Isometrics, Steroids, Charles Atlas, and NASA What Do They All Have In Common??
Did you know that you could build
muscle and become stronger
without weight training?
It's true.
It's
called isometric training
and it increases
muscle mass, giving you that great-looking body you always wanted.
And best of
all, you can get fit without going
to the gym or buying all that expensive home exercise equipment.
Sounds hard to believe? Well read on...
Isometric
exercises involve muscular contractions performed against fixed resistance.
The system gained scientific
acceptance in 1953 when a couple of German researchers named Dr. Theodore Hettinger
and Dr. Eric A. Muller published a study showing people who did isometric exercises obtained dramatic results by causing their muscles to tense for
no more than 10 seconds at a time.
This muscle tension became popular in America when a young man from southern Italy, Angelo Sicilano, teamed up with marketing genius Harold Roman to produce an advertisement in comic books.
It showed how a 97-pound weakling became a "real he-man" and punched
out the bully who had kicked sand in his face. This ad launched the
mail order body-building program called "Dynamic Tension." Young Angelo went
on to win the title The World's Most Perfectly Developed Man.
He changed his name to Charles Atlas, put on a pair of leopard
skin shorts, and the rest
is history.
Ghandi Gets Sand Kicked In His Face
Probably the
only man Atlas could not help was
Mahatma Gandhi. When the great spiritual leader of India wrote a letter to Atlas asking for help, Atlas devised a diet and recommended a series of exercises to help restore Gandhi's
weakened condition. "I felt mighty sorry for him," Atlas said. "He was nothing but a bag of bones."
A few years before Atlas started flexing his muscles, another strongman used isometrics to build and maintain his strength. Like Atlas, Alexander Zass-better known as The Amazing Samson-offered his training through a mail order course. Zass was born in Vilna, Poland in 1888, but lived most of his
early years in Russia and after
1924 in Britain.
He developed a great belief in the application of isometrics and "maximum tension" for the development of strength. He
believed such an
approach was superior to the normal use of weights in developing strength.
"I aimed, first, to develop the underlying connective
tissues rather than the superficial muscles," he wrote in his instruction manual, Samson's System and Methods. "I developed tendon
strength...." Without tendons,
one would possess no control over the body, he continued. "They and their development are the secret to
my strength. Muscles alone won't hold wild horses back. Tendons will, and do."
Sampson, so-called The World's Strongest Living Man, said muscles were an illusion when it came to
strength, but he did encourage his students to develop them because well-defined muscles "furnish quite a respectable physical appearance."
Sampson said beginners should practice tensing their muscles one at a time
then grouping the muscles together, tensing as many as possible at one time.
He outlined three methods of isometric tension: freestyle, using no appliances; wall exercises for resistance training; and weight exercises in
which the student held the weight in a rigid position instead of using curls or presses, the typical "pumping iron" method of weight training.
Most isometrics instructors agree not to exceed 10 seconds on each muscle contraction. That is
perhaps the greatest appeal to isometrics-a person can enhance muscle mass and strength with only a few simple
repetitions in a limited time without heavy exertion.
Steroids And Isometrics
In the 1960s, gym rats-not wanting to publicly admit their use of steroids-attributed their sudden remarkable gains in strength and muscle mass to the use of isometrics.
This association, however false, between the system and the abuse of steroids created a panic among the health conscious, resulting in the American public shunning the use of isometrics.
But the system flourished in Europe, especially in physical rehabilitation programs among the aged. Seeing such positive results in Europe's medical use of isometrics, patients in the United States also turned to the healing aspects of the system.
Scoliosis is just one of the afflictions being tackled by the medical use of isometrics. The Anti- Scoliosis Treatment Method is a Russian approach that consists of isometric and stretching exercises, vibration, spinal
manipulation and electrical muscle stimulation.
Traveler's thrombosis is another ailment that isometric exercises can help prevent. Brought on by pressure on the upper thighs caused by prolonged sitting and low mobility in narrow seats on long airplane rides, this ailment is a greater problem than jet lag or airline cuisine.
The low air humidity onboard passenger aircraft can favor the formation of blood clots in cases where passengers may be lacking fluids. Studies by Medsafe, a business unit of New Zealand's Ministry of Health, indicate the use of isometric exercises helps relieve this condition.
Isometrics In Space?
