Fitness & Wellness

Simple Strategies To Achieving Health Goals

Simple Strategies To Achieving Health Goals

We take a holistic approach at Rising Fitness in Houston, TX. It uses several strategies to help you reach your health goals. These are simple. You need good nutrition via a healthy diet, the right type of exercise based on science, and a community-first approach to ensure you have quality information. Reaching fitness goals doesn’t have to be difficult. Some simple strategies can help make it easier. It all starts with creating an achievable goal and believing it’s possible.

Do you have to lose a challenging fitness goal?

If you want to run a marathon but always lived a sedentary lifestyle, the thought of running a full marathon can be extremely daunting. You have to start small and build up to that point. The same is true of any fitness goal. Breaking it down into manageable bites makes it more palatable. Instead of losing 40 pounds, the thought of losing 2 pounds a week for 20 weeks is far easier to envision. If you can picture it, you can achieve it. Break down your big goal into smaller ones.

Don’t try to do too much initially without getting the basics.

One reason to have a personal trainer is to stay motivated to do more. However, everyone is different. Some people try to do too much when they first start a workout program. Instead of focusing on form and taking it slowly as their body acclimates to exercise, some people push themselves too hard, sacrificing form in the process. They injure muscles or are too sore to work out for a week. Take it slower at first. Focus on form. As you get fitter, push yourself harder. You’ll have some sore muscles, but not debilitating pain.

Incorporate your fitness goals into your daily routine.

Schedule your workout and do it at the same time each day. When you schedule it, it becomes a priority. You’ll work around it like you would at a doctor’s appointment. It will become a habit that is hard to break. You’ll increase your stamina and strength by changing a few everyday activities. Park further from the store and walk. Take the stairs instead of the elevator. Carry your groceries into the house, lifting as many bags as you can safely.

  • Have a plan of action when you workout. List the exercises you’ll be doing, the number of reps, and sets. Track your progress and make it a game to achieve the next level.
  • If healthy eating is a goal after spending a lifetime as a junk food junkie, start by taking one step at a time. First give up food with added sugar, then processed foods, increasing fruit and vegetable intake as you do.
  • Reward yourself. When you’ve reached a difficult goal, it’s time for a reward. It can be anything from new gym clothes to an afternoon nap or a day at the spa.
  • Never give up. Even if you eat a whole cake, it doesn’t mean you failed. Just start back the next day, determined to eat healthier. It’s not the end of the world if you miss a workout and shouldn’t end your exercise program.

For more information, contact us today at Rising Fitness Gym


How To Balance Your Hormones Naturally

How To Balance Your Hormones Naturally

If your hormones are out of balance, it can affect your body in many ways. It all depends on the hormone in question. In many cases, you can rebalance your hormones naturally. For instance, leptin, the satiety hormone, and ghrelin the hunger hormone can get out of balance if you don’t get enough sleep, causing the body to produce too much ghrelin and too little leptin. The solution is relatively easy. Get adequate sleep to reset these hormones.

Hormones are messengers.

People often think of sex hormones like estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone when they hear the word hormones, but there are so many more. Insulin, for instance, is a hormone. It tells the cells to open and uptake glucose. Too much sugar in your diet and too little exercise can cause insulin resistance. If you have insulin resistance, the cells don’t respond to insulin, so the glucose levels are high and the body produces more insulin. The excess insulin can cause weight to accumulate, especially around your midsection. A simple solution is a healthy diet and regular exercise.

If your sex hormones are out of balance, healthy eating helps.

Hormonal changes during menopause can affect the balance of hormones. Cutting out food with added sugar can help. Eating healthier can aid in solving the problem. Your body needs healthy fat to create hormones and maintain how they function, so including foods like avocado, eggs, and nuts are good options. High-quality protein like salmon is also necessary. Wild salmon is high in omega-3 fatty acids and vitamin D, the building blocks of hormones. Improving adrenal functioning helps balance sex hormones. Eating food like kale, bell peppers, pumpkin seed, and almonds helps.

Exercising can solve a lot of hormonal issues.

Cortisol, the stress hormone, can create a lot of problems. It can cause weight gain on the belly. You’ll burn off the hormones of stress when you work out. Estrogen dominance is a problem faced by many menopausal women. The symptoms include hot flashes, weight gain, and insomnia. Exercise helps rebalance estrogen. It also increases testosterone, which helps build muscle tissue, increases the human growth hormone—also known as the fountain of youth of hormones, and can improve the production of melatonin.

