Upcoming - Fitness News

Looking for a mega-watt workout that’ll shrink your thighs, butt and belly all at once? Look no further! Plyometrics uses quick jumps to tone muscles, increase metabolism and strengthen the nervous system. Here’s a guide to get started… Plyo-what? Do you know the high-impact workout called plyometrics? Eastern Europeans developed it to help train Olympic athletes in the 1960s. Today, plyometrics helps beginning fitness enthusiasts rev up their metabolism and burn lots of calories in a short time.

“Fake it till you make it, that’s our motto,” says Meredith Vaughn at the outset of this week’s Laughter Yoga class in the First Unitarian Church’s upstairs chapel. She and her husband Dave are both sporting large yellow smiley-face buttons; we’ve all been given smiley stickers to place wherever we choose. The purpose behind Laughter Yoga, which was started fourteen years ago today in Mumbai, India by Dr. Madan Kataria, is to use simulated laughter to provide the mind and body with the same stress-busting and overall health benefits spontaneous laughter does.

Yoga To The Rescue (YTTR) was created by Amy Luwis, a yoga enthusiast who researched yoga instructors, involved her friends in yoga poses, and came up with a catch-all yoga guide that's good for what ails you. Don't let the cotton candy-colored packaging deter you from picking this book up. It might look like it was designed for the tween set but this book is truly all-woman. YTTR's concept is simple: if you're feeling less-than-amazing, there's a yoga pose for that. Feeling a little flabby? There's a yoga pose for that. Feeling like you want to hit the bar for a few dozen martinis?

Whatever industry we work in, day-to-day stress about projects, deadlines and customers is enough to make us all wish we were instead in a restorative yoga class, sweaty and wrung out and draped over a bolster. Similarly, mid-afternoon energy slumps (which we usually combat with over-caffeinated drinks and sugary snacks) often make us long for the energized feeling we get from doing a few sun salutations. So who says we can’t do yoga asana at the office? Sure, visiting an inspiring Web site can really help to soothe our jangled nerves and get us centered.