How to Build Lean Body Mass

Series Summary

Many people want to lose weight, yet despite claims of quick fat burning pills and powders, the best way to lose weight is still through proper diet and exercise. Exercise does more than maintain physical fitness. Working out improves bone density, builds muscle strength, and improves joint mobility. It can also reduce general health risks, boost the immune system and help with depression and insomnia. Whether exercising to lose weight or improve muscle mass, working out is always a good idea to promote mind and body health. In this free exercise video series, a fitness director demonstrates simple exercises to incorporate into a daily workout regime. Learn the correct way to perform sit ups, push-ups and crunches. Find out how to work out specific parts of the body, like the back, the abs, legs and arms. Even see a 10-minute exercise routine that eliminates all excuses for not working out. With these simple exercises, achieving physical fitness has never been easier.

Video Transcript

"Building lean muscle mass is very important. This is Alice Monsaert, I'm going to give you some tips on building your lean muscle mass. One thing you're really going to have to consider is doing some resistance training. If I were a beginner person, stepping into the fitness industry for the first time, I would really seek the advice of a personal trainer. If you were going to play golf you would need some lessons. Same thing in fitness. If you're going to visit the gym for the first time, seek the advice of a trainer, and they'll set up a proper program for you. You're going to need to lift something that we call a dumb bell, or some sort of resistance training, something that's heavier than your body weight. When you first start out doing leg exercises, such as a squat, may be just enough overload for the system. So we have to continually overload the system, so if you're used to walking every single day, or bending down, then we'd want to add resistance to those movements. So doing a simple bicep curl, with some resistance training, or an overhead press. There is various exercises that you can do, but you want to overload the system. That's very, very important, so that the body is always challenged to do something new. You want to be able to do about fifteen repetitions of the exercise with the chosen weight. If this becomes really easy at repetition number fifteen, then it's time for me to overload and lift heavier weights. So I want to build muscle in all the major muscle groups of the body, which would be the quadriceps, the hamstrings, the glutes, the abdominal muscles, the chest, the shoulders, the back. So that I can have balanced, lean muscle mass throughout my body. Lean muscle mass will help you rev up your engine so that you can actually build...burn more fat while at rest. I'm sorry, burning more calories while you're at rest. So you can be laying on the couch after your workout and your metabolism's still revved up. So lean muscle mass keeps us strong for activities of daily living. It's very, very important, so I encourage you to get on a resistance training program today. This is Alice Monsaert. Have a great day, and stay healthy."