It seems that the market is already overflowing with all types of fitness dvds. Today, many people see them as practical fitness options that will aid in maintaining an ideal body weight without spending thousands on exclusive gym memberships. Today, the industry of health and fitness present a very lucrative business opportunity. The profit gained from workout videos alone are surprisingly above what you might have expected. That is why, numerous companies as well as entrepreneurs have already dived into the fitness bandwagon.



However, the question still remains --- do fitness dvd's really work? With a great variety of workout videos that are currently available in the market, it is really hard to keep track which is effective and which is not. In addition to that, different workout dvds are available in various forms. They may come as dance workouts, pilates sessions, yoga exercises, tae bo, and even kick boxing ...

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Polar F4 Product Review

 

 

 

The Polar F4 model is a petite feminine heart rate monitor ideal for fitness enthusiasts who want to optimize their training sessions. It is the smaller feminine counterpart of the Polar F4M monitor. The big display allows reading the data at a glance while the small strap size keeps the product easily in place even during strenuous exercise.

The product can be used to continuously monitor heart rate and calorie expenditure. It also has full watch functions, including a stopwatch to keep track of exercise duration. A fitness bullet appears each time the user stays within his/her training zone for 10 minutes.


Product Specifications:
 
•    Automatic age-based target zone (% / bpm) - %/bpm
•    Backlight - w/o backlight in the North and South America
•    Graphical target zone indicator
•    Heart rate (displayed as % of maximum heart rate)
•    Heart rate (displayed as bpm)
•    Visual and audible alarm in target zones
•    Average ...

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Commonly referred to as a ‘Gym’, a Health Club is a place where exercise equipments are commonly found and used for the sole purpose of exercising physically. A health club or Fitness Center may feature a variety of facilities and services.


Free weights or exercise equipments utilized for strength training (use of resistance to muscular contraction to build the strength, anaerobic endurance and size of skeletal muscles) like dumbbells, barbells and other exercise machines are a must in any fitness center. These equipments are commonly located in the main workout area of most health clubs. Most often than not, the main workout area also has mirrors in order for exercisers to monitor and maintain correct posture as they do their work out.



A fitness center’s Cardio Area or Theatre includes treadmills, rowing machines, stationary bikes, elliptical trainers and other equipments for cardiovascular training or aerobic exercises intended for the ...

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The POLAR RS300X is ideal for runners who are actively training. Aside from being a heart rate monitor, the device can also keep track of speed, distance, and time spent in the activity with the help of a compatible S1 foot pad™. The product comes in black or orange color.

 

The monitor can create a personal training zone which can help the user train at the intensity ideal for him/her – this feature is the basis for the product being called a “training computer”. This heart rate monitor can keep track of 16 training sessions. The monitor displays heart rate in bpm. It also shows the calories burned per training session.

Product Specifications:
 
•    Automatic age-based target zone (bpm/%)
•    Average and maximum heart rate of each lap
•    Average and maximum heart rate of training
•    Heart rate (bpm/%)
•    HR-based target zones with visual and audible alarm
•    HRmax (age-based)
•    HRmax (Polar Fitness test-based ...

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As can be seen from our Canadian cousins fitness study, nutrition and exercise is declining which is creating a number of health concerns for the US and world population. This includes diseases like heart failure, diabetes and many others. Weight loss surgery for the larger or obese of the population may be the answer to help you to be able to lead a normal life by reducing the health risks of being overweight. However this may come at a cost. Here are some articles from around the net detailing the benefits and risks of weight loss surgery.

   
Weighing up the risks and benefits of weight-loss surgery

 

Weighing up the risks and benefits of surgery is a difficult but important task for any patient. New research into the outcomes of gastric bypass surgery for very overweight people may make that decision easier, by showing the likely increase in length of life ...

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Polar: The Company

Polar is a company founded to specifically create and market portable heart rate monitors. Founded in Oulu, Finland, a region well known for its advanced technological research, it is not surprising that the company was able to release the first wireless wearable heart rate monitor in as early as 1982 – just 3 years after the patent for wireless heart rate measurement was filed.

Today, the company continues to be among the top creators of portable heart rate monitors. It is renowned in many parts of the world – with customers full of praises for the company’s innovation and its wide range of products suitable for runners and athletes of all levels. Through the years, it has maintained a reputation of having the best heart rate monitoring hardware and solid electronics and engineering.

Some Representative Monitors

The Polar RS 100, Polar RS 300x, Polar F6, Polar A4 Strapless ...

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The Polar F6 Heart Rate training computer has all the essential functions that an active fitness enthusiasts need in terms of monitoring his/her heart rate and fitness training. This monitor helps keep track of the heart rate (displayed as bpm or % max HR), exercise duration, calories and percentage of fat burned, and the time of the day.

The Polar OwnZone feature can be used to create a personal training zone while the exercise diary stores and displays several weeks’ worth of exercise data which also include how many times the user exercised plus the time spent in various exercise zones. It also displays fitness bullets for every 10 minutes spent within the set training zone.

Polar F6 Product Specifications

• Automatic age-based target zone (% / bpm) - %/bpm
• Graphical target zone indicator
• Heart rate (displayed as % of maximum heart rate)
• Heart rate (displayed as bpm)
• Heart rate sets: pre-program favorite exercise settings ...

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The Canadian Health Measures Survey (CHMS) released its first report study today detailing the changing of fitness levels of its population between 1981 and 2009. The results have found that obesity levels have dramatically increased and in some age groups it has tripled and even quadrupled and fitness levels have dramatically decreased.

It seems from the empirical data that women statistically have become more health conscious then men with smaller rises in being overweight between the two periods. However equal proportions between the sexes in obesity incidents were calculated.



