How To Do Muscle Minutes™
In a nut-shell, my Muscle Minutes™ method entails "inserting" an exercise for 1 minute at a time, 4 times spread across your day, everyday - hence my company name, "Insert^Fitness". The foundation to its effectiveness is due to the following 3 components: Consistency, Intensity and Form.
Insert 1 minute doing an upper body exercise, 1 minute doing a mid-body exercise, 1 minute doing a lower body exercise and 1 minute doing a second exercise for the body area of your choice (upper, mid or lower), but change-up the body area for that 4th minute from one day to the next. You can insert your Muscle Minutes™ in any order that you choose during your waking hours, so long as you include an exercise for a muscle from each of the 3 body areas: upper, mid and lower.
Upper Body refers to exercises that target the muscles of your arms (biceps, triceps, forearms), shoulders (front, rear, lateral), chest, upper back, traps, lats and hands.
Mid-Body refers to exercises that target your "core" muscles which includes your abs, obliques, mid-back and lower back.
Lower Body refers to exercises that target the muscles of you buttocks, legs (quads, hamstrings, calves, inner & outer thighs), ankles and feet.
Spread your Muscle Minutes™ throughout your day rather than doing them all at once. This helps ensure that you can give each exercise maximum energy for that minute, which fulfills the "Intensity" requirement of the 3 foundational components for Muscle Minutes™. Plus, spreading the 4 minutes out helps you interrupt sedentary periods of time during your day, if you have a job that involves prolonged sitting or standing.
Inserting 4 exercises for 1 minute each into your waking hours everyday fulfills the "Consistency" requirement of the 3 foundational components of Muscle Minutes™.
The 3rd foundational component, "Form", requires that all exercises done are based on your specific fitness level and are properly performed. These two requirements serve to ensure that you get the most out of the exercise and you reduce your risk of injury.
Why Muscle Minutes™ Work
My Muscle Minutes™ method is based on the mathematical reality that during an hour long strength workout at the gym a great deal of time is wasted. In fact, only about 8 minutes of the 60 is spent with our muscles actually under tension. The other 52 minutes is spent resting, changing weights, texting, chatting with or watching others in the gym, etc. (Not to mention the time to get there and back home.) That’s fine if you have the time but if you don’t, then try my Muscle Minutes™ method instead, where your muscles will spend the same time under tension, but the other 52 minutes will be available for whatever else you need to get done.
Conventional weight training recommends 3 sessions per week with a day of rest following each strength workout to give your muscles time to repair. This would mean that your muscles are put under tension for about 8 minutes, 3 times per week for a total of 24 minutes on average each week. If instead, you put your muscles under tension for 4 minutes each day, your muscles would receive equal or greater adaptive stress with a total of 28 minutes per week. (4 min/day x 7 days/wk). Regardless of how busy each of us is, we can find 4 minutes each day for our muscles - for our health, especially since the 4 minutes are not done at once! How about: 1 minute while you’re waiting for the water to get hot for your shower + 1 minute before you sit back at your desk after a mid-morning break + 1 minute in the kitchen while waiting for the popcorn to finish in the microwave for a late afternoon snack for the kids + 1 minute during a commercial while you catch you weekly evening show. Choose any way that you’d like to/are able to spread them out during your waking hours.
You can do 4 minutes a day - spread out 1 minute at a time!
KEYS TO SUCCESS:
3 FOUNDATIONAL COMPONENTS
CONSISTENCY
Commit to your Muscle Minutes™ every day, unless you have a health issue. However, if your health issue is limited to a specific area of your body, (i.e., your ankle is sore because you twisted it tripping over a co-workers computer cable that afternoon), while the rest of your body is fine, then do Muscle Minutes™ for the unaffected areas like your abs, biceps, butt etc. Don’t look for excuses, look for solutions. Remember, a few drops of water every day will soon fill the whole glass. You CAN spend 1 minute doing a resistance exercise 4 times each day, spread throughout your waking hours. You Got This!
INTENSITY
Give it all you've got for that 1 minute. That will ensure that your muscle has been put under enough stress to contribute to the gradual yet continuous improvement this approach provides. Push yourself. If you did 20 squats the last two times, do 22 this time. Keep advancing. If the exercise feels too easy, then modify it so that it is not. Don’t worry about your shirt, you won’t be sweating in 1 minute but you should be breathing heavier. This will indicate that you’ve elevated your heart rate and your metabolism. While your metabolism is raised, you burn more calories. The more intense you perform the minute the more muscle you'll build and the more calories you will burn. Cumulatively, this translates to more lean tissue and less fat. Perfect!
FORM
FORM
All strength movements should be performed with optimal form throughout the exercise, from first rep to the last rep. Maintaining great form will ensure that you get the most benefit from the exercise and it will help avoid injuries. Be sure to rest a few seconds or more if needed, as soon as you feel that you’re struggling to maintain proper form throughout the entire movement by involving other muscle groups to continue. Generally, when you’re doing a resistance exercise for a specific muscle group, the rest of your body should be stationary, i.e., only the lower part of your arm should be moving for a bicep curl while your upper arm, shoulder and back should remain stationary.
Now is a good time for your Muscle Minute!
^
Now is a good time for your Muscle Minute! ^
ALL GRAPHICS ARE ORIGINAL DESIGNS BY MDMArt