While some people are more attune to traditional weight loss or fitness tracking methods, technology has crept into every aspect of our lives. Sometimes there’s no denying that today’s technology has made our lives easier, and that trend has finally come to fitness. While cell phones were usually banished from gym, now they’re becoming more and more essential to tracking your workouts or assisting in workout instruction. Here are some ways you can use technology to put your track your workouts and overall fitness progression.

Workout Apps

Whether you’re looking for a smartphone app that plays workout playlists or a personal trainer app, you’ll find it in your phone’s app store. Researching fitness apps may also help you find workouts to do in between gym sessions or count calories. Anything you could need to make your gym time more productive could be found in an app!

Fitness Tracking Devices

The new trend in fitness technology is wearable devices that monitor everything your body does from sweat to sleep. These accessories can be worn outside the gym to track your daily activity and in the gym to monitor your vitals. There are several models out that serve different lifestyles, but their technology could help your reach your overall health goals. It is important that you use the information they give you to make the necessary lifestyle changes for this technology to actually help you.

Fitness Accessories

As previously stated, cell phones are usually frowned upon in a gym setting, but with all this technology that is useful in the fitness room, you want to have easy access to it during your workout! To keep your cell phone app close, you’ll want to invest in a comfortable fitness armband. These accessories feature see-through screens to allow you to open your favorite fitness apps and interact with them mid-workout. To keep on everyone’s good side at your gym though, be sure to bring headphones and refrain from cell phone conversations. If you’re phone has “do not disturb” settings you may want to turn that on once you get ready to work out to keep your social life from interrupting your workout.

Accessing a gym to achieve your personal health goals may bring you one step closer to being satisfied with your personal appearance. While everyone working out in a gym has similar goals, some may not know how to properly conduct themselves in a serious fitness environment. To become a part of this community and be a welcomed member of your local gym, follow these guidelines for gym etiquette.

Equipment

First and foremost, respect your gym equipment. Most facilities have signs posted about re-racking weights or wiping machine off after use, but you also want to be conscious of what and how you are using the equipment. Respect gym equipment by returning weights to their designated areas. If the gym is crowded don’t hoard several sets of free weights or spend 60 minutes on the elliptical. Rotate with your fellow members and be courteous of other people’s needs and space. This is not your personal gym that will be cleared of nuisance when you enter.

Clothing

While some gyms have strict rules on what you can and cannot wear, you should be aware of how you look in certain get-ups. Men and women should be conscious of how far the sides of their cut off tshirts come down on their torso, and be aware that something resembling a full shirt should be worn. While the gym is no place to body shame or judge someone’s clothing, having discretion about what you wear is just polite. Also, if your gym has a locker room, refrain from any excessive nudity. The human body is a beautiful thing but flaunting it in the locker room where people are simply trying to change is not the place to do it.

Space

Gyms can get crowded, especially at peak hours. Even when it seems like there isn’t enough room for everyone’s activities, give you and your fellow members enough space to perform their exercises. Leave enough of a radius so that there is no chance of injury if someone may drop their equipment. Steer clear of hassling other members who are using equipment you want to use. Simply ask them in between their sets how many more they are going to do and occupy yourself with another activity close by until they are done.

Learn how to be a helpful spotter, but only agree to help if someone asks and you know what you’re doing. This type of close-quarter assistance could mean breaching someone else’s workout zone, but you’re helping a fellow member and potential gym buddy!

When deciding on a workout routine that is best for you, you’ll want to consider your fitness goals, the current state of your health, and what kind of exercise you enjoy doing. If you enjoy shorter workout routines that combine high intensity activities mixed with periods of moderate rest, high-intensity interval training may be the method for you.

High-intensity interval training (HIIT) has been proven to be better than a regular cardio routine. This training routine gives you an immense boost in the fitness hormone, HGH. Along with other long lasting health benefits, this training program will keep your heart rate high long after you’ve left the gym, burning calories and maximizing your workout benefits.

