1 Exercise – Exercise Routines

 

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• The Women’s Health Big Book of Exercises Four Weeks to a Leaner, Sexier, Healthier YOU! [
• The Men’s Health Big Book of Exercises: Four Weeks to a Leaner, Stronger, More Muscular YOU!

The Women’s Health Big Book of Exercises: Four Weeks to a Leaner, Sexier, Healthier YOU! [Paperback]
Author Adam Campbell

View Details

Product Details
Paperback: 464 pages
Publisher: Rodale Books; 1 edition (December 22, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1605295493
ISBN-13: 978-1605295497
Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 8 x 0.9 inches
Shipping Weight: 2.4 pounds

Editorial Reviews
Product Description
The Women’s Health Big Book of Exercises is the essential workout guide for anyone who wants a better body. As the most comprehensive collection of exercises ever created, this makeover manual is a body-shaping power tool for both beginners and longtime fitness buffs alike. From start to finish, this 480-page makeover manual bulges with hundreds of useful tips, the latest findings in exercise science, and cutting-edge workouts from the world’s top trainers.

Inside The Women’s Health Big Book of Exercises you’ll find:

619 Exercises!
All expertly demonstrated with color photographs, with dozens of movements for every muscle in your body, including:
* More than 100 core exercises! You’ll never run out of ways to sculpt your abs.
* 74 biceps, triceps, and forearm exercises: Tone your arms faster than ever before.
* 64 chest exercises, to burn more calories and even help give your bosom a lift.
* 103 back exercises, to make sure you turn heads in your backless dress.
* 40 shoulder exercises, so you can wear a tank top with confidence.
* 99 quadriceps and calves exercises, to help you look great in a pair of shorts.
* 62 glutes and hamstrings exercises, for the perfect backside.

Hundreds of workouts!
From cover to cover, you’ll quickly see that there’s a training plan for every fitness goal—whether you want to shrink your hip, find your abs, or shape your arms. Highlights include:
* The World’s Greatest 4-Week Diet and Exercise Plan
Lose 10 pounds of pure fat in 30 days! This scientifically proven plan, based on research from the University of Connecticut, shows what’s truly possible when you combine the right kind of diet with the right kind of exercise. You’ll build muscle and lose fat faster than ever.
* The Get-Your-Body-Back (Fast!) Guide
If you’ve never even picked up a weight, you’ll want to try this plan from Joe Dowdell, C.S.C.S. Joe makes his living training models, athletes, and celebrities, and has worked with such names as Anne Hathaway, Claire Danes, Molly Sims, and Kate Hudson, as well as Victoria’s Secret and Sports Illustrated swimsuit models. And the strategies he uses when designing workouts for his high-profile clientele are the same ones he employs to help you quickly burn fat, firm up, and improve your overall fitness.
* The Bikini-Ready Workout
This fitness plan will help you flatten your stomach and tighten your butt. It’s designed by celebrity trainer Valerie Waters, who has perfected the body-shaping workouts you’ll find here on dozens of Hollywood stars, including Jennifer Garner, Rachel Nichols, Kate Beckinsale, and Jessica Biel. Add your name to Valerie’s client list to tone your total body and feel more confident than ever.
* The Skinny Jeans Workout
Want to look sexier in a pair of Sevens? Try this routine from Women’s Health fitness advisor Rachel Cosgrove, CSCS. In a pilot study at Rachel’s gym, clients who tried the plan dropped two jean sizes in just 8 weeks.

And:
* The Wedding Workout
Look great—just in time for the big day (and your honeymoon!)
* The Hard-Body Workout
Use this 12-week plan to tone your legs, arms, and abs faster than ever
* The Lose-the-Last-10-Pounds Workout
Your guide to finishing off that last bit of flab for good
* The Total-body Arm-shaping Workout
Blast fat as you shape and firm your arms
* The Best Three-Exercise Workouts
Shrink your hips with just three simple moves
* The Prenatal Workout
Stay fit and healthy during your pregnancy
* The Best Workouts for a Crowded Gym
Sculpt a lean, fit body—no waiting!
* The Time-Saving Couples Workout
Burn fat together (it’s the secret to better sex!)
* The Best Bodyweight Workouts
Take your workout anywhere with these no-weight routines
* The 10 Best 15-Minute Workouts
Bust stress, blast fat, and build muscle in almost no time

Plus:
Every page of The Women’s Health Big Book of Exercises is filled with the fitness and nutrition tips and tricks you need to sculpt the body you want.
Throughout the book, you’ll discover:
* The secret to burning 40 percent more fat.
* The 18 fitness mistakes you should never make
* The best stretch for every muscle
* The fastest cardio workout of all-time (just 4 minutes!)
* The best exercises you’ve never done
* The 8 healthiest foods you aren’t eating
* The 4 perfect fitness foods
* The 25 super snacks that keep you lean
* The 5 biggest nutrition lies—exposed!
* The truth about saturated fat
* The simple way to master the pushup
* The 20 ways lifting weights helps you look great, stay healthy, and live longer

About the Author
Adam Campbell is the fitness director for Women’s Health and a National Magazine Award-winning writer. He holds a master’s degree in exercise physiology and is a NSCA-certified strength and conditioning coach. Campbell has appeared on Good Morning America, The Early Show, and VH-1.

Reviews : The Women’s Health Big Book of Exercises: Four Weeks to a Leaner, Sexier, Healthier YOU! (Paperback)

Awesome book!,
This is the second time I have bought the book. The first time was for me. I am now buying it again for a friend.
It is well-written, easy to understand, and has great color pictures explaining each exercise. The book is broken down into major muscle groups, with an intro to each chapter going over the muscles. You can mix and match on your own or use one of their suggested routines. There is also a section on nutrition as well as muscle and exercise physiology. I am a veterinarian and still

Learned a lot of physiology from this book.
I followed their simple, low carb diet and did the “get your body back workout”. I have lost 20 # in 3 months! I think this is a great book for someone starting out or even a more-experienced exerciser looking for a new routine.
One of the best fitness books ever.,
I’ve been into fitness and healthy lifestyle all my life. I’ve purchased countless books and DVD’s (at one time VHS tapes) on the subject and I have to say that this book is in my top 5. Maybe even top 3.
The photos are outstanding. The exercises are excellent. The information in this book is simply awesome.
The diet section of this book is also great for a general “good health and weight loss” program. Follow this and you will see results. But, if you really want to “get ripped” and blow everyone away in a bikini come summer time (awesome abs, super sexy butt and legs, well defined arms, etc), most people will have to diet harder than this book suggests.
If you’re on the fence on this book, get off of it and buy it. It will help you no matter what stage of fitness you are at.

Most comprehensive women’s fitness book,
Received this item very quickly and in excellent condition. Would recommended this dealer .

Best Fitness Book EVER!,
Absolutely love this book!! My husband and I both got one (he got the men’s one). We’ve been doing the 4 week diet/fitness program for 2 weeks. He’s lost 14 lbs, and I’ve lost 6. Its all the information on dieting and fitness you’ll ever need.

Excellent Resource,
I work in physical therapy and as a personal trainer and this is one of the best exercise books I have ever seen. Not only is it full of good exercises, but the pictures show them being done with perfect form (something you don’t see often.) It is the only book of exercises I would recommend to everyone.

Great book,
Just what I was looking for. Lots of exercises, many you dont need any equipment for.

Love this book,
I love this book. I was looking for a book that would provide various types of exercises for different muscle groups, and this book provided just that. I am able to customize my very own weight training routine or follow one of the guides that a trainer has already put together. The diet is easy to follow, because I was the type of person who hated following diets that told me exactly what to eat. I would recommend this book to anyone.

Great Book,
This book has a lot of diet and exercise information. The guides on how to do the listed exercises are helpful.

The Trick to this Program…DO IT!,
This book has helped me trim and tone my body. I started the “Bikini Workout” in April 2010 and am currently doing the “Hard Body Workout.” I do the full body workout three times per week (as recommended in the book) in addition to cardio (6 days per week). I’ve lost nearly 15 pounds and over 3 inches, and work out no longer than an hour each day.
Prior to beginning this program I never knew what to do for strength/weight training. The Women’s Big Book of Exercises gives you a very detailed plan, awesome images to model, and even includes diet plans.
The trick to getting yourself in shape is simple… Eat healthy and work out! Just DO IT

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• The Men’s Health Big Book of Exercises: Four Weeks to a Leaner, Stronger, More Muscular YOU!

The Men’s Health Big Book of Exercises: Four Weeks to a Leaner, Stronger, More Muscular YOU! [Paperback]
Author Adam Campbell

View Details

Product Details
Paperback: 480 pages
Publisher: Rodale Books; 1 edition (December 22, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1605295507
ISBN-13: 978-1605295503
Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 8 x 0.9 inches
Shipping Weight: 2.4 pounds

Editorial Reviews
Product Description
The Men’s Health Big Book of Exercises is the essential workout guide for anyone who wants a better body. As the most comprehensive collection of exercises ever created, this book is a body-shaping power tool for both beginners and longtime lifters alike. From start to finish, this 480-page muscle manual bulges with hundreds of useful tips, the latest findings in exercise science, and cutting-edge workouts from the world’s top trainers. Inside The Men’s Health Big Book of Exercises you’ll find:619 Exercises!
All expertly demonstrated with color photographs, with dozens of movements for every muscle in your body, including:
* More than 100 core exercises! You’ll never run out of ways to sculpt your six-pack.
* 74 biceps, triceps, and forearm exercises: Build your arms faster than ever before.
* 64 chest exercises, and featuring dozens of variations of the pushup and bench press.
* 103 back exercises, so you can carve a v-shaped torso.
* 40 shoulder exercises, for a tank-top worthy torso.
* 99 quadriceps and calves exercises, to help you jump higher and run faster.
* 62 glutes and hamstrings exercises, for a more powerful, athletic body.Hundreds of workouts!

