Cliff "Irongeezer" Eggink, age 73, going for a jog and and an ocean swim.
"If I can be this active, you can too!

Get In Shape Now

The Exercises On This Page Will Be Posted Here Thru 2010, Refer To Them As Often As You Like.

For More Workouts Go To > www.irongeezer.org <

AT HOME 10-Minute Strength Workout

Warm up with a minute or so of light walking

Keep the rest very short between exercises

End with a light cool down and stretch

Beginners: Perform one set of each exercise for 15-30 seconds

Intermediate/Advanced: Do each exercise for 1 (or more) minutes

1.  One-Legged Squats

Stand in front of wall with ball behind lower back, weights in hand.  Lift the left foot off the floor and keep it up as you bend right knee into a half-squat, keeping knee behind toe.  Push through the heel back to start and repeat then switch legs.  If you don't have a ball, simply do the exercise without it and without the weights (you may want to hold onto a chair for balance). 

2.  Pushups/Side Planks

Get on hands and toes (or knees), abs in and back straight.  Do one pushup and as you come up, put the weight on the left side of the body, twist to the side while bringing the right arm up towards the ceiling in a side plank.  Lower the arm back to the floor for another pushup and then twist to the other side.  Repeat the series, alternating each side, for the desired length of time.

3.  Walking Lunges/Front Kick

Take a step forward and lower into a lunge (knee behind toe and abs in, body straight).  Pushup with the back leg and immediately bring the knee up into a front kick.  At the end of the kick, immediately step that foot into a lunge and again bring the back leg forward into a kick. Repeat the series, alternating sides, for the desired length of time.

4.  Squats/Chest Squeeze

Holding a medicine ball (or other type of ball), place hands on either side of the ball, feet shoulder-width apart.  Squeeze the ball and, keeping the pressure on, lower into a squat (knees behind toes) while pushing the ball straight out in front of you.  Still squeezing the ball, stand back up and pull the ball back in to your chest.  Try to keep pressure on the ball for the entire time.

5.  One-Legged Deadlifts

Holding a med ball, stand on one leg, knee slightly bent, the other knee bent with toes off the floor.  Keeping abs in and back flat, tip from the hips and take the ball towards the floor until you feel a gentle stretch in your hamstrings.  Contract the glutes back to start.  Do all reps on one leg and then switch to the other halfway through.

6.  Rear Delt Raises

While standing, tip forward until body is parallel to the floor, back flat and abs in.  Take arms out to the sides to shoulder level, thumbs rotated up to face the ceiling.  Keep the thumbs up throughout the movement and squeeze your shoulder blades together at the top of the movement.  Repeat for the desired length of time.

7.  Dips/Leg Extension

Sit on a chair or bench, hands next to thighs.  Come off the step and a bit in front of it so that the lower back grazes the step.  Bend the elbows and keep the shoulders relaxed and down while you lower the body into a dip, elbows at 90 degree angles.  At the bottom of the movement, straighten the right leg in a leg extension. Lower the leg and push back up.  Repeat the series, alternating right leg and left leg for the desired length of time.

8.  Plie Squats on Toes

Stand with feet wider than shoulders, toes out at a comfortable angle, hands on hips.  Raise up onto the toes, bend the knees and lower into a plie squat, keeping the knees in line with the toes.  Lower as far as you can while still on the toes and press back up.  Try to stay on your toes the entire time.

9.  Row/Squat/Front Raise

Holding a medicine ball (or dumbbells), tip forward with abs in, back straight, knees slightly bent.  Pull the ball towards the belly button, contracting the back muscles.  Take the ball back down and stand up, immediately going into a squat while raising the ball up to shoulder level.

10.  Crunch/Ball Toss

Working Out at HOME

Turn your house or apartment into a fitness factory!

You don’t even need to buy a home gym!

Depending on your goals and preferences, you might want to buy one, or more, of the following items:

Jump rope (high intensity cardio)

Mini-trampoline (mid-intensity cardio)

Exercise DVD (for those who like guidance and motivation)

Free weights or an exercise band (strength training)

Exercise ball (core strength)

These items are inexpensive and can add to your workout but they’re really not necessary. Read on for tips on improvising and creating your own routine.

Cardiovascular Exercise

This type of exercise increases your heart rate and tones your muscles. Here are some suggestions:

Jog in place and do jumping jacks.

Jump rope (start slowly as this is very high intensity).

If you have stairs, run up and down or use only the bottom step to jump on and off, using both feet.

Do old-fashioned aerobics (think 80’s dancing). Aim for at least 20 minutes and make sure your heart rate is elevated.