Below are a few of the articles from the CMHS and papers detailing all the statistics from the survey. 

 

Canadian Health Measures Survey

Between 1981 and 2009, fitness levels of Canadian children and youth, as well as those of adults, declined significantly, according to the first findings from the Canadian Health Measures Survey (CHMS). This is the most comprehensive national survey ...

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Health care Reform over the last month has given the newspapers a lot to write about regarding the changes that the Obama administration are trying to institute in the Health Care Bill. Health Reform is on the outside scope of review from the newsfitness.com team however some of the issues that are being debated do relate to the general fitness of the population. With the well documented statistics of the Health Issues in the US regarding the growing obesity rates and other lifestyle problems, I would assume that an increase in the uptake of physical fitness and the partaking of healthy lifestyle choices can only be a good thing. Or is it? Here are some of the issues that intrigued me around these sensitive issues.

From an article by the ABC news regarding the “Wellness Provision” where the US Senate were proposing to include incentives designed to encourage healthy ...

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With the release of the Top 10 Fitness Trends for 2010 specialty exercise classes are a big growth area for the fitness industry. One of the biggest growth classes in this field is Pole Dancing which combines many of the attributes of a regular exercise with the added benefit of being fun. So what is this new fitness craze that is sweeping the US and UK?

Pole dancing has been around the US for many years starting around the 1920’s or the time of the Great Depression where dance performers initiated a pole into their routines, however more recently the dance has often been used in Gentlemen’s or strip clubs. Pole Dancing to be recognized as a and is now recognized as a true form of exercise training has toned down the sex appeal with the exercise providing many attributes of fitness. The growth is so large that ...

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It seems that Health Care is a major political issue at the moment with the two houses passing their versions of the Health Care Bill. However there will be plenty of political maneuvering still to happen before this bill will be passed. Here are the latest news items and a Q&A to keep you updated with all the Health Care Reform issues. 



Health spending in U.S. grows at slowest rate ever in 2008

Health spending in the United States in 2008 grew at the slowest rate ever recorded since the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services started officially tracking expenditures in 1960.
The CMS reported Tuesday that national health spending increased 4.4 percent in 2008, to $2.3 trillion or $7,681 a person.

However, the agency reported that health care spending continued to outpace overall economic growth, as measured by the 2.6 percent increase in the ...

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With the increasing rates of obesity and high cholesterol levels, people have been trying out various methods of losing weight and living a healthy life. One of the many types of exercises that people have tried out is known as the “Boot Camp program”, which, like many exercise routines became popular at one point in the past few years and have been rated in the Top 10 Future trends for 2010.

While not everybody found boot camp programs agreeable, there were still some people who did enjoy the workout that came with the boot camp program. In most cities, the boot camp program is done when a person signs up to the program and the group often meets in local parks where the participants undergo workouts that are more or less the same as the physical training that soldiers get.



Of course, getting in shape does not necessarily mean that ...

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As of recent years, with the increasing awareness of health and fitness, people have been looking to herbs for maintaining good health. One of the most popular natural miracles are the acai berries.


Acai berries are small, round drupes that are around 1-inch in diameter in black-purple color. These are sometimes mistaken as grapes, but these have less pulp than the more popular fruit. For many centuries, this berry has been used by indigenous people in the Amazon region to help enhance health and vitality.




Generally, the enhancement of health and vitality has been tagged as the main benefits of acai berries. However, apart from this important benefit, there are also other advantages that these fruits bring.

Benefits of the Acai Berry

• Increases span of life – this can be seen through research based on the longevity of life of the indigenous people in the Amazon region who have been enjoying ...

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The Top 10 fitness trends for 2010 as recently announced by The American Council on Exercise has been released based on their annual survey of Fitness experts, personal trainers and other industry experts. The consensus is that people want exercise routines to fit into their busy lifestyle and not take up too much time, they want their exercise to be cash conscious and they are willing to sweat to deliver results. 

Cost-Conscious Workouts: No matter where you exercise, the global economy is continuing to have an impact on our lifestyle. People no longer have the excess cash to spend on yearly gym memberships or expensive gym equipment. The second hand market for gym equipment should remain steady with the gyms offering alternate gym programs to try and capture this cost-conscious market. It is a matter for the individual which path they take however if you are a gym junkie and ...

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During these holidays I have been discussing with many clients the growing trend of people moving away from conventional training and trying out the Boot camp style of exercise. Boot Camp exercise encompasses many fitness attributes combining cardiovascular exercise through running and interval training whilst building up strength through the use of weights whilst completing the activities. The training usually occurs outdoor and has its origins from the basic military boots cmps. The term Boot Camp used in the fitness industry is used to define classes that provide exercise to promote fat loss, team fitness bonding and general camaraderie.

So what do the news wires say about Boot Camps? Well here are three articles I found during the holiday period.

Fitness boot camps offer what gyms cannot

When the New Year's resolution calls for getting in shape fast, joining a gym and pushing yourself hard every day probably won ...

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Your New Year resolution has been made and you have been inspired for fitness in 2010. The choice you have now is to build your own fitness gym or choosing a fitness centre. Both of these options have their own pros and cons. There are a few articles posted on building your own gym however this is not for everyone. So now the consideration is on what attributes should I look for before you choose a fitness centre?

 

The choices that you need to consider for Choosing a fitness are vast however not insurmountable. A lot of fitness centers specialize or provide fantastic services in one area but are generalist in other areas. Selecting the right gym for you is paramount for you to meet your specific goals. On the surface all the gyms look very similar. So before you go out and spend your hard earned money on a ...

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