Not only can isometrics help the weary worldwide wanderer, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration is out of this world when it comes to recognizing the benefits isometrics offer in the close confinements of a space capsule.
On long space journeys in prolonged
weightlessness, astronauts suffer crippling muscle and bone
loss. Future space trips will be longer, say three years for example, when astronauts eventually explore Mars. Longer durations in space mean increased muscle and bone losses.
Researchers at NASA's
Johnson Space Center recommend a variety of preflight fitness plans, training space travelers for in-flight use of the exercise equipment onboard the International Space Station, and monitoring their health after their return to Earth.
"Muscle and bone loss in space create an entire
realm of biological concerns for astronauts," said William J. Kraemer, director of the Human Performance Laboratory at Ball State in Muncie, Indiana.
"Our challenge is to find countermeasure programs which ... allow the body to maintain proper structure and function."
Astronauts Need Muscles Too
Strength training for astronauts involves two types of resistance exercises: high-intensity isotonics, which shorten and lengthen muscles (for example, lifting and lowering a dumbbell), and isometrics, which fully contract muscles without movement (such as pushing against a doorway). While both types of exercises could potentially reduce muscle atrophy in microgravity, research suggests isometrics may be more successful than isotonics in protecting slow-twitch fibers, according mto a
February 2004 report in NASA's Biological andPhysical Research Enterprise newsletter.
Isometrics At Home
For the homebody, massive muscle and bone loss may not be as much a problem as those extra calories packed on while
watching football or soccer on the television. It might be good advice to roll yourself out of that easy
chair and spend 10 secondsat a time doing isometric exercises-at least during the commercial breaks.
Frank Sherrill is a former U.S. Army Ranger, Fitness and Martial Arts expert and creator of the Bully Xtreme Home Gym.
Keep the Floor Clean and Protected With Car Mats
Nobody likes dirty feet
in their vehicle. Be it
hunters, Soccer
Moms or anyone in between, everybody wants
the inside
of their
car to be neat
and tidy.
So, what they do to
maintain the cleanliness of car floor! Obviously, it is
the car mats they turn to. By putting some nice looking mats on the floor, they keep the
floor clean and
protected as well.
But mats are something that
a car owner probably does
not think about very often. It is when they consider the high cost
of replacing the carpet for their car, floor mats suddenly become
a cost-effective option. They are available not
only in a variety
of colours but also affordable within the budget of even the most frugal car owners.
Car mats are
an essential accessory when it comes to protecting your
investment, especially if
you live in an area that witnesses lots of winter weather. Without this particular car accessory, slush and snow can soak into your car through the carpet padding, and cause rusting on the floor pans even before you know it. So, mats deserve equal attention as any
other accessory.
Buying car mats also deserve a little extra care. It is not possible for you to make
time and
shop for it frequently. So, take a little time out of your
busy schedule and decide what type of mats
will perfectly suit your
need. Mats are available in a wide variety of colours and materials to suit the demand of any and every user.
An all-vinyl floor
mat or heavy-duty floor mat
may be a better choice, if
ice, snow, and slush are common in the
part of the country where you drive your car very often. Custom-fit floor mats are available for other type of weather also. Regarding colour they offer an unlimited variety. So, there will be no
problem to get one that matches with the colour and interior design of the car.
Alexus Devon is an
automobile writer specializing in automobile and car accessories (such as
Car mats) products and has written authoritative articles on the car accessories industry. He has done his Master in Business Administration and is currently
assisting directcaraccessories.co.uk as a car accessories specialist.
The Pet Cage
Placing animals in cages
is generally
considered to be
a cruel thing, but many people who do not own pets do not know that some animals do not suffer as a direct
result of
living in a
cage, or spending most of
its time in a cage. Pet lovers everywhere are looking
for better ways
to provide a home for their beloved pets,
it is
the pet owner that is
the party which is most interested in its pets comfort
and will also go through many difficulties in supplying
the best home he
can find, build or buy.
This is mostly true when talking about
owners of pets who are generally considered dangerous, like
snakes and other reptiles, these are animals that
you would want to keep away from your living room
and on
the same time some people love these
kind of animals
and enjoy watching them grow and live their lives.
The solution is a pet
cage that
will provide security for
the pet owner and his family and in the same time give the animal a spacious place to live and spend most of its time.