For a more effective calorie-burning routine, alternate five minutes of cardio with one of the strength exercises below until you’ve worked every muscle group. This is called circuit training and should keep your heart rate elevated. When your heart rate remains high throughout your exercise time, you burn more calories.

Strength Training

Compliment your cardio routine with strength training. Strength exercises are necessary for a complete workout. Building muscle raises your resting metabolic rate, which means you burn more calories throughout the day. If you aren’t into the big and bulky muscle builder look, don’t worry about it. It’s pretty much impossible for you to get that way without incredibly intense training and supplements. Follow this full-body plan 2-3 days a week for the best results.

Arms - You can either purchase an exercise band (about $10 at a retail store), free weights (prices very by weight) or fill up a milk carton with water or sand until it reaches your desired weight. Do 12-20 repetitions of bicep curls, tricep dips and shoulder raise

Working Out in Your Apartment

Chest - Get on the floor and do some old fashioned pushups—as many as you can do without losing your form. Start on your knees if you’re a beginner. Also do a press with your band or weights. Lie on the floor and hold a weight in each hand. Lift them straight over your chest and lower slowly. (12-20 reps)

Back - Stand with your feet hip-width apart and bend forward. Grasp a weight, or a weighted object, in each hand and hold your arms out in front of you with a bend in your elbow. Use your back muscles to lift the weights to shoulder length and lower slowly. (12-20 reps)

Legs Squats - Stand up straight with your back against the wall and bend your knees until they are almost parallel with the floor. (12-20 reps)

Lunges - Stand with one foot 2-3 feet in front of the other. Bend both legs as low as you can without allowing your front knee to go over your toes. Keep your back straight the entire time. (12-20 reps)

Abs - Do 25-50 traditional crunches on the floor. Lie on the floor and put your hands behind your head gently. Lift your head up, not forward and focus your eyes in front of you. Hold in your stomach muscles the entire time and breathe after every crunch.

Toning/Flexibility

Every workout needs a stretching component so that your well-toned muscles can look their best—and not cramp up at work the next day. There are myriads of different stretches but here are a few you can do to keep limber:

Purchase a stretching video: Dim the lights and make it a relaxing experience.

Do yoga: This can be a workout in itself. Look for a book or video on hatha yoga, the style that focuses on stretching poses.

Recall your basketball team days: The warm-up and cool-down exercises you did as a high school athlete are still useful today.

Now don’t you feel better? Try to get in a workout 4-5 days a week to really notice a change in your body and energy level. Now your only problem is the neighbors below you…be courteous and workout during daytime hours so that you’re not getting angry knocks on your door mid-crunch!

Source: apartmentliving.com

Simple Strength Training for Swimmers

From Mat Luebbers,

An Easy To Follow Strength Training Program

Weight training and dryland exercises can be used for many things, including injury prevention, rehabilitation, gain strength, build general or specific fitness, or to cross-train to improve abilities in other sports. Many training programs seem too complicated to follow. You may get discouraged, almost before you start. If this has happened to you, then perhaps you'll give this weight training program a try.

This is a basic, simple program. You can adjust it as needed, but its central purpose is a quick, easy to follow plan. You can do it once a week for strength maintenance or two to three times a week to build strength and power. If done several times each week, separate workouts by 1-2 days to allow for full recovery.

Each lift has a minimum/maximum number of repetitions

During the early portion of the program (the first 6 to 10 weeks), if you can exceed the maximum number, then add 3% to 10% more weight the next time you do that exercise.

Later in the program only increase the weight if you can exceed the maximum number two workouts in a row.

If you cannot do the minimum number of lifts, decrease the load by 3% to 10% the next time you are doing the routine.

If you miss a week, decrease the weight load for each exercise, building back to your pre-miss levels over the next few weeks.

Start with a moderate to light weight load for the first workout and slowly add weight each subsequent workout until you reach a weight load that meets the minimum/maximum number of lifts for a specific exercise.

Substitute different lifts

Squats instead of a leg press machine, for example, if needed due to available equipment - or if wanted because you like one type of lift more than another.

Control the speed of the lift

Aim for a 1-2 second positive, loading, or lifting effort and a 2-4 second negative, unloading, or lowering effort.

Stick with the basic order of exercises

Work muscles from large groups to more specific muscles.

Take minimal rest between lifts

By alternating upper and lower body exercises, rest for general areas being worked is automatic, and your heart rate will remain slightly elevated for the entire workout.

Avoid plateaus

Switch the program from one set of lifts to two sets at half the minimum/maximum level with an increased weight load periodically, as often as every four weeks. When you switch back to week 1-4 Min/Max, remember to use a lower weight than you were using during the weeks 5-8 Min/Max sessions. During the week 5-8 Min/Max sessions take 1-2 minutes of rest between exercises for the same part of the body.

