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- Use both feet - use the inside alternately the outside of the foot in turning - turn both clockwise and counter-clockwise... Equipment: 2 x Ballwall Technique Wall, cone, ball ballwall.com
Saturday, October 30, 2010
Monday, October 25, 2010
Fitness Without the "Dumb" Weights
There's a lot to be said for weight resistance training - but some of us are just bored with dumbbells and repetitive movement.
Try these alternatives to invigorate your fitness lifestyle:
Upper body:
1. Do the gumby dance with Rubber Bands.
I get bored with repetitive moves here too - so I make it stupid and it gets fun! You can break up repetitive moves like a bicep curl and pretend you're working with more resistance. I pretend to be a Gumby mime artist, doing the same movements with extra resistance. The bands are great for improvising with, so combine your different movements to see how you can break the routine.
2. Use 1pd, 3pd or 5pd weighted balls also known as dancer's balls.
These balls fit in your hands and you can dance with them - but gently - so you don't throw out your arm joints! Try this activity - slow arm circles while sitting and lying, feel where you arm collapses, falters of feels weak. Now take the ball around your weak spot and see how you can integrate your abs into making the movement stronger. Try not to overwork your weak spot as this can cause muscle fatigue. The intention is to find how your abs and back can shift to SUPPORT the arm movement, rather than using your arm to do all the work.
3. Use the weighted balls while sitting on a fitness ball.
This makes it more interesting and challenging for your muscles and mind to balance. Do the arm rotations slowly and enjoy the massage of your joints. It's not all about muscle - your tendons and joints need to feel some juice moving through them too. You can use the balls to do arm stretches and reaches and create your own dance and stretch.
Lower Body and cardio combinations:
The legs act as a pump for the blood to return back to the heart. So find activities that are not repetitive to activate your heart and muscle health.
4. Boot camp training.
You can sign up for a weekly training that gets you playing games and doing physical activities you would not do unless someone you "forces" you to do them. These activities get you playing as if you're in the play ground - walking, running, jumping and balancing through obstacle courses, running up and down hills. Having some one yelling at you to do different activities activates the muscles and brain to fire in new ways, which stimulates the metabolism like crazy. Make sure you are not forced to do activities beyond your limit.
5. Game Days with the Kids. (Or just adults if you wish!)
If you have kids, you can play great activities that involve them too. Does anyone remember the old jumping sack race, three legged race and egg and spoon race? These are great activities for co-coordinating brain and muscle strength that challenge and increase your metabolism. Ball games and frisbee are always a great way to challenge your brain and muscle coordination as well.
6. Hiking.
Getting out in the out doors makes "working out" a pleasure and gives you the oxygen you're starved of in a gym and in air conditioning. Hiking also challenges the muscles and metabolism to fire in different ways that will only increase the need for more muscle cells and increase metabolism.
Combo workouts - Whole body:
7. Clean out the garden.
OK - I always resented doing the weeding in the garden. But these days a good session of pruning, weeding and breaking up garden waste involves every muscle group you could imagine. If you don't have a garden - you probably have a friend who does and they will love you for thinking about them!
8. Martial Arts.
There is nothing as deflating as trying to do a series of 10 kicks and realizing you have another 100 or so to go. Be warned that some martial arts training has no sympathy for the faint hearted. The kicking practice and warm ups of Kung Fu is the best way to activate the power and integration of your leg muscles. The warm up kicks will give you more control over your leg muscles that using a machine in the gym or even your good old leg lunges. Leg lunges are great but only work on balancing joints and muscles in stationary position. Once you start using kicks, you activate your core muscles, your guts and your attitude.
9. Qi Gong
For beginners find a tai chi class that gets you to do real slow form (Wu style) that activates your legs. For the more gung-ho, try fast form. Qi gong classes are also great low intensity ways to activate your legs and core as well as balance your blood pressure and breathing at the same time. You will be surprised how this slow form can tone your whole body.
10. Start Bouncing!
A good bouncing trampoline or "rebounder" with the right spring balance will tone all your muscles, inside and out. Dave Hall has created a mini-trampoline called "cellercise" which has springs with the right rebound so you avoid jarring the body and spine. Bouncing and balancing on a rebounder wakes up the core muscles, stirs up the body fat and invigorates lymph, blood vessels, organs, bones, skin and hormonal system.
