Bender Ball Method

People spend a lot of time trying to figure out the best exercise routine for themselves.  Should they force themselves to the gym? Should they do more stomach exercises with a bender ball, or concentrate on their legs with a Stair Master?  The bottom line - no matter what you decide - is to get moving!  You can get more fit and see a slow weight loss if you simply incorporate some new creative movement into your day.  Take the stairs at work rather than using the elevator.  Park far away from the mall and walk farther to get to your favorite store.  Take the dog for an extra 10 minute walk each day; use the bender ball for 5 minutes at a time instead of 4.

There are oodles of little ways that you can increase your stamina and get yourself moving without even altering your life very much.  Try it out - you’ll be surprised what an extra 15-45 minutes of movement a day can do for your overall energy level, your stamina and your weight.  What have you got to lose giving it a try?

One problem that many of us face when we go on a diet or start an exercise routine, is our goal.  Often, the goal is to look good.  Looking good, however, shouldn’t really be the goal.  The goal - when you change your diet or start to exercise - should be to become healthier and more fit.  When this is truly the goal, it completely changes your outlook and your mission.  Rather than hoping to fit into your “skinny” jeans, you are hoping to breath more easily, to feel good walking a mile, to have more energy, and to feel healthy.  This completely changes how you approach your food and your fitness.  When using the bender ball, going to the gym, passing the cake by and doing that one extra lap at the pool, you are working towards an overall feeling of well being.  Keep this mind shift in mind - you’ll be amazed by the difference that it can make in your approach to wellness.

There are many benefits to having a strong stomach. A strong stomach helps your entire body to be stronger and more stable. This aids you in picking up objects, in having a strong, healthy back and more.

In addition, a strong stomach, and overall good health, helps you with your mental health. When you feel strong and healthy, it makes your emotional state more stable and helps you to conquer stressers in your life.

And of course, it goes without saying that you’ll love the look of having a strong stomach. You’ll be ready to show off at the beach next summer after using the bender ball or working out at the gym to enhance your stomach muscles!

If you’re killing yourself trying to get a stronger stomach, or if you’re just busy feeling guilty that you aren’t killing yourself over your stomach, it’s time to understand why a strong stomach is important. Sure, you want to look great at the beach next summer. But, in addition to the aesthetic reasons to stay fit, there really are many physical reasons to do so.

A strong stomach helps to distribute stresses around the body. Lifting and bending becomes easier when your stomach is strong. Your risk of injury to your back muscles also decreases as you strengthen this area of your body. Well developed stomach muscles protect your inner organs, keeping you feeling great and looking your best.

For all of these reasons, and so many more, doing stomach exercises with a bender ball or with another tool can really have many benefits.

Did you know that the Bender Ball is not only useful for improving the tone and strength of the abdominal muscles, but it is also effective on the gluteus maximus (the muscle that you sit on) and the other crucial muscles that support the backbone? Well it does, and in addition, using the Bender Ball to improve the gluteus maximus (glutes) muscle and those that stabilize the spice can improve posture and relieve backache. The American Council of Exercise offers a course on how to do this using the unique Bender Ball.

The Bender Ball method of core training is probably one of the best ways of getting your abs into the shape you want them. It is possible to spend just a few minutes each day and see great results after a remarkably short amount of time.

The Bender Ball was designed by Leslee Bender, master trainer. Leslee has been involved in physical fitness for over 25 years, and designed the Bender Ball and created the innovative Bender Method of Core training.

Crunches are a great way to exercise your abdominal muscles. This exercise is efficient and safe, as long as you don’t put too much pressure behind your head or neck. As great as crunches are, there are easy and fun ways to make crunches even more efficient and even fun, and that is when you use a Bender Ball.

In just a few minutes a day a Bender Ball can help you achieve your goals of strong and beautifully sculpted abdominal muscles in much less time then you thought possible.

We used to do sit-ups, but because sit-ups are not as efficient and can even hurt your back, we now try and do crunches, also known as curl-ups. These are an excellent method of strengthening the abdominal muscles.

What you do is lie down on your back, place your hands either crossed over your chest or cupped behind your head as a shelf to support your head. Care should be taken not to exert pressure on the back of the neck or back of the head. Excess pressure could cause neck injury.

Bend your knees up toward your body, and then curl up your shoulders. There is no need to lift your back off the floor. Merely lifting your shoulders and bending towards your stomach will exercise your abdominals. And since you are not lifting your back up off the floor, your hip muscles remain relaxed. All the effort you are exerting is going into strengthening your abs.

There are many variations on crunches that we will be discussing in the future.

You know, no one does sit-ups anymore, but do you know why? The object of sit-ups is to strengthen the abdominal wall muscles by using them to bend the spine up and off the floor. However, two other things happen that not only do not contribute to strengthening the abs, but can actually make things worse.

First, when you pull up the spine off the floor, a lot of pressure is exerted on the lower back, or the lumbar region. The weight of your body and the compression of the vertebrae are not such good things for the back.

The second problem is that when you pull up all the way off the floor you also bring the muscles of the hips into play. This reduces the workout you are trying to give your abdominals because the hips are joining in with the effort, helping the abs and taking away from the efficiency of the exercise that you are doing.

Nowadays we do crunches.

One of the more challenging problems of exercise is effectively targeting  the right muscles for strengthening. Core training is the Bender Ball method of sculpting those abs into the strong, healthy muscles that they should be.  This sculpting is accomplished with Leslee Bender’s unique method of Selective Stabilization , which produces the great results you want.