Keep a training log

Track weight loads and progress through the program.

Don't skip the warm-up or warm-down!

The Strength Training Routine:

Warm-up: 5-10 minutes of aerobic work, like a spin on a stationery bicycle or an easy jog.

Exercise: Leg Press

Week 1-4 Min/Max repetitions goal:20-25

Week 5-8 Min/Max repetitions goal: 8-12 x 2 @ 1-2 minutes rest

Exercise: Rowing

Week 1-4 Min/Max repetitions goal: 10-15

Week 5-8 Min/Max repetitions goal: 5-10 x 2 @ 1-2 minutes rest

Exercise: Leg Extension

Week 1-4 Min/Max repetitions goal: 15-20

Week 5-8 Min/Max repetitions goal: 6-10 x 2 @ 1-2 minutes rest

Exercise: Push-ups (remember up on a 1-2 count, down on a 2-4 count)

Min/Max repetitions goal: maximum possible in 60 seconds

Exercise: Leg Curl

Week 1-4 Min/Max repetitions goal: 15-20

Week 5-8 Min/Max repetitions goal: 6-10 x 2 @ 1-2 minutes rest

Exercise: Bent-arm Pull-down (mimics the basic pull of freestyle or butterfly using the lateral pull-down machine)

Week 1-4 Min/Max repetitions goal: 10-15

Week 5-8 Min/Max repetitions goal: 6-10 x 2 @ 1-2 minutes rest

Exercise: Calf Raises

Week 1-4 Min/Max repetitions goal: 15-20

Week 5-8 Min/Max repetitions goal: 6-10 x 2 @ 1-2 minutes rest

Exercise: Rotator Cuff Exercises (light weights, surgical tubing, or stretch cords. Do several different types: internal rotation, external rotation, etc. - focus on smooth movements - intended to reduce/prevent shoulder injury)

Min/Max repetitions goal: 10-15

Exercise: Back Extensions

Min/Max repetitions goal: 10-15

Exercise: Abdominal Crunches (this exercise always has two sets of repetitions)

Min/Max repetitions goal: 10-25 x 2 @ 1 minute rest

Cool-down: 5-10 minutes of easy aerobic work, like a spin on a lifecycle or an easy jog.

That's it - a general workout for upper and lower body that should only take 35-60 minutes. I recommend doing body core work - abs, back, etc. - at least every other day. I also recommend that swimmers perform stretching every day following your workouts.

Give it a try and let me know how it goes. I use this routine because it fits in my schedule. While I am not getting the same strength gains I did when using a more swimming specific, detailed weight lifting routine, I am still getting stronger - and in much less time than I formerly spent in the weight room.

This workout will be posted here thru 2010.

Cliff "Irongeezer" Eggink, age 73, after a 2.4 mile swim.

Yoga for Swimmers Yoga, with its emphasis on balance and alignment, is great dryland training for swimmers.
By Baron Baptiste and Kathleen Finn Mendola

 Gentle on the joints, forgiving of injuries and other physical limitations, and deeply relaxing, swimming and yoga, when practiced together, unite their strengths, making for a more balanced athlete.

The minimal gravity effect of swimming is appealing to those who suffer from injury that precludes them from high-impact movement, as well as pregnant women, people with chronic joint pain, and the elderly. Logging laps in the pool undoubtedly provides physical and psychological benefits. But too much time spent in the water without counteracting or opposing activities can be detrimental, resulting in body misalignment and lack of bone strength.

Body alignment, integral to all sports performance, is often thrown off kilter in swimmers, says Leslie Sims, a former national swim coach who is currently a yoga teacher at "now YOGA" and head coach at Club Swim in Los Altos and Palo Alto, California. This is due to overdevelopment of the front of the body, which occurs from chronic overuse in three of the four basic swim strokes—butterfly, breast, and freestyle. Because a swimmer's pectorals are predominantly in a contracted state, the opposing fascia (where muscle attaches to bone) of the rhomboids is weakened. Because the backstroke can counteract some of the repetitive stroke motions that lead to such muscle imbalance, Sims instructs her swim students to perform the backstroke at the end of every workout. Often just doing the backstroke isn't enough, however. Learning proper alignment through a consistent yoga practice can help tremendously, Sims says.

The biggest drawback to a fitness routine based solely on water sports is that the body can't get stronger without gravity. Just as a coiled spring gets its force from resistance, the body needs stress to build strength in muscle and bone. Bone density, in particular, is developed through low- and high-impact weight-bearing exercise like running, walking, bicycling, dance, and yoga. This is an especially unfortunate drawback for women, who are most at risk for developing osteoporosis, a disease marked by a gradual weakening and thinning of the bones.