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Ballwall - Football skills training
Ballwall offer a range of training aids for developing football skills. The walls can be used independently, by twos/threes, in schools and for team practice. Ballwalls are suitable for indoor and outdoor use. They require only a few square metres of space and are easy to move -- enabling you to protect surfaces, such as doors, walls and windows. Ballwall's versatility means you can... practice anywhere, anytime, with any number of people.
Friday, October 15, 2010
Ness Notes (Jan 19)
Duke (81-68), Florida (113-62) and Pittsburgh (76-68) all won last night and will head into the weekend as the nation's only three remaining undefeated teams. Illinois won its first 29 games last year before losing its regular season finale at Ohio State, 65-64. The Illini then won the Big-10 tourney and made it all the way to the national championship game, where they lost to the Tar Heels, 75-70.
Two years ago, Stanford won its first 29 games but like Illinois, lost its regular season finale at Washington. That same year, St Joe's won all 27 of its regular season games, but lost its opening game in the Atlantic-10 tourney. The last team to finish a season unbeaten was Bob Knight's 1975-76 Indiana Hoosiers at 32-0.
My free play for Thursday is in college hoops. Take Washington State over Oregon at 10:00 ET. I won TWO of three in CBB last night and I'm now 7-3 70% ATS since last Saturday. Get my 20* CBB Rivalry GOY, my latest 15* CBB Winner (off to a 4-1-1 start in Jan) and my CBB TV Game of the Month. Pay only AFTER you win!
There are 31 games on the college hoops board tonight. ESPN features a doubleheader with North Carolina visiting Virginia at 7:00 ET and Cincinnati at Xavier at 9:00 ET. ESPN2 has a MWC game at 9:00 ET, Utah at Air Force. The Tar Heels, despite losing four players in last year's NBA lottery, are 10-3.
Three freshman guards plus 6-9 freshman Tyler Hansbrough (leading scorer and rebounder) have joined returning players Terry and Noel to give Roy Williams a much better team than most anticipated. Virginia let Pete Gillen go after seven disappointing year but new head coach Dave Leitao hasn't had much luck so far, as the Cavs are just 8-6. North Carolina is favored by three points with a total of 143.
Cincinnati is without head coach Bob Huggins for the first time in 17 years and just lost a key player for the year, forward Armein Kirkland, to a torn ACL. Cross-town rival Xavier is 'loaded' and has opened 11-2, losing to only Illinois (by three points at the United Center) and at Creighton, 71-69 (Blue Jays are 9-0 at home). Xavier is a five-point choice and the total is 139 1/2.
In Colorado Springs, Air Force hosts Utah. Despite its third coach in three years (former Nugget coach Jeff Bzdelik) and the loss of last year's co-player of the year in the MWC (Nick Welch to injury), the Falcons are 15-2. The Utes are no longer the league's dominant team, as they enter just 8-7 and that's reflected in the fact that they are 10 1/2-point underdogs (total is 114 1/2).
The NBA has just two games tonight but both are carried on TNT. The Pistons are in New York to face the Knicks (Detroit is favored by nine points with a total of 190 1/2) and the Lakers are in Sacramento to take on the Kings (LA is a 2 1/2-point choice with a total of 206).
The Pistons are doing just fine these days without Larry Brown, as their 31-5 mark is a league-best and marks the best start in franchise history. Brown, now coaching the Knicks, enters this game with a 13-24 record. The Lakers and Kings are no longer the elite teams of the Pacific Division. LA has won six of seven but sports just a 21-17 record. As for the Kings, they enter this game at just 16-21. This game begins an 11-game stretch in which the Lakers will play NINE of those games on the road.
NFL Playoffs...A look in the rearview mirror.
I'm NOT a "conspiracy advocate" but the way I see it, the NFL has two choices! It can either acknowledge that its on-field officiating crews and the replay officials upstairs (supposedly hand-picked for the postseason as the league's finest) are trying to "influence" the outcome of the games, or they are simply INCOMPETENT!
Years ago, when I was doing a national radio talk-show, I made the following comment, tongue-in-cheek. My quote was "NFL officials are there to insure that the players DON'T decide the outcome of the games." After this past weekend's games, I think it's time to remove my tongue from my cheek!
While the NFL has admitted that its officials 'blew' the call on the Polamalu interception of Manning in the Pittsburgh/Indianapolis game, that's the LEAST of the league's problems, when it comes to the "integrity" of the game. I'll give just a few examples because more would be just PILING ON!
