Training Guidelines

Prior to working any muscle in your body, its essential that you read these guidelines to help prevent any injury or muscle soreness that can be caused by exercise.

Doctors Clearance.
Speak with your doctor or qualified health professional, explaining what exercise you're looking at participating in so that they can check your current health for any reasons why you may not, or be restricted to certain exercises.

Start at Your Level
Always commence any exercise, knowing that you can achieve it. Exercise's that are to hard, will cause you injury, resulting in negative training time, and as such results will take longer to achieve.

Warm-up and Stretch
Spend a few minutes performing a few simple stretches and mobility exercises to help prepare the muscles to be worked. Combine these with static contractions of the muscles, aiming to feel each area tense up gradually, followed by slow release.

Read and Learn
Understand how to perform each exercise correctly, looking at the key points and range of movement for the exercise. By working with a partner you can look at each others technique, and aim to correct any poor movements.

Check Your Equipment
Look for any signs of damage to any equipment you may be using, especially Swiss Balls, (check for any puncture area's). If equipment is damaged, don't use it, however do replace / report it.

Check Your Technique
Look at yourself in a mirror, so you can see how you're performing each exercise. Never sacrifice poor technique in order to be able to perform the exercise movement, if you can't do it correctly, then don't do it at all.

Slow they Grow
The speed that you perform each exercise, needs to be as controlled as possible, if you work at speed, then you don't allow your muscles to contract through a full range of movement, you are only allowing momentum to make the exercise by performing at speed. The slower you work, the more muscles fibers you are recruiting to carry out the exercise correctly, and by doing so, will become bigger and stronger.

Avoid Copying
Its often-human nature to follow others, especially when we feel unsure. When in the gym avoid copying the exercises that others may be doing, they may be performing them incorrectly, or they may be too hard for your own fitness level.

Avoid Excessive Reps
Aiming to achieve a set amount of reps is good to have as a goal or guideline, however avoid excessive reps, if it's painful to perform the exercise, then your body is telling you to stop. Listen to your body! Pain causes poor technique and injury, resulting in you having to rest for possible long periods.

Keep a Written Log
By keeping a written log of your workouts, you can see your progression, and also discover the exercises that you find hard or easy, and as such look at working on the exercises you find hard, in order to develop good all-round strength.

Daily - Hourly Workouts
Never train sore muscles, the simple key to remember is that your body needs time to recover and rebuild your muscles. If time is short, there is nothing wrong with performing a simple 2 minute workout, as long as you perform the exercises with good technique and allow time for a short warm-up and stretch.

Never Train when Injured
Training whilst injured can cause further problems with new injuries, as well as aggravating your current injury. If injured always seek professional advice to see exactly what you can or can't do, it's not that you will have to give up, it's simply that you will have to adjust your exercises to suit your injury.

Exercise the Correct Muscles
When working the muscles, aim to work these muscles, focus on feeling the area you're aiming to work contracting.

Avoid Momentum
The biggest sin when performing exercises, is allowing momentum to come into play, avoid at all costs. Speed increases the risk of injury and poor technique, whilst decreasing the muscle fibers being used and any gains from the exercise.

Breathe Naturally
Certain exercises may require you to control your breathing, as a complete beginner, aim to breathe naturally when first learning the exercise, establish the correct technique, then aim for the correct breathing motion. When you can establish correct natural breathing, around 15 - 20 exhales per minute, this is an ideal speed to perform most exercises, i.e. 1 complete rep every 3 - 4 seconds. Exhaling during the exertion phase lowers your internal pressure, while failing to breath correctly can lead to broken blood vessels, as well as a hernia.
Many people have the urge to hold their breath when they exercise, but this can elevate your blood pressure, causing headaches, dizziness or even fainting.

Check your Range of Movement
Never place your bodies joints under strain by aiming to perform any exercise that is beyond your range of movement. Forcing yourself to sit-up straight will require force, and as such this force will cause injury - never force yourself into any exercise movement, if your body doesn't have the strength to do it, gain the strength by performing slightly easier exercises.

Exercises Whilst Pregnant
Being pregnant does not mean no exercise for 9 months, what it means is seeking qualified advice and routine checks to make sure that both mother and unborn baby will not be in discomfort when exercising. As everyone is different, this advice is best to be personal, rather than as a guideline.

Notice your Signs of Fatigue
Fatigue causes poor performance, poor performance causes injury. You will know when any exercise is becoming hard to perform, as your own technique will suffer. Simple signs are increasing the speed of the exercise, jerking movements (especially in the initial / final phase) using momentum and shutting the eyes. Aim to find out what physical signs you show when fatigued, so you can remind yourself to stop when you see these. There is no point performing 20 reps if the last 7 are poor quality, rest for a short period then do the 7 that you have left, all with good technique.

Variety is the Key
If you were to perform the same exercise every time you worked out, for the same amount of reps, you body will quickly become adapted to that workout. The key is to plan and adjust your workouts regularly in order to avoid staleness, with no progression within your workouts.

Progress Positively
Progress at your own fitness level, begin with the exercises that are suitable for you, and adjust the intensity at a level that suits you, ideally aim to increase the amount of reps each week by 10 - 20% maximum. Remember that as you perform new exercises, you may be performing fewer reps, however if the exercises are harder, you are still progressing positively. Jumping straight into the advanced exercises will cause you an injury, and set you back a few weeks, always begin at your level and increase the intensity at your level. You will know if the exercise is to hard, because you will be unable to perform it correctly.

Slow they Grow
Mentioned earlier, however this is really important - The speed that you perform each exercise, needs to be as controlled as possible, if you work at speed, then you don't allow your muscles to contract through a full range of movement, you are only allowing momentum to make the exercise by performing at speed. The slower you work, the more muscles fibers you are recruiting to carry out the exercise correctly, and by doing so, your muscles, will become bigger and stronger.

Stay Motivated
Results will take time, it may be a few weeks even months, however if you give up after just a few weeks, you will get the other result - poor posture and weaker muscles. By keeping that log, you can see results on how you're improving on paper, seeing the physical results in the mirror is very hard, as you will be checking on a daily basis, and each small improvement will go unnoticed, take a photo of yourself and place it by your mirror, it will always help in keeping you motivated.