Gym Smarts: Cardio Workout

: Gym Smarts: Cardio Elliptical Training

If you're interested in starting a cardiovascular program, one of the best selections for most populations is the elliptical trainer machine. And we're going to have Jason demonstrate this machine for us. The first thing you need to do when you get on the machine is you want to start pedaling and moving the handles and the pedals. And the reason this is a great selection for most people is because it's a non-impact exercise. Once you begin pedaling the machine you want to make sure you stand up real straight, hold in your abdominal muscles and make sure that you're not leaning forward or back or moving your body from side to side. And then the machine will ask you questions and gather information from you, so that it can give you the information you need while you are doing your workout. Such as how many calories you're burning, the level you are working at and so on. The first thing it's going to ask you is what type of program you'd like to use today. So Jason is going to select his program and then the machine will ask him what his weight is, so it can calculate the amount of calories he is going to be burning during his workout. And then you select the level that you want to work at and you always want to work a little harder than you feel like working. You want to always challenge your body a little bit so it has to accommodate the work load. Once you get used to the machine be sure that you increase the intensity not the duration necessarily. Because if you continue to increase the duration you'll end up doing more and more every day and then you'll come to the gym and you won't even want to do the exercise because you have to be in here for so long. So working a little harder for a moderate duration is probably a better thing to do. And that's how you get in better shape using the elliptical machine.