The Great Dumbbell DVD and Handbook

Features:

Introducing The Great Dumbbell DVD! This multi-functional DVD contains a library of 46 dumbbell exercises that will transform your entire body, each accompanied by dynamic on-screen graphics precisely illustrating muscles used. It also contains 3 complete workout routines designed to meet all fitness levels. With an array of additional features rounding out this amazing package, The Great Dumbbell DVD offers the most effective workout experience possible.

Included:

The Great Dumbbell Handbook! Reap the benefits of training with dumbbells. This handbook shows you 45 basic and advanced dumbbell exercises using clear descriptions and illustrated photos. Handbook also includes instructions on creating your own program, stretching and setting up a mini-gym. Muscle anatomy diagrams and an accessory guide make your workouts easier, safer and more efficient. Printed in color; 64 pages.

Our Aging and Disease Problem

If aliens from another planet had been studying human physiology for the past two thousand years, they would have noticed very little change in human body composition—until about 1980, that is, when inactivity, obesity and disease statistics, especially in North America, began to skyrocket. These health and lifestyle statistics are dramatic enough to raise an intergalactic eyebrow (if, indeed, our aliens even have eyebrows) and should act as a wake-up call to the general public, health and fitness professionals (with eyebrows) whom will have to deal with the costly fall-out from these changes here on Earth – specifically North America.

Aging Overview – Trends
We are living longer. Five years ago, the average North American was 35.3 years old and could plan for 43.5 more years of life extended life. By 2050, researchers estimate this statistic to increase to 41.7 years and 45.8 future years of longer living. This extended life span, provokes an important question – what quality of living will we have by living so much longer? The answer is bleak given North America’s present lifestyle and disease issues. Many North Americans are already suffering in pain, illness and misery and with advanced medical technology; these individuals will be suffering for a longer period of time.

Life Expectancy
1776 = 35yrs
1900 = 47yrs
1990 = 75yrs
2000 = 80yrs

Are you Aging Faster Than you Need to be? – Checklist
Daily we experience physical “issues” that many of us assume are “normal” or “common” for our “age”. This perspective however, is flawed. Consider this, it is “common” and “normal” to find cancer patients on a Cancer Ward in a hospital, yet, this disease obviously, is not at all “healthy”. Below is a brief physical checklist for you to use to assess your present “health” state and to spot important physiological problems earlier rather than later.

Checklist:
In your life presently…
How would you rate your present: (1 = worst ever, 10 = best ever)

•  Energy level
•  Overall Health
•  Stress Level
•  Moods
•  Emotional Stability
•  Fitness Level
•  Muscle Tone & Firmness
•  Stamina

Presently, which of the following best describes the challenges you face when trying to stay healthy and physically fit?

•  Lack of time
•  Fluctuating Energy Levels
•  Unhealthy lifestyle
•  Lack of consistency
•  Lack of discipline
•  Poor diet
•  Not sure of how/what to do
•  Lack of support
•  Lack of motivation
•  Work schedule

Presently, which of the following symptoms of aging are you experiencing?
 Poor Memory

•  Muscle & Joint Pain
•  Low Sex Drive
•  Chronic Stress
•  Lack of Vitality
•  Weight Gain
•  Decreased Muscle Mass
•  Elevation of Cholesterol
•  Sleep disturbances
•  Mood swings
•  Lack of energy
•  Shortness of Breath

In your life presently do you experience:

•  Chronic stress (at work, new-born at home, relationship problems)
•  Chronic fatigue (mornings, during day)
•  Chronic muscle and joint pain
•  Chronic infections or allergies
•  Low sex drive
•  Excessive cravings
•  Poor skin health
•  Chronic GI issues

 Loss of aerobic stamina (out of breath easily)

These are not normal healthy physiological states! (16). Further, Dr. Brian Martin, ND, states “If your clients or participants are experiencing one or more of these conditions for more than 7-days, you need to take it very seriously, for the road you are trudging has a bridge-out in your future”.

What you need to know about Aging, Cardio and Early Death
Fifty years ago, researchers stated that as we age, we naturally lose 5%-10%of our cardio fitness every decade. Recently, with the major lifestyle and inactivity levels in North America, this statistic has changed and is now showing an accelerated decline in this “cardio fitness”. Worse, researchers have recently linked one’s peak aerobic exercise capacity (I.E. stamina) to accelerated aging and premature death. Myers J, Prakash M, Froelicher V, Do D, Partington S, Atwood JE. 1: N Engl J Med. 2002 Mar 14; 346 (11):793-801

What does this mean for you?
Learn more about your true physiological age. In our increasingly inactive society today, we need to balance the battle field and offset this imbalance favoring stagnation. We need arm ourselves with powerful self-health insight. The new rules of engagement in the 21st Century for aging well, require that we get very clear as to what is happening to our bodies BEFORE a crisis occurs. Research is now showing that health “crisises” are happening earlier in our youth than ever before! We need to get smarter!
We need key reference points of our present physiological health (I.E. cardio, hormone levels, daily bone-loss etc) so that we can make informed decisions as to the quality of our future health and aging. Having these critical reference points, provide you and your health-care providers with vital points for comparison now, and in the future.

