How to Calculate Your Target Heart Rate

It is important to note that before I go into the step by step guide that this method that your TRH is generally between 60% and 80%. The way I am going to show you how to calculate your target heart rate is based off the Karvonen Method, which is one of the most effective methods since it takes into account your resting heart rate (RHR).

Step 1: Find Your Resting Heart Rate

The best time to find your resting heart rate is in the morning when you first wake up. You will need to count your pulse for 60 seconds and this will determine your RHR. I would take an average of at least three days to make sure you are getting an accurate depiction of your RHR. So just take your RHR for three days and then add them all together and divide by three to get your average.

Finding Your Pulse

For those of you who do not have a fancy heart rate watch it is fairly easy to find your pulse. There are two main ways to find your pulse.

1. Neck pulse- the neck pulse can be found right under either side of your jaw bone towards the corner of the back of your jaw. Take your index and middle finger and feel around for it. If you are having a hard time finding it, do a few jumping jacks and get your heart rate up and it should make your pulse more noticeable.

2. Wrist pulse- your wrist pulse can be found on either one of your hands right underneath your thumb. I personally have a harder time finding this one, but that is just me and either one works just fine.

Step 2: Find Your Maximum Heart Rate and Heart Rate Reserve

Both of these are really easy to calculate. Your maximum heart rate (MHR) is simply the number 220 minus your age. So a 30 year old man would have a MHR of (220-30) 190. Your heart rate reserve (HRRes) is just simply the your MHR minus your RHR. So for a 30 year old with a MHR of 190 and a RHR of 66, their HRRes would be 124. Make’s sense right? Right!

Step 3: Find Your Upper and Lower THR

Based on the fact that we have established our THR zone as being 60-80% of our MHR these will be our lower and upper limits. To calculate each limit you multiply your HRRes by the limit and then add your RHR, in that order. So for the example with our 30 year old:

1. Lower Limit: [124(HRRes) x 0.60(limit)] + 66(RHR) = ~140

2. Upper Limit: [124(HRRes) x 0.80(limit)] + 66(RHR) = ~165

Step 4: Calculating Your THR

The last step is very simple and will give you your THR. All you have to do is take the two numbers you calculated for your upper and lower limits add them together and divide by 2. So you are essentially averaging the two to calculate your THR. So in finishing our example:

Calculated THR = (165+140)/2 =~153

How to Calculate Your Target Heart Rate: Final Remarks

I hope this post helped you find out how to calculate your target heart rate. As mentioned in the beginning knowing what your target heart rate is will help you maximize the benefits you can achieve from cardiovascular activity. If you want to make sure you are in your target heart rate zone while your exercising then I recommend whenever you take a quick break to count your pulse for 30 seconds and then multiply by 2. This will give you close to what your current heart rate is.

If you have anymore questions or concerns about how to calculate your target heart rate than be sure to leave a comment below!

Yours in Success,

Brett Banford

Work with me –Leaders Only!

My Blog: http://brett-banford.com

The post How To Calculate Your Target Heart Rate first appeared on Trek2BeFit.com.

P90X2 Phase 1: Foundation

Basically the foundation phase of P90X2 is all about preparing yourself for the rest of the workouts. It is about finding your balance and stability that will help you master some of the more difficult moves in the later workouts.

The first series of workouts that are in P90X2 phase 1 that are specific just to to this phase are X2 Core, X2 Total Body, and X2 Balance and Power. These three workouts really focus on giving you the foundation you need to succeed with the future workouts. For overviews of the workouts and how they went for me feel free to click on the links above.

Just as a quick run through all of these workouts incorporate a lot of balance posters and core moves as they would suggest. You will do a lot of compound movements that involve you balancing on one leg, squatting, core contractions and extensions etc. If you have awful balance and a weak core then this will be a phase you may want to spend a little longer time on before advancing on to the next phase of P90X2.

P90X2 Phase 1 – How It Went For Me

Overall I really enjoyed P90X2 phase 1 and found it to be very helpful with my balance and stability. Check out the video below for a more in depth look at how it went for me. I may even show you a move or two haha

P90X2 Phase 1 – My Special Opportunity To You!

