fitness

  Ever noticed those people in the gym that are doing some wild combination of instability and strength work—like standing on a BOSU ball or one of those blow-up cushions while performing overhead dumbbell presses as they fight to lift the weight and simultaneously stay balanced? It looks super impressive and challenging, but it’s probably not the best tactic for most people. “I see this stuff and I think,  Wow, that’s an incredible waste of time ,” Ryan Campbell, a kinesiologist and training specialist at Anytime Fitness of Southern Wisconsin, tells SELF. While combining strength training and stability work might seem like a foolproof way to get an efficient workout, the truth is that it actually might end up being less beneficial than if you were to do both strength and balance work on their own. So before you climb atop a wobble board with some free weights, here’s what you need to know about instability training and the best ways to work it into your routine. Why instability traini

  I've been confused for a while now by the   indoor cycling   craze. People obviously love it, and I sort of get it—the music, the vibe, the intensity, the cardio! But there are some things about these classes that kind of get to me, as a fitness enthusiast and journalist. Namely: What is going on with those on-bike push-ups? I mean, seriously... why ? Bike push-ups—which you do by placing your hands on the handlebars, bending your elbows so your torso comes toward the bars, then straightening your arms out again (and repeating over and over again to the beat of the music) as you continue to pedal with your legs—are commonplace at many indoor cycling studios, including SoulCycle. While I can appreciate the break in monotony and the distraction from the burn in my quads, I also just don’t really get it. What’s this move even doing? Is it really a push-up if I’m sitting down? How much upper-body strengthening am I even getting? And is there any possible downside? So I asked three cy

  These tiny tweaks can make all the difference. Anyone can get a good workout with bodyweight exercises. There are so many options and variations, and since they don’t require any equipment you can do them wherever you want—and for free. But it’s also common as you do bodyweight exercises consistently and get stronger to start to feel like they’re becoming too easy. Like you need something to make them more challenging again—and that’s definitely something to celebrate. For some people it might make sense to progress to using free weights like dumbbells. But what if you’re not ready for weights (this may help you figure that out btw) or don’t have access to them? There are actually a lot of really simple ways to make bodyweight exercises more challenging without involving a single piece of equipment. Here are a few ideas for changing up your go-to bodyweight exercises so that you can work your muscles in slightly different, more challenging ways. 1. Slow them down. “People assume fast

  These bodyweight moves hit key upper-body muscles.                              While many upper-body exercises involve equipment like dumbbells and barbells, arm exercises without weights are a solid way to put your muscles to the test, too. After all, the weight of your body is equipment in its own right—you can use it to load your arm muscles and make 'em  work . There's no heavy lifting required, and a gym membership is totally optional. To be totally clear, it's hard to work  all  of the muscles in your arms without weights, so arm exercises without weights are only going to be able to target certain areas, primarily the tops of the shoulders (the deltoids) and the triceps. Other arm muscles, like your biceps, typically need some external resistance to work against. But the exercises listed here are definitely useful for hitting some key muscle groups when you don't have access to equipment. Most arm exercises without weights are some version of planks or push-u