Stepping Out Into Healthy Life

I have been working closely with Tan Tock Seng Hospital and have since joined forces with their Stepping Out Team to be one of the trainers for their Stepping Out Into Healthy Life programme. The aim of this programme is to lower the risks of falls among elders with the help of exercise.

Sessions are conducted twice weekly and a session lasts for 1 hour. Exercises are done indoors and with the help of the Thera-Band Tube, strength training was a breeze!. The most important aspect of the session is the balancing exercises where participants will try to balance on 1 foot, tip-toeing, standing on your heels (amongst other things) and will do their best to maintain their balance. Exercises were done in sets to give them ample time to rest and recover for the subsequent workouts.

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Session 7 - Jeremy Yeo (Project SlimDown)

Sorry for the late entry, too many pictures this time! We changed venue this time due to my swollen ankle. We met at Tampines Stadium and did our rounds there. A 4km workout with intervals of exercises after each round. It's kind of difficult to run alone, especially under the blazing hot sun, smacked in the middle of the day. Jeremy, currently weighing 103.3kg, ran 10 rounds on the perimeter of the field. Why not the track? Because his shoes gave way...

So we started the first round and he took about 3mins per round in average. He completed the following exercises (I was amazed) :

Biceps, Triceps and Squats

Jeremy ran 2min 27s for the first round, and was feeling good! His second round was 2min 54s.

Standing alternate rows, push ups on railing and step ups

Standing row, reverse fly and lunges

Straight arm pull, bicep pull and calf raises

Forward row with elbows close to body, single chest fly and lateral squats

Lateral raise, forward raise and drop squat.

Upright row, forward raise and drop lunge.

Normal sit ups, back arches and oblique crunch.

No pictures for this set - we did touch heels and slap heels and obliques leg swing.

Leg raise, leg extension and Oblique twist with band.

From the 3rd round onwards, Jeremy HR was shooting up, so he went much slower for the rest of the rounds.
3. 3min19s
4. 3min01s
5. 3min21s
6. 3min13s
7. 3min14s
8. 3min16s
9. 3min18s
And the last round he did a sprint, and came back with a time of 2min14s!!

The report says:
Duration: 1hr 47mins
In zone (60-80%): 1hr 18min
Average HR: 150bpm
Max HR: 190bpm
Calories: 1487!!!

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Session 6 - Jeremy Yeo (Project SlimDown)

Jeremy is still suffering from D.O.M.S., couldnt really push for today's training. Nevertheless. he whacked the session! Jeremy was complaining about heavy breathing and couldn't really jog at a faster pace. Check out the photos :)

First set of exercises... Observe the wet patch on his shirt.

2nd set of exercises.. that patch getting bigger..

3rd set of exercises, bigger.....

 

Lastly we finished with abs and back exercises :) Totally drenched!

Here are the details from the report.

Duration of the workout: 1hr 16mins
In zone training (60% - 80%): 55mins
Average HR: 133bpm
Max HR: 164bpm
Total Calories spent: 855

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Session 5 - Jeremy Yeo (Project SlimDown)

The weather has been really kind to us! Blessed :) We finally managed to get a correct and proper measurement from the weighing scale! Jeremy dropped from 104.9kg to 103.8kg for this week! So happy for him! Today we tried jogging the whole round of the reservoir and did exercises every 10mins. First we did standing back row and shoulder extension and for the legs we did step ups.

Standing back row

Shoulder extension

Step ups

 The next interval we did lateral raise for the deltoids and also the punch ups. And the lateral squats for the legs. I think the lateral squats killed him. His HR went up to 90+%!!!

Lateral Raise

Punch ups

 We went on for the next 10mins and did our next set of exercises. We did a reverse fly and back row with different grip. We did the calf raises to build on his beautiful calves :)

 The last set of exercises, we did 30s bicep curls non stop and also the triceps. We did not do the legs exercises, because we wanted to sprint for the last stretch back to base! We did and Jeremy died... HR went up to 100%!! But he didn't stop! He went on at a slower pace all the way till we finish the round! Great Job!!

 We finished off with abs (lying leg raises) and back exercises (back arches). Yes, he died...
This was the report from the watch:
Date: 14th Aug 2012
Duration of workout: 1hour 34mins
In zone training (60% - 80%): 1hour 2mins
Average HR: 141bpm
Max HR: 187bpm
Calories: 1158!!

All the way Jeremy!! Go under 100kg!

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Session 4 - Jeremy Yeo (Project SlimDown)

Happy National Day Singapore!! It's already the 4th session and Jeremy has been very consistent with his training. This morning we measured his weight before we started the exercises and he is now lighter by 700g :) 2 days ago was 105.6kg, and today 104.9kg!!

Same routine, we went around the reservoir and did exercises every 10 minutes interval. We tried to run non stop this time, within the zone 60%-80%. For the exercises every 10mins, we did downward paddle and forward row with elbows up. Followed by body weight squats. Jeremy said he felt easier to do the squats! Getting stronger! We did triceps and biceps, followed by lunges. and the last set of exercises, we did standing single arm chest fly, lateral raise for the deltoids and calves raises.

As much as we wanted to run non-stop, Jeremy was struggling with his increasing heart rate, stopping him from further jogging. Therefore he did brisk walking for the last stretch back to base.. We did 2 abs exercises and 1 for the back, each 3 sets of 12reps. The leg tugs and heel touch for the abs, followed by support back arch. I'm sure these terms and exercises sounds alien to you, but if you want to know more, you can either visit our youtube video on the Theraband exercises (http://youtu.be/qiRVifN_58A) or just ask me personally :)

 Jeremy asked me to use this picture instead, He doesn't want anyone to see his struggling face...
And lastly, this is the report from the Polar HR monitor:

Duration of training: 1hr 37mins
In zone 60% - 80%: 1hr 03 mins
Avg HR: 137bpm
Max HR: 174bpm
Calories: 1126

We had minced meat noodle after our session, from my favourite Former Plaza Singapura food court stall. They've moved to Bedok reservoir road! Strongly recommended!!

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