Any HIIT workout routine will require maximum effort, but will yield the best health and fitness benefits if practiced regularly. There are many different programs you can try, including a Tabata workout that lasts only 10 minutes. HIIT workouts are designed to be short but intense workouts that will test your limits, but be the most beneficial to your overall health improvement.

When you’re first starting out with a high-intensity routine, you’ll want to stretch and warm up for about 5 minutes. You can experiment with the timing, but generally as a beginner you might try working out at your maximum effort for 30 seconds and switching to a slower pace for 90 seconds. repeat this up to 7 times. While working out at such an intense rate, listen to your body. You want to push yourself hard without serious injury. If you’re feeling faint, or something is suddenly strained or popped, immediately slow down and assess your injury. You may only be able to do 2 or 3 repetitions for your first HIIT workout, and that’s okay. It will take time to build up your rep count and achieve fitness goals.

The main thing to remember is to keep working at your HIIT training regimen. Set personal weekly goals that challenge your body and track your progress. using high-intensity workouts 3 or 4 times a week will greatly increase your cardiovascular health and give you lasting health benefits if you continue. Research reputable workout routines to find where your starting point is and keep challenging your body. HIIT training will only be beneficial to your health if you work hard to improve your times. You may be able to do more reps or work out harder and rest for shorter times. There are any number of HIIT workout routines that will help you reach your short and long term health goals.

Here is a HIIT workout for beginners.

Bodybuilders are not the only ones that should go to the weight room. Everyone can benefit from free weights training. The type of weight you choose depends on your preference, fitness level, as well as your goals. Free weight training has many benefits, but here are the top three.

Balance and strength

Research indicates that free weights provide a high level of body strength and balance if properly used. A study  that was conducted in 2008 showed that people who used free weight exercises had 58% more strength and 196% increase in their balance when compared with those who did not.

Versatility and special natural movements

Free weight exercises are not only effective in increasing muscular balance and strength but they also provide muscle flexibility and enhance specific day-to day body movements. A big advantage of free weight exercises is the ability to do different movements in one exercise instead of only working one muscle in each exercise. Unlike machines where you are fixed on a certain movement and only focuses on one muscle per exercise, free weight allows you to mimic daily movements that occur in different planes of motion.

High energy output

Another benefit of free weight is the increased effort that is involved during the exercise. Free weight exercises causes you to burn more calories as they engage greater amount of muscles mass to maintain stability and balance when performing the exercises. The increase in muscle mass involved during this exercise results to a higher cost of effort to produce free weight based movements.

Both barbells and dumbbells provide great workouts but free weight combined with a rack and a bench gives you a variety of exercises.

If you are looking to grow muscles quickly, you’ll be surprised that it is not as difficult as you might have imagined. Lots of gym rats and bodybuilders are often upset as they attempt to grow their muscles quickly without success. You can spend many hours in the gym doing exercises and workout activities and still fail to put on the lean muscle that you wish for. The reason for this is you do not know the tricks of how to bulk up quickly. Luckily, we will cover that.

Many people want to pump up their biceps. But the truth is that many of them, regardless of the number of workouts they perform, they do not experience any changes on the size of their biceps. Why is that? Sure, you guessed it right. It is because their training methods are poor. The fitness world has developed some really good methods to pump up muscles quickly and safely.

The best method to use if you want to bulk up is weight training. What this means is that to build huge and strong biceps, you have to lift enough weight. Increasing the weight and number of sets is key. Certainly, just three sets won’t lead to the growth of your muscles. You have to make an effort and lift heavy weights in order to attain your desired results. Also, you’ll need to lift a minimum of ten reps each set.

Its important to use the right weight level so as not to hurt your form, which will not help you to reach your goal. You will want to lift weights 2-3 times a week. Giving a day of rest for your muscles in between. In order to grow, your muscles need time to repair.