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FocusOnFitness is a series of basic exercises you can do in your house, in the dorm or during a short break. Using the natural surrounding without having to find the right equipment, the best gym or the perfect time to do a little workout. Focus on Fitness is all about doing it when you can and hey, why not?
Maria Johnson, aka Girl Gone Blind, joins Jeff Thompson in the Blind Abilities Studio to Focus on Fitness and how you can incorporate little nuggets of exercise without throwing your schedule off and being able to work out within your own time and space.
In this Focus On Fitness episode, Maria and Jeff talk about the use of Dumbbells to exercise and keep those muscles toned and defined. A Dumbbell is a hand-held weight ranging from a pound to a huge amount of weight for body building. We are talking about the lighter end of the spectrum, from 2 pounds to 15 pounds. These affordable and easily stored Dumbbells can be used for various motions to isolate and focus your workout to specific muscles. From the Curl for bicepts and triceps to the presses and lifts for shoulders and lats, Maria and Jeff go over a few to get you going on toning up them muscles.
Check out some more Focus on Fitness episodes and if you have any suggestions or comments, feel free to let us know. You can find Maria on Twitter @Girl_Gone_Blind and follow her blog on the web at GirlGoneBlind.com.. You can find Jeff on Twitter @KnownAsJeff and check out more podcasts with a Blindness perspective on the web at www.BlindAbilities.com.
And remember:
Consult a physician before performing this or any exercise program.
This is especially important if you or your family have a history of high blood pressure, heart disease or diabetes.
It is your responsibility to evaluate your own medical and physical condition,
and to determine whether to perform or adapt any of the exercises in this Focus on Fitness episode.
The use of any information provided on this site is solely at your own risk.
If you start to feel any pain or discomfort while exercising, stop immediately and contact your doctor or health care professional.
Thanks for listening!
Full Transcript Below
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Full Transcript
Pete:
Be sure to consult a physician before performing this or any exercise program. This is especially important if you or your family has a history of high blood pressure, heart disease, or diabetes. It is your responsibility to evaluate your own medical or physical condition and to determine whether to perform or adapt any of the exercises in this Focus on Fitness episode. The use of any information provided in this Focus on Fitness episode is solely at your own risk. If you start to feel any pain or discomfort while exercising, stop immediately and contact your doctor or healthcare professional.
Maria:
Focus on Fitness. You didn’t even know you had a muscle there. Goals, man. Goals, Love it. A plank. You know, a plank is a full body exercise, and it’s a love/hate exercise, actually.
Jeff:
Five, four, three, two, and rest.
Maria:
It’s worth it.
Jeff:
Hey Maria, how are you doing?
Maria:
I’m doing great. Jeff. How are you?
Jeff:
I’m doing good. I heard we’re going to be talking about dumbbells and weightlifting a little bit.
Maria:
Yeah. Yeah, and that is not a dumb topic.
Jeff:
No, it’s a handy one though.
Maria:
We’re on a roll.
Jeff:
There we go. From Walmart, Target, you can always pick these things up and they’re very inexpensive and they stow away pretty good.
Maria:
Yeah. I keep mine under my couch in my office. There’s a nice little gap and I just shove them all under there because nobody wants to kick a dumbbell. Nobody. Or they’re easy to fit inside of a closet next year shoes, or even just lined up against the wall, again, if they’re not in the way of walking or foot traffic.
Jeff:
If you’re starting out and you want to get dumbbells, I would start out with the lightweights. While you’re at the store, check out the threes, check out the twos, then the fives, and then there’s eights, and then there’s tens, and you can go higher to twelves and fifteens, but I would say start out with the small ones just to firm up a little bit. We’re talking about firming up where you’re building tone. We’re not going to start building up into some Arnold type of guy or Body by Jake or something. We’re just talking about keeping the muscles active. It’s something you can do at home and stow them away real easy, and if you go too fast, too heavy, too hard, and if you kick one of those 20 pounders, you’re going to feel it.
Maria:
Yes you are, and you’re not going to feel it in your muscles. You’re going to feel that in a broken toe. So yeah, I agree with all of that, Jeff. Tightening and toning is kind of where it’s at right now. Using lighter weights, more repetitions is going to do that. Now keep in mind, if you pick up a pair of threes and fives, say, you can always hold a five and a three and it makes an eight pounder. See Jeff, I can do math. I’m pretty smart.
Jeff:
Whoa.
Maria:
Yeah, I know. I know. I thought about that one for a while.
Jeff:
We’ll have to change the title of this podcast.