From cover to cover, you’ll quickly see that there’s a training plan for every fitness goal—whether you want to shrink your hip, find your abs, or shape your arms. Highlights include:* The World’s Greatest 4-Week Diet and Exercise Plan
Lose 10 pounds of pure fat in 30 days! This scientifically proven plan, based on research from the University of Connecticut, shows what’s truly possible when you combine the right kind of diet with the right kind of exercise. You’ll build muscle and lose fat faster than ever.* 64 Ways to Add Inches to Your Arms
You’ll learn how to mix-and-match the 12 best biceps exercises to create scores of sleeve-busting routines. The upshot: You’ll never get stuck in a muscle-building rut again!* The Get Back In Shape (Fast!) Guide
If you’ve never even picked up a weight, you’ll want to try this plan from Joe Dowdell, C.S.C.S. Joe makes his living training celebrities, cover models, and professional athletes, such as NBA stars Troy Murphy and Mike Dunleavy. And the strategies he uses when designing workouts for his high-profile clientele are the same ones he employs to help you burn fat, build muscle, and get back in shape.* The Ultimate Fat Loss Plan
You might call this the six-pack workout. That’s because it’s designed to help you finally finish off the flab that’s hiding your abs. Created by Bill Hartman, P.T., C.S.C.S., a top fitness advisor to Men’s Health, it’s based entirely on the new science of fat loss. From the sets to the reps to the rest, every part of this workout is designed to optimize your body’s ability to burn away belly-fat.
And:* Boost Your Bench Press by 50 Pounds in 8 Weeks
World-class powerlifter Dave Tate shares the strategies that helped him lift a personal best of 610 pounds
* Triple Your Chinups in 6 Weeks
Use this simple routine that to master one of the world’s greatest muscle-building exercises* Add 4 to 10 inches to Your Vertical Leap
This high-flying plan from strength coach Kelly Baggett will have you jumping out of the gym in no time
* The Beach Ready Body Workout
Get-strong to get-big—this 8-week plan shows you how
* The Wedding Workout
Look great—just in time for the big day (and your honeymoon!)* The Best Sports Workout
Train like an athlete, look like an athlete* The Scrawny to Brawny Workout
Pack on muscle fast: your 4-week plan
* The Best Workouts for a Crowded Gym
Sculpt a lean, fit body—no waiting!* The Best Bodyweight Workouts
Take your workout anywhere with these no-weight routines
* The 10 Best 15-Minute Workouts
Bust stress, blast fat, and build muscle in almost no time* The 7-Minute Back-Saving Workout
End low-back pain for good!Plus:
Every page of The Men’s Health Big Book of Exercises is filled with the fitness and nutrition tips and tricks you need to sculpt the body you want.Throughout the book, you’ll discover:* The secret to burning 40 percent more fat.
* The 18 muscle mistakes you should never make
* The best stretch for every muscle
* The fastest cardio workout of all-time (just 4 minutes!)
* The best exercises you’ve never done
* The 8 healthiest foods you aren’t eating
* The 4 surprising foods that build muscle
* The 25 super snacks that keep you lean
* The 5 biggest nutrition myths, busted
* The truth about saturated fat
* The perfect foods to fuel your workouts
* The complete guide to protein powders
* The 20 ways lifting weights helps you look great, stay healthy, and live longer

About the Author
ADAM CAMPBELL, is the fitness director for Men’s Health and a National Magazine Award-winning writer. He holds a master’s degree in exercise physiology and is a NSCA-certified strength and conditioning coach. Campbell has appeared on Good Morning America, The Early Show, and VH-1.

Reviews : The Men’s Health Big Book of Exercises: Four Weeks to a Leaner, Stronger, More Muscular YOU! (Kindle Edition)

If found the kindle version of very poor quality. I downloaded it on both my kindle and kindle for pc, and it’s still very difficult to use, even though the computer version includes the color. That’s not the kind of book you want to get on a kindle… very bad when you need to go from the programs (second half) to the exercises (first half of the book). I’m going to buy the paper version which I should have got in the first place.

Great Book!,
Excellent Book! It is down to earth and lets you know how to perform each exercise and answers all beginner’s questions on what exercises to do, pictures for each exercise and the writer keeps your attention. Great Buy! Everyone at work wants my book now!

Great exercises and instructions,
The only thing keeping it from getting that last .5 is what everyone else is saying. The book doesn’t necessarily tell you how you are working the muscle but once you do try it you can feel what it is hitting. It has a few notes on what affects the muscles and how but not for every exercise. Overall, it’s great book, especially for someone who works out at home and needs help with changing up their workouts.

One of the best fitness books ever.,
I’ve been into fitness and healthy lifestyle all my life. I’ve purchased countless books on the subject and I have to say that this book is in my top 5. Maybe even top 3.
The photos are outstanding. The exercises are excellent. The information in this book is simply awesome.
The diet section of this book is also great for a general “good health and weight loss” program. Follow this and you will see results. But, if you really want to “get ripped” and look awesome at the beach come summer time (awesome abs, wicked chest, swooping quads, bulging hamstrings, etc), most people will have to diet harder than this book suggests.
If you’re on the fence on this book, get off of it and buy it. It will help you no matter what stage of fitness you are at.
Bought this book as a gift for my boyfriend and he loved it! He has told me several times how much he likes it.

Best Fitness Book EVER!!,
I bought this for my husband because he was having a hard time finding motivation to work out. This has been amazing. The 4 week diet/fitness program in it is great, we’re halfway through and he’s already lost 14 lbs and I’ve lost 6. You will never need another fitness book again.

Clear, concise and common sense!,
I received this book a week ago and have not been able to put it down since. I have been in the military and played sports to a high level since I was a teenager. As such I have trained my body for nearly 18 years and this book opened my eyes to several new facets of workingout, including nutrition. A lot is common sense with the rest being new findings. Either or, I found this book a fascinating reference from new styles of various training methods, to great planned workouts, tons of different exercises with the best at the end of each respective chapter and a wealth of nutritional information. Seems most of our “common knowledge” has been dictated to us by the large cereal/ baking corporations. Not to mention the findings on saturated fats! There are even sections recommending what types of protein supplements to take, despite a previous reviewer saying to the contrary…
All round, wether you are a rookie to this or a veteran, it has something for you. Just read through it and trust what the guy says, you will wreap the rewards.

Read it before start training!,
It’s a good book for whole who make sport or just movement: read it and you’ll go on the next stage of your training.
Men’s Health Big Book of Exercises,
I purchased this book at my son’s request and he loves it. It can in a timely manner and was in great shape.

Amazing!!,
This an amazing book. I recommend it. It has plenty of exercices and programs. it’s totally worth the price.

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Anatomy of Exercise: A Trainer’s Inside Guide to Your Workout [Paperback]
Author Pat Manocchia

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Product Details
Paperback: 192 pages
Publisher: Firefly Books; 1 edition (March 1, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1554073855
ISBN-13: 978-1554073856
Product Dimensions: 10.9 x 8.7 x 0.9 inches
Shipping Weight: 2.4 pounds
Editorial Reviews
Review
A great motivator… Anatomy of Exercise is critical reading for those who want to acquire the best body they can. (Shelf Life 08-09)
Distinctive to [Duke's] approach: her encouragement to appreciate our bodies instead of aiming for an ideal that may not exist. (Library Journal Xpress Reviews )
Exercise books abound — filled with how-to photos of various exercises. But here’s one with a bit of a different focus. (I Seiberling Regina Post )
The computer-generated illustrations of the muscles recruited to perform each exercise are cool. (Steve Jacob Star Telegram (Dallas-Fort Worth) )
A fascinating book…. Recommended to medium-sized and large public libraries as well as high school and undergraduate collections. (Shannon Graff Hysell American Reference Book Annual )

Product Description
Anatomy of Exercise is revolutionary for its insights into how different muscles of the body actually work during exercise. The book is organized by body area and shows common sequences in the progression of a typical workout. Lifelike anatomical illustrations demonstrate each exercise and reveal in colorful detail exactly which muscles are engaged, which are being conditioned and how those muscles respond.
The following features help the reader gain the greatest benefit from each exercise and thereby improve fitness and well-being:
Detailed, full-color anatomical illustrations for all the exercises
Annotations identifying the active and stabilizing muscles
Concise how-to instructions for each exercise
Identification of the specific muscles that benefit the most from each exercise
Suggested modifications for different levels of difficulty
Instructions on stabilizing the body throughout each movement
A visual index of exercises that allows easy navigation through the book
A glossary of anatomical terms.
No other book provides such rich detail tailored to the general reader. Beginners, those already committed to exercise, competing athletes, trainers, coaches, physiotherapists, massage therapists and the many others involved in fitness will find Anatomy of Exercise fascinating, instructive and practical. (200902)

About the Author
Pat Manocchia is the owner, founder and director of La Paletra Center for Preventative Medicine in New York City. A pioneer in the integration of health and medicine, he was the fitness expert for Good Morning America and was contributing editor to Women’s Sports and Fitness and Allure magazines.