In this, the 21st Century, it is no longer a wise approach to WAIT until something “falls-off” our body; it is clear that pre-empted testing and self-education provides you and your loved ones with accurate information for making critical informed decisions presently and in the years to come.

Three Must-Do Healthy-Aging Tests
Resting Metabolism: tells you whether your metabolism is slowing or speeding; this information, in the hands of an experienced clinical exercise specialist, can provide you with powerful insight and lifestyle strategies that help us age-well immediately.

Aerobic Exercise Metabolism and Capacity: tells you whether the current state of your cardio-respiratory system. Again, in the hands of an experienced clinical exercise specialist, it can provide you with vital insight regarding your rate of aging, mortality and the success strategies to implement easily that will have a profound impact on your present and future years.

Recovery Heart Rate: tells you how well your body can recover from a stressful physical overload (newborn, death, moving, exercise) and provide further insight regarding your rate of aging and mortality.

To learn more about these tests, a great starting point is www.infofit.ca.

How do you want to Age?
“Aging Gracefully is an intention NOT an accident”, this is my most potent statement when helping my clients understand the role we can play in the aging gracefully game. As a clinical exercise specialist, I use it to help them modify their beliefs of aging from a “victim” perspective to a more empowering “self-accountable” one. What happens with you, when you read this phrase? Did it shift anything within you? Whether it did or not make an impact with you, pass it on! Perhaps, it will help a family member or friend.

The 21st Century Aging Gracefully Solution
In the battle to generate proficient fat-loss and reduce your disease risk, what is needed is a solid, well-organized assault plan, but without professional guidance, it is, for most, a losing battle. There are just too many confusing variables to address and accurately plan against (high-sugar intake, rampant stress-hormones, misdiagnosed thyroid issues etc.) (11). Since the playing field is so uneven, in favour of degeneration and accelerated aging, it is critical that each person build a personalized healthy aging plan. In addition, for all health-care and fitness professionals, consider your role in this 21st Century aging gracefully “game-plan”, as mentors in our community, how do you plan to promote this potentially life-saving concept?

In Closing
There is little any physician, therapist or pill can do for your state of health and happiness as you age, than what you can do for yourself. By being aware of your health and fitness options, and be willing to educate and empower yourself to make informed decisions, you have “set the stage” for success on a daily basis.

“Aging is inevitable, pain is optional!”

Happy Aging!

André Noël Potvin, MSc, CES, CSCS, TFL, is a Clinical Exercise Specialist and Co-owner of the EnerChanges Anti Aging, Health and Fitness Clinic and Owner of INFOFIT Educators, North Americas Premier School for Health and Fitness Education. Email: admin@infofit.ca; www.infofit.ca; 604 683-0785.

References
1. American College of Sports Medicine’s Guidelines for Exercise Testing and Prescription. 7th ed. Lea & Fibeger, 2006, p. 4-7.
2. American College of Sports Medicine’s Resource Manual for Guidelines for Exercise Testing and Prescription. 5nd ed. Lea & Fibeger. 2006
3. Annual Review of Public Health, Ross Brownson, St. Louis University
4. Barnard, N. Turn off the fat genes. The revolutionary guide to taking charge of the genes that control your weight. Harmony Book (2001) NY.
5. Bouchard C, Deriaz O, Perusse L, Tremblay A. Genetics of energy expenditure in humans. Genetics of Obesity, 135-45
6. Flegal KM, Carroll MD, Ogden CL, Johnson CL: Prevalence and trends in obesity among U.S. adults 1999-2000. JAMA 288: 17231727, 2002.
7. Jung RT, Shetty PS and James WP. The effect of refeeding after semistarvation on catecholamine and thyroid metabolism. Int J Obes 4:95-100.
8. Lee IM, Rexrode Km, Cook NR, et al. Physical activity and coronary heart disease in women: is “no pain, no gain” pasee? JAMA 2001; 285: 1445-1454.
9. Leibel RL, Rosenbaum M, and Hirsch J. Changes in energy expenditure resulting from altered body weight. N Engl J Med 332:621-28., 1995.
10. Manson JE, Greenland P, LaCroix AZ et al. Walking compared with vigours exercise for the prevention of cardiovascular events in women. N Engl J Med 2002; 33: 2145-2156
11. Martin B. Clinic Director, EnerChanges Medical, Health and Wellness Clinic. Vancouver, BC, Canada. www.enerchanges.com .Personal Interview, July 2006.
12. National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), 2001-2002
13. Ristow M, Muller-Weiland D, Pfeiffer A, Krone W, and Kahn CR. Obesity associated with a mutation in a genetic regulator of adipocyte differentiation. N Engl Med 339: 953-59, 1998.
14. Ravussin E , Lillioja S Knowler Wc et al. Reduced rate of energy expenditure as a risk factor for body-weight gain. N Engl J Med 318: 467-72.
15. Schoenborn CA, Barnes PM. Leisure-time physical activity among adults: Advanced Statistics from Vital and Health Statistics No. 325; April 7, 2002. U.S., 1997-1998. 2002
16. Urasmus U. Fats that Heal and Fats that Kill. Alive Books, 1993
Wadden TA, Foster GD, Letizia KA and Mullen JL. Long-term effects of dieting on resting metabolic rate in obese outpatients. JAMA 264: 707-11, 1990.

