A Great Fitness Resource in TO: ExerciseToronto.com

Looking for information on fitness, sports and athletics in Toronto? Look no more!

ExerciseToronto.Com is a Toronto based platform that offers a commitment to unite relevant, fitness activities and businesses with Toronto’s amateur, exercise community.

ExerciseToronto.Com’s focus is separated into two, yet equally important areas:

• Maintaining a successful platform for exercise related businesses to promote their services to the Greater Toronto Area… In a cost effective way.

• Staying connected to the athletic community of the GTA by profiling everyday exercisers, landmarks and community based events that are taking place in the Toronto area.

Initally, ExerciseToronto was created because the publishers became fed up with traditional, out of date, community directories that continually asked small businesses for their marketing dollars and did little in return to drive relevant traffic to the website. As a result ExerciseToronto.Com was launched with the small business’s and the GTA based exerciser’s interests in mind.

As the site continues to grow, they hope you’ll grow with it and come along for the ride as ExerciseToronto.Com becomes the ‘one stop shop’ for everything exercise in the Greater Toronto Area!

Check out the website at http://www.ExerciseToronto.Com

Or follow them on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=500432505346&ref=ts

Carolyn’s Top Tips for the Most Effective Ab Workout

www.HealthyGirl.net

Focus on Your Whole Body You can’t pick a part of your body, do a bunch of exercises just for that single part and watch the fat just disappear. You must target your largest muscles to shed fat evenly throughout your body, and in turn, allow your abs to show. Focusing on working your back and chest, as well as your lower body through exercises such as push-ups, squats, and lunges, will help you achieve this!

Doing 100 Crunches a Day Will Not Lead to a Six Pack! You must work your entire core through varied exercises to have a strong midsection. All the sit-ups in the world will not give you a six pack without a proper diet! A healthy diet is the MOST IMPORTANT factor when you are losing weight and searching for those toned abs.

You Do Not Have to Train Your Abs for Hours At a Time Extremely long workouts provide no additional benefit to defining your abs. It will only cause weakness from overtraining. Less than 20 minutes per abdominal training session is ideal!

Do Cardio Before Your Ab Workout When you are warmed up as a result of cardiovascular exercise, you are able to get a better contraction with your abs while working them. Warming up helps you feel the deep muscular burn much more when your abs are trained. Warming up also helps prevent abdominal pulls or muscle strains.

Contract Your Abs in Between Sets This may help build definition in your abs. Bodybuilders have been known to stretch and flex in between sets to increase muscular tone and definition!

Minimize Rest Time in Between Sets Aim for 1 minute or less of rest time in between ab sets. Your main goal should be to keep rest to 30 – 40 seconds in between sets. This will keep the metabolism high, allowing you to burn fat at a quicker, more efficient rate.

Lower Your Sodium Intake Cutting down on sodium can make a huge difference in the way your abs look. Salt, water and fat lead to major fat surrounding the love handles!

Eat 5-6 Small Meals Each Day Instead of eating 3 large meals, try to eat 5-6 smaller meals, spacing them out so you aren’t going more than 2-3 hours without food. This will keep your blood sugar stable and your metabolism racing throughout the day!
Avoid Belly Bloating Foods Some foods are worse than others in how your body reacts with them and what causes that bloated feeling. Here are key belly- bloating foods to avoid: Excess Salt, Fried Foods, Carbonated Drinks, Refined White Flour and Artificial Sweeteners.

Focus on a Healthy Diet Your diet is the main aspect in toning and defining your abs. Supplementation should also be considered for best results. I love the quote, “Abs are formed in the kitchen, not the gym!”

Carolyn@HealthyGirl.net