Introduction
This is not the first book ever written that concerns itself with the anatomical structures that are involved in exercise, nor is it intended to be the final word. It is not meant to be an exhaustive exploration of exercise vocabulary either. This book takes a unique and comprehensive stance on the anatomy of exercise, useful to laymen and professional alike.
Predominately, books that have included exercises with anatomical representations, whether or not they included instructions for performing the exercises, were targeted at two groups of readers: body builders and scientists. What I’ve tried to do with this book is to make this kind of information accessible and useful to anyone who exercises, including bodybuilders and scientists. To that end, this book includes exercise types typically overlooked in similar works, such as aerobic activities, stretches, and stability work. Moreover, this book takes into consideration the ways in which the body’s systems depend on one another to generate movement.
In other texts of this nature, exercises have for the most part been depicted as using a specific muscle group because the book was intended to show how to develop size or strength in that particular muscle or group. Unfortunately, what often doesn’t get mentioned is how the adjacent muscles and structures, as well as some that are not directly or obviously involved, contribute to the exercises and subsequent improvement. Hip and spine position, for instance, contribute to almost every major exercise and are integral not only to the proper biomechanics of a given movement, but the subsequent improvement of the targeted muscle.
For each exercise, the muscles indicated in the illustrations are identified as the ones that are primarily involved in the movement, whether they are active or stabilizing. Active or primary muscles are defined as those that contract to move a structure, while stabilizing muscles are defined as those that either co-contract, or, by their activation, stabilize either the primary or a secondary structure to allow movement. In a push-up, for instance, the primary active muscles act to extend the elbow and adduct the humerus (upper arm) at the shoulder joint. Primary stabilizers act to ensure that the elbow and shoulder joints remain steady and track properly; however, without the contraction of the deep spinal and pelvic musculature, as well as anterior leg musculature that contract to keep those joints stable and allow the ankle joint to act as a fulcrum, the movement is not possible.
The contribution of the secondary stabilizers varies in degree, depending on the movement. For example, in a barbell curl, since the weight is in front of the body and is translated in a curvilinear fashion that creates a greater forward lever and subsequent need for stabilization as it moves upward, the back and hip muscles become more relevant with regard to movement contribution. If the movement could simply not be performed without the contribution of these muscles, they were included.
The point here is to make the reader aware that during any given movement, some muscles that may not play a major role in the actual execution may still be necessary contributors for proper biomechanics and form while the exercise is being performed. The basic method I used to determine this was to ask whether or not the movement could be performed if the secondary stabilizers were injured, but readers should be aware that the specifics are open to some debate.
There is an enormous amount of variation that can be made to these exercises, since for any one single exercise there are perhaps four or five different ways to alter the stimulus (by changing the grip, foot position, altering the speed of the movement, and so forth). I have included some of these variations for many of the exercises.
This book contains the basic exercise vocabulary that any program can, and should, be built around, whether you are an elite athlete, a raw beginner, or are suffering from an injury. The specific exercises to use as well as intensity (the weight used, when relevant), volume (number of sets and repetitions), duration (time per session), and frequency (sessions per week) will all be determined by your own specific capacities and goals. The best and most effective way to determine these things is to consult a professional in the fitness/wellness/strength training profession for a program and prescription that suits your unique abilities and objectives.
The text is laid out in a structure that mimics the progression of a typical workout. While the text encompasses all of the elements pursuant to a comprehensive workout, it is not intended to be prescriptive in any way. The best use of this book is as a reference manual for understanding both positioning and muscular involvement for the included exercises, and should stimulate some thought, when performing a given exercise, about how the rest of your body plays a part in any particular movement.

Reviews : Anatomy of Exercise: A Trainer’s Inside Guide to Your Workout (Paperback)

Very useful book,
I found it very useful and I am trying to use it for my training.

Picture worth a thousand words,
Excellent illustations show neuro-muscular activation for each exercise. Stresses the importance of stabilization muscles as you are as strong as your core stabilizers. Very good hints for each exercise, things to focus on and things to avoid. I am using it daily as a personal trainer and conditioning coach

Great Illustrations but limited number of exercises included.,
The illustrations in this book are great. The only problem is the number of exercises included was limited. I expected to see a number more of actual exercises. It’s great for seeing exactly which muscle or muscle is group being worked, just needs more.
I purchased this book several weeks ago and have reviewed its contents. I wish I had known before what exercises benefit which muscles. It’s good to have this information. I think it’s a good reference book.
Fast service,
The book was shipped very fast, and arrived in good condition, I would recommend buying from this seller to anyone.

The Definitive Guide to Exercise,
If you’re looking for a ‘Dummies’-type volume that will show you an introductory workout (and there’s nothing wrong with that), then this is not the book for you. What Pat Manocchia has assembled here is the ‘Larousse Gastronomique’ of fitness, strength training in particular. Every major exercise (squats, biceps curls) is examined in depth, and broken down both by the steps involved and by the muscles affected. You’ll soon find yourself dipping in mid-workout to check your technique or find out if your strength routine has any holes. A classic.

Love it. As an athlete and personal trainer!,
This is a great book! Don’t miss it if you are an athlete or in the personal training/coaching field!
Certified Personal Trainer Licensed Massge Therapist Teacher/Coach

Best In Class,
Up until now, my favorite training book was ‘The Encyclopedia of Bodybuilding’ by Arnold Schwarzenegger. The book was loaded with meticulous details, and who better to explain them than Arnold?
Now here comes Mr. Manocchia with ‘Anatomy of Exercise’.
Pat explains in full detail which exercise/movement impacts which muscle, and includes a picture of exactly which muscle(s) are involved. You really can’t get a better book than this. It includes EVERYTHING you’ll need to tailor your workouts, and you’ll be extremely well informed.

Extremely Insightful and Helpful,
I am just a regular person who likes to work out, and I found this book to be very clearly written and understandable as well as being insightful and helpful to me as I go about my exercise routine which includes aerobic, stretch, stability and weight exercises.
I am learning how particular excercises can benefit different areas of my body and muscles and also understanding and seeing how the positions and movement impact my muscles. It has already been helpful in curing some muscle pain I’ve had. Excellent book for the lay person!

Getting to know my muscles,
This is a great book for people from beginner to advanced in working out! It will show which prime muscles are being used as well as the synergyst muscles. It also demonstrates ways to make the move harder or easier depending on what level you are at and so that you do not injure yourself. The pictures are great and very helpful. This is a very good book!

Extremely Insightful and Helpful,
I am just a regular person who likes to work out, and I found this book to be very clearly written and understandable as well as being insightful and helpful to me as I go about my exercise routine which includes aerobic, stretch, stability and weight exercises.
I am learning how particular excercises can benefit different areas of my body and muscles and also understanding and seeing how the positions and movement impact my muscles. It has already been helpful in curing some muscle pain I’ve had. Excellent book for the lay person!

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101 Ways to Work Out with Weights: Effective Exercises to Sculpt Your Body and Burn Fat! [Paperback]
Author Cindy Whitmarsh
Foreword Kerri Walsh

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Product Details
Paperback: 192 pages
Publisher: Fair Winds Press (December 1, 2006)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1592332161
ISBN-13: 978-1592332168
Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.5 x 0.6 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds

Product Description
A book for women who want to improve or start a weight-lifting routine.
Another follow-up to our successful 101 Ways to Work Out on the Ball, this book targets another piece of inexpensive yet powerful equipment – dumbbells. Many people buy them but either use them incorrectly or not at all because they’re not sure how. This book gives 101 different exercises for upper and lower body that you can do in the gym or at home. Strength training can actually change the shape of your body, improve your metabolism, and build bone strength – but most women aren’t sure how to do it. This book makes it easy to reap the enormous benefits of weight training?in your own home.

About the Author
Cindy Whitmarsh is a licensed sports nutritionist and fitness instructor. She founded Ultrafit Nutrition Systems in 1997 and has expanded Ultrafit to 6 locations in San Diego and other cities throughout the US. Cindy is the fitness/nutrition expert for KUSI news in San Diego, also for some of the top San Diego Charger players as well as the San Diego Charger girls. She is the author of Ultrafit Cooking, UltraFit, and she created and starred in “Ultrafit Fat Burning Workout.” She also starred in “10 Minute Solution”, a Target toning DVD. Cindy recently founded Ultrafit Kids and Ultrafit Food on the Go!
Kerri Walsh and her teammate Misty May brought home the Gold Medal in the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens, Greece. It was the first Women’s Beach Volleyball Gold Medal for the United States in US Olympic history.

Reviews: 101 Ways to Work Out with Weights: Effective Exercises to Sculpt Your Body and Burn Fat! (Paperback)

Gift for my wife
I got this for her and I routinely see her with the book out and doing the exercises, so I can only conclude that there is one happy owner of the book out there.

Wonderful Book!
This book, 101 Ways To Work Out With Weights, should be a part of every woman’s library. I so love this book because the exercises have helped my body become stronger more limber and toned. The instructions and pictures with every exercise make it so easy to follow. There are exercises for beginners to advanced. Any woman can follow the exercises no matter what physical shape they are in. Thanks to this book I will never stop working out with weights as the benefits make it all worth while.

Great At-Home Free Weight Workout Book,
This book was exactly what I was looking for– workout moves with free weights that I can do from home. The layout is great & I like how each move is marked with a fitness level. Additionally, each move is easily understood thanks to the helpful pictures that go with each step. I only have two very minor complaints– I wish the warm-up section was non- free weight workouts but stretches instead. And it’d be a lot easier to use during a workout if it was spiral-bound.