Laps and Asanas
Competitive swimmers call it "dryland training"—incorporating other sports into an exercise regimen to compensate for what is missing in a primary workout. A yoga practice can complement even an amateur's swim routine by introducing two legs of the fitness triad—strength building and flexibility. Asanas (postures) utilize body weight as a powerful source of resistance: Outside of the water, gravity helps to build strength and muscle. In addition, postures take the body through a full range of motion, encouraging flexible, supple muscles that are less prone to injury.

Consistent practice of yoga also yields extended muscles, as opposed to the contracted, compact muscles associated with running or cycling. And extended muscles are physiologically necessary for a swimmer: To be efficient in the water, every stroke and kick demands a full extension of the arm and leg. When executing all four strokes, swimmers propel themselves by extending and contracting from the tips of their fingers to the ends of their toes.

Many competitive swimmers run to increase aerobic conditioning—the third leg of the fitness triad—because effective aerobic training requires more than just a few laps in the pool. "If you just casually swim laps, chances are you'll be unable to bring your heart rate up high enough and sustain it long enough to gain significant aerobic conditioning," says Sims. "By incorporating the four basic strokes when you swim—breast, freestyle, butterfly, and backstroke—you can get a full body workout. However, achieving a cardiovascular workout in the pool is more challenging. You must use interval training—swimming laps at a vigorous pace against a clock."

In Sims' work with swimmers, she focuses on key body areas and applies some of what she calls "universal principles" of asanas to help them ward off injury and improve performance:

Shoulder Blades: In Adho Mukha Svanasana (Downward-Facing Dog) and Urdhva Mukha Svanasana (Upward-Facing Dog), your instructor may tell you that the shoulder blades need to drop down the back. The same principle applies in swimming, where the shoulders create the biggest problems. Rotator cuff injuries or shoulder tendonitis (also called "swimmer's shoulder") occur when the rhomboids are not held in place when the arm is raised in freestyle stroke. Instead of the muscle carrying the weight of the arm, the tendon bears the burden. Over time the tendon becomes frayed and aggravated.

Hips: Baddha Konasana (Bound Angle Pose), with the soles of the feet touching together and the outsides of the knees flat on the floor, demonstrates a healthy external rotation of the hip. For many people, though, the hips remain locked and stiff. In a swimmer, this congestion can manifest in a faulty breaststroke kick. Without free, loose hips, it's difficult to complete this stroke effectively and efficiently.

Ankles: In all of yoga's standing poses, it's important to place the foot on the ground in order to get full extension, and flexible ankles allow the foot to rest solidly on the ground. Similarly, swimmers use the ankles as the foundation of movement—propelling the body forward with a kick. The top of the foot should hit the water as if in Virasana (Hero Pose)—at 180 degrees. Sims will often work with runners who have such severe ankle stiffness that their kick literally pulls them backwards—"like trying to lift a plane off the ground with the flaps down."

Swimming to Samadhi
Both yogis and swimmers know about using the breath to move the body. Yogis use the breath to encourage the opening and lengthening of stubborn muscle groups, and the cleansing of physical and emotional toxins. Deep, full breathing enhances yoga asanas and increases circulation and cardiovascular capacity. Being immersed in the water makes this process easier, as water puts pressure on the lungs to expel excess air and allows fresh new prana to enter the body.

"All breathing in swimming should be done in an open chest position," says Sims. Just as yogis often exert effort on the inhalation and relax on the exhalation in asana practice, swimmers inhale before submerging, then utilize the extended exhalation to follow through on each stroke, propelling themselves through the water. The stroke facilitates the cycle of breath, with the rhythm modified according to each individual. In freestyle, swimmers are encouraged to become aware of alignment and pattern their breath cycles so that the head turns to breathe on alternating sides of the body. Not practicing this "bilateral breathing," Sims says, would be like doing Trikonasana (Triangle Pose) on only one side of the body.

It makes sense that breath awareness factors into good swimming. After all, swimming is a sport in which the senses are withdrawn and awareness is pulled inward. For some people, Sims adds, because "you are covered with water, with little sensory ability, little sound, little visual stimulation...it's a sense of the fifth limb of yoga—pratyahara," literally, a gathering toward oneself.

Baron Baptiste is a yoga teacher and athletic trainer in Cambridge, Massachusetts, known for his work with the Philadelphia Eagles and as the host of ESPN's "Cyberfit." Kathleen Finn Mendola