Welcome to 2018! As we turn the calendar on a new year many will be embarking on a new fitness routine. With more people getting started in fitness there will be more injuries on the way. What can we do to make sure our fitness efforts are safe and effective?One of the things we want to make sure to do is to warm-up properly for exercise. If you've ever attended a track and field meet and watched the 100 m race you'll notice something.Although these athletes will only race for 10-12 seconds depending on the level, they will warm-up for much longer than that. Elite sprinters won't arrive at the track 30 minutes before their race to lace up and pull a heel to their glutes. Instead their warm-up could last hours. And this is to enhance their performance and to minimize injury.So what does a warm-up do?A warm-up helps accomplish a couple of things. It helps improve muscle dynamics so we are less inclined to injury It helps prepare us for the demands of sport (or exercise)Regarding reducing the rate of injury, over 30% of sports/training injuries are related to skeletal muscles so it makes sense that we would want to prepare them adequately for the demands to come.Are there different ways to warm-up?Well are the different ways and different types. In terms of types we can think of active and passive warm-ups. Active warm-ups are things we do ourselves by moving our bodies. And these can be general, like jogging or ridding the bike before a training session, or specific with movements that mimic the demands of the sport or activity.Warm-ups can also be passive where we are warmed by external means. This could be by sitting in a sauna or a hot tub or having a warm shower.Does the...

So yesterday I had the chance the play a round of golf with a buddy, Jim, and he invited a couple of friends which was great. I actually knew one of the guys from many years ago at a gym in downtown Kelowna called Flex Fitness. Anybody remember that place? Anyways Jim and I planned to have lunch on the course and then hit a few balls before teeing off. Well we got involved in conversations about travel and other things that we didn't realize that we hadn't gotten our food and we had about 10 minutes until we were due up at the first hole. Needless to say we didn't hit any balls at the range and went straight from the restaurant to the first tee where we both proceeded to find the sand. While it was a beautiful day I would have been okay with the middle of the fairway rather than the beach. To summarize the round I was about 11 strokes better on the back nine than the front. And I attribute a large part of this difference from a lack of a warm up before playing. And it got to thinking back to a study I had read in the Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research which had 30 military cadets performing a number of agility and power tests after either: * a dynamic warm-up* a static stretching warm-up* or no warm-up at all The tests were a T-shuttle run to measure agility as well as a medicine ball throw and a jump test. What they found is that the dynamic warm-up group outperformed the other two groups on all three tests. There was no significant difference between the static stretching group and no warm-up group on the agility or med ball throw but the static...

Who doesn't want better results? It doesn't matter whether this relates to business, finances, education, fitness or anything else. We all like to experience improvement.But you know what's better than improved results? Better results in less time.Think about it.If I told you that investing $1000 could turn into $10,000 would be impressed or interested? It depends, doesn't it? Obvioulsly the time component makes a huge difference on whether or not this would be considered impressive. 10 days to turn one thousand into ten thousand would make any investor curious and possibly interested. However if it took 100 years to achieve the same no one would be interested.In the same we need to consider the time component when it comes to achieving results in the gym. Better results in less time always wins. So with that in mind here are 5 ways to make your workouts more efficient and get better results in less time.1. Skip the General Warm-upWhat's the first thing most people do when they get to the gym? The jump on a bike or walk on a treadmill. While there may be a slight increase in heart rate and circulation this does next to nothing to mobilize and activate the thoracic spine, shoulders and upper body. And while the foot may contact the belt of the treadmill there isn't the same proprioceptive feedback gained from solid ground contact. And with a bike there is no ground contact. Add to this the lack of frontal or transverse plane motion as well as nervous system excitation and the pre-workout cardio becomes more useless. But personally my main reason to ditch the general warm-up is that is uses energy that may have allowed for more intensity, volume or speed of movement.2. Perform Complentary ExercisesWhen someone new to training performs a chin up for...

I'm sure most of you have taken a plane before. And you've probably paid for that flight.Sometimes you time it right and book during a seat sale. And other times you need to get somewhere and end up paying more than you'd like. And definitely more than what others are paying for the same flight.Back when I was in grad school my brother was working off-shore off India. He became sick and I ended getting on a plane to help him back home to Canada.Since the amount of time from we when learned he was sick to the time time it was decided I would go get him no more than a few days passed.So I showed up at the airport and bought my ticket on the spot to leave on the next available flight. This is not the way to travel on a budget.Even though I was sitting beside someone travelling the exact same route as me we experienced vastly different financial 'pain' to make that trip. Even though the result was the same our investment in that trip was totally different.And this is very similar to the experiences many people have when they work out in the gym.Some people plan ahead and have a purpose in mind and get tremendous results from their efforts in the gym.Others do not plan anything out and are not sure of their purpose. These people get minimal, slow results from training.Below are 5 keys that account for achieving great or marginal results.Reason #1 Some Get Better Results - PlanIt's really hard to make effective use of your time in the gym when you don't have a very clear idea of what you're going to do that day in the gym.What exercises are you doing? How many sets? How many reps? What loads will you...