I work out in two different places – at home and at work. At home, we are lucky enough to have an elliptical machine and a nice weight set as well as a floor work mat complete with an ab cruncher that we can safely do situps on without injuring our backs.

One big difference I’ve noticed between the ellipticals that I work out on at work and the one we have at home is that the one we have at home, which happens to be a Horizon elliptical machine, that I love, has the handle bars that go back and forth as you glide, whereas the one at work does not, and I have to move my arms myself if I want upper and lower cardio action.

I think it’s important for me, personally, to get the best workout possible for my body type, which is the type that tends to maintain weight in my upper arms a lot, to get a good upper body workout as well as lower. I also think that it tones as well as burns off fat in that localized area if you have the arm handle bars, so that you can sculpt your arms easily.

If you have to manually just move your arms back and forth in a swinging motion, and you don’t have that extra added resistance of a handle bar going back and forth, you really don’t fee it in your arms like you do when you’re done on an elliptical machine with the handle bars. I don’t think it’s just me either, as others have also said they feel they get better workouts on the ellipticals with the arms handles.

Another thing is, I feel like it allows me to align my back and spine better with the arms levers because I am actually forcing myself to stand up straighter, as well as getting that good resistance muscle building which may help to strengthen the back and make the posture better, naturally. That’s my two cents, and I think some other people might agree with me on that, whether they own a Horizon elliptical or another popular one like the ProForm elliptical machine, both of which come with and without the arm levers for extra movement and cardio work.

Well, it may not have been a recumbent bike, as I think there are different style exercise bikes that are used for spinning classes in gyms (I’ve never been to a spinning class personally, can you tell?), but a man claims that he was assaulted while he was on his spinning bike in a spinning class in a gym in Manhattan by another gym patron.

He claims that the other patron, another male, picked him up on his bike, and threw him against a wall, injuring his back and causing a minor concussion. He also claims that no one, including gym personnel called 911 for the man, nor did they come to his assistance when the other customer allegedly assailed him. These kinds of stories do make you wonder, did this person do something that horrendous that no one would help them, or were people just not privy to the situation?

I would think that with a spinning class, there would have been several onlookers to the incident, so the fact that no one called an ambulance or came to this man’s aid is disturbing, at best. I just read another story today in the paper about how a woman in Minnesota was assaulted (sexually) in a hallway of an apartment complex, with security footage clearly showing several witnesses who did nothing.

No one called the police or an ambulance. This is really humanity at it’s worst, or a terrible, terrible misunderstanding. I don’t know how you could not do something or come to someone’s aid who was so clearly being hurt, but it happens a lot more than we care to acknowledge I guess. This is also another good reason to invest in some home exercise equipment, so you can exercise in the safety and comfort of your own home. Plus, if you’re a private person like me, you can enjoy working out in the privacy of your own home.

As I’ve hammered into my own head and yours over and over, working out is, I feel, essential to living a healthy and fulfilled life. But that’s not just my opinion. In fact, some would say that it’s an unshakeable fact, and that it even affects your intelligence. Workouts, as we know, are beneficial to our weight control, our cardiovascular system and our bone and joint health. There’s scientific evidence that exercise can help yet another area of our body, our brain.

According to Fred Gage, lead researcher at Salk Institute, their research has already shown that, in mice, regular physical exercise has increased the birth and survival of new brain cells in the hippocampus. The hippocampus of the brain is vital to memory and learning.

Furhter clinical research is continuing to try to establish a connection between regular physical exercise and the prevention of certain diseases such as Alzheimer’s. Regular workouts do improve memory and learning as physical exercise promotes new brain cell growth.

Mental activities, like crossword puzzles, sudoku, reading and card playing are still a great way to keep your mind active and your brain sharper. These activities should be encouraged and continued especially to slow the aging process to the brain.

In addition to the mentally challenging and stimulating activities,don’t forget to maintain a physical workout routine. Not only will you look and feel better physically, but your mind and memory will function at the optimum level.