Good book,
If you need some exercises this book has them. Nothing new, nothing revolutionary, nothing bad.

101 ways to workout with weights,
This is a great book for those wanting variety and the ability to build their own workout routines. I love that she includes lots of compound exercises, which means you are working lots of muscle groups at the same time, rather than just one muscle group. Includes a section on working out with a slipping towel on a smooth floor, which I haven’t done yet but it’s something different I might work on later. Lots of suggested workouts for each body area as well as mesomorph, ectomorph ect Can work as a diet, weightloss, sculpting program as she includes a suggested diet (very stringent and involves her own protein products though). But I just use it to supplement what I already do and provide some interesting variety and its great for that.

Comprehensive Classic,
A good book that has many illustrated exercises that are useful for all types of fitness enthusiasts. the pictures are clear and the paper and print quality are excellent. however you could have also used a male model for some of the exercises which would have made it look like a book for men and women.

Love the variety,
This is a great book for creating workouts when you don’t have access to a gym. All you need are a few simple props, a few hand weights, and you’re good to go!
101 Weights is one of the best I have seen as a Head Coach & Trainer in 30 years… specifically targeted for women. Makes knowing how the body works …easy.

LOVE this book!,
101 Ways to Work Out With Weights got me started lifting weights again after several years of neglect. I don’t care for gyms and this book has helped me develop a great weight lifting program in the comfort of my own home. And I never get bored because there are so many exercises, combinations and routines I can do, many of which I’d never done before. Excellent descriptions and photos ensure I’m lifting properly.

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Healing Back Pain Naturally: The Mind-Body Program Proven to Work [Paperback]

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Product Details
Paperback: 320 pages
Publisher: Pocket; 1st, First Edition edition (May 22, 2001)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0743424646
ISBN-13: 978-0743424646
Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.9 x 0.7 inches
Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces

From Library Journal
After abusing his back for years, Brownstein, a practicing physician, turned to conventional medicine for relief. Surgery did not reduce the pain and led to an ongoing use of strong painkillers. Frustrated, Brownstein embarked on his own self-healing journey. The knowledge he acquired from yoga, meditation, diet, relaxation, and deep breathing was channeled into a program he calls Back To Life. Unlike the quick fixes offered by conventional medicine, Brownstein’s program works holistically and requires changing unhealthy life patterns. He introduces the reader to a stretching program and strengthening exercises (demonstrated in black-and-white photos), then covers stress management, nutrition, return to work, and the psycho-spiritual elements of recovery. This is a readable book, less blunt than John Sarno’s groundbreaking Healing Back Pain: The Mind-Body Connection (Warner, 1991). Back pain sufferers disappointed by conventional approaches will want this. Recommended for consumer health collections.ALisa McCormick, Health Sciences Lib., Jewish Hosp., Cincinnati

From Kirkus Reviews
How to improve back health through exercise, yoga-based stretches, and stress reductiona reasonable plan. Brownstein (a clinical instructor of medicine at the University of Hawaii, Manoa) suffered multiple injuries and severe back pain for 20 years; when traditional medicines and surgery failed to help, he found relief by creating a regimen drawing on yoga, meditation, and other alternative therapies. His program is sound, and his starting point valuablerather than looking for an initiating catastrophic injury as the basis for designing treatment, chronic back pain sufferers would do better to understand their acute event as the culmination of years of stress, poor body mechanics, and possible weight and nutrition problems. His second important point is that almost all back pain originates in the muscles (rather than bone or other structures). This program is aimed, therefore at muscular fitness, principally with the extensive, progressive stretches based on yoga poses. Brownstein is careful to give appropriate cautions along the way: when to seek medical help, possible signs of serious disease. Nutritional advice, stress- reduction exercises, advice on lifestyle changes, and “Emotional and Spiritual Lessons for Healing” round out the program. Reliable advice for a common problem, with a spiritual/yoga flavor that will have special appeal for some sufferers.

Review
Bernie Siegel, M.D. author of Love, Medicine & Miracles and Prescriptions for Living The future treatment of back pain is here today with Dr. Brownstein’s truly revolutionary program. I hope that everyone who suffers from back pain will read his book and heed its wisdom.

Reviews: Healing Back Pain Naturally: The Mind-Body Program Proven to Work (Paperback)
Life changing
I purchased this book about 8 years ago after having debilitating back pain for 15 years. I did not work for 3 years due to the pain and stiffness (spasm). I had tried everything, massage, PT, exercise, injections, epidurals, rest, ice, heat, had MRI’s, went to pain clinics. I was told I had degenerative disc disease. I could have a fusion but it might not help. I could not sit for more than 15 minutes at a time. My life became very restrictive and I missed a lot of functions and travels with my family because the price (back spasms) was too high to pay. I saw Dr Brownstein on a TV show and I purchased his book. I started with his back program slowly and took to heart the section on stress and emotion and back pain. It all makes sense but I never connected it before. I realize now that I can get back pain with stress as that’s my weak point physically. His book has given me tools to manage and control my response to the stress and pain. I don’t have long periods of incapacity as I did before. I feel more in control instead of my back controlling me. I do the exercises and stretching faithfully every day, even on vacation. My life has completely changed over the years. It has been slow but steady. I can now drive for 2 hours at a time. I can go on long vacations as I have learned to manage my back. My problems have not all gone away but the flare ups are fewer and last shorter periods of time. You need to stick with the program as it is not a quick fix but it really works.

Helping so far!,
I bought this book because I have been having back problems since a car accident 2 years ago. I’ve gone for massages and practice pilates- which have helped, but the tension and pain always seem to come back. A couple of months ago I started having a sharper pain in my back and looked for help online. I found this book! I have been stretching and doing some of the exercises every day and my back has definitely improved! I would definitely recommend this book. My back has loosened up and the sharp pain is gone. My back is still a little tense sometimes, but I am hoping that will continue to decrease- I have only been doing the exercises a few weeks.

real help for back pain,
I can’t say enough to explain how great this book is: it works! I had severe back pain due to injury and arthritis – and this book gave me the tools for recovery. Even my physician keeps a copy to loan to patients. I have given copies to several friends and their results were also positive. Highest recommendation.

The most important book I have read about back pain,
I was in severe pain with three herniated disks at L3,4 and 5 when I ordered this book. I read it in pain when I could not barely walk. I was very emotional reading it as I was feeling despair and having a grim outlook on life. Back pain is not a terminal illness, but it feels like your life is over. As I got through the book, I realized he was 100% perecent right about the mind-body approach combined with stretching a healthy life. His medical approach also matched exactly what I was hearing from my physical therapist. His words resonated very deeply with me and I am much better now after many months of working on my natural healing. The main thing, there is no quick fix, only a long term committment and approach to a healthy back. Thank god for this book. I would have caved to surgery unnecessarily.

Very Usefull!,
We love this book! It’s helped us out more than once with back pain.
Thank you!
Thank you Dr., this changed my life,
Quite simply this book has dramatically changed my life for the better. I thought I knew it all so it took me 15 years to actually buy a book about back pain.

There is lots and lots of very helpful advice. The things that made the most difference for me were Deep Relaxation, jogging to get glute muscles, and proper hamstring stretching.

My back is better than it has been in years and my fear is much lower. I learned a lot about my cycles of fear and stress and how that made things worse for me. When my back went out on me a few months ago, just before i bought this book, I basically hit rock bottom mentally. Due to what I have learned, even if my back goes out on me again, it will never be that bad because I have taken control of my emotions. This book filled me with hope and my belief in it has truly helped me.

Lastly, I believe that this book could only be written by someone who had gone through it himself. To the Dr. in case he ever reads this, thank you so much for writing this book.

Saved my life,
I was suffering from years of lower back pain. My solution was self medication and rest whenever the pain was too severe to do anything else. Surgery was an option that I was finally seriously considering.

And then my daughter-in-law sent me this book. She said her boss though it was the best book he had ever read on helping people suffering from back pain. Obviously I was very motivated to read it because my pain had lead to a very depressing existence.

It was very refreshing to learn that the author was not just a doctor prescribing his/her remedy. This “story” was by someone who was suffering very much like me. The difference was that he had resources to investigate the actual cause of his problem, medically and mentally and the skills to write about it.

The first half of the book tells his story and what he learned. There are many great anatomical (spelling?) images that made it much more clear what was happening and which muscles influenced that area.

The story and information is so accurate that it would have been stupid to not attempt his methods. It is much like yoga (not that I have any experience) but I can now say that 4 years later, after lots of hard work, I’ve only had one recurrence of minor back spasms. It requires daily work to make sure I stay stretched and strong in certain areas but NO MORE BACK PAIN.

Practical solution,
Excellent book. Just what I needed. The author is a doctor and past back pain sufferer so he is very qualified to write on this subject. The book is very practical.It is a true self help book. I used it in conjunction with weekly physiotherapy ( after seeing a doctor) over a 4 week period to reduce my sciatic pain and difficulty in walking. I could hardly sit. The pain woke me up several times a night. Not any more. It may take me weeks or a month or more to get back to normal. If you follow the wise and compassionate advice in this book -physical emotional nutritional spiritual- and listen, really listen, to your body -all on a daily basis and also seek medical help to diagnose the problem, I believe you stand a good chance of a cure. Small regular progress and patience and trust over weeks or months may be all that is needed to heal this marvellous machine that is our body.