  • Adding green tea and more fiber to your diet and drinking it three times a day can help rebalance hormones. It helps improve the microbiome. Specific bacteria are necessary for the body to overproduce estrogen.
  • If weight gain is a problem, a vegetarian diet and abstinence from alcoholic beverages can help. Avoid sugar, too much caffeine, and soft drinks, both regular and no-calorie. Artificially sweetened drinks stimulate the production of the hunger hormone.
  • Probiotic foods help improve the gut microbiome. Don’t forget prebiotic foods that feed the beneficial microbes in the gut. Include food like sauerkraut, yogurt, and kefir for probiotics and apples, whole grain bread, and asparagus for prebiotics.
  • Find ways to deal with stress. Learn breathing techniques, meditation, or find ways to eliminate the stress. Stress can cause hormonal imbalance. Consult your healthcare professional if the problem continues.

For more information, contact us today at Rising Fitness Gym


What Is The Wellness Diet?

What Is The Wellness Diet?

When I researched the wellness diet after one of our members at Rising Fitness Gym in Houston, TX, asked about it, I was amazed. I quickly scanned the internet, thinking there would be an answer, but only found two articles specifically naming it and they were against any attempt to limit people’s diets, saying it created a negative vibe around food. Eating healthy or a diet focusing on wellness isn’t a specific diet, nor does it limit your choice of food. Instead, it focuses on making smarter choices when selecting food.

A healthy diet makes sense.

Nobody is trying to force people to eat certain foods when they recommend a healthy diet. It simply makes sense. Some foods contain more nutrients, so you get more for every bite. Other foods negatively affect the body, so every time you eat them, you’re subtracting benefits. Eating healthy involves consuming more food with benefits, like fresh fruits and vegetables, high-quality protein, and healthy fat, while avoiding those that have no benefits and may harm the body.

Sugar isn’t evil, but too much can cause inflammation.

Sugar is addictive. That sweet taste triggers opioid receptors in the brain and gives the body a dose of dopamine that makes you feel good. Products with added sugar and no redeeming qualities, like beneficial phytonutrients, vitamins, or minerals, cause inflammation. Chronic inflammation is linked to asthma, Alzheimer’s, cancer, heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and rheumatoid arthritis. The more added sugar you eat, the less you can taste the sweetness. If you give up food with added sugar, everything will taste sweeter. Think of a healthy diet as an opportunity to enjoy the true taste of food more.

A wellness diet is created around your needs and food preferences.

There are an overwhelming number of healthy diets on the internet. One may be slightly better than another, but they all normally provide good nutrition. There are several problems with strict dieting. One of which is personal taste. No matter how fresh avocados may be, if you don’t like them, you won’t eat them. You may, however, eat guacamole, so include it in your diet instead. That’s personalizing the diet. If you can’t drink milk, get calcium from leafy greens. Eating a wide variety of whole food can ensure you create your wellness diet.

  • Foods with no benefits have empty calories. It’s why they’re often called “junk food.” If you eat food from the “junk food” group occasionally, it’s not a problem. Just don’t make it your complete diet.
  • A big change that can make a huge difference in your health is switching your soft drink to water or infused water. It cuts out the extra sugar, has zero calories, and if you choose infused water, is delicious.
  • Change the way you cook food for a real boost in health benefits. If you eat deep-fried food frequently, simply changing it to roasted, broiled, boiled, or grilled makes a difference.
  • A healthy diet is a diet filled with healthy foods. It includes a variety of food with a rainbow of colors on the plate. It’s not a strict diet, but one geared to your needs, personal taste, and budgetary restrictions.

For more information, contact us today at Rising Fitness Gym


Can I Get Enough Probiotics From Food?

Can I Get Enough Probiotics From Food?

What are probiotics? Can you get all the probiotics from food that you need? Those are questions many people have when first hearing the terms. Probiotics are beneficial microbes, such as bacteria, fungi, and viruses that live in our bodies. The body has both harmful and beneficial microbes. The beneficial ones perform services that make our body healthier, such as aiding in food digestion, fighting off harmful microbes, and aiding in the creation of vitamins.

Probiotics need to survive in the intestines after they’re consumed.

To be a probiotic, it first has to survive the digestive process and survive in the gut. It’s an independent entity that isn’t an original part of the body. It must provide benefits and be safe to consume. The three most common types of probiotics sold in supplement form today include two bacteria, Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium, both produce lactic acid, and the yeast Saccharomyces boulardii. You can increase all three microbes by eating food high in live bacteria, such as yogurt, kefir, sauerkraut, and other fermented foods.

