Increase Cycling Efficiency Workshop

Saturday, June 2, 11 am – 1 pm

Westside Recreation Centre, Calgary
Register:  403 531 5875

LIMITED TO 5 PARTICIPANTS!!

In all my years of teaching cycling, I am still amazed at how transforming subtle improvements can make to cycling performance.   I have taught serious and recreational cyclists skills to bring more ease into their cycling to achieve greater results.  In the May issue of IMPACT Magazine, you can read more about what I teach.  Here’s your chance to be part of this special cycling experience and learn techniques to:

• Make your pedal stroke more powerful to increase rpms and wattage.
• Breathe more effectively so higher exertion zones feel easier with faster recovery.
• Develop proper body alignment to improve muscle recruitment and feel less fatigue.
• Identify bad habits that may be hindering your performance.

Feel free to email me if you have any more questions.

Moving Meditations – Meditate In Training

My latest class creation “Mindful Cardio + Meditation” has inspired my blog topic for this month.

Time and time again I have seen fabulous results in training and fitness due to meditation.  I realize meditation is a strong word that carries many connotations, some of which may be negative.  But don’t stop reading here!!

If you are the type of person that finds it really hard to slow down, you can try a type of meditation that I call moving meditation.  This is something you can actually do while strength training, cycling, running or other repetitive types of cardio training.

When you think of someone meditating, you likely think of someone in a seated quiet place, with eyes closed, appearing in another world.  But meditation does not have to be like this! Meditation can be moving, energizing and with other people!  And in all of that you can still find calm, quiet and stillness because meditation is about what’s going on inside of you, not what’s happening around you.

The definition of meditation is a self-directed practice of relaxing the body and calming the mind.  So in other words, you can do this in sports and training….now you are likely asking – but why would I want to??

Through meditation you are able to cultivate deeper strength, power and endurance. When you learn how to relax your body and calm your mind, you breathe better, exert less energy and are more fluid in your movement.  Breathing better enables greater oxygen intake for higher exertion and quicker recovery.  Exerting less energy occurs when you hold less tension in your muscles.  Simply, you work the muscles you need to and relax the ones you don’t.  You are more fluid in your movement because you are totally engaged and creating power through proper alignment and core activation.

One of my favourite quotes describing a meditative state comes from Sue Holloway, after her Olympic silver medal performance in kayaking pairs.  Sue said, “almost every 3 secs or so toward the end of my race I’d say relax and let my shoulders and head relax, and I’d think about putting on the power, and then I’d feel the tension creeping up again so I’d think relax again, then power, relax.  I knew that to have power I had to stay relaxed.  You can be powerful, but tense and the boat won’t go.  When we crossed the line, I knew we’d gone our very hardest.”

Sue was completely in tune with the tension in your body.  The essence of her performance was moving meditation.  You too can learn how to do this, but without dedicating thousands of hours of training like an olympic athlete.  Personally, I have seen a few people make radical transitions within a few hours of moving meditative training.

If you would like to connect to harmony in your mind and body, here is a step-by-step guide.  I would suggest practicing this while walking first before progressing to higher intensity sports or training.

1.  Draw Awareness Into Your Body – Focus ALL your thoughts on your body.  Feel into the contact of your feet on the ground.  Feel into your legs – your stride and timing.  Feel into your hands and the momentum with your legs and feet.  Remain focused for 2-3 minutes.  If you notice your mind is wandering and not feeling into the sensations in your body – do not move onto the next step.

2.  Connect With Your Breathing – Allow each breath cycle (inhale and exhale) to come into rhythm with your body.  Slow down and really feel into your inhales and exhales.  This is difficult to describe.  I can only say when your breathing connects with your movement, you will feel it.

3.  Release Tension – Let go of unnecessary muscular tension in your body.  Tension wastes energy and makes exercise feel more difficult.  It also plays havoc on your breathing and nervous system.  Feel as if you are basking in the warm sun free of tightness in your body.

4.  Maintain A Steady State – Once you feel settled with the first three steps, now you can work on the duration of your moving meditation.  Like anything it requires practice.  Be gentle on yourself.  It is normal to drift in and out of a deeply engaging mental place.  But remember, the more you do it, the easier it will become.

Music can definitely enhance your experience.  Some of my favourite artists are Sarah McLachlan, Tiesto and Enigma.

As I mentioned, the process of moving meditation is something that you can learn, but you need to practice it.  It is difficult to describe since it is something that you have to feel in your body and mind, and experience it for yourself.  I have seen how it has enriched training for so many people.  It can be truly transforming.

If you have any questions, please email me, or better yet, join me at my new class “Mindful Meditation + Cardio” at the Westside Rec Centre starting Thursday, April 7.

Breathing to Improve Sports Performance

Breathing is your life force.  It can greatly impact your mood, sleep, immunity and even your sports performance.

It is said that the average person has as much stimulation in one week as his or her great, great, great grandparents had in a lifetime! Life’s demands, deadlines and technological advances all take its toll on your health, particularly your breathing.

How do you breathe?  Do you think you breathe efficiently or poorly?  Is your breathing supporting or hindering your health?

If you are like most people, you may not be able to confidently answer those questions since you don’t pay much attention to your breathing.  You may be even wondering what efficient breathing feels like and isn’t breathing all the same?

It is true that breathing is an automatic function that occurs in our body, so we don’t have to think about it, it just happens automatically.  But it is VERY common to develop bad habits with breathing.

