One of my best ab workouts from many years ago was probably about as simple as you can get.  It goes along with what I said in my previous post about sit-ups being the natural --- and, therefore, the best --- abdominal exercise.  One problem with sit-ups, however, is that, when you get good at them, you can do them by the thousands.  In this situation you have to make them harder!  One way to do this is to do “Roman chair” sit-ups.  You do them by sitting across a bench with your feet under something heavy.  Then you do a sit-up, the difference from a conventional sit-up being that you hyperextend your abdominals and touch your head to the floor behind you.  There are many variations of this.  One that I used when the photo was taken was to do Roman chair sit-ups on my basement stairs!  I had devised a way of locking my feet to a step below me and I could hyperextend as much as I wanted.  If I recall correctly, I also held a barbell plate to my chest when I did them.  A famous body builder from my college days, Irwin (Zabo) Koszewski, always won best abs at contests.  His formula for success?  Roman chair sit-ups.  Lots of them!   

When it comes to stomach exercises, sit-ups are king!  Forget about crunches.  Forget about hanging from a bar and raising your legs.  Sure, there are a lot of ways to exercise your abs.  But, sit-ups are the natural movement of the human body that strengthens your abdominals. Let’s face it, whenever you rise up from a lying down position, you do a sit-up.  That’s the motion that your abdominal muscles are there to do.  So, if you want to develop them, treat them like any other muscle on your body.  You just move them in their natural way.  But, you do lots of them and/or you add resistance to the movement.  As far as sit-ups are concerned, it’s possible to do thousands of them.  You can make them harder by holding a barbell plate to your chest, by using an inclined bench, and a few other ways as well.
 
Around seven or eight years ago I got fanatical about doing sit-ups and I recall that I used to do them for a half hour or so while holding a 50 pound barbell to my chest.  Once, back then, I did sit-ups with no weight for roughly an hour and twenty minutes.  Around 1,500 of them.  Marian held my feet down and I watched a movie while I did them.  Aside from the movie, it was pretty boring.  I finally stopped because my shins hurt!  Marian had probably been holding my feet a little too tightly!  My abs were fine.  But, I welcomed the excuse to stop!  There are a lot of photos of me taken at that time in my book, the K*I*S*S* Fitness Program.  At 66 years old my abs still looked pretty good!  Now, at 73, it's a little harder to keep my abs in shape as this old body of mine wants to replace muscle with fat.  All I can do is fight it…
 
In both my exercise books, the K*I*S*S* Fitness Program and the K*I*S*S* Weight Training Program, I use sit-ups as the exercise for strengthening a person’s abs.  The approaches I take in the two books are different.  But, the exercise is the same.  Again, sit-ups are king!   

In my last post I noted that I was running again after a layoff of nearly a month.  Since then I’m now happy to report that I’m again doing my strength exercises.  As I’ve emphasized in all my eBooks, it’s imperative that you get both endurance and strength exercise.  The endurance exercise is so important for the health of your cardiovascular system and the strength work makes your entire life easier.  Both of them make you look good and feel good and help the pounds to slip away if you’re overweight (more about weight loss coming in future posts!).  

Anyway, now, in addition to running, I’m working out with weights regularly.  I’m following the program in my book, the K*I*S*S* Weight Training Program.  In a nutshell, it consists of working out four days per week using a split routine.  Half the exercises are done on Monday and Thursday and the other half are done on Tuesday and Friday.  I like this arrangement for a number of reasons.  One is that there is some flexibility built into it.  For example, last week I couldn’t work out on Tuesday. No problem.  I simply worked out on Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday instead of the normal arrangement.  Don’t fall into the trap of letting a missed workout disappoint you to the extent that you stop exercising all together.  In my book I talk a lot about strategies for overcoming occasional laziness or missed workouts.  I’ve seen so many guys abandon their fitness program because of this. You don’t want to be one of them!
 
I only do two or three exercises each workout --- in addition to sit-ups.  This takes me between a half hour and an hour to get done.  It’s a good workout and I feel it’s more than enough to make significant gains in strength.  In my case I also do some extra warm-up exercises.  This might take another 10 to 20 minutes.  Warming up becomes more and more important the older you get.  You don’t want to strain a muscle or, worse yet, become a candidate for a joint replacement.  
 