You can eat your way to a healthier microbiome, but you have to look closely.

If you’re replenishing your microbiome with food, make sure the food contains live microbes. The manufacturing process often kills the very microbes that provide health benefits. If you’re buying yogurt, look for the words “active cultures” or “live” on the label. For sauerkraut, opt for unpasteurized, since pasteurization kills bacteria. Some pickles have probiotic benefits, but not the ones made with vinegar.

Keep your probiotics healthy by eating prebiotic foods.

Prebiotic foods feed the probiotics in your gut. Foods high in fiber are included in that group. They include fruits, vegetables, and legumes such as chickpeas, beans, raspberries, broccoli, and apples. Those foods increase the population of Bifidobacteria in humans. The fiber and beta-glucan in whole grains also help build friendly bacteria in the large intestines.

  • If you can’t eat probiotic foods, supplementation is an option, especially if you have certain health issues, such as inflammatory diseases, IBS, diarrhea, allergies, and urinary tract infections.
  • Some people shouldn’t take probiotic supplements. Those with a compromised immune system or on immune suppression therapy, SBO sufferers, or who have histamine intolerance, since some bacteria strains promote histamines, while others block it.
  • Sugar impedes the growth of certain probiotics, often the ones found in healthy, lean individuals. Recent studies show it actually may cause certain bacteria to quit producing ROC that allows them to colonize in the intestines, so they get flushed out.
  • A healthy balance of microbes can help with many illnesses and also aids in weight loss. Some can stop fat absorption, so you can flush the fat away. Other microbes make you build muscle or feel full sooner.

For more information, contact us today at Rising Fitness Gym


The Best Foods To Fight Inflammation

The Best Foods To Fight Inflammation

There are two types of inflammation. One is acute, which responds to injury and helps protect the body. The other is chronic. It’s low-level inflammation that can damage the body. Foods like sugar can cause chronic inflammation, while other food can fight inflammation. An autoimmune disorder, poor diet, lingering bacteria or viral infection, and stress can create chronic inflammation that can cause heart disease, lead to digestive issues, like Crohn’s, or damage blood vessels or joints.

Foods that fight inflammation should be on your grocery list.

Stop at the produce section and you’ll find many foods that reduce chronic inflammation. Leafy greens, such as kale, spinach, collards, tomatoes, blueberries, strawberries, cherries, and oranges are at the top of the list. Nuts like almonds and walnuts are also inflammation fighters. In other departments, you’ll find olive oil and fatty fish like salmon or tuna that help reduce inflammation.

Some spices reduce inflammation.

Turmeric is one of the best-known inflammation fighters, especially since it was thought to help with Alzheimer’s that’s linked to inflammation, Ginger is another spice that aids inflammation. Ginger is known for its anti-inflammatory properties from shogaols and gingerols in ginger and is helpful for soothing stomachs and relieving the pain of arthritis. The capsaicin in cayenne pepper also has anti-inflammatory properties. Cinnamon, cloves, rosemary, and sage also aid in inflammation reduction.

Avoiding foods that cause inflammation can also reduce it.

Sometimes reducing inflammation comes not from what you eat, but from what you don’t eat. Cut out food with added sugar, which includes soft drinks and other sweet drinks. Sugar is in many foods you might not expect, like salad dressing, bread, and ketchup. Trans fats also cause inflammation. Some foods still have trans fats, like baked goods, crackers, and frozen pizza. Processed meat and red meat cause inflammation, just as food high in omega-6 fatty acids, like corn oil, peanut oil, and mayonnaise. Refined carbs, those using primarily white flour, can also cause inflammation.

  • Food with artificial sweeteners or high fructose corn syrup is even worse than those with sugar. They also cause inflammation, while doing even more to change the gut microbiome.
  • Pineapples and other food with bromelain can aid with digestion and help reduce inflammation in other areas of the body. Studies show it has a positive effect on people with arthritis.
  • Colorful fruits and vegetables are anti-inflammatory. The phytochemicals in the plant provide the benefit, like anthocyanin that makes blueberries blue.
  • Switch your drink of choice to tea. All types of tea, oolong, or green, provide anti-inflammatory properties. Herbal teas can also benefit the body. Ginger tea, chamomile tea, turmeric tea, and peppermint tea are a few choices.

For more information, contact us today at Rising Fitness Gym


Is Sugar Ruining Your Health?

Is Sugar Ruining Your Health?