Notice what you feel about your breathing right now.  Notice where you feel your breathing.  Does it feel smooth or jagged?  Easy or laboured in some way?  Long or short?  Do you feel it in your upper neck, upper chest and shoulders?  Or do you feel it lower, into your ribs or belly?  Do you emphasize your inhales or exhales?  Take a moment and feel what’s there.

Ideally, your breath should move like an accordion. As you inhale, it expands your belly and as you exhale it releases and draws in.   Your breath should feel soft, easy and fluid.

There are many reasons why you will want to breathe your best.  Your oxygen intake increases, which allows you deepen your exertion and recover faster.  It calms your nervous system and enables your muscles to relax for greater muscular force.  It strengthen your respiratory system and increases lung capacity.

Here are a couple of my favourite breathing exercises to try:

Whistle Breath (3 mins each direction)

• Inhale through your mouth with gently pursed lips and make a whistle sound, exhale through nose.
• Then reverse – inhale through nose, exhale through mouth and make whistle sound.
• Works on energy levels and increases lung capacity.

Breath of Fire (1 min, rest 1 min, 1 min again)

• Relax your stomach muscles.
• Breathe quickly in and out through your nose (like you are sniffing loudly).  Allow your belly to move in and out, pulsing with your breathing rhythm.
• Go at your own comfortable pace.  This can be a challenging breathing exercise.
• This technique quickly brings more oxygen into your blood, builds lung capacity, helps purify your respiratory system, and balances and strengthens your nervous system.

Like anything else, the more you practice the more you will feel results.  Complete 7-10 minutes of breathing everyday for 3 days and see what you notice.

Breath work is one of my favourite subjects to teach because the results are often dramatic.

Very recently, one of my cycling students shared a story with me.  She said twenty years ago she smoked and would take deep inhales while puffing on her cigarettes.  Since she quit smoking she hasn’t breathed with such deep inhales.  She realized this after practicing a few breathing exercises.  Her discovery was amazing.  For the last twenty years she has been breathing shallow and it is so simple to change!!  She started breathing deeper and felt the benefits while cycling.

…Now obviously, I am not advocating anyone should smoke, the point here is you can consciously change how you breathe.  Choose to breath deep or shallow, it is your choice.  The first step is to become aware and feel.

Enjoy and feel free to email me at newinfo@fitnessonthefly.ca if you have any questions.

Personalize Your Cardio

Are you stuck in a rut with your cardio?  Do you find it boring?  With a little investment of your time, you can create your own stimulating, challenging workouts to YOUR OWN MUSIC!!

The #1 reason people do not stay committed to fitness is because of time.  Personalize your cardio and gain a huge amount of flexibility.  You can fit in workouts even when your life is crazy busy.

Here is an overview of what to do for treadmill running and indoor cycling.  My format is based MIT:

• Music

• Intensity/Drills

• Time

MUSIC – Select songs that really motivate you.  Then put them into a rough playlist order.  Slower, softer sounding songs are good for warm-ups and cool-downs.  Faster, more upbeat songs are great for your core workout.  Here is a guideline to follow, considering that the average length of a song is 3 minutes.

Warm-up:  2 songs (5 to 7 mins)

Core of workout:  Cardio time divided by 3 = Approx. number of songs you need

Cool-down:  1 song (3 mins)

For a 30 minute workout you would need approximately 10 songs (2 for warm-up, 7 for core and 1 for cool-down)

INTENSITY – It is important to know your BASE level.  This is your intensity starting point.  The drills you create will grow from your base and come back to your base.

Treadmill Running Base – Comfortable, easy pace, one that you could maintain for 30 mins with an incline of 1.0 (this simulates a flat road outside).  Cycling Base – Flat road resistance with a moderate cadence, 80 – 90 rpm.

Now create a list of drills that you would like to do.  All the drills start from your BASE intensity level.  Here a few you may choose from:

Speed pyramid – Every 10 to 30 secs increase your speed, 3 to 5 times in a row.  Then reverse and decrease your speed one interval at a time, back to your BASE.  Running – increase 0.2 to – 0.4 mph each time.  Cycling – increase cadence 3 – 5 rpm each time

Incline/Resistance Pyramid – Every 10-30 secs increase your incline/resistance, 3 to 5 times in a row.  Then reverse and decrease your incline/resistance one interval at a time, back to your BASE.  Running – increase 1-2 incline each time.  Cycling – increase 1 gear each time

Speed bursts – Explode your speed/cadence for 10–30 secs and return to your BASE for double the time.  Repeat 3 – 5 times in a row.  This is a great drill to do with a chorus of a song.

Power bursts – Add more incline/resistance into your speed bursts and now you are working power!  Running – increase incline 3-7 incline each time.  Cycling – increase gears simulating a hill climb or strong wind

Rolling Hills – Build your incline/resistance up over 1 min and then hold for another minute.  Return to BASE for 1 min and repeat.

Full-out effort – Max effort (speed & incline/resist combined) for 30 secs – 2 min intervals, followed by active recovery (below BASE).  Recovery length is 3-4 times longer than your max effort interval length.

TIME – Decide the how long you want your total workout to be.  Pick the drills you want to include.  If applicable, for each drill, determine the interval lengths in the drill.  Then calculate the total length for each drill.  Decide how many times you would like to repeat each drill.  Now WA-LA, MAGIC you have a personalized cardio workout!!

If you would like to learn more about how you can personalize your cardio, please join me at one of my upcoming workshops:

Personalize Your Cardio

Treadmill Running:  Tues, Feb 3, 9–11 am

Indoor Cycling:  Mon, Feb 27, 9:30–11:30 am

See the right column of my blog for more information.