As I mentioned above I wanted to give you a special opportunity that a handful of people have already taken to help them change their lifestyle and finally get the body they deserve. I want to help as many people as possible get into the best shape of their lives, but I am only looking for people who are ready to take action.

This is why I still want to extend the invitation to you to join my “NO Excuses” Challenge Group. We are officially rocking and rolling and off to an awesome start towards getting to our goals. Click the link above for more information on the group or if you are ready want to ask me directly than all you have to do is contact me.

Don’t let the opportunity to finally get the body you deserve slip away. You won’t always have people here to believe in you like I do. Take advantage of this and know that someone cares to see you succeed.

I hope you enjoyed my P90X2 phase 1 review and got some helpful information from it. Let me know how your journey is going! I want to hear from you and help keep you accountable. How did P90X2 phase 1 go for you? Why do you want to get into shape? Let me know below!

To Your Success,

Brett Banford

My Blog: http://brett-banford.com

The post P90X2 Phase 1 COMPLETED! first appeared on Trek2BeFit.com.

Well it’s time to answer that question for all of you women out there who are hesitant about trying out P90X.

By the way if you are wondering yes that is she hulk the female version of the hulk. I thought it was fitting for this post haha.

I Want To Look Like Wonder Woman NOT Superman!

Alright so I know that was a little cheesy, but I felt like this was a good comparison of body types between what women are and aren’t looking for!

So enough fooling around the truth is that P90X is not a program that is solely geared towards “bulking up” and putting on muscle. It is an overall extreme fitness program that will help you lose weight and get the body you always wanted for both male and female. So NO P90X will not cause you to bulk up and look like Superman.

P90X attacks this problem from a number of different perspectives that will make sure you don’t bulk up and put on a lot of muscle.

How To Avoid Bulking Up With P90X

* This is just a side note that I wanted to make clear before I go any further. It takes a long time to build muscle. The muscle that would make you look bulky. Muscle burns fat, which will actually make you look leaner contrary to popular believe. Check out my post about is P90X for women for more information on how muscle works!

1. Do the P90X Lean Schedule – the P90X lean schedule is exactly what it sounds like. it is the schedule that is used to get you lean and toned not big and ripped. With the lean schedule you are getting rid of one of the three muscle specific oriented workouts and adding Cardio X along with Core Synergistics. This will help to avoid lifting weights and doing all of the pull ups that are associated with those workouts.

2. Lighter weights, more reps – this is also a highly recommended way to get lean muscle and not put on size. When you start P90X you should actually here Tony say in some of the workouts “If you want size 6-8 reps, if your looking to tone and lean up, 10-12 reps”. In doing so you won’t be pushing your muscles as intensely in short burst and will be more so working on the endurance of the muscles helping you to burn off fat without putting on size.

3. Avoid Large Amounts of Protein – protein is highly associated with muscle repair, growth, and recovery. I am certainly not saying it isn’t important because it is, I am saying if you want to avoid bulking up then you need to monitor how much protein you are taking in. This is why I love the P90X Results and Recovery Formula so much!

It has only 10 grams of protein in it which will assist in your muscle repair and recovery without giving you a ton of extra to help put on the muscle size and growth. It does have a little bit of creatine in it, but this is also used to help build lean muscle and avoid bulking up. I highly recommend it. It taste delicious too, like an orange sherbet push pop!.

Your Next Step!

I hope this post has helped you ladies realize that you can get incredible results with P90X without bulking up. If you decided that you are ready to take on P90X and are ready to get into the best shape of your life than here is your next steps.

1. Sign up for a Free Beachbody account– this will give you instant access to free fitness and nutrition tools and you will also receive me as your personal coach to help motivate and support you 100% of the way.

2. Contact me on Facebook – send me a friend request on facebook and let me know that you are ready to commit to P90X and get that body you always wanted. Let’s get you back into those jeans or that bikini that you used to wear!

I hope you enjoyed this post and will leave lots of comments and questions. I would love to hear from you help you on your fitness journey!

To Your Success,

Brett Banford

My Blog: http://brett-banford.com

The post Will P90X Cause Women To Bulk Up? first appeared on Trek2BeFit.com.