HEALING BACK PAIN NATURALLY,
Outstanding, very helpful and lacking in the hubris of certain other health gurus. This is an easy read and a workable program of exercise that leads up to ( in my case ) a better quality of life without scars on my back.

Good insights about pain, but read it critically,
I bought this book over a year ago when my lower back pain became intractable. I had been in a car accident nine years earlier and through the years the pain got progressively worse and the episodes longer. Brownstein is good at assembling a lot of information and advice in a single, very readable book, but none of it is particularly original.
The most compelling, and also most problematic, part of the book is Brownstein’s discussion of his own ordeal with back pain.
I cringe at books that attribute physical pain or disease to psychological trauma. Brownstein indulges in a very typically American mentality that equates physical illness with moral or emotional deficits. Sarno invented a diagnosis, accepted by no one in mainstream medicine, that repressed anger creates muscle tension which creates back pain. He rejects the now proven fact that discs cause pain, i.e. there are pain receptors in the outer layers of the disc that send signals to the brain when the disc nucleus ruptures and irritates the nerve endings in the disc. The lower spine itself is the main relay station for the peripheral nervous system and any disorder, be it muscular or due to a spinal anomaly, will trigger plenty of pain receptors.
Brownstein also focuses a lot on self-destructive behavior that leads to back pain. Here we run into the classic mind-body mess that is so appealing to readers because it provides a sort of Puritanical religious hope that if you just get your life together, you will overcome your pain.
This notion is nonsense. There are far too many people indulging in self-destructive behaviors who have no back pain. What lucky souls they must be, if we are to believe Brownstein’s conclusion.
Having said that, I will recommend this book as an antidote to the surgery-obsessed approach to back pain that is driven more by economic considerations than sound medicine. How many horror stories do we hear of people (like me) who had back surgery only to feel worse? I completely agree with Brownstein that exercise, stretching, yoga (safe yoga) and meditation are your best bet in dealing with back pain. If nothing else, the passage of time usually takes care of most flare-ups.
The book’s advice on exercise etc. is hardly original.

Art Brownstein’s program works for me!,
I would give this book 6 stars if I could. The yoga-based exercises Dr. Brownstein describes and illustrates so clearly saved me from the expense, pain, and risk of a lumbar laminectomy to remove a synovial cyst at the right L4/L5 facet joint. I didn’t even know I had a back problem until I had an MRI this spring. All my symptoms were in my legs and hips, beginning with intermittent pain and numbness a few years ago, then progressing to fairly severe sciatica last fall. I was not incapacitated, but just moving around for daily activities was at best unpleasant. It was not fun to have severe cramps in my gluteus, along with sharp, shooting pains down the backs of my legs, and numbness in my toes and soles of my feet. I was advised that surgery was the only long-term solution. I attended Dean Ornish’s Preventive Medicine Retreat in mid-April, 1999, where I met Dr. Lee Lipsenthal, and asked him if he had any knowledge about lumbar cysts. He strongly recommended Dr. Brownstein’s book. Participants in the Retreat were given some instruction in Yoga, but Dr. Lipsenthal said Dr. Brownstein gave many more stretches aimed specifically at relieving back pain by developing better muscular conditioning. I consulted a surgeon on April 20, and scheduled a lumbar laminectomy for May 17. I bought a copy of Healing Back Pain Naturally on April 22, and began practicing the Yoga positions. On May 3, I was still having significant pain. I could not carry a box of newspapers weighing 25 to 30 pounds out to my curb for recycling without stopping to take the weight off my spine. I started doing the stretches twice a day for about 45 minutes each time. The following Sunday, May 9, I carried six 50-pound sacks of salt from my car to my water softener and poured them into the softener – WITH NO PAIN OR DISCOMFORT. I continued the twice-a-day regimen, and decided on May 11 to cancel the laminectomy. As a scientist, I find it difficult to believe that something so simple can have such a profound, immediate effect. But I am almost completely free of symptoms, and those I have left are mild and confined to my right leg. Nothing, including the program recommended in this book, will work for everyone. But if you have back problems, buy a copy, pay careful attention to the disclaimer at the beginning, consult your physician, and, if your physician approves, try Dr. Brownstein’s recommendations, including those on diet and stress reduction (the latter are essentially the same as Dean Ornish’s program). No other book I have read has so powerfully affected my life.

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Healing Back Pain Naturally: The Mind-Body Program Proven to Work [Paperback]