Whether the health issue is diabetes, obesity or high blood pressure, consuming excess sugar probably played a role, if not the main role. Humans have always loved food with a sweet taste. Babies immediately love the sweet taste of baby food dessert far more than they like green beans. Some believe it is part of our instincts to like sweet things, dating back to the day when wild food that was sweet was normally safe to eat. Today, sugar is in almost all food, just read the labels. It’s in ketchup, commercial soup, and even canned fruit and it’s ruining your health.

Manufacturers try to trick you with advertising.

You’ve heard the ads for some types of sugar, like high fructose corn syrup. They say it’s natural, so it must be good for you. Tobacco is natural, too and it’s not healthy. The truth is that there’s nothing natural about high fructose corn syrup and nothing healthy about most sugar. The sugar in fruit doesn’t affect your body as much as when you eat the entire fruit, since the fiber in the fruit slows the rush of glucose into the blood.

Sugar assaults the immune system.

The immune system protects the body from bacteria, viruses, and even cancer cells. One of the more important nutrients for immune health is vitamin C. Vitamin C’s structure is similar to glucose. The white blood cells that latch on to vitamin C use it to help fight invaders. When you have too much glucose in your blood, it grabs the glucose, which leaves them powerless. Any food, even some healthy food, like orange juice, can have the same effect, but only if you drink the juice instead of eating the orange. The fiber in the orange slows the amount of glucose entering the bloodstream.

Sugar speeds aging and increase AGEs—advanced glycation end products—in your body.

When protein and fat combine with sugar, it creates AGEs. They accumulate in the body and can build to high levels, increasing the risk for diseases and ironically, speeding up the aging process. AGEs attack collagen and elastin, which are necessary for young looking skin, making you look older than you are. High levels are not only associated with chronic diseases like heart disease, liver disease, diabetes, Alzheimer’s, high blood pressure and aging. AGEs cause oxidative stress, inflammation, and damage the body’s cells.

  • Sugar is highly addictive, which makes it harder to quit. It enters dopamine receptors in the brain just like opiates, to make you feel good. The more sugar you eat, the more you need to get the same sweet taste.
  • Sugar can lead to heart disease. The American Heart Association suggests men limit sugar intake to 9 teaspoons a day and women limit theirs to 6 teaspoons. The average can of soda contains 9 teaspoons.
  • Poor eyesight, varicose veins, gallstones, and arthritis are increased when you consume too much sugar. It is a far bigger enemy of health than fat, except trans fats.
  • Sugar negatively affects your brain and affects your ability to learn and remember. It can be linked to dementia and memory problems that can occur with aging.

For more information, contact us today at Rising Fitness Gym


Are You Overweight Because Of A Hormone Imbalance?

Are You Overweight Because Of A Hormone Imbalance?

Whether it’s sudden weight gain or weight you’ve tried to lose for years, but just gain more instead, you may be overweight due to a hormone imbalance. That doesn’t mean you’re doomed to be overweight for the rest of your life. You just need to make some changes in what you eat and how you workout and will be back on track in no time.

Most people identify hormonal imbalances with sex hormones, testosterone, progesterone, and estrogen.

Hormones are messengers, giving your body information to help it run properly. Sex hormones do determine how fat is distributed, but other hormones also play a role. Your thyroid hormones, insulin, stress hormones, and ghrelin and leptin—two hormones that control hunger and satiety—play important roles in weight gain, too. Some imbalances require help from a doctor, like those that come from illness or health conditions. However, many can be rebalanced by taking action on your own. You can reset your hormones and lose those extra pounds for good. The simple act of getting adequate sleep can reset the balance between ghrelin and leptin, so you won’t constantly be hungry.

Insulin helps control blood sugar levels.

Insulin is a hormone that alerts the cells to open and take in the glucose in the blood for energy. When you have insulin resistance, the cells fail to open, which causes the body to send more insulin and it spirals out of control until you develop type 2 diabetes. High levels of insulin from insulin resistance can cause weight gain. Ironically, excess fat can cause insulin resistance. Again, the body is stuck in a loop. How do you end the loop? Cut out food with added sugar first. Do high intensity interval training—HIIT. You alternate between high intensity and recovery, triggering glucose uptake by muscles.

Stress can cause weight gain, particularly around the middle.

If you have visceral fat—belly fat—it may come from the stress you face. Stress causes the fight or flight response that sends out hormones to prepare the body for running or fighting. When you run or fight, those hormones burn off, but if you don’t, your body remains in a constant state of alert, which causes the metabolism to slow and the body to store more fat with much of it belly fat. You can combat stress by using meditation and other techniques like deep breathing to calm yourself, which also prevents stress in the first place. Exercise is the second way to reset your hormones back to normal.