As a fitness enthusiast, have you ever wondered why you have to run further or train harder simply to achieve the same results? If this sounds familiar – you are not alone. Over 90% of the active population are training harder than they need to AND are getting poorer results.

As any expert will tell you, it’s normal to have to change, update or cross-train as your fitness level continues to grow stronger. But what many of them don’t tell you is that we have science on our side to help!

Andre Noel Potvin, M.Sc., CES, CSCS, President & Owner of INFOFIT Educators, International Speaker and Author of the Great Exercise Handbook series, is internationally renowned in the fitness education, health and training industry. For many years he has incorporated scientific testing into his programs because he knows its value. Andre believes that for people to train at their optimum levels, they need a program that ensures efficient and effective fitness progression.

“In this 21st century each person, fit or unfit, needs a personalized training plan and science can help facilitate specific training protocols for each individual. What is needed today is an understanding of what is happening inside our bodies; we need to know our physiological reference points (starting points). This is why science in fitness is so important. Professionals can use this information to develop a personalized health and fitness plan that is scientifically-based, personally targeted, safe, effective and efficient. After all, we use technology and science in medicine to diagnose disease, why not use that same technology to diagnose health?”

Training zones measure different levels of the heart’s exertion and include:

The Aerobic Zone
This zone helps you develop your cardiovascular system and has your heart rate working at 70% – 80% of capacity. Training in this zone will help build endurance.

The Anaerobic Zone
Here, the heart rate is working at 80% – 90% capacity. It is in this zone that the body learns how to efficiently convert the lactate the body is creating and helps athletes (of all levels) ascertain pace so they progress to higher velocities.

The Red Zone
This is the “hurt me” zone. Working your heart to over 90% of capacity, training in this zone is extremely intense and is only possible for short periods of time. This is the zone that really challenges your heart rate and is generally reserved for interval training.

Incorporating scientific fitness testing into your program will help establish your appropriate (and personal) training “zones” and eliminates the “hit and miss” approach most people continue to use today. These are simple tests that yield powerful results.

The first test Andre recommends is the Resting Metabolic Rate Test (RMR). This Metabolic Fingerprint test provides an analysis of your fat-burning proficiency. It will give you the present genetic expression of your fat-and–thin genes. This data tells a Fitness Professional your fat-simmering proficiency state (the number of calories that your body burns without physical activity). This information is used to develop a sound fat loss protocol that eliminates guesswork and accelerates the fitness and weight-loss process. It is used also to help modify your diet to best match your personal genetic exercise profile. This 15-minute breathing test measures caloric expenditure, oxygen to carbon-dioxide use and incorporates calories burned for daily activities and workouts. This gives you a complete picture of what your body requires for fuel to keep it healthy, happy and strong.

The second recommended test is called the Exercise Metabolism Test – Cardiovascular Fitness and Performance Test (SubMax VO2). Most exercise enthusiasts are training in the wrong training zones and wasting their hard-work efforts. Professional athletes know that VO2 testing is the way to maximize their performance with LESS effort. The test uses a graded treadmill to assess the ability of the heart, lungs and muscles to perform vigorous physical activity. The results will show you, regardless of your fitness level, your precise and, personal, heart rate training zone to maximize your training efforts. You will learn exactly how many calories you are really burning at a specific heart rate and use this information to design your workout and diet plans. This testing has saved countless hours of ineffective training and wasted effort for many people (young, old, ill or fit) by teaching how to train smarter and not harder.

Runners, in particular, can benefit from this test since many are unaware that they’re training at the wrong levels.

“I was training 10 beats faster than I needed to be; with the Submax VO2 testing I increased my recovery time, improved my speed AND finished Penticton Ironman. I recommend it to anyone”
Brenda M., Chiropractor
Vancouver, BC

So bring your health and fitness plan into the 21st Century. Seek out fitness professionals and facilities that offer you the tools you need to succeed. Work smarter…not harder and get the results you want without wasting effort.