Way #1: Not Having a Strong Enough Why

Many of you may have just read that and said “I did have a strong why, I wanted to be able to do this or that, or feel this or that way”. Whatever your reason was the fact is you still failed at it. So what does that mean? It means that your reason was not strong enough to keep you motivated to stick with it. Plain and simple. When something is truly important to you, when you truly want something you will do whatever it takes to get it.

I heard this story from Eric Thomas, a motivational speaker, and I want to give the quick synapse of that story to really put things into context for you. He told a story of a man that wanted to be successful. The man met this success guru at the beach. All the man could talk about is how successful he wanted to be and how bad he wanted it. So the guru brought the man out into the water , clothes and all, the man kept getting a little deeper until finally the water was at his chin. At this point the man thought the guru was crazy and was wondering what the heck this had to do with success. All of the sudden the guru shoves the man’s head under the water. He holds him there, 20 seconds go by then 30 then 40. Finally the man starts flailing his arms around and right when he is about to pass out the guru lifts him up and says you just learned the first principle of success. The man gasping for air shouts “What the hell are you talking about?” and the guru says:

“When you want to be successful as bad as you want to breathe, then you will be successful….”

Find your why my friends, look deep down inside of yourself and find what drives you and what motivates you and then you’ll be on the right path.

Way #2: Not Changing Your Eating Habits

If you really want to make sure you fail at your workout program than not changing your eating habits is a big way to do it! Nutrition is 70% of the battle. You can workout all you want, but if you continue to put crap into your body than you will always hinder your results. Does any of this ring a bell to you? Did you work your butt off and eat like crap and find  yourself to be surprised when you didn’t get the results you expected?

Luckily for you if you struggle with nutrition as much as I do then you have a secret weapon to help combat this problem. SHAKEOLOGY of course! If you are not sure what Shakeology is then check out my no BS Shakeology review.

Way #3: Having No Support System

Finally having no support system can be a critical missing piece that can lead you down the path to failure. How many times have you had to motivate yourself, and failed? Did you just go about the whole workout thing on your own terms and whatever happened happened? Keeping your motivation, trying to hold yourself accountable, and having little or no encouragement are all issues that can be solved by having the right support system.

The two main ways that you can solve this are:

1. Sign up for a Free Beachbody Account – by signing up for a free account you open up the doors to a whole community of people who are trying to accomplish the same fitness goals as you are. You can get on message boards to talk to others, find a workout buddy, and you’ll even get me as your personal coach to help you 100% of the way. This brings me to my second way and my special opportunity that I mentioned earlier in the post.

2. Join a Challenge Group – joining a challenge group with a small amount of people all committed to the single goal of getting into shape can be a complete game changer. I want to offer you that chance. Check out my “No Excuses” Challenge Group and see if you are ready to do what it takes to get into the best shape of your life. SERIOUS CHALLENGERS ONLY!!

I hope you enjoyed this post and will take some of these to heart. I want nothing more than to help you succeed in your fitness. It has been a truly life changing journey for me thus far.

I want to get you started on your fitness journey right here and right now, so if you are serious then answer the question and leave your answer in the comment box below:

What is your why?

To Your Success,

Brett Banford

My Blog: http://brett-banford.com

The post 3 Ways To Fail At P90X, Insanity, P90X2, or (Insert Workout Here) first appeared on Trek2BeFit.com.

With that being said I have put together a video for you guys that gives you a little face to face time with me. I also go into a little more details about each of the P90X2 workouts through out the entire week. Enjoy!!!

How Did Your First Week Of P90X2 Go?

I hope you enjoyed my first weeks review of P90X2! I would love to hear from you about how your first week of P90X2 went. Even if you just want to comment on one of the workouts that would work as well.

What did you struggle with for these workouts? What did you like the most about the workouts? Let me know what you think. If you have any comments, questions, or concerns about P90X2 then please leave them below.

Finally if you are looking for someone to help keep you accountable then make sure you check out my “No Excuses Challenge Group“. I would love to help you reach all of your fitness goals all you have to do is take action. I look forward to hearing from all of you.

To Your Success,

Brett Banford

My Blog: http://brett-banford.com

The post My P90X2 Week 1 Review!!! first appeared on Trek2BeFit.com.