The pet cages are
just a modern version of the animal
cage that humans used many years ago to hold their
wild animals, after a while these became the domesticated animals and most of them were released out of the cages because of the relationship between the animals and the humans, dogs and cats are an excellent example of animals who were first placed in cages and afterwards granted the freedom of movement which relayed heavily on the connection between pet and owner.
Some pet owners will tell you that some pets like to
have a place of their own, a
well placed cage can take care of the natural need for a secure space, and the pet cage can also work
well in many cases in which the owner needs to
transfer the pet to some other location, sometime to a visit to the veterinarian, a flight or while moving to a different house. The great advantage in
having a pet that is used to its pet cage is that
no matter where you place the pet it will always
feel at home if it has the cage nearby.
Deciding on what kind of pet cage you want is sometimes the hardest decision, it is naturally dependent on the kind of pet you have or want to keep in the cage, from rabbits for iguanas, the sort of cage, material and build is completely different. When looking for a pet cage to buy you should always talk to a veterinarian first, and make sure you know what kind of space the animal needs and what will be the health issues you will need to address.
If you are
building your pet cage you will probably need to look for
good design plans and talk to owners of pets that use all kinds of different cages, you will be amazed at how much information is
available on the internet and how much help some people will be willing to offer, all you need to do is try and contact your fellow pet owners.
Simon Oldmann is an avid pet lover, now living in the countryside he setup a dog kennel for his dogs and other features for his many pets, Simon currently writes tips and
advice on
http://petcage.advice-tips.com.
Why It's So Important to Make Legitimate RuneScape Money
You can
have all
the RuneScape money you will ever
need easily and there are only two very basic things
you have
to do to get it.
The first
thing is to do
a little bit
of work and
the second
is to know
the best strategies to
make legitimate RuneScape money.
Honestly, no one really wants to do the work for
you so if you really want to make lots
of RuneScape money and become a millionaire,
then you need to put
in a little time & effort to get good
at the game. However, to create
an elite
level 85+ RuneScape character and make massive RuneScape money
in less than a
week, youll need to follow top secret strategies that only top
notch pro
players know about.
However, I tell you one
sure way to totally destroy your game, your reputation, and peoples respect for you and that
it is to beg for items
or gold. The desperate
act of
begging tells
other RuneScape players three things.
1. You dont respect
yourself enough to make your own RuneScape money.
2. You dont respect the people you beg for RuneScape Money.
3. You want to take advantage of their hard work to make the RuneScape Money
in the first place.
Thats why you must
never, ever beg for RuneScape money. Believe me, its a lot easier to make RuneScape money the legitimate way than it is to resort to begging (or scamming, which is even worse). In a desperate moment asking for RuneScape money may seem like the easy thing to do but an
hour later youll
probably end up losing your RuneScape money and most importantly your self respect. Seriously, in that same hour you could have easily made 50K in RuneScape money employing the right tactics.
Sure, there are people who will give away things for free to low-levels. As a matter of fact, I have a friend that once gave away a whole set of rune to random
passer bys and Ive even given away party hats to total strangers (Im an old
player). The important thing to know is that RuneScape gamers usually only give away stuff to people that arent begging for it in the first place!
Its funny but true so if another RuneScape player surprises you with a freebie, be thankful for the gift but move on and definitely dont try to make a RuneScape living that way.
I have
nothing to say about scamming except that it totally sucks. If youre willing to stoop to the lowest level of dishonesty to get your money by scamming or hacking (especially when theres a far easier and more honest way), then theres nothing anyone can do to help you.
Have you ever seen a pro player beg for RuneScape money? Have you ever seen a level 80+ beg because they lost all their RuneScape money in the wildy? Have you ever heard of a top notch player that doesnt have time to make RuneScape money or to train stats? No so if you want to preserve your
pride and learn to play RuneScape at an elite level always follow the simple rules I just told you about.
Copyright 2006
Roy Phay
Roy Phay is an Internet Marketer on Top 101 Secrets of Runescape ebook.
It is a content-rich and most valuable ebook ever written on Runescape, it is Not about Runescape Cheats. It is an ebook sharing the Fastest, Easiest Step-by-Step cut throat strategies to Create Millions and Level 85+ in RuneScape in less than 7 days. To get a copy of the ebook, please click on
http://www.RunescapeTopSecrets.com Now!