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The next day my right leg was numb and painful down to the toes. Because of my medical training, I was pretty sure that I had ruptured a disc in the lower part of my spine. It was time to see our neurosurgeon at the Air Force Regional Medical Center, Dr. Roberto Masferrer.
After Dr. Masferrer examined me, I was admitted to the hospital where the myelogram confirmed the presence of a large ruptured disc. My worst fears were true; it was decided that I would need surgery. This is where my story began.
After my surgery, the pain and numbness down my leg was greatly diminished. What a relief! But the pain in my back was excruciating. My back now had a huge hole in it. There was a gap between the rear portions of the two vertebrae where Dr. Masferrer had to cut away the bone to get to the ruptured disc. I thought the removed portions of bone would be rewired back in place. I was wrong. They were thrown in the garbage can and muscle was sewn together to cover the hole. I realized then that what Dr. Masferrer said was true. My back was indeed broken!
Upon release from the hospital, I was instructed not to drive or climb any stairs for one month. Two days later, I was driving my car and got locked out of my office at the hospital, so I had to use the stairs.
At home I had a pair of hanging boots that I used to stretch out my back. Following the axiom “physician heal thyself,” I decided that I could give myself traction and get an upper body workout at the same time by hanging upside down while holding small dumbbell weights in my hands. Can you imagine the stupidity? Predictably, I never even made it that far!
Only three days out of the hospital, standing in the checkout line of our base’s only department store with 30 pounds of dumbbell weights in my arms, I felt the left side of my back collapse.
As I stood there grimacing in pain, not speaking a word, a petite female store employee noticed my pale and clammy face and offered to take the weights off my hands. For the first time in my life, I, Mr. Macho, “superman extraordinaire,” accepted help from a woman. As my male ego crumbled with my back, I noticed how grateful I was to be relieved of the physical burden of those weights.
When I reached home, however, the muscles in my back orchestrated a major spasmodic rebellion. They seized up violently, locked themselves into a deathgrip, knotted themselves into fist-sized lumps, and simply refused to budge. Laid out flat once again, this incident was a huge setback in my rehabilitation.
I was in so much pain that just going to the toilet was a major ordeal of the day, taking from 2-3 hours just to crawl down the hall on my hands and knees before returning back to my bed. Sitting on the john or taking a bath were impossibly excruciating, and I had to psych myself up for several hours in advance, anticipating this dreadful, yet necessary daily ritual.
Due to the proximity of the intestines to the spine, when my bowels moved they would set my back off in a wave of painful spasms. Thereafter I fasted on mango and carrot juice for two weeks to avoid any bowel activity whatsoever. Without any food in my intestines, I didn’t move my bowels for the entire two-week period.
The Air Force gave me a choice. Return to work or face a medical board to go on disability with an early separation from the military.
Clearly, my back was in a bad way. This was despite the fact that I was now eating 10 mg Valiums and an ungodly number of other medications as if they were candy. These pills had no effect on the pain in my spine. All they did was make me feel stupid.
I thought about the Air Force offer and decided I didn’t want to give in to the prospect of permanent disability. I knew if I had taken their money, that’s precisely what would have happened. I’ve seen it too many times in my profession. “All that glitters is not gold,” I reminded myself. To this day, I’ve never regretted my decision to decline disability.
Stubbornly, I forced myself back to work, refusing to cut short my service obligation. I donned a back brace and, swallowing pills by the handful, toughed out the next year, completing my tour of duty on schedule.
After my service was completed, like a wounded animal retreating to the safety of a cave to lick his wounds, I sought refuge in a quiet place. I needed a break from the world, so I journeyed to India to stay at a yoga institute. It was a very quiet place located in the remote highlands in the western part of the country. I had no car and no telephone and for the next seven months, instead of taking care of other people as I had been trained to do as a doctor, I concentrated on my own healing.
I decided to throw away my pain pills and face the pain head-on. After nearly a year and a half of dependency, this was a big step for me. Now I felt naked and vulnerable to my pain. It was frightening! But I was stuck in a hole and I wanted out. This was the obvious first step that had to be taken.
Without medications, the pain overwhelmed me, and I plunged into a deep, dark cavern of hopelessness and despair. Anybody who doesn’t think that pain can drive a person to the depths of depression and despondency, to the point of contemplating suicide, has never experienced true pain. It is pure hell, nothing less! Nothing can demoralize your spirits like steady, consistent, unrelenting, chronic pain!
At the institution where I was staying, I followed a regimen that consisted of various stretching, breathing and relaxation exercises, reading inspirational books to keep my spirits up, and a simple diet that was free of toxins and highly refined, processed foods. I devoted myself exclusively to this program, and scheduled all of my daily activities around the healing of my spine.
All was not easy. During this period I had to deal with the tremendous physical, mental, and emotional exhaustion that the pain was causing. Every day, awakening to more pain after having worked so hard the day before, was demoralizing. My spirits were at an all-time low.
I was still in the process of trying to understand my pain and not be terrified of it, but my pain carried a huge psychological advantage over me of having completely intimidated me for almost 15 years. In other words, it was well-established in my psyche and could not be easily shaken.
During this period, I read all the experts’ books on back pain and was not getting the answers I wanted so I threw them away and surrendered to the guidance of my own intuition and inner spirit. Because I was basically charting unexplored territory, I decided to trust my instincts and proceed from a very fundamental level.
I knew I had a body, and I believed that if I could learn to listen to it, it would guide me in the right direction. All I had to do was pay attention and work with the pain, accepting it as the voice of my body. My intuition told me that if I honored my body and was patient, the healing process would occur on its own.
According to the experts, I did everything wrong. I bent my body forward when I shouldn’t have, and I knelt down in the wrong fashion. But I didn’t care what the experts said because I was moving with more awareness than ever before and I was learning to listen to my body in a way that I knew was good for me. As I became acquainted with my body’s wisdom, I began to hope that my personal suffering would soon come to an end.
After two months, I took a personal inventory. While I wasn’t getting worse, clearly I wasn’t getting any better and that was discouraging. Perhaps my expectation of a speedy recovery was unrealistic. I decided to get out my mental magnifying glass to measure my progress in micrometers instead of inches. In spite of my hard work, improvement was elusive. Depression and suicidal thoughts intermittently renewed their onslaught, and many times I felt like quitting.
After several months of floundering and experimenting, however, I began to notice small changes in my body that let me know I was on the right track. These were the first clear signs that the healing process was underway. With this encouragement, I continued on the course that I had set.
I found out later that the seeds of healing are sewn during such plateau phases where no apparent progress is being made. It is important not to get discouraged at such times, but rather to be patient.
One of the more helpful elements of my healing program while in India consisted of going to a large, flat rock in the middle of a secluded rice field and standing in the hot sun every afternoon for two hours at a time. With the heat searing down on my bare back, I would place my feet at different angles, practicing the simple art of standing. I stood in various positions, bending my knees, shifting the weight from one foot to the other as I changed the direction in which my feet were pointed, ever mindful of how these changes impacted the muscles of my back. I became acutely aware of the connection between my feet and back, and how I had not paid enough attention to this important anatomical relationship before. When I got tired of standing or when the pain became too intense, I would lie down with my back directly against the surface of the rock and let the radiating heat penetrate deep into the muscles of my back. Over a seven-month period, this large, flat slab of stone became my hospital and healing sanctuary.
I kept a journal by my side to document my insights and discoveries. I called it my Pain Journal. Proceeding this way, I found my body to be a huge storehouse of wisdom. Pain, I discovered, was one of the ways my body communicated this wisdom to me. I also discovered that painful memories were somehow stored in my body in the form of muscle tension, and that this pain could be released once I could relax and release the tension in my body.
As I stretched and moved my back, I began to see that I could no longer keep running away from my pain. I was committed to this journey; there was no turning back at this point. I was willing to face whatever pain I discovered in my life, wherever I found it.
Then, I began to understand that my physical pain, powerful as it was, was just the tip of the iceberg. A much deeper emotional and spiritual pain had been buried in my soul and suppressed for years. My physical pain was making me aware of my emotional and mental pain. As I worked with my body, I found myself reflecting on painful issues in my life, from incidents of my early childhood, up through the present day.
And I gained another valuable insight through this process. I had never learned to stand up for myself; I had avoided confrontation and interpersonal conflict at all costs. Learning to stand up physically required a corresponding commitment to stand up for myself mentally and emotionally, to take a stand on who I was and what I believed in. Did I have the courage to defend my principles and say no to others when necessary? If not, I would have to learn. It was amazing to discover that these deep, emotional principles could somehow express themselves in my body.
Through the help of my body, the deep layers of pain in my life were coming to the surface of my conscious awareness where I could confront the pain, understand it, and then release it. As I did, my body began to heal, so I knew I was heading in the right direction. I decided to follow the pain in my body. It was really as simple as that.
When I returned to the United States, I enrolled in a two-year training program in guided imagery, sometimes called visualization. I learned how the mind can heal through the skillful application of imagination. As I practiced what I learned, my back continued to improve.
I read John Bradshaw’s books on the family and the need to heal childhood wounds. I enrolled in a week-long intensive course that dealt with this topic while I explored the relationship of my physical pain to deeper, unresolved emotional issues within my own family.
I was also assisted by many healers, including chiropractors, acupuncturists, osteopaths, massage therapists, yoga teachers, nutritionists, herbalists, and a host of others, some highly conventional, others quite unorthodox. Almost all of these healers helped me in one way or another, adding a new piece to the puzzle I was assembling on my way to reclaiming my wholeness.
The intimate relationship I discovered between my mind and body during this healing process was fascinating; I had no idea just how closely they were connected before I went through this ordeal. My pain was showing me how responsive my back was to my thoughts, particularly those that dealt with concern, worry, or fear. Such thoughts immediately made me feel a twinge or tightening of the muscles in my back and made me realize that they were causing tension in my body.
Positive thoughts wouldn’t disturb my back in the least. They would actually relax it. I discovered that my thoughts could influence the health of my back, and that if I listened to my back, it would help me identify healthy, constructive thoughts that would not create tension or stress in my life.
I learned to consult my back at every possible opportunity. I would check with it before making important decisions. If something didn’t make my back feel good, I would avoid it. In this way I allowed my back to influence my choices, and modify my lifestyle. As a result, my lifestyle is healthier today than ever before and so is my back. It proves that by listening to your body, you can enjoy a healthy, happy life.
Over the course of time, as I slowly climbed the psychological and physical mountain of pain, I began to sense a deeper mental and emotional purification taking shape. My body felt healthier, lighter, freer, more relaxed, and more flexible. It wasn’t long before the pain was no longer in control of my life, even though it wasn’t completely gone.
I now see that my back pain was a catalyst for a profound personal transformation in my life.
I am grateful for the understanding that my back pain brought me. It made me a better person and a more compassionate doctor. Without going through the pain, I never would have made the changes that were so necessary for my growth and evolution. I now see how pain is a blessing in disguise.
While pain descends upon your life initially as an unwelcome visitor, if you have the courage to study its deeper lessons, it will be a consummate instructor. Because pain has guided me into the spiritual fabric of my soul, the source of all healing, I can now offer you a way out of your pain.
Copyright © 1999 by Arthur H. Brownstein

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Healing Back Pain Naturally: The Mind-Body Program Proven to Work [Paperback]

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Product Details
Paperback: 320 pages
Publisher: Pocket; 1st, First Edition edition (May 22, 2001)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0743424646
ISBN-13: 978-0743424646
Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.9 x 0.7 inches
Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces

Product Description
Dr. Art Brownstein suffered back pain for twenty agonizing years. Now he shares the cure that worked for him and thousands of others: his revolutionary Back to Life Program.
Sharing his own story of surgery, painkiller dependency, and severe depression, Dr. Brownstein guides you through the recovery program that gave him his life back. Today, he runs a medical practice, bikes, surfboards, teaches yoga, and leads an active life — free of pain!

