What Topics Would You Like to See?

This post is to help you, whether you are new to strength training or an old hand looking for some new tips and tricks. Tell me what topics you would like to see discussed. Are you interested in specific exercises? Do you want to find your way around the gym? Are you interested in healthy eating to get the most from your workouts? Are you concerned about what to wear at the gym? Join in the conversation by leaving your comments below this, or any, post on this blog. I look forward to hearing from you.

My Favorite Exercises: Shoulder Raises

I don't know about you, but I hate those ultra skinny arms that most fashion models have. You want to look toned, not emaciated. Since women can't build bulky muscles, we can do lots of arm exercises that add definition to our arms and shoulders.

Today, I want to talk about two more of my favorite exercises: lateral raises and front raises. Both work the deltoid muscles in the shoulder. You have front, middle and rear deltoids, but today we'll focus mostly on the middle and front.

Lateral raises are basic and are great for the middle deltoids:

1. Holding a dumbbell in each hand, let the arms hang down at your sides.
2. Lift your arms straight up to the side with palms facing down.
3. Lift just to the shoulder level and keep arms fully extended (without hyper-extending the elbows).
4. Lower slowly to the starting position.

Front raises are similar, but focus the exercise more on the front deltoids:

1. Holding a dumbbell in each hand, let the arms hang in front of your thighs, palms facing in.
2. Lift your arms straight up to the front with palms facing down.
3. Lift just to the shoulder level and keep arms fully extended (without hyper-extending the elbows).
4. Lower slowly to the starting position.

As you do these exercises, make sure you are not using momentum and that you are keeping your abdominal muscles tight. Think about pulling your stomach muscles toward the small of your back. This will help ensure you are focused on the shoulder muscles and using your core muscles for support. Keep your knees slightly bent. Use good posture.

Start with light dumbbells. Lots of repetitions with light weights will get you the results you want without injuring your shoulder joints. I use five-pound weights for both exercises. If you do them in a slow, controlled fashion, you will feel them. Trust me.

With summer here, work on those arms and then you can show them off in sleeveless blouses and dresses.

My Favorite Exercises: Pull-ups

While our society tends to focus on other areas of the female form, the back is one of the most beautiful parts of a woman's body. Ballet dancers know this.

Work to build a lean, strong, sensuous back. I love shoulder and back exercises. And, after push-ups, my favorite exercise is pull-ups (or chin-ups).

Since I am a normal woman with normal strength, I have never been able to do a pull-up unassisted. Therefore, I have to rely on having a pull-up machine at my gym. If you have one of these at your gym that has a pad you stand or kneel on and weights to assist you, take advantage of it.

Pull-ups work a lot of muscles in back and arms. However, I feel them most in my latissimus dorsi, the broad muscles across the back and above the waist. See the picture here from Wikipedia. They work most of the same muscles as the lat pull-down machine, but they work more muscles and work them better, in my opinion.

With the assisted pull-up machines, you have to think of the weights in the opposite way you normally do. The more weight you use, the easier the exercise gets. That's because the weights are the amount of assist. Think of it this way. If you weigh 130 pounds and you set the weights at 30 pounds, it means you are pulling up 100 pounds. With a 100-pound assist, you are pulling up only 30 pounds of your own weight. Over time, you want to decrease the amount of weight you use on this machine. Keep in mind that these machines vary. On some I have had to use 70 pounds of assist, on others 40 or 50. They don't all work the same way.

One of the nice things about these machines is that they usually allow multiple grips. This allows you to vary your pull-ups and work your muscles differently, for a better workout. I sometimes do four sets with four different grips. Or I might do four sets alternating just two grips.

If you are not a well endowed woman (if you know what I mean), then work the back and accentuate this beautiful and feminine part of your body. A good place to start is with pull-ups.

My Favorite Exercises: Push-ups

Let me share with you some of my favorite exercises, year in and year out.

Today, I want to talk about probably my favorite exercise, push-ups.

When I do an upper body workout, I warm up and then my first exercise is push-ups. Why?

Engages all your upper body muscle groups. Push-ups work every muscle in your upper body: your chest, back, shoulders and arms.

Gets your blood flowing. Even with good breathing, my entire upper body turns red from all the blood pumping when I do my push-ups. I get warmed up fast!

No equipment required. You can do push-ups just about anywhere, any time. You are using your own body weight for push-ups. Do these when you travel.

So what kind of push-ups should you do? Do you have to do "men's" style or can you do them on your knees? It really doesn't matter. If you can't do the full-body push-ups, by all means, do them on your knees. The important thing is to use good form. Lift and lower the entire body. Often, I see women (and men), lifting and lowering only the shoulders. Funny how people like to cheat themselves of the full benefit of an exercise. Do it correctly or don't do it at all. Your body should remain straight, and it should move like a see-saw, in one piece.

Can women get strong enough to do full-body push-ups? Of course. I have never been able to do pull-ups unassisted, but I built up sufficient strength to do full push-ups. If you want to learn to do them, try what I did.

• Get in a good push-up position with arms full extended and body straight.
• Lower as much as you can and then push back up.
• Next time lower as much as you can and then go a little lower. At first you may collapse. Over time, You will be able to go a little lower and then a little lower and then push back up. One day you will surprise yourself by going to the point where you can just about touch your chest to the ground and then lift yourself back up. That's when you will have achieved the full push-up. Once you can do one, adding reps is easy. You'll see.

You may want to build up to full push-ups for no other reason than you'll impress yourself and your friends. Not that many women do them. But I know you can.

I do four sets of 12 push-ups. I change up my hands to get a slightly different workout for my muscles. I generally do a set with my arms directly under the shoulders on my knuckles (left over from karate days) and then a set with flat hands. Then I do two sets, knuckles and flat hands, with my arms wider apart.

Knuckle push-ups have the added benefit of strengthening your wrists. They are really no harder than flat push-ups. Give them a try.

I'll be covering more of my favorite exercises in upcoming posts. In the meantime, send me your comments. Let me know what your favorite exercises are and why.