The following below is an excerpt from an article called "Spring Into Fitness" written by Jennifer Holmes from SuperOnda Magazine. Jennifer contacted me as the "Body Sculpting Expert" and below is the result of the interview. I would like to thank Jennifer and the awesome people from the magazine for the opportunity they gave me to contribute.
Hugo A. Rivera's personal fitness success story was the foundation for his intuitive and easy-to-follow Body Sculpting Bibles.
Train Yourself
Within the last few years, weight training has emerged as a key to lasting weight loss (and a supremely buff bod). While fitness professionals tout its benefits on every magazine and talk show available, the practice remains an essential but often overlooked element of most people's exercise routines. Will it turn your fat into muscle? Give you bigger breasts? Allow you to eat anything you want? Well, no on all accounts. However, SúperOnda approached Hugo A. Rivera, author of "Body Sculpting Bible for Men" and "Body Sculpting Bible for Women," and asked how he thinks utilizing weights could benefit new or existing fitness routines.
His No. 1 piece of advice for SO readers: Don't be afraid of weight training. He especially encourages SO's female readers to start picking up weights – even the little three-pounders – as you will see a noticeable (and rapid) change in your physique compared with just dieting and doing aerobics. Nervous about using the free weights in the male-dominated weight room? Try elastic bands: They come in different levels of resistance, which correspond to a dumbbell equivalent (e.g., 5-lbs, 8-lbs), and can be used anywhere. In addition, Hugo recommends squats and lunges to firm the backside. While they do increase the size of the glute muscles, Hugo iterates, "By dieting and cardio exercise, the fat that is typically stored in this area is reduced. The concurrent increase in the muscle tissue will give your rear a very different appearance – it will look firm and fit, not big and out of shape."
For most guys, the problem is not the absence of weight training, but over-training certain muscle groups. You can spot these guys from across the weight room – either huddled around the chest and shoulder machines, or admiring their lightbulb-shaped silhouettes under fluorescent lamps in the floor-to-ceiling mirrors. Hugo says, " 'Why train legs,' many guys ask me, 'if you can hide them in your jeans." Two reasons: You can't really hide them and the opposite sex criticizes guys with big upper bodies and no legs much more than I do." He hypothesizes that guys ignore their lower halves and overdevelop their chests because leg training is not very enjoyable at first. His recommendation is to start with machine-based exercises such as calf raises, the leg press for thighs, and leg curls for hamstrings. If you can weight train three to four days a week, Hugo suggests splitting your routine in the following manner: Workout No. 1: Chest, back, biceps, triceps; Workout No. 2: Shoulders, thighs, hamstrings, calves.
WEIGHT A SECOND!
Hugo Exposes Training Myths
With a background as a self-trained professional bodybuilder, Hugo A. Rivera knows muscles. After suffering through weight issues as a child, Hugo made it his life's goal to learn and teach practical training methods – incorporating his successful bodybuilding principles – tailored to body sculpting. SO took Hugo to the mat and asked him about some of the biggest fallacies floating around the gym when it comes to lifting weights.
Using weight training for body sculpting will make women look like bodybuilders: Women do not produce as much testosterone as men, so it is impossible for a woman to gain huge amounts of muscle mass. Also, the amount of food required to achieve large increases in muscle mass is not something that most women would ever consume in one day.
Weight training makes you stiff: If you perform all exercises through their full range of motion, flexibility will increase. Exercises like flys, stiff-legged deadlifts, dumbbell presses, and chin-ups stretch the muscle in the bottom range of the movement. Therefore, by performing these exercises correctly, your stretching capabilities will increase.
Weight training turns fat into muscle: This is the equivalent of saying that you can turn any metal into gold. The way a body-sculpting transformation occurs is by gaining muscle through weight training and losing fat through aerobics and diet simultaneously. Again, muscle and fat are very different types of tissue. We cannot turn one into the other.
As long as you exercise you can eat anything you want: How I wish this were true! However, it's not. Our individual metabolism determines how many calories we burn at rest and while we exercise. If we eat many more calories than we consistently burn, our bodies will accumulate those extra calories as fat regardless of the amount of exercise we do.
Excerpt from SuperOnda Magazine
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