  • Sex hormones also can cause weight gain. Not only do you gain weight due to estrogen dominance, but it also affects where it’s distributed on the body. Exercise, drinking more water, and eating more fiber can help.
  • Don’t forget to include healthy fat in your diet. Adding healthy fat to a diet has been shown to increase weight loss. Healthy fat includes olive oil, walnuts, and ghee. Like a keto diet, it can help train the body to burn fat.
  • HIIT workouts increase HGH—human growth hormone. The more HGH you have, the easier it is to build muscle and lose weight.
  • Make sure your diet includes omega-3 fatty acids, magnesium, vitamin C and B vitamins, plus get extra sunshine for increased vitamin D. All these vitamins are necessary for balancing hormones.

For more information, contact us today at Rising Fitness Gym


Easy Ways To Burn More Fat

Easy Ways To Burn More Fat

There are many reasons people benefit so much from training at Rising Fitness in Houston, TX. The personal training, science-backed programs, and years of experience in fitness play an important role. We focus on solid facts and consistent effort, but we also share easy ways to burn more fat that help boost the success of each individual. When building muscle mass and losing fat is your goal, these tips will help you get faster results.

Cardio is great, but don’t forget strength training.

You won’t have the success you want by just doing cardio. Cardio does burn tons of calories, but it gets that energy from both fat tissue and muscle tissue. It can reduce the amount of muscle tissue you have and that makes it even harder to lose weight. Muscle tissue requires more calories for maintenance than fat tissue does, so the more muscle you have, the higher your metabolism. Include strength training in your workout. It burns a lot of calories and those calories come from fat.

Don’t forget to include spicy foods, cold water, and protein in your diet.

Spicy foods, like hot peppers, can burn extra calories by boosting your metabolism. It’s the capsaicin in the peppers that lights the calorie-burning torch. You’ll also burn a few extra calories and get rid of fat by drinking ice-cold water. It takes extra calories to warm the body and it doesn’t require any extra effort. Eating meals high in quality protein provides extra nutrients for building more muscle tissue, which boosts your metabolism. It also fills you up and keeps you feeling full longer.

You need sleep to burn fat.

Sleep plays a huge role in keeping your body fit. Lack of sleep has almost become revered by society, but it plays a huge role in packing fat on the body. Lack of sleep causes an imbalance in the hormones ghrelin—the hunger hormone—and leptin—the hormone that makes you feel full. Lack of sleep suppresses the production of leptin and increases the production of ghrelin, so you’re always hungry. Lack of sleep also lowers your metabolism, so you burn fewer calories throughout the day.

  • Switch the way you workout. Do a HIIT workout. HIIT stands for high intensity interval training. It’s not an exercise, but a way of exercising alternating between high intensity and recovery pace. It keeps the calorie-burning fires going long after the workout ends.
  • Include more fiber in your diet. Slowly add high-fiber foods to your diet, like whole grains, fruits and vegetables. It helps eliminate bloating and keeps you feeling full longer. Adding healthy fat also increases the feeling of satiety.
  • Drink a tall glass of water before you eat. The water will fill you without adding extra calories. You’ll eat less at the meal and leave feeling satisfied, even though you consumed fewer calories.
  • Substitute plain green tea for high-calorie drinks to boost your metabolism and burn more fat. All types of tea contain epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG), which increases metabolism, but green tea contains the most.

For more information, contact us today at Rising Fitness Gym


Rice Vs Pasta - Is One Better Than The Other?

Rice Vs Pasta – Is One Better Than The Other?

Whether you’re mixing vegetables with rice or pasta, it’s a budget stretcher. Both provide extra calories and bulk to make vegetables and meat go further. They’re also both good side dishes and have a variety of uses. Rice is a natural whole grain, while pasta is made from flour, water, and sometimes eggs or salt. There’s not just one type of rice or pasta. Rice can be long grain, medium grain or short grain. It can be brown, red, purple, parboiled or instant. Pasta comes in many shapes, from thin angel hair to large lasagna noodles. It can be made from a variety of flours, some of which are quite healthy, but is normally made from durum wheat and flour.

The type of rice you choose makes a difference.