About the Author
Art Brownstein, M.D., is a clinical instructor of medicine at the University of Hawaii at Manoa and medical director of the Princeville Medical Clinic in Princeville, Hawaii. A former Air Force flight surgeon, he is also the only American physician to ever receive a diploma in yogic education from the government of India.
Chapter One: The Straw That Broke the Camel’s Back
“Art, you’re taking this operation too lightly”, said Dr. Masferrer, my neurosurgeon. “I’m afraid you just don’t understand. I’m going to break your back!”
It was July of 1986 and I was lying in bed at the U.S. Air Force Regional Medical Center with excruciating pain and numbness running down my right leg into my foot and toes. The myelogram, a special X-ray of the spine, showed a large disc rupture between the fourth and fifth lumbar vertebrae. After two weeks of bedrest with no let up in the pain and numbness, it was time to go in and operate.
How did I end up in this mess, me, a doctor of all people? Besides the pain, it was embarrassing to be a patient in my own hospital!
To my best recollection, my back trouble began when I was about 21 years old. I was still in school when I took a job loading and unloading trucks at a large warehouse to help support myself. I put in long, grueling days that involved a lot of lifting. It seemed like the “manly” thing to do, and besides, I was young and strong and enjoyed sweating and doing hard physical labor. I was at that age when I thought I was invincible. I never said no to work of any kind. In fact, I never said no to much of anything, and that, I discovered later, was a major drawback to the future health of my spine.
On the job, one of the games we played in our spare time was King of the Warehouse. In this test of male macho strength, we would stand at opposite ends of the warehouse, lower our shoulders, and charge at each other like human battering rams, trying to knock each other over. Having been a surfer and a football player, I had good balance, timing, and strength. Additionally, I loved contact sports.
My boss, Bob, at 6’5″ and 305 lbs, loved to square off against me, even though he could never defeat me. As we charged from opposite corners of the warehouse like a couple of raging bulls, I would come up on him from underneath, flicking my shoulder and smacking into him at the last possible moment. Upon impact, Bob would be sent flying.
One day, however, while playing this game, things didn’t quite work out right for me. As Bob and I squared off in opposite corners prior to charging, I was feeling a little tired. When we slammed into each other my timing was slightly off. I knocked him down anyway, but absorbed the entire force of the blow in my lower back. That night I went home feeling a little stiffer than usual.
The next day in chemistry lab at UCLA, while bending over to get my glassware from the bottom drawer of my desk, I felt an electric shock travel clear up through my neck and into my head. It was a sudden, jolting sensation. In an instant, my legs gave out beneath me as I found myself sitting on the floor with both feet splayed out in front of me. There was no strength in my legs whatsoever. Strangely, there was no pain either. I brushed myself off, stood up, and as there were no residual symptoms, I decided to continue on with my activities as if everything were fine. I completely dismissed the significance of this event. To this day, I have never told a soul, not even my doctors.
Less than two years later, while wheeling a half-ton operating room table into one of the operating rooms at UCLA, my back did something funny again. As I returned to a standing position after bending down, I found I couldn’t straighten up all the way, as if someone had jammed a broomstick up my hind quarters. It was rather unnerving. “I certainly can’t resume my duties in this condition,” I thought to myself. I ducked into a vacant room and cautiously backed up to the side of another operating table. Reaching down with my arms, I forced myself into a backbend as far as I could go until I heard a “pop.” Miraculously, my back had snapped back into proper alignment. I was both grateful and relieved to find that now I could straighten up and move without any restrictions. Once again I went back to work, resuming my normal duties as if nothing had happened.
Two years later, during my first year in medical school, I found myself alone and isolated in a strange city. Philadelphia, where I was now living, was experiencing its worst winter in 25 years. I was an hour and a half away from school by rail commute and the trains kept breaking down because of the deep snows and sub-zero temperatures. I was also in the middle of a strained relationship that eventually broke apart.
By itself, the first year in medical school is emotionally demanding. With these complications, however, my standing as a first year medical student was in serious jeopardy, especially since I couldn’t get to class for lectures and labs. On the occasions that I did make it into school when the trains were running, I worked off the stress by playing basketball.
During one basketball game, while coming down for a rebound, my back went out just like it had done that day in the operating room two years before. This time, however, I couldn’t straighten myself up and pop my back into place.
I showered and then grabbed my books and athletic bag with great difficulty. My body was stuck in a bent-over position. Hobbling to the curb outside of the medical school, I reasoned that if I could make it to the library across the street, perhaps my back would slip back into place on its own. I glanced up and saw an elderly woman crossing the street, slowly, but with ease. I was envious of her and at that moment, I felt very old. The bags I was carrying felt like they weighed two tons each. It was horrible to feel so helpless.
Somehow I made it to my seat in the library and while turning to my neighbor, Rob, who was also a medical student, I mentioned something about my back to him. Before I knew it, Rob had brought a wheelchair to my seat, insisting on wheeling me to the emergency room. As I reluctantly got in, I felt embarrassed being wheeled past all the other medical students, doctors, and nurses in the library.
In the emergency room, after a four-hour wait, I had X-rays taken. The orthopedic resident (doctor-in-training), after looking at the films in a back room, gave me all of two minutes of his time. He managed to tell me on his hurried way out of the examining room that despite my being bent over sideways and unable to straighten up, all that was wrong with me was a simple muscle strain. “But I’m sure I slipped a disc or something,” I pleaded with the resident. “Then go to another orthopedic surgeon for a second opinion if you don’t believe me,” he said. In the midst of my pain and confusion, this was all he could offer me.
I refused to believe that all that was wrong with my back was a simple muscle strain. It was way too painful for that. As an athlete, I had experienced many muscle strains before. I had also separated both shoulders and had ruptured an inguinal hernia while lifting weights when I had the flu. I felt I wasn’t a sissy and had a fairly good tolerance for pain. The diagnosis that the resident had given me, according to my understanding, did not correlate with my pain. I felt slighted. Either he was wrong, which I was determined to prove, or if he was right, then I was being a big baby about this whole thing. My mind was reeling at a hundred miles an hour trying to figure out what was going on with my body! Why was I in so much pain?
Dr. Hoffman, a professor of orthopedics at my medical school, had a private office not far from our school. He examined me briefly, reviewed my films, and concluded that it was possible that my disc had slipped. Inwardly, I was comforted that now my pain was justified with this more serious diagnosis. “You better take care of yourself or you’re headed for an operation,” he informed me. I didn’t realize how prophetic his words were at the time.
I took a room near my medical school so I wouldn’t have to deal with the hassles of the lengthy rail commute and the inconsistent trains. Unable to walk without support, I hobbled to class on a pair of crutches through the snow.
I phoned my father, a psychiatrist at the UCLA School of Medicine, and told him what had happened. “Are you under stress?” he asked. “Dad, I was coming down from a rebound while playing basketball. What the hell does stress have to do with it?!” I retorted angrily. It would take me 15 more years of back problems before I would realize the accuracy of my father’s line of questioning.
After about a month, my back slowly improved. With this incident, however, I could no longer ignore my back. I needed to make some changes in my life if I wanted to avoid back surgery.
I enrolled in a yoga class to help bring some flexibility to my body and, in particular, to help me avoid the possibility of surgery. I also needed to deal with the anxiety of medical school and to learn how to relax and manage my stress. My yoga teacher assured me that if I were a sincere and regular student, all of these things were possible. While practicing yoga for the next five years, the condition of my back improved tremendously, and I did learn how to relax.
There were several setbacks during this period, however, as my back went out at inopportune times during periods of accumulated stress. The triggering events were physical traumas that while sometimes severe, could also be quite minor. One time my back went out lifting two full five-gallon water bottles, another time while wrestling with a friend, still another while bending down to pull on a boot. There seemed to be no correlation between the degree of trauma and the severity and duration of the pain. One thing seemed true, however; each time my back went out, it took longer to heal, and this had me worried.
In September of 1983 I entered the Air Force and was sent to the Philippines on active duty as payback for a military scholarship I was awarded during medical school. In this physically demanding environment, I ran 4-6 miles a day, swam 1,000 meters a day, biked 20-25 miles a day, and surfed 5-10 hours every weekend to maintain a warrior’s level of fitness. For three full years, I participated in helicopter rescue missions and did extensive flying all over the Far East without any back problems whatsoever.
In May of 1986 however, dark, ominous clouds appeared on my horizon. My mother, brother, and father had all passed away in the last three years, and my wife at the time was at home dying of cancer, where I was trying to take care of her.
We had just purchased an expensive piece of property in Hawaii. The political climate of the Philippines was tense as the Marcos regime was ready to fall. The military was preparing for conflict. It was all too much, and like the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back, my back went out as well.
To take my mind off my problems, I had flown down to a remote outer island with some friends. On the airplane ride back home, while merely turning around to talk to the person in the seat behind me, my back began to stiffen. After an hour or so, I was locked in a deathgrip of painful back muscle spasms and could barely shuZe my way off the plane.
With my back out, I tried to give it rest. The military, however, ordered me back to work. This added to the underlying tensions of being incapacitated. So once again I went into my familiar denial mode, put on a back brace, swallowed some pills, and tried to ignore the pain as I reported back to work like a good soldier.
My back was making its own efforts to heal, but the improvements were too slow for the fast pace of the Air Force. I felt pressured for time. I tried to accelerate the healing process with anything I could get my hands on — pills, electronic devices such as infra-red lamps, TENS (transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulators), heating pads, traction devices, hanging boots, braces, balms, and plenty of other stuff.
Sitting is the worst thing for an injured back, and having to man my desk for eight hours on end did not help my situation. As a member of the military, there was also the constant stress of war readiness, having to respond to contingencies on short notice.
In the previous three years, when my back had shown improvement, surfing had helped me overcome stress. I headed out to the ocean practically every weekend with a few buddies. Now, however, with my painful back, I found that I was unable to surf. I wondered how I would be able to manage my stress.
After more than a month, as stress kept building, I was eager to get back in the water. My back was still pretty bad, but the call of the ocean and the waves was strong.
On a chance visit to Base Operations, headquarters for all flight operations including the latest weather information, I saw a satellite photo of a huge typhoon that was heading our way. I could tell from the storm’s size and direction that the waves were going to be good on the weekend. I couldn’t resist. I decided to go surfing.
After a three-hour drive, when I finally got to the beach, my back was stiff and sore. I had no right to be there, but in my sheer pig-headed stupidity, I told myself that this would be good for me. As I carried my board to the water’s edge, I told myself that I would be careful once I was in the water.
In the water, lying flat on my board while paddling out, felt good because now all the weight was off my spine. But I had made one fatal mistake. In my haste to get out in the water, I had failed to apply wax to the back part of my board. In the surfer’s world, wax is more valuable than gold because it keeps you from slipping on your board.
While standing up on the first wave that I paddled for, my rear foot slid off the back of the board as I did the splits. I experienced intense pain as I heard a popping sound. At that very moment I knew I was in trouble, that I had made one of the biggest mistakes of my life.

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The Multifidus Back Pain Solution: Simple Exercises That Target the Muscles That Count [Paperback]

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Product Details
Paperback: 132 pages
Publisher: New Harbinger Publications; 1 edition (June 15, 2002)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1572242787
ISBN-13: 978-1572242784
Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 0.4 inches
Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces

Product Description
New research suggests that most back pain is caused by underdeveloped multifidus muscles, those that connect the spinal vertebrae and are crucial in bending the back. This book presents exercises to strengthen the multifidus group. Simple explanations and black-and-white drawings throughout show readers how to work with these muscles.

From the Author
Readers who suffer from spinal stenosis might want to check out Treat Your Own Spinal Stenosis. It contains all the multifidus exercises shown in The Multifidus Back Pain Solution, plus additional exercises specifically designed to restore back flexibility and proprioception.