Maria:
I didn’t even ask Siri. I did it my own head. Okay, so more math. If you hold both fives in one hand, it’s a 10 pound. So you can mix and match the weights to make heavier weights. So keep that in mind as well, but don’t go out and buy twenties, like Jeff said, and think you’re going to become the next Arnold Schwartzenegger and enter a physique contest, because that’s just not going to happen. You’re going to injure yourself and that’s not going to end up well.
Jeff:
No. I mean I’ve seen some of these weight systems where you can interlock the weights and you can just put it back in, twist, and all of a sudden you’ve got eight pounds. Then you twist again and then you can pick up more, but what I’m talking about, these are small, little dumbbells. They actually look like a dog bone, almost. They almost look like a cartoon dog bone.
Maria:
Yes, they do. They do, and the small ones that are little one or two pounders, in class I joke and call them Barbie weights because they’re usually pink. I don’t know why. They’re usually pink and they look like little Barbie weights, but hey, there’s times that if you are new to holding weights or you have any injury, it is best to hold that lighter weight if you need to. So don’t be afraid of the Barbie weight or the little baby dog bones. Don’t be afraid of them.
Jeff:
No, don’t be afraid. What I like to do with dumbbells is just do some curls, work the biceps a little bit, or I want to do a press. I would say, start out sitting down, get your space. Make sure that you’re not going to be swinging your arm or moving it in a position where you’re close to your TV or an aquarium or something. You just want to have your space, and preferably in an open area, and you might want to bring the chair in that area and use that as kind of an anchor, a point of reference. So either you want to sit down with it or you want to put a knee on it and then do some weightlifting, but there’s lots of little things that you can do with dumbbells.
Maria:
Yeah, I totally agree, Jeff, and one thing to keep in mind as that maybe grabbing a dining room table chair without arms, because if you’re going to be doing bicep curls or any other kind of exercise where your arms are down by your side, the arms of the chair are going to get in the way. So just keeping that in mind. Or a stool, a kitchen stool, but only if you have really good balance, and if those arms make you feel a little bit more steady, then hey, use a chair with arms. I agree, 100% safety first, right Jeff? Safety first.
Jeff:
That’s right. Now a curl. That’s doing your bicep. You’re going to work the bicep. So if you hang on to the dumbbell straight down by your side and then curl it up so your wrist comes up towards your shoulder and then back down again, and when you bring it back down, that resistance when you bring it back down, you’re actually working your triceps a little bit. So always have a controlled motion. Count it out. You can do two dumbbells, one in each hand at the same time, or just work one side at a time and then switch over to the other one if you only have one dumbbell. So some people buy two twos, two fives, two tens. Some people just buy one of each and do it independently. It doesn’t matter. You’re still working the muscles.
Maria:
Absolutely, and keep those elbows really tight to the rib cage. We don’t want you to move the upper part of the arm. We only want you to move the forearm. And like you said, Jeff, you want to control that weight up and you want to control the weight down, and you can vary the count as well, Jeff, is you can do two count up, two count down, or you could do five counts up, five count down, or singles just up and down. Vary the count of the movement. Faster, slower, quick move up and then a slow move down back to your thigh. You can also switch the hand position, Jeff, to what you would call a hammer curl, and that’s where your palm is facing your thigh. So when you come on up, the top of the weight gets to the shoulder, and when you come back down, you bring that palm back to the thigh. So palms are facing inwards on that, just switching the way you’re working the bicep. Those are great exercises for sitting in the chair for the bicep.
Jeff:
So you got a little twist in it there.
Maria:
Yeah, a little twist. Mixing it up.
Jeff:
So another thing is the press. Say you’re sitting down in the chair and you take the weight in your hand, palm facing away from you, knuckles up, and you lift it from the shoulder straight up above your head and then back down, and your elbow would be facing outward away from you, but then it’s a controlled motion up and then down. You can do both, again, one in each hand, or one at a time.
Maria:
Yeah. Again, different counts as well. I tell people in my classes that the starting position is like a goalpost, where you have your arms up and your elbows are aligned with their shoulder and your wrist is right above your elbow. So your arms are in a goalpost position, and that’s the starting position and the ending position. So maybe that would help folks listening get a little bit more visual of what your arms look like, but the other thing I want to mention to make it a functional exercise is that when you press up, you come a little bit in front of your head and then you come back down to that goalpost position, shoulder, elbow lined up, wrist right above your elbow. Now why I call it a functional exercise is that think about when you’re trying to shove that suitcase up into a closet or sheets up into the top shelf. You’re actually pushing a little bit forward above your head. So it helps with that functional movement. So those shoulder presses are great exercise. Good one, Jeff.
Jeff:
Now you had another one where you actually just lift the weight straight out in front of you.