The pass interference call on Asante Samuel of the Patriots, late in the second quarter of a game in which New England led 3-0, was nothing short of 'criminal!' The flag came in LATE and was made by the official who was blocked from seeing what kind of contact there was, was not or who was making the contact, by the two players themselves. His ABSURD call (on the replay it looked more like OFFENSIVE pass interference than defensive!), changed the 'tone' of the game.
In the Pittsburgh/Indy game the following day, with Pittsburgh already up 14-0 in the 2nd quarter, a Steeler WR had beaten the Indy 2ndy on a deep route. Roethlisberger underthrew the ball and with the Pittsburgh receiver slowing down to catch it, the Indy player bumped him. That's an OBVIOUS pass interference call. However, the on-field official 'swallowed' his whistle. The TV commentators wondered aloud how the play they just saw was NOT pass interference, when the play in the NE/Den game the night before, WAS?
Are they really that naive or are they just being good "company" men? I'm afraid the answer is fairly simple. A pass interference call on Indy in that situation would have put Pittsburgh in a great spot to go up 17-0 or 21-0. So, the call was NOT made! Later, the "over-rule" of the Manning interception by Polamalu followed the same "theme."
In the Carolina/Chicago game, the Panthers scored on their second offensive play of the game and led 7-0. When Julius Peppers returned a Justin Gage fumble 37 yards for a TD later in the first quarter, the Bears were 'saved' by a replay official who ruled Gage's knee was down (and he was touched), before the fumble. Is that what you saw CONCLUSIVELY on the replay? What's a better game situation? Carolina up 14-0 or just 7-0? I think we all saw the answer.
Later in the game (4th quarter), Chicago's Thomas Jones was ruled to have scored a TD on a seven-yard run. Replays CLEARLY showed that not only did he lose the ball before it crossed the goal line but that the ball also went into the end zone for a touchback. However, just as clearly, there was a face-mask penalty on the Panthers. That 'saved' the replay officials from having to rule it would be Carolina's ball at their own 20. We'll never know what kind of 'story' they may have come up with if not for the face-mask penalty?
Anyway, it's back to work this weekend and I'll get off my soapbox with NFL coverage Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Ness Notes is available Monday by 1:00 ET and on Saturday and Sunday at 7:00 ET.
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
How to Help Your Child Cope With the Coming of a New Baby
The coming of a new baby in the family is great news to everyone especially for parents. Everyone gets excited and prepares for the latest addition in the family. The grandparents start to buy baby clothes, aunts and uncles give surprisingly cute presents for the little one, daddy gets the playroom ready, and mommy takes extra care of herself. All the acts are directed to the coming baby and the first-born child often feels neglected. This is the usual scenario when a new baby is due to arrive. All the attention goes to the other unborn member and the eldest child feels forgotten. The child begins to have self-pity and thinks that she is unwanted. The child senses that somebody will soon replace her and she will no longer be the favorite in the family.
In order to get back the attention lost, the child creates unusual behavior that will catch the attention of the adults around her. She begins to whine about almost all little things, misbehave in school and be mean to younger children.
Parents should deal with the feelings of the child about the new baby coming. Otherwise, the child will end up hating her baby brother or sister and this will be more difficult to handle. Here are some tips that will help your child cope up with the situation.
-Talk and explain.
Parents have to present the situation to the child in a way that she understands. Let the child voice out her sentiments about the baby and address this the soonest possible time. Explain to the child that your love for her does not change even with the coming of your new baby. Let her know that her baby brother or sister can be her friend and needs her care too.
-Continue your routine and play time with her.
As much as possible, keep playing with your child. Spend quality time together. When the child sees that the amount of time you spend with her does not change, she will feel secure.
-Tell stories about your experience with being pregnant with her.
Children love to hear stories. Tell her how excited you were waiting for her to come out and how everyone was happy to see her. When your unborn child moves inside you, let her feel it and explain to her that she was also like that when she was still inside your womb.
-Involve her.
Let her take part in choosing the color of the playroom, decorating the crib, buying clothes and even during the prenatal check- ups. This will help the child feel important. Later on, when the baby is out, you can also involve her in taking care of the baby. This will give her a sense of responsibility.
As parents, understand your child. This is not an easy stage for her. With your help and advice, she will soon surpass this phase in her life.
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