About the Author
Jim Johnson, P.T. is a physical therapist who has spent over nineteen years treating both inpatients and outpatients with a wide range of pain and mobility problems. He has written many books based completely on published research and controlled trials including Treat Your Own Knees, The Sixty-Second Motivator, Treat Your Own Rotator Cuff, The 5-Minute Plantar Fasciitis Solution, Finding Happiness in a Frustrating World, Exercise Beats Depression, Treat Your Own Tennis Elbow and Treat Your Own Spinal Stenosis. His books have been translated into other languages and thousands of copies have been sold worldwide. Besides working full-time as a clinician in a large teaching hospital and writing books, Jim Johnson is a certified Clinical Instructor by the American Physical Therapy Association and enjoys teaching physical therapy students from all over the United States.

Review: The Multifidus Back Pain Solution: Simple Exercises That Target the Muscles That Count (Paperback)
Physical therapist (P.T.) Jim Johnson’s The Multifidus Back Pain Solution is a straight forward, educational and hope inspiring read that has been effective in helping me address my lower back and leg nerve pain.

For others who may be searching for a non-drug or non-surgical answer to back pain, I am sharing my experience in the hope of helping someone else.

Background:
Over the last year and half, I could not get any more than 3-4 hours sleep a night, because of back pain. I went through 3 new beds. Each new firm mattress I tried ended up after a month not being supportive enough for my sore back pain. My doctor recommended muscle relaxants, but that didn’t help. So, I cranked up the sit-ups and attended an exercise class in addition to my normal tennis and occasional running. No pain, no gain. (Yes I am a slow learner). Then in exercise class my right knee went numb from a jumping exercise and I could not walk for a couple of minutes. Now I had back pain preventing me from sleeping. Sitting was becoming impossible without pain. My right knee would go numb going up stairs two at a time. My left leg had nerve pain shooting down my left thigh and part of my lower leg. And even after 4+ weeks staying off exercise to heal, none of these pains were going away.

So, the doctor ordered a series of tests and physical therapy for me. Ultrasound, electrical treatment and stretching for previous sports injuries always worked in the past. This time, physical therapy was a bust and some stretching my leg nerve pain. After getting an MRI of my back, the orthopedic doctor explained I have Grade 1 / 2 spondylolisthesis (i.e., your L5 vertebrate is slipping forward, because at some time in the past your bilateral pars or the hooks that hold each neighboring vertebrate in line in your back have broken off over time and the slippage is causing narrowing and severe impingement of the nerve root). You can take drugs and get a cortisone shoot to manage the pain, but there is nothing you can do. (The doctor was kind enough not to mention the screws in the vertebrae solution). Chiropractors and physical therapy are just feel good placeboes that can’t help.

I am fifty and have lived a fairly healthy life. I won’t take drugs to mask a problem and make it worse. Implying I have no future athletic mobility depressed me, and made me mad. This was just unfair and unacceptable.

Back pain help search:
So, I spent a lot of anxious weeks searching the internet for back pain solutions through Google scholar papers and university medical sites. I started reading and collecting randomized control trial studies similar to what P.T. Johnson describes in his book. During this searching it became apparent the British, Australians, French and Belgians believe in intensive physical therapy to address back pain and where successful in pursuing this route. It also became apparent surgical solutions may help some with improved back functionality, but some level of pain still remains.

My self-research progress was slow. I just kept reading and collecting studies, but not sure of what path to move out on. My first break thru was to read keeping a pillow between your knees in bed would relieve back and nerve pain. Pretty odd, but it only took one night and now I could sleep through the night. You can’t believe what a relief and pleasure this was to sleep again! Next, I began using a lumbar support pillow to learn to sit up straight at work and at home which made sitting bearable over time. Then I told myself you need to keep exercising. So, I started walking for 50 minutes every morning before work. This was embarrassing at first for someone who has run all their life, but it seemed to relieve some of the leg nerve pain.

Eventually, I come upon Australian Professor Peter O’Sullivan’s “Evaluation of Specific Stabilizing Exercise in the Treatment of Chronic Low Back Pain with Radiologic Diagnosis of Spondyloysis and Spondylolisthesis”. This is where I began to realize a pattern in some of the back pain randomized control trail studies focusing on the multifidus back muscle and transversus abdomis muscles. However, the problem with most of the control studies is that they provide detailed randomized control trial statistics and control parameters, but scarce details on the actual physical exercise for these muscles. Fortunately, I was able to obtain a copy of one of Professor O’Sullivan’s references, “Muscle Control – pain control. What exercises would you prescribe” by C.A. Richardson and G.A. Jull which describe simple multifidus core muscle activation exercises similar to P.T. Johnson’s exercise #6 in the on-all-fours position, lying on the stomach and standing positions. So, I began practicing these simple exercises and while continuing to build my anxious pile of internet papers and trying this or that exercise also. Still suffering from my no-pain, no-gain stupidity, I proceeded with searching the internet for multifidus and transversus abdomis exercises. Per chance, one multifus searches turned up P.T. Johnson’s book. I read the Amazon reviews and surmised his exercise was similar to others I had stumbled upon elsewhere. However, one review was by a runner and he said he returned to marathons in 6 months. With my hope perked up from an athlete’s perspective and being exhausted from internet searching and back muscle exercising, I bought the book.

Ignoring P.T. Johnson’s advice at the beginning of his book, I immediately read the back exercise chapter and started exercising it. A week later I read the rest of the book. This is when I began to relax and have faith in pursuing this book’s recommendations. P.T. Johnson references the same Professor O’Sullivan control trail I found and explains how his efforts are based on the randomized control trials accumulated over many years of research and practice of physical therapy in a hospital. In other words, here is a person knowledgeable in his field extracting from all the control studies, what I was struggling to understand, in simple terms, a understanding to back pain and what most can do to relieve that pain through specific exercises. Also, very important, P.T. Johnson’s book educates the reader in understanding the back and its issues. For me, this helps provide belief that something is worth committing to.

Finally progress
After 4 weeks of P.T. Johnson’s exercise, I am back and leg nerve pain free with minor back hip/buttucks area nerve pain at the end of the work day some times! This is after 1 ¼ years of lower back pain and 4 months of leg nerve pain. Now, the multifidus muscles on both sides of my lower back are like taught cables after the exercise. Also, now I don’t need a pillow between my legs to sleep or a lumbar pillow for sitting, and have returned to competitive tennis. Note: I can still induce leg nerve pain by doing knee fall outs or sitting in slouchy positions, but it means I have to go out of my way to feel pain. A year from now is when I can give the best report, because it takes a while to build any muscle and really know if you are free and clear of an issue.

On my specific 3 day a week back exercise regimen, I do the following:

1. The simple multifidus activation exercises referenced by Richardson and Jull similar to P.T. Johnson’s exercise #6 on the all fours position which P.T. Johnson recommends you do every day
2. P.T. Johnson’s exercise #3 with the following caveat
- do one exercise #3 set holding each leg out statically with the weight for 5-10 seconds and the other set with no delays to a dynamic beat. Why? The Belgian’s L A Danneels, did a study, “Effects of three different training modalites on the cross sectional area of the lumbar multifidus muscle in patients with chronic low back pain”, on what exercise program it took to grow the multifidus as measured by a CT scan. Note: not that I am right, but that’s what I am doing. If anyone can share an understanding of this it would be appreciated.
3. Sitting weighted ankle leg lifts
4. Lateral Dynamic Pillar Bridge exercises for each side to exercise the transverse abdomis muscles which horizontally wrap around the rib cage to give additional support to the back in conjunction with the vertical multifidus muscle support. Note: situps put a lot of undue compressive stresses on the backs and should be avoided if in pain or injured. (Reference: Professor Stuart McGill).
5. Walking 50 minutes each morning.

Based on my experience, I could have saved a lot of time and anxiety if I started reading P.T. Johnson’s book first. I apologize for my long winded probably cathartic review, but I hope this provide a path of optimism and results for someone else suffering from back pain.

After 28 Books – This is the one.,
I’ve had chronic back pain for years and have tried several modalities to treat the pain. I’ve also read several books on the subject and have tried different exercises. The Multifidus Back Pain Solution has fabulous medical research to back it up, simple exercises for people of all different strengths, and great common sense.

Most of the pain I have had in my back is gone. On the rare occasion that I do have pain, it is much less intense and doesn’t last for as long. I have renewed hope and a rich life because I can move without fear.

Strenthening the multifidus is the way to go. I have checked out the spine journals where the author gets his information, and they are right on the mark.

The Chiropractor who wrote that the book is full of garbage should realize that the author is actually an advocate for chiropractic care along side the exercise program in the book.
I also don’t see medical research as to the Chirpractor’s claims to back them up.

Jim Johnson has clearly spent meticulous hours on organizing medical research, reading the spine journals, and seeing where commonalites exist within the data. I don’t know too many practitioners who care that much to be so meticulous.

This book has allowed me to regain control of my back and not rely on outside help.
Buy this book and follow the program. It could just change your life like it has mine.

No More Back Pain!,
I have been doing the exercise recommended by this book for the past three weeks. I have had lower back problems on and off for over 25 years.
We have just had a blizzard which was followed by a storm two days later. I was out shovelling snow for several hours for several days in a row. In the past this would have led to severe lower back pain from all the lifting and twisting movements. Today I have no back pain at all! My back feels very strong and comfortable. I have just a bit of soreness in my shoulders from all the heavy lifting.
I have no idea if this exercise will help everyone with lower back pain but I can say it has improved my back condition by 100%. I can unreservedly recommend that anyone with lower back pain try this simple exercise which takes only a few minutes.

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