More 'Secrets' for Success

Lean, Long & Strong: The 6-Week Strength-Training, Fat-Burning Program for Women
by Wini Linguvic

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While the cornerstone of my workout program is the synergy set, that's not the only unique feature. You'll also get maximum results in minimum time with the following core features of the program.

Customized plans to target key trouble spots. We all have them: those areas of our bodies that we d particularly like to tone up. Maybe you've just had a baby, and you really want to firm up your abs. Or maybe summer's coming, and you d like to tone up those thighs so you look great when you wear a pair of shorts. In part three of the book, I'll give you specific focus programs to target key trouble zones. And if your goal is all-around fitness, you'll also find a total-body, fat-blasting program that will give you amazing results.

Precision combination of compound and isolation moves. You'll also enjoy the benefits that come with the unique design of each workout routine. Each set of strength-training exercises builds on the previous one, combining a mix of compound and isolation movements, which more effectively sculpt your body. For example, in the lower-body workouts, you'll do standing exercises followed by targeted leg exercises done while lying on the floor. This way, your muscles have already been challenged by the time you start the floorwork, and there's no need for dozens of ineffective reps.

Strength Training: Debunking the Myths
Where the belief that women shouldn't lift weights got started, we'll never know. Maybe we saw teenage boys lifting weights and growing like weeds, and we assumed the same would happen to us. Somewhere along the line, many of us developed the belief that lifting dumbbells would immediately turn us into a female version of the Incredible Hulk. Let's take a closer look at the three most common reasons women usually give for not doing strength-training exercises. I don't want to get big. This is the most common excuse, but I'm here to tell you it's just not going to happen. Even if you wanted to develop big muscles, it's pretty difficult for a woman to get big and bulky from weight training. Sure, there are lots of male bodybuilders who have huge, superhero-like muscles. But women don't have the kind of hormones a man has. Our muscles cannot get as big. The women you may see on TV who are bodybuilders have devoted hours each day for many years to working out and sometimes have manipulated their hormones to purposefully gain muscle. Getting big does not happen by accident. You don't do a set of lateral raises to sculpt your shoulders and the next day find it impossible to fit through a doorway without going sideways. And actually, even a lot of men find it hard to get big. They're the ones who have all the hormones to gain muscle, and they don't wake up the day after their workouts and get stuck in their doorways either. I don't want to get muscle-bound. Again, not a concern with my balanced workouts.	Is it possible to get muscle-bound? If all you do is lift really heavy weights for a very limited range of motion—and that is all you do—sure, it could be a challenge to reach over and touch your toes. But the right strength-training exercises actually increase your flexibility. The exercises you'll be doing require you to move your muscles through their full range of motion, so the muscles get stretched as well as strengthened. Plus, each synergy set includes at least one specific stretch, virtually eliminating any chance that you'll become muscle-bound. I should lose weight first. I don't want to turn my fat into muscle. I understand wanting to put off something until you feel better about yourself. We've all done it. Here's the catch with this one, though. Muscle and fat are two different things. Fat doesn't turn into muscle and muscle doesn't turn into fat. I know you're thinking about that retired football player who can't fit into his custom-made suits anymore. Well, his muscle didn't turn into fat. He simply stopped training, so his muscles got smaller. At the same time, he started gaining body fat because he didn't have anything to do in his retirement except watch old football films and eat ice cream. Fat won't turn to muscle. But having more muscle can help you lose fat. Strength training will help you lose weight. Not only will it not get in the way of any diet or weight-loss strategy you have, but having more muscle on your body will increase your metabolism, helping you to burn more calories even when you're at rest.

Maximum toning with an exercise ball. Many of the exercises are designed to be done while sitting or lying on an exercise ball. By using the ball, not only do you work the target muscles, but your abdominals and lower back also are challenged as they keep you in balance and in good form. With every move, you are challenging the muscles of your core, which include the abdominals, obliques (your waistline), and the all-important lower back. By doing exercises at a variety of angles—such as when sitting or lying on a ball—your body gets stronger using all the muscles together, the way they re used in real life.

Effective weight work. My workouts use weights in a way that allows you to get maximum results in a minimum amount of time. If you've taken toning or body sculpting classes geared toward women, you've probably noticed that almost all of them emphasize doing a high number of reps with very light weights. But this ignores an important fact: The best way to define the muscles is to challenge them. And unfortunately, using light weights to do endless reps is simply not enough of a challenge.

I spent many years teaching a class called Cuts. Women of all ages, shapes, and sizes would attend, including pregnant women, women over 40, dancers, and even grandmothers. Unlike traditional toning classes that used very light weights for endless repetitions, I had everyone using weights that were challenging for just 15 reps per set. Though some of the women were intimidated at first by the fear that they'd get big, that fear was soon replaced by the wonderful feeling of being strong. And as other women started seeing the results my students were getting, they began venturing into the class, too.