There’s a lot happening here with respect to fitness in this family of mine.  In my next post I think I’ll talk about the weight training program I just started Margie on.  She’s 12 years old now and has a lot of potential as both a sprinter and swimmer --- and, I think, as a power lifter!    


 
    

In my last post I indicated that I now have the problem of getting in shape --- again.  The hardest thing about exercising is always getting started.  It doesn't matter if you're a beginner or someone who has laid off and wants to get back at it again.  I'm in that boat now --- and I've been in it countless times before.  The way to get started is to simply do something --- ANYTHING!  Memorize the motto at the bottom of this page!  If you do something, you will always feel better afterward.  Just get started!

So, that's where I'm at right now.  I'm goofing off a little with my strength work (more about that in my next post), but am seriously walking and/or running for a half hour almost every day.  I'm fortunate in that we live on a large piece of land so that, at least two thirds of the year, I can run in my own back yard.  And, that's what I'm doing now.  Running back and forth on a fairly level course across our property.  When I'm in better shape, I'll change direction 90 degrees and run up and down the hill!  My hope is to again be competitive in my age group in 5K races.  Every year there is a "Turkey Trot" here in Norwich, NY, around Thanksgiving time.  So, I have around three months to get in shape.  My objective is an eight minute pace.  We'll see...    

In my training I'm more or less using the procedure for developing endurance that I talk about in the K*I*S*S* Fitness Program book.  It's very simple.  You walk and/or run for a half hour.  As you progress, you gradually replace the walking with running until you're running for the entire time period.  The book goes through a very  structured program for advancing (that's the engineer in me!).  However, this is the basic idea.  I'm prejudiced, of course; but it seems that this method works great.  I feel that I've already made progress in the few weeks that I've been at it again.  Here's hoping that I'll achieve my goal for the coming Thanksgiving race.  I'll let you know what happens!

I didn't mention it in the book but a half hour period of walking and/or running is just about perfect for training for 5K races.  A fast guy will complete the race in under 20 minutes.  Older folks are happy to complete it in a half hour.  The eight minute pace (per mile) that I'm aiming for will amount to around 25 minutes.  So, you can see that running for a half hour per day is pretty good training for this distance.  A thirty minute run is also a very reasonable time period to devote to running every day.  It's not very long but it's still long enough for a person to obtain significant cardiovascular benefit.  

OK, if you haven't started running yet, get with it.  Pick up a copy of the K*I*S*S* Fitness Program if you feel you need help along the way. 

Welcome to the K*I*S*S* Blog!  I hope that what I share here will be interesting and useful to you --- and sometimes even a little entertaining.  Mostly I'll talk about what's new with me and the family as it pertains to health and fitness.  Sometimes I'll get a little nostalgic and reminisce about all this from times past.  I plan to make a post every weekend and will do my best to make them worth your while to read.  Of course, I'll welcome your comments on what I write.  However, I'm afraid that I'll have to screen comments before allowing them to post.  It's unfortunate but some comments on blogs can be inappropriate or are simply useless spam.  Please refrain from promoting websites or products in your comments. 

We just returned from a three week trip to Micronesia, my wife, Marian's, home and where our kids Win and Margie were born.  Win and Margie represented Chuuk as swimmers in the 2014 Micronesian Games held in Pohnpei.  They didn't bring home any medals but Margie came within tenths of a second from a bronze medal in one event.  Not bad for a 12 year old competing against adults...   

Now I have the problem of getting back in shape after three weeks with almost no exercise, not enough sleep, and food that violates many of my dietetic principles.  However, that's life.  I'm back in the groove again and it will take me another three weeks to get into the condition I was in before we left.  I've been through this sort of thing many times before.  All you can do in this situation is get back on track living the way you know you should live.  As far as exercise is concerned, I've decreased the poundages I handle in my weight training routine and will give myself a few weeks to get back to where I was before we went on vacation.  I'll keep you posted on progress...