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Q: It’s midsummer and I’m wearing sleeveless tops and dresses. Is there a quick (quick being the operative word here) arm shape-up you can recommend? A: Quick trick: Before you get dressed do about 1 minute of this routine: 20 pushups (on your knees), 25 bicep curls with 5-pound dumbbells and tricep kickbacks with the same 5-pound dumbbells. Bicep curls: Stand erect. With weights in hand, let your arms hang down in front of your body. Elbows are against your belly. Bring the weights up as far as your shoulders and then back down to starting position. Repeat 25 times. Tricep kickbacks: Bend over at the waist, elbows above your back pointing to the ceiling. Weights in hand, straighten out your arms without letting your elbows drop and without moving any part of your body except your forearms. (Imagine kicking back your weights until they are locked out.) Now get dressed in that sleeveless top and strut your stuff. Muscles respond and pump up quickly. If you’re carrying a lot of extra weight in your triceps area (back of the upper arms), you’re of course not going to reduce that mass with a few flexing exercises. We all are built differently and carry our fat in different places. For example, consider someone with lean legs, narrow hips, flat buttocks yet a thick midsection, large chest, thick shoulders and a tendency to carry weight even in the face. If such a shaped person wants to bring her upper arms down by a few inches, working those arms obsessively might do it. The muscle will build, but the fat won’t disappear. Regardless of where we’d like to reduce fat, we’ve got to burn calories and eat less. Fat will come off the entire body … usually coming off last from the places we want to reduce most! Diana Nyad and Bonnie Stoll are the founders of BravaBody.com, an online fitness movement for women over 40. Once world-class athletes and now in their 50s, Diana and Bonnie have spent their careers sharing the basics of maintaining youth and quality of life in all areas through fitness. Their BravaBody mantra is "Make THIS the Prime of Our Lives!" Send your questions to BandD@smartnow.com. |
