treadmill or in the hip-hop class, and maybe I won’t find you on the running trail or in the weight room, but as long as we’re both out there, somewhere, we’re getting it right.

Reprinted from womensrunning.com courtesy of Pop Sugar

7 Reasons Your Arms Aren't Changing No Matter How Much You Work Out

You might actually be working TOO hard

 by Samantha Lefave

Been trying to sculpt sleek arm muscles for months with no results? Don't throw in the towel just yet. We asked top trainers to name the most common mistakes people make when toning those triceps and biceps. Whether you're neglecting your shoulders or just lifting the wrong size weights, here's what you'll want to avoid to see some REAL progress. 

You're Doing Too Many Isolated Movements

Let's get one thing straight: Pumping out 100 triceps extensions with 2kg weights won't get rid of unwanted arm fat—nor will it make you any stronger. “No amount of weight and no number of reps of tricep extensions will get rid of flabby underarms,” says Heidi Powell, co-host of Extreme Weight Loss. Even if you go for heavier weights, lifting won't necessarily make your arm look slimmer (more on what will help later). “You’re just expanding the muscle, not burning the fat in that region,” says Powell. 

So what’s a girl to do? Lauren Williams says multi-joint exercises like pushups, pullups and upright rows are more effective than exercises meant to target only one isolated area. Compound movements like these fire up your back and shoulder muscles first, and automatically loop in the biceps and triceps muscles while you’re at it. 

You're Working Too Hard

When it comes to your workouts, Williams says trying to power through exercises that are too advanced is detrimental to your progress. “You’re not able to work through the whole range of motion of the exercise,” she explains.

Take a pushup, for example. If you’re unable to do a full pushup on your toes, lowering your chest all the way down to the floor while keeping your body in a straight line (don’t let those hips sag!), then you need to focus on mastering an easier variation first.

“Focus on the full range of motion so you can get higher reps and see more improvement in muscle tone and strength,” says Williams. “If you need to regress the movement, do that.” So for a pushup, Williams says you can start doing them against a wall or a bench, and after you are able to complete three sets of 10 full pushups, start moving to the ground. A combination of the full-blown movement and a regressed one (like three full pushups and 12 bench ones) will help ease the transition.

You're Only Working Your Upper Body

If you can get more of a total-body workout in the same amount of time and increase your calorie burn, the real question is why wouldn’t you? Jillian Michaels, celebrity fitness expert and creator of FitFusion, says she often sees people do upper-body or lower-body work alone when they should really be combined. “Combo moves increase calorie burn and make workouts more efficient,” she says. “Do lunges with your biceps curls, or squats with an overhead press. This will burn a hell of a lot more calories than straight curls or presses.” They'll also help get your heart rate up and rev that metabolism, meaning you’ll continue to burn calories after you hit the showers.

Those Weights Arent Heavy Enough

Gone are the days of picking up tiny weights because you're afraid of “bulking up.” By now, we know that just isn’t going to happen unless you work really hard to do so; ladies simply don’t have enough testosterone. “If you want definition, you need to train with a weight that actually stimulates your muscles and produces a training effect,” says Holly Rilinger, NIKE master trainer. “If you’re choosing a weight where you can do 100 reps—or even 20-plus reps—you simply aren’t doing anything.”

Here’s how to know enough is enough: When performing an exercise, Rilinger says to aim for 8 to 12 reps, and to be able to do that three to five times. “The last two reps in each set should be extremely difficult to finish without losing your form,” she explains. If it’s not—hooray!—you’ve beasted that weight and are ready for more.

Your Posture Sucks

Take a look in the mirror for a quick eval: Are your shoulders hunched forward or arched up by your ears? Williams says she often sees a lack of awareness or control over the scapula—a.k.a. shoulder—movements. “People are often hunching over in planks, pushups, and lat pulldowns instead of having a neutral spine,” she says. To counteract that, be sure to check in throughout your movement and make sure your chest and shoulders are open. And don’t be afraid to shrug the shoulders down and roll them back every few exhales to make sure your form is on point.

Be sure to check in on your overall form, too. "I know it seems obvious, but I can’t tell you how often I see people tossing weight around improperly in ways that compromise results and risk injury,” says Michaels. A common offender: arching your back during bicep curls. If this is necessary, Michaels says your weight is too heavy. Once you’ve got the right resistance, “tuck your tailbone, pull your belly button in, and engage your core,” says Michaels. “And don’t bring your elbows in front of your rib cage—that engages your anterior delts, not your biceps.” Noted.

Your Diet Isnt Dialed In

You’ve been killin’ it with the pushups day in and out, but you’re not seeing any improvements in the mirror. What gives? Probably what you’re digging into in the kitchen. “If you want definition, your body fat composition has to be low enough that you can see the muscles in your arms,” says Rilinger. “If you’re building muscle but eating poorly, you’ll still get stronger, but not more defined.”

In other words, keep an eye on your eats. Protein is the building block of muscle development, says Rilinger, so make sure you squeeze it in at each meal, and definitely aim to eat some within 30 minutes of your sweat sesh. That’s when your bod is primed for nutrient absorption. Plus, protein helps rebuild the muscle fibers that are torn during a workout. Otherwise, focus on lots of veggies, don’t shy away from , and try to minimize the amount of processed foods and sugar you take in.

You've Forgotten About Your Shoulders And Back

When was the last time you worked out your shoulders and back? “Often times we get so fixated with the old-school bodybuilding mentality that we need to do bicep curls for upper-body day. But we’re neglecting the most important muscle groups that actually help create the appearance of a slim and sculpted arm,” says Powell.

Instead of those curls, try some of Powell’s favourite compound shoulder and back lifts: lat pulldowns, pullups, shoulder presses, and dips. Tempted to skip out? Remember this: “The nicer the shoulder boulder, the slimmer the arm appears,” says Powell. “And I’ll bet you’ve never seen a woman with nice shoulders that didn’t have amazing arms as well.”

reprinted from womenshealth.com