The Women's Health Big Book of 15-Minute Workouts: A Leaner, Sexier, Healthier You--In 15 Minutes a Day! Read Free Page A
Author: Selene Yeager
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volunteers did just one set of nine exercises, or about 11 minutes of strength training, 3 days a week, they increased their resting metabolic rate (the calories burned when just hanging out) and fat burning enough to keep unwanted weight at bay. And then even more great things will happen.
3. Stay Young
Unless you do something to stop it, your body loses about half a pound of muscle a year after age 20, says Tina Schmidt-McNulty, exercise specialist at Purdue University Calumet. That may sound nearly insignificant, but when you consider that muscle is your body’s biggest calorie burner—burning five times as many calories per pound as fat—it’s like “taking your foot off the gas pedal of your metabolism right as you enter adulthood,” explains McNulty. That metabolism meltdown can lead to a creeping weight gain of 1 to 2 pounds per year. Little wonder then that the average American woman loses a metabolism-stalling 15 pounds of muscle and adds 45 pounds of fat between the ages of 20 and 50.
4. Fit Into Your Clothes
Even if the scale doesn’t take a wild downhill ride, that lean muscle tissue minus the fat will keep you in those skinny jeans forever. How’s that? Because 1 pound of fat takes up 20 percent more space on your body than 1 pound of muscle. Resistance training—just 15 minutes a shot—is all it takes to keep your youthful muscle (and figure) for life.
5. Sleep Better
High-intensity exercise helps you sleep like a baby, which in turn helps you keep pounds at bay. Australian researchers recently reported that men and women who did total-body resistance training for 8 weeks enjoyed a 23 percent improvement in their sleep quality. Even better, they were able to fall asleep faster and slept longer than before they started working out. That’s important because poor sleep wrecks your waistline. In fact, Stanford University scientists have found that body weight rises proportionally as hours of sleep drop below 7½ a night, likely because sleep deprivation triggers the hunger hormone ghrelin and the fat-storage hormone cortisol.
6. Get Stronger
Resistance training is second to none for building bones. Unfortunately, women build their peak bone mass in their teens and early twenties and then start a skeletal slide around 35, when bone thins at a rate of about 1 percent a year; it’s two to three times that following menopause. A study of 124 men and women published in the journal Osteoporosis recently reported that high-intensity exercise like that found in our superfast workouts increased bone density in high-risk spots like the spine, hips, and legs in just 40 weeks. By contrast, those doing low-intensity exercise actually lost bone mineral density over the same time.
7. Become More Flexible
Flexibility is the first thing to go, as your muscles shorten over time. Left unchecked, you can lose a full 50 percent of your flexibility over adulthood, which means waving a long-distance good-bye to your toes…from your knees. Using those muscles through a full range of motion, like you will in these 15-minute workouts, will keep all your limbs limber. In a study published in the International Journal of Sports Medicine, scientists reported that men and women doing just three full-body workouts a week for 16 weeks increased their range of motion in their hips and shoulders and also improved their sit and reach test scores by 11 percent. You’ll find specific stretching and strengthening workouts for even greater flexible benefits in our workouts.
8. Prevent Heart Attacks
Regular resistance training strengthens your most important muscle—the heart—and improves the health of your entire cardiovascular system. In a study published in the Journal of Applied Physiology, scientists reported that volunteers who strength trained just 3 days a week for 8 weeks lowered their systolic blood pressures (the top number) by an average of 9 points and their diastolic blood pressures (the bottom number) by an
3. Stay Young
Unless you do something to stop it, your body loses about half a pound of muscle a year after age 20, says Tina Schmidt-McNulty, exercise specialist at Purdue University Calumet. That may sound nearly insignificant, but when you consider that muscle is your body’s biggest calorie burner—burning five times as many calories per pound as fat—it’s like “taking your foot off the gas pedal of your metabolism right as you enter adulthood,” explains McNulty. That metabolism meltdown can lead to a creeping weight gain of 1 to 2 pounds per year. Little wonder then that the average American woman loses a metabolism-stalling 15 pounds of muscle and adds 45 pounds of fat between the ages of 20 and 50.
4. Fit Into Your Clothes
Even if the scale doesn’t take a wild downhill ride, that lean muscle tissue minus the fat will keep you in those skinny jeans forever. How’s that? Because 1 pound of fat takes up 20 percent more space on your body than 1 pound of muscle. Resistance training—just 15 minutes a shot—is all it takes to keep your youthful muscle (and figure) for life.
5. Sleep Better
High-intensity exercise helps you sleep like a baby, which in turn helps you keep pounds at bay. Australian researchers recently reported that men and women who did total-body resistance training for 8 weeks enjoyed a 23 percent improvement in their sleep quality. Even better, they were able to fall asleep faster and slept longer than before they started working out. That’s important because poor sleep wrecks your waistline. In fact, Stanford University scientists have found that body weight rises proportionally as hours of sleep drop below 7½ a night, likely because sleep deprivation triggers the hunger hormone ghrelin and the fat-storage hormone cortisol.
6. Get Stronger
Resistance training is second to none for building bones. Unfortunately, women build their peak bone mass in their teens and early twenties and then start a skeletal slide around 35, when bone thins at a rate of about 1 percent a year; it’s two to three times that following menopause. A study of 124 men and women published in the journal Osteoporosis recently reported that high-intensity exercise like that found in our superfast workouts increased bone density in high-risk spots like the spine, hips, and legs in just 40 weeks. By contrast, those doing low-intensity exercise actually lost bone mineral density over the same time.
7. Become More Flexible
Flexibility is the first thing to go, as your muscles shorten over time. Left unchecked, you can lose a full 50 percent of your flexibility over adulthood, which means waving a long-distance good-bye to your toes…from your knees. Using those muscles through a full range of motion, like you will in these 15-minute workouts, will keep all your limbs limber. In a study published in the International Journal of Sports Medicine, scientists reported that men and women doing just three full-body workouts a week for 16 weeks increased their range of motion in their hips and shoulders and also improved their sit and reach test scores by 11 percent. You’ll find specific stretching and strengthening workouts for even greater flexible benefits in our workouts.
8. Prevent Heart Attacks
Regular resistance training strengthens your most important muscle—the heart—and improves the health of your entire cardiovascular system. In a study published in the Journal of Applied Physiology, scientists reported that volunteers who strength trained just 3 days a week for 8 weeks lowered their systolic blood pressures (the top number) by an average of 9 points and their diastolic blood pressures (the bottom number) by an
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