Put a little sprung into this spring

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Certain exercises, such as jump squats, can help strengthen bone density.

Strength is improved generally by lifting more weight, but what about power? What about bone health? Why does this matter?

No matter what your goal is, a well-rounded conditioning routine will prepare you for better sports and competition performance and make both work and life easier. It’s not all about having big strong mus­cles either.

Training your body with power or explosive exercises will not only help you with athletic performance, it will prepare you for the fight or flight response and minimize risk for injury.

The other day, I ran out to my car in the dark and didn’t realize there was black ice on the driveway. I went for a slide, but because I have trained my body for those moments, I was able to tighten my core imme­diately and brace my legs, adding a little hop off the ice onto the grass for a soft and safe landing. Others may not have been so lucky and could have easily broken a limb.

You can easily add power moves to any workout. It’s all about tim­ing of repetitions. You can still lift heavy weight and maybe add a few power lifts with slow controlled lowering (or slow return to starting point). You can also go the opposite way with slow start and quick fin­ish.

Power moves can be done with or without weight and even on cardio machines. You can also play around with the amount of repetitions or do time sets such at 10 to 30 sec­ond intervals (no longer than one to two minutes, depending on the ex­ercise). If you are not sure how to get creative safely with this, check in with a trainer for support.

Explosive movements also sup­ply great benefit to bone density. This is especially important as you age so that bones do not become brittle and break easily. Of course, you will need to make sure your nutritional choices are healthy and include sufficient calcium, magne­sium and phosphorus. Don’t wait until you are old and grey to do something about your bone health. It’s never too early to prevent dis­ease and injuries. Bone density is improved when explosive move­ments have impact. It really doesn’t take much and is relative to your improving fitness level: walking, jogging, jump squats, burpees, skaters (lateral step-touch), going up steps are all examples of impact movements.

High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) routines may be the obvi­ous choice for more power and impact but are not for everyone. Many group fitness classes can be modified to suit the same goal. For example, you can get a lot of pow­er and impact out of a regular step class or you can talk to the instruc­tor about ways you can amp up the movements so they can give you more advanced options during the class. You can also add power and impact to everyday life activities: run up the stairs rapidly, do some power pushups off the edge of the counter while you wait for some­thing to cook, and get in a few jump squats while reaching for some­thing high up.

Not only will you see improve­ment in performance and bone density, you are bound to have other physical changes: explosive movements done more often max­imize your calories burned and are proven to have significant impact on weight management. They also can help suppress appetite with in­creased blood flow and release of hormones that make you feel sat­isfied and full. Just make sure you are eating sufficiently and taking in two to three litres of water a day. It doesn’t matter if you are training for Team Canada Soccer or Wii soc­cer, power movement training will benefit everyone.