Andre Noel Potvin is President of INFOFIT Educators School for Fitness Professionals http://www.infofit.ca and BCRPA Trainer of Leaders. He teaches a wide spectrum of certification and continuing education courses and offers free information seminars to the general public. He is a well renowned international speaker and author of the Great Exercise Handbook series which has sold over 1 million copies.

Overview
A recent report indicated that 4 members of the Canadian Spring Classic baseball team had pulled out of the event to due to injury. The loss of four high performance athletes in an international competition due to injury heightened the importance and timeliness of presenting the ‘P’repair to Perform long-term athlete development model.

Since its acceptance in the 1970’s, strength and conditioning in sports performance has evolved though phases where training was predominantly focused on bodybuilding, Olympic lifting, football methods, track and field training, & most recently the functional training model. Proponents and practitioners of each method have all helped advance our current methodologies. Fundamentally, each training paradigm is extremely successful in producing results for its specific purpose(s). However, accepting the methodologies associated with any one of these paradigms prevents us from learning and evolving in our current practices. Furthermore, it is tempting to ‘fit’ each athlete into one of these paradigms. That is, if we determine an athlete needs more speed, more agility, more strength, more size we should train like the fastest, most agile, strongest, and largest athletes. Logically, this approach makes a lot of sense. Even more logical, is to create a system of training that cyclically trains athletes to achieve more strength, size, speed, power & agility. Our research has proven the cyclic variation of training (periodization) to be effective. In recent years strength and conditioning professionals have explored variations of the traditional periodization (Baker, 2007), creating such terms as undulating (Rhea, 2002, Peterson et al. 2008), and reverse periodization.

Other authors and practitioners have previously offered adaptations (Jeffreys, 2008, Balyi, 2001) of the long-term quadrennial training models developed for the successful eastern block athletes of the 70’s and 80’s. However, while athletes, coaches and parents understand and accept that the journey for each athlete is unique, long and sometimes unpredictable, we continue to create cyclic, relatively short-term, quantatively rigid, performance based conditioning models (Bompa, 1999, Fleck & Kraemer, 1987, King 1998). Each model is logically designed to develop those traits deemed ‘make or break’ discriminators of athletic performance. Regardless of the length, style, paradigm or specific methods, each model’s success is based on cyclically varied short-term quantifiable changes to the designated performance training variables under scrutiny.
While it’s important to assess and establish baseline measures and subsequent goals, it is equally important that each plan also operate with strong consideration of the ‘whole’ athlete, including his emotional state, coping skills, physiological profile, lifting technique, instabilities, and injury history. Regardless of the chosen cyclic training system, without a strong focus on technique, stability, movement skill acquisition, and environmental stimuli outside our control, athletes will tend to be progressed faster than their bodies or neuromuscular system can adapt. The result of the ill-advised progression is often a bigger, stronger, faster, muscle imbalanced, unstable and emotional drained athlete, who is a walking time bomb. Eventually, these incredibly well conditioned athletes will succumb to performance drop-off, lost training days, personal health problems or injury.
The purpose of this overview isn’t to discount the value of periodization, sports specificity, and or current practice, but rather to introduce an updated 4 Phase training model specifically designed to help recognize the individual experiences and genetics of athletes. This model can also be sequentially applied to emerging adolescent and rehabilitating athletes. In addition to current periodization practices, the proposed 4-phase athlete development model places a heavy focus on movement quality and technique mastery. The overview will highlight the need to ‘adapt’ currently practiced strength and conditioning models. In addition to a ‘P’repair to Perform (P2P) phase, the proposed model will introduce a modified movement quality periodization and progression designed to specifically prepare and rehab injured athletes for explosive sport performance.

• Featured information on upcoming productive fitness products
• Featured Articles by leading fitness experts
• Payments through Visa/paypal for speedier transactions
• Featured Articles by leading fitness experts
• No more expensive  cross border shipping 
• Faster Shipping times from within Canada

The Great Dumbbell DVD expected to sell out fast!

Training with The Great Dumbbell DVD has many benefits. Simplifying the home gym, this DVD allows full muscle work out, with the convenience of dumbbells. Complete with step by step visual and verbal instructions. The Great Dumbbell DVD is a guide to make your home work out easier, safer and more efficient.

Fitness expert Andre Noel Potvin provided expert consultation through the making of the DVD. The exercises are easy to understand and duplicate, providing dumbbell exercises for basic to advanced levels.

This new DVD is a must for those using dumbbells in your exercise routine, available late 2009 online or in fitness stores near you.

By Roxanne Griese

Fitness experts James Talo and Andre Noel Potvin, provided expert guidance through the making of this DVD.

The New Kettlebell DVD is a great way to discover the merits of Kettlebell lifting; and is easy-to-understand. Available in retail stores & online fall 2009.

By Roxanne Griese