It used to be that pot bellies, even on thin people, were regarded as a funny looking, but harmless physical attribute, but now, more and more research is pointing to the fact that protruding bellies are indicators of some serious health issues and can elevate risk of certain health issues substantially.

Some of us have been naturally blessed with a flat tummy, and have never had an issue with a belly that is larger than our waist line, but there are many times those numbers in people who do have problems with maintaining a trim belly area, and experts think this may have to do with the higher amount of heart disease and other heart related health issues these days.

Supposedly the newest studies actually have correlated larger bellies that protrude from the body on heavier people, as well as people who are thin everywhere else except their bellies, and found that both have the same substantially increased risk and likelihood of developing health issues that are mostly heart related.

It had always been thought that this was mostly a theory, and not yet a proven one, as most of those with heart problems did tend to exhibit the pot bellies more than those without, but now that studies back this theory up, it’s another reason to get that cardio work in as often as you can, and do your crunches to keep the pounds off the midsection as best you can.

Sure, there are some body types that tend to have more weight centralized in the midsection, but as with weight anywhere on the body, it can be reduced through diet and exercise to add least get the odds on your side.

I ran track in high school. The track I ran on was a plain old, black cement track. Granted, it seemed like a softer cement, so the impact wasn’t as bad on your joints as, say, running on a regular sidewalk of black top would be, but you still could get shin splints if you over did it, or didn’t wear the right shoes.

Fast forward 15 years and they have these nifty tracks, even at high schools, made out of something called vulcanized rubber, which is almost like a silicone polymer, in that it’s quite squishy and soft, but it also has a durability of no other softer rubber, since it will be run on again and again.

To look at a rubberized track, it almost looks as though there are flecks of rubber all over the track, and it feels as though you are running or walking on air instead of hard ground. My boyfriend and I went jogging, running and walking on a brand new rubberized track yesterday and boy, could you tell the difference. Today, my joints are sore at all, and my back doesn’t hurt from the usual jolting I experience from running on cement.

Usually, two disks up near my neck get compressed, and I have to do a lot of stretching after running or jogging, but not so with this type of track. The cool thing was, since it was a high school track, there were bleachers, so we can also run the bleachers next time for some extra sweating, cardio and calorie burning plus more muscle building and endurance building.

They also had those tall iron structures that you can use for stretching, where you can stretch basically any part of your body, hang upside down and realign your spine, and stretch the backs of the legs really well because of the positioning of the bars and the angles and heights. Very cool. We just moved into the area and had been meaning to check out the track and its amenities forever, and finally made it there.

This will be an excellent addition to our workout regimen, and we can do it well into the fall, and on winter thaws if we want to. It’s better than some treadmills and other home exercise equipment, and gets you outside, although I’ll admit it’s less convenient if it’s not super close. The rubberized track is phenomenal. If you’re a runner or jogger, you could totally appreciate the impact absorption and how much further you can go.

I found this very interesting, because I certainly don’t think it’s what I looked at when I chose my current longtime boyfriend, but hey, maybe I did subconsciously choose him for it, who knows! Researchers are saying that it’s not the eyes, the hands, the nose, the mouth, or the face for that matter that we really innately look for in a lifetimes partners or mate, but rather it’s their waistline. Huh? So women look at mens’ waistlines instead of their chests? Hmm…..I’m a little skeptical about that one!

I guess that we as humans tend to choose, whether we know it or not, mates for life with similar ratios of body fat to ourselves. I can see that part as being true, but am not sure if we somehow relate the waistline to body fat either, especially since women in particular can have dramatic waist to hip ratios since we are much curvier than men, and it may not be the best judge of body fat overall for women. At least, that’s my opinion.

It may be that to judge how our offspring may fare in this world, or how our mates may look in the future, we subconsciously look at their waistlines as a way to gauge this type of information. At any rate, I suppose that men and women may want to be working out their waistlines a little more in order to find a good mate, right!

