How do you know if your training is paying dividends?

How do you know if your training is paying dividends?

 

Keeping motivated with your workouts can be hard work especially if you are not tracking your progress.

 

If you can see you are improving, then it is easier to stick with your plan and keep motivated.

 

 

Below I am going to list several ways you can gauge your progress. You may wish to select a few and monitor your results. You don't need to do all of them. Just pick a couple that will help you set some goals and stay motivated.

 

Test yourself this week and then re-test yourself after a couple of months to see how you have improved.

 

 

Performance Rankings

• Rank your current paddling endurance on a scale of 1-10
• Rank your current wave riding performance on a scale of 1-10

 

Strength Tests 

• Upper body strength test 1 - how many chin-ups can you do?
• Upper body strength test 2 - how many pushups/weighted pushups can you do?
• Lower body strength test - How many single leg squats/weighted split squats can you do?
• Lower body power test - How far can you broad jump on 2 feet?
• Core stability test - How long can you hold a front plank/side plank for?

 

Endurance Tests

• Endurance test 1 - How long does it take to run 3km
• Endurance test 2 - How long does it take to swim 500m

Body Composition Tests

• What's your body fat % (body fat scales or skin folds)
• What's your waist & hip measurements
• Muscle girth measurements - chest, arms, quads, calves

 

 

Obviously these are not the only tests you can do to measure your progress. If you have some other ideas then you can use those as well.

 

Hopefully you can see that it is fairly easy to measure your fitness and performance progress, you just have to commit to it!

 

 

Notes for a Simple Cardio Workout.

If you want to get a good, fast cardio workout done, you don't have to have expensive exercise equipment or even have lots of space to exercise.

 

You can do a fast cardio workout in your own living room or backyard.

 

Instead of doing traditional cardio exercises, try doing some bodyweight exercises instead.

 

 

For example you could do this...

 

After a completing a 5 minute dynamic warm up, do the following exercises in succession taking rest breaks as needed. Do as many rounds as possible in 10 minutes.

 

• Squat Jumps x 20
• Mountain Climbers x 50
• Jump Rope x 100
• Running on the spot x 50
• Burpees x 10
• Jumping Jacks x 30

Once you are done do 5 minutes of stretching and you are finished! Easy as that. A hard and fast cardio workout done in only 20 minutes without leaving home.

 

 

Core and upper body stability exercises

Today I just wanted to show you an awesome core and upper body stability exercise that you can adding to your workouts.

 

This exercise goes great as part of your dynamic warmup or even as an add-on to a strength superset. 

 

The exercise is called an Up-Down Plank and there are 3 variations you can try based on the equipment you have available.

 

 

Variation #1 - no equipment

 

The Up Down Plank is great for building core stability (anti-extension) and also shoulder stability.

 

• Start in a plank position on the ground with your core braced
• Press up on to one hand and then the other hand so you end up in a pushup position
• Reverse the movement, lowering your body back down to a plank position.
• Repeat for 10 repetitions

 

Variation #2 - BOSU version

 

The BOSU will add to the stability challenge and force you to work harder to stabilise. 

• Start in a plank position on the BOSU with your core braced
• Press up on to one hand and then the other hand so you end up in a pushup position
• Reverse the movement, lowering your body back down to a plank position
• Repeat for 10 repetitions
   
  

 

Variation #3 - Swiss Ball version

Doing the exercise on a swiss ball is the ultimate challenge and will test your stability to the maximum.

• Start in a plank position on the Swiss Ball with your core braced
• Press up on to one hand and then the other hand so you end up in a pushup position
• Reverse the movement, lowering your body back down to a plank position
• Repeat for 10 repetitions

 

Make sure you have a go at this exercise in your next workout!

How many days per week should surfers strength train?

How many days per week should surfers strength train?

 

As a minimum you should do at least 2 total body functional workouts per week.

 

This will provide a lot of the health and fitness benefits that resistance training is scientifically proven to do.

 

Aside from the obvious benefits like improving your functional strength and surfing performance, doing regular weight training will also help with...

• Improvements in fat burning
• Enhancing bone density
• Better cardiovascular health
• Reduced risk of diabetes and some cancers
• Decreased stress levels
• Improvements in sleep
• More productive at work

 

However, in an ideal world, you would try and do 3 total body workouts per week for several reasons...

 

1. You can build muscle for up to 48 hours after a workout. University studies have shown that after a strength training workout, muscle protein synthesisis increased for up to 2 days after your workout, which means you can build muscle for this time period (as long as you are eating enough to fuel muscle growth).

 

2. Your metabolism can stay elevated for a similar amount of time after a full body workout, meaning you can be burning fat for almost 2 days after your workout. So if you want to get lean and athletic, strength training is the way to go.

 

 

Taking both of these factors into account, if you do total body workouts every 2 days (or 3 times per week) you are increasing the opportunity for both muscle growth and fat burning.

 

 

So in summary, aim for 2-3 total body functional training workouts per week to improve both your surfing and your health!