The body responds to the challenge of a heavier weight by getting stronger. So instead of using light weights to do hundreds of reps that challenge your patience but not your body, my workout program encourages you to use whatever weight is a challenge for you to lift for just 15 reps. In other words, you'll challenge your muscles not by seeing how many reps you can do, but by seeing how few reps you can do.

At-home convenience. Because the workouts don t require complex exercise machines, you can do them at home any time you get 12 minutes to spare. There's no need to go to a gym or purchase expensive exercise equipment. Your workouts will be more convenient to do, so it will be easier to integrate them into your day.

Rounding Out Your Workouts

As amazing as the workouts are, to take full advantage of them—to become truly lean, long, and strong—you need to balance them with cardio work and eating right.

Count on cardio. Though it's strength training that will sculpt your body and give your muscles definition, cardio exercise is still important. After all, the most important muscle in your body is your heart. No one dies of weak biceps. So I encourage you to supplement your strength training and stretching with a 20-minute cardio workout 3 days a week. You don't need to do anything elaborate: Walking, swimming, cycling, even jumping rope will do. Later in the book, I'll give you an easy-to-follow plan that will allow you to add in some cardio training easily and efficiently.

Use the kitchen to support your workouts. What you put into your body makes a big difference in the strength and energy you get out of it. For that reason, an entire section of this book is devoted to evaluating your daily eating habits and developing a balanced approach to food. Notice that I didn't say the word diet. I believe that because diets hold you up to a rigid standard, they set you up for failure. Plus, most diets these days have you eliminate major food groups, and that approach just doesn't work for the long term.

Instead of a diet, I'm going to give you practical strategies you can use to substitute healthy eating habits for unhealthy ones. Each week for 6 weeks— exactly the amount of time it will take you to complete one level of the Lean, Long, and Strong workouts—I'll ask you to try some new strategies that will support your workouts nutritionally. You can combine these commonsense strategies to meet your individual goals, needs, and taste preferences to come up with a plan that works for you.

What Benefits Can You Expect?

For most of us, fat loss is at the top of our fitness goals. And for this, you can't do better than the balanced workouts in this book. To understand why, you'll need to know a little bit about physiology.

Scientists know that muscle tissue burns more calories than fat tissue does, even when you're at rest. So the more lean muscle you have, the better your metabolism works. This means that if you have two women who both weigh 140 pounds, but one has more muscle than the other, the woman with more muscle will burn more calories than her friend, even when they re both just sitting around watching TV.

Unfortunately, women naturally lose muscle mass as they age. This makes their metabolism slow down—and the scale creep higher. The solution? Strength training. Simply put, it's the best way to preserve muscle.

Yes, it's true that your metabolism increases while you do cardio exercise. But what many people don t realize is that it increases only for the amount of time you're working out. So, if you walk on a treadmill for 45 minutes, your metabolism will speed up for those 45 minutes, but no longer. On the other hand, if you focus on exercises that preserve muscle mass—such as the ones in this book—your metabolism will be working better all the time, not just while you're exercising.

Yet fat loss is not the only benefit you'll gain from the strength-training exercises in this book. After all, it's called strength training for a reason. With these workouts, you'll get physically stronger, which means you 11 be able to accomplish more in your day. You'll have better posture, get through your chores and errands more easily, improve your joint strength, and experience fewer body aches and pains. You can have this strength without a bulky physique. Women are meant to be strong, and the right exercises will give you the lean, long, and strong look of a fit woman.

By integrating your strength-training moves with stretching, you 11 become more flexible— and more graceful. You'll gain a greater sense of connectedness to your entire body. As a result, you 11 be able to do all other forms of activity better. And because you'll improve your range of motion, you will limit your chances for straining a muscle as you go about your day.

And finally, by incorporating the concept of “flow” into your exercise routines—by moving through the exercises, one right after the other— you will be gaining some of the cardiovascular benefits of an aerobic workout. When you supplement this with a few cardio workouts each week, you will decrease your risk for a heart attack or cardiovascular disease, gain stamina, and burn calories.

The time has come for a change. It s time to redefine fitness—and to stop settling for less than the whole. Fitness means endurance, flexibility, and strength. And with the precision workouts in this book, you will gain all three.

© 2005 by Wini Linguvic. All rights reserved. No Part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any other information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the publisher.

About the Author

Wini Linguvic was one of New York City's most sought-after personal trainers even before the publication of her first book, the bestselling BodyChange, coauthored with Montel Williams.