It’s funny, because reading this made me realize that we really don’t focus on the waist much any more in popularized workouts around the world as it used to be in the older days when small waistlines on women was the most coveted body type to have, but the hips really did not matter if they were slender. I suppose we should all be doing side bends again maybe.

Actually, modified side bends and side crunches are some of the best ways to work the waistline and wittle it down, as well as some home exercise equipment that targets this tricky area, you just have to be careful to protect the back. I suspect that may be the reason that these types of exercises fell out of favor, because of the increased awareness of back protection in working out. At any rate, you make your own judgment, what do you think. Think you chose your partner for their waist?

I thought this was a very cool concept when I read about it. It’s a new treadmill-like machine that is slightly modified that can be found in high tech rehabilitation centers that helps stroke victims and others with brain injuries that has impaired their motor functions for things like, say, walking, by helping to stimulate the part of the brain that is responsible for movement and coordination.

How does it do this? Well the traditional treadmill that I’m sure you’ve all used at least once in your life if you find yourself reading this blog, works by having one uniform pad that moves constantly, and mimics the movements that one makes when they are walking by providing a moving platform that allows them to move without actually going anywhere. Wow, that sounds ridiculous in concept when you say it out loud, doesn’t it?

Here’s how this modified treadmill works for rehabilitation. The belt is actually split in two, so each of your feet is forced to walk at different speeds. The additional brain stimulation that it takes for you to actually not fall down and coordinate each of your feet so you stay at an even pace is what helps to rehabilitate that mind and rebuild coordination in those that have had brain damage that otherwise would not allow them to walk, move, or coordinated to do certain movements correctly.

I saw a picture of the treadmill, and it looks like exactly what it is explained as : a treadmill like the Proform treadmill or Horizon treadmill would look in your gym, but only with two separate smaller belts, instead of one bigger, wider belt. I don’t even know if I could do this properly, not having any type of brain injury, so I don’t envy those that have to try this without falling.

Supposedly there are separate nerve pathways that operate each leg, so the thought process is that if each leg can be forced to walk normally, this can help rehabilitate the patient’s walking patterns without them lurching backwards and forwards, as is common in those with brain injuries. The challenge for them is that they have to figure out how to get patients to keep walking normally after they do not have access to the special treadmill any more.

Hopefully they can figure this out, because this machine seems nothing short of ingenious for those that cannot walk and perform motor functions, something that would be beyond frustrating to anyone I’m sure.

I didn’t realize how important it was to purchase the right abdominal equipment until we actually purchased one – an ab-roller style piece of exercise equipment that was a simple C-shaped crunch machine that helped you stay in form when doing ab crunches, at a garage sale.

We had already purchased a “cheapo” ab roller type of machine at Target for about $30, and thought that this model, which looked a lot nicer and more intricate than the ab roller we’d purchased at Target (and mind you, cost only $1 at the garage sale), would work a lot better and be a more solid piece of home exercise equipment for completing abdominal crunches correctly and without lower back strain or pain.

However, boy were we wrong. This ab cruncher model did look a lot nicer and sturdier, but there was a reason the folks who sold it at the garage sale were getting rid of it. Doing your crunches on the thing actually made you lower and upper back kill you the next day. While it did feel like you were working your abs a little harder, the C shaped design had some kind of flaw in it where you lower back was not protected at all, and in fact it actually made you wrench you back a little every time you came into the crunch position.

I knew it wasn’t only me either, my boyfriend also said the next day his back was incredibly sore. So, for now, we’re sticking with our lower end Target ab roller, and may be on the look out for an even more back-safe model down the road. I do know that a lot of not getting a sore back from doing ab work is in your form and protecting your back by using your abdominal muscles instead of your back, which is a common mistake a lot of people make when doing ab work, but I consider my ab form pretty good, and I’ve been doing them for years, so I don’t think the form was my problem, I really think it was the machine.

I wish I could remember the brand name of the machine, I want to say it might have been Reebok, but can’t say for sure – it was a purple color though and did look to be an old model.