If you choose long-grain rice, you’ll get more protein and fiber than you would in short grain. Choosing whole grain rice like brown rice provides all the nutrients of the bran and germ. Brown rice has antioxidants that lower the risk of serious conditions, but the same amount of calories and carbs as white rice, so you get a boost in nutrition with brown rice. Brown rice also has three times as much fiber, which can also help with blood sugar regulation. It is also higher in protein. Red rice is high in antioxidants. Black rice starts black and turns to blue/purple when cooked. It was once called the forbidden rice, reserved for the ruling class, and is the highest in antioxidants.

Pasta from white flour isn’t as healthy as pasta from whole grain flour.

Pasta from white refined flour is often enriched, but those extra vitamins don’t prevent it from spiking blood sugar levels. It doesn’t contain as much fiber as whole wheat flour does. Whole wheat flour contains both the bran and the germ. The bran and germ provide additional nutritional benefits. It’s lower in carbs and calories due to the extra fiber. It also has more protein and more potassium, phosphorus and magnesium. Other unique types of pasta are also available. Pasta made from lentils, chickpeas or black beans is more nutritious with more fiber, fewer carbs and more protein.

Diabetics will find brown rice a superior choice.

Unless you eat only rice or pasta, both could make healthy options. It all depends on the type of rice or pasta you choose. If you have diabetes, choosing brown rice is superior to white rice. In one study, brown rice lowered fasting blood sugar and insulin levels by significant amounts compared to white rice. Fasting insulin was 57% lower than those of the white rice group. Brown rice is also superior to pasta for lowering blood sugar levels.

  • Brown rice takes 45 minutes to cook, but pasta can take as little as 10 minutes. Brown rice has a short shelf life because the fat in it gets rancid. Whole-grain pasta has a much longer shelf life.
  • What you put on the rice or pasta makes all the difference. A pasta dish with a creamy sauce will often be higher in calories than stuffed peppers with kale. Sauces make a difference and so does the number of vegetables added.
  • You can use pasta alternatives to make a dish healthier. Spaghetti squash and zoodles are two of those options. It can make every dish healthier.
  • You can boost the flavor of rice by cooking it with grated ginger root and a small amount of coconut oil. Ginger also boosts the antioxidant content.

For more information, contact us today at Rising Fitness Gym


Exercises You Can Do In Bed For A Flat Stomach

Exercises You Can Do In Bed For A Flat Stomach

You don’t have to jump out of bed and start exercising first thing in the morning. You can ease into your day with these exercises you can do in bed. These are excellent if you want a flat stomach and can boost circulation to help clear the cobwebs and get your day off to a great start. One is very simple. Some call it a suction exercise when done standing, but you can do it sitting and realign the abdominal muscles. It’s especially good after pregnancy.

You’ll get quick results from the suction exercise modified for the bed.

When doing the suction exercise in bed, sit cross-legged placing your hands on your abdomen. Inhale deeply, expanding your stomach. Exhale while sucking in the abdominal muscles. Blow out as much air as possible as you try to pull your stomach toward your spine. Hold in your stomach while you take deep breaths. Place your hands on your stomach to monitor how well you’re doing. With each exhale, pull your stomach in further. You can do these standing up.

More traditional workouts can be done in bed.

You can do an abdominal crunch or reverse crunch in bed, too. Lie with your knees bent and feet flat on the bed. Put your hands behind your head for neck support. Raise your upper body and hold. Reverse crunches are similar, but you lift your feet off the bed, with your thighs forming an angle. Lift your head, as you raise your legs so your thighs are perpendicular to the bed. Hold for a few seconds, then slowly lower both the head and legs.

Leg scissors and bicycles are fun to do and can boost your circulation.

You’ll be boosting your brain power, while you work your abs when you do a few sets of leg scissors or bicycles. Both are similar. With the bicycle exercise, you lift your legs and move them in a pedaling motion. With scissors, raise your legs as high as possible, pointing your toes toward the ceiling. Raise one leg as you lower the other in a chopping motion. Repeat for 20 to 30 repetitions.

  • Lay flat with your hands by your sides, knees bent and feet flat on the bed, Outstretch your hands and lift your upper body to create a V. Hold for a few seconds then lift your feet off the bed slightly and hold.
  • Don’t hold your breath as you hold your muscle tight, but do exhale as you pull in your stomach, attempting to force all the air out of your lungs with pressure from your abs. Focus. Be more aware of how the muscles feel when you tighten them.
  • You can do scissor kicks at any height. It doesn’t matter if you keep your feet an inch off the bed or raise your toes toward the ceiling. It works abdominal muscles.
  • You can do many traditional abdominal exercises in bed. Our trainers at Rising Fitness in Houston will help you find ones that will fit your needs.

For more information, contact us today at Rising Fitness Gym