Maria:
Yeah, just a front raise. It’s another shoulder exercise, and all it is … again, it can be done sitting or standing as the other exercises we’ve already talked about, and the starting position is going to be right by your thighs. And you’re just going to raise right in front of you, right to shoulder height. Elbow is slightly bent. Never lock your elbows, and then you’re going to just bring it back down right on the outside of your thighs. You can also change it up by angling your arms out towards more of the corner of the room and then bring it down. So front or at an angle, little bit out towards the side and down, and you can vary the count, one arm at a time, both arms. Another great one for the shoulders.
Jeff:
When you’re working these, especially with the curls too, you want to make sure that you keep your back straight up and down and do not start moving at your hips or your back and swinging. You really want control of this so you’re isolating those muscles, those shoulders, or those biceps when you’re doing this so you can really focus on that concentration. Otherwise, you can hurt yourself if you’re not careful. You don’t want to be jerking around. With this light of weights, you should be able to work into something that’s real comfortable, and you can really concentrate on the muscles that you want to impact.
Maria:
Absolutely. You want to keep in mind what muscle group you’re working at all times. If your mind slips from that, then you got to get sloppy. I’ve seen it. People do it all the time. You’ve got to keep in mind what muscle group you’re working. Another one, Jeff, that will help work the back of the arm is a tricep overhead press, and it sounds complicated, but it’s not, and again, it can be done with one arm at a time, and it can be done with different counts, and how this exercise is done is that you’re going to put your arms straight up from your shoulders, elbows to ears, and your weights are going to be right above your head. You’re going to bring your arms back behind your head, bending at the elbows so that the dumbbell ends up right behind your head, and then you’re going to lift by straightening your elbows and the weights will end up right back above your head.
Maria:
That is one overhead press. Again, you can do one arm at a time or hold one weight. You hold a weight at each end and you simply do it with one weight, or you hold one weight in one hand and do it with one arm. Now again, several counts, whatever it may be, but this is going to work the back of that upper arm, which we all need a little work back there. Well, I’m just saying just maybe I do, but for those of you who do, it’s a good one.
Jeff:
And if you think Maria Johnson needs to work … no, I’m just kidding … email us in at –
Maria:
Yeah, exactly.
Jeff:
That’s a really good exercise because you can really tell when you’ve been working your triceps, because that’s one of the areas that really can get defined when you straighten your arm out and reach around, and you’ll be doing these exercises. After working your biceps, your triceps, go ahead and touch those muscles after a good workout. If you don’t notice it then, you’ll notice that the next day if you’re doing it right, because you’ll feel the burn. So I suggest if you’re going to do these exercises, do them every other day and switch them up so you’re not always concentrating on one muscle group all the time. Switch it up a little bit.
Maria:
Yeah, you know how people say, “I’m doing leg day,” and, “I have shoulder and back day,” and, “I have arm day.” Well, that does hold true. You don’t want to be doing biceps every day and pounding away at them. That just never gives them time to recover, and that soreness that we feel, Jeff, is the tears in the teeny tiny little fibers in our muscles, which is okay, because when they repair themselves, that’s when they build and become stronger and that’s that soreness. So you’ve got to give your muscles time to repair and recover.
Jeff:
We call it ripped.
Maria:
Yeah.
Jeff:
It’s good stuff. It’s good stuff. These are just practical things that you can do, affordable, have the weights, set them aside, like the storage that you talked about, Maria, but you pull them out, get done with it, put your stuff back, and you got a work out in.
Maria:
Yeah. Make a little routine for yourself. Make a little schedule for yourself. Monday, Wednesday, Friday or Tuesday, Thursday, arms, shoulders, whatever combination works for you, and that’s the key. Make it work for you, nobody else. This is just little bits of information to hopefully help motivate you to add a little exercise into your day. It doesn’t have to be a lot. Start small, work yourself up to something more when it’s right for you.
Jeff:
When it’s right for you, well said. Well, Maria, why don’t you tell the listeners where they can find Maria Johnson, AKA Girl Gone Blind, on social network?
Maria:
Thanks Jeff. I do write a blog and my blog is called Girl Gone Blind, and you can find it at girlgoneblind.com. You can find me on Facebook at Girl Gone Blind and on Twitter @girl_gone_blind.
Speaker 1:
Be sure to consult a physician before performing this or any exercise program. The use of any information provided in this Focus on Fitness episode is solely at your own risk. If you start to feel any pain or discomfort while exercising, stop immediately and contact your doctor or healthcare professional.
Jeff:
Stay tuned for more episodes of Focus on Fitness, right here on Blind Abilities, and remember to enable the Blind Abilities skill on your Amazon device, just by saying, “Enable Blind Abilities,” and most importantly, thank you for listening. We hope you enjoyed, and until next time, bye bye.
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Jeff:
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