What: Whisper Walk and 5K Run 

Where: McKee Farms Park in Fitchburg WI on
When: SUNDAY, September 22, 2013 from 9:00 am to Noon  

Why:  

Supreme has several members touched by Ovarian Cancer and Luanne is rallying the troops to help make a difference!  

We are excited to welcome our new Children's Swim Instructor Laurie Boettcher!

Our members and staff do some pretty amazing things!  Have something you would like to share?  E-mail your news to shana@shanamartin.com 

Over the past year I've been incorporating Tabata intervals into my personal training sessions, cycling classes, and even in water fitness!  Most love the short high intensity interval, so much that I recently had somebody ask, "Can we do that thing the Japanese guy discovered?" for a cycling class.  But what is the story behind "Tabata" and what is it exactly?  Read on to find out!

It all started with the Japanese Olympic Speed Skating Team. Head Coach Irisawa Koichi created a high-intensity interval-training workout for his skaters that consisted of eight rounds of 20 seconds each of intense work on a cycling ergometer, followed by 10 seconds of rest, for a total of a four-minute workout. Koichi asked one of his training coaches, Izumi Tabata, to analyze the effectiveness of this short but grueling workout. The result is a landmark 1996 study that found, in just six weeks of testing, a 28 percent increase in the subjects' anaerobic capacity, plus a 14 percent increase in their VO2max.

"Originally I thought this type of training was just for speed skaters or other highly motivated athletes because it is very painful and tiring," says Izumi Tabata, now a professor and researcher at Japan's Ritsumeikan University. "However, I found that there were groups of people interested in building muscle and therefore doing short high-intensity exercises that trained their muscle, but not those exercises that improved their aerobic training. When this regimen came along, they began to realize they could train both at the same time."
  

Though Tabata didn't actually design the workout, due to the widespread interest in his findings the workout was coined the "Tabata Protocol." In recent years, legions of exercisers have been inspired to do high-intensity Tabata-style workouts, including most notably the CrossFit community, which now uses the protocol in a popular workout they call "Tabata This."
  

"It seems like everything high-intensity is now called Tabata Training," says John Porcari, Ph.D., head of the Clinical Exercise Physiology Program at the University of Wisconsin, La Crosse. "The original Tabata study was done on a bicycle, but people are now doing that 20-second/10-second format with resistance training, plyometrics, calisthenics...with almost anything."

"The great thing about Tabata is it's a short workout-only 20 minutes-and it incorporates your total body, so it's working every muscle group that you possibly can," says Embert, referring specifically to the Tabata-style workout she designed.

Basically, if you work hard enough, even for just four minutes, you really should be able to get into decent cardiovascular shape. Do the full 20-minute workout shown here and your results will be much better. 
  

"I think with his research, Tabata was trying to prove that if you work people hard enough-if you work at high enough intensity-you can get in shape in a very short period of time," says Porcari. "The flip side is, if you're in good shape and you're limited on time, you can definitely maintain your fitness. It's just another trick in the arsenal of helping people get and stay in shape."
  

That said, based on the intensity of a Tabata workout, the average non-exerciser should be very careful with this type of training. "It could be potentially dangerous for them to be working this hard," he says. "Before people even attempt Tabata they probably need to have a pretty decent baseline level of fitness."
  

Thus, Emberts recommends only doing Tabata-style workouts two to three times a week with 48 to 72 hours rest between each session. And Porcari puts it all into perspective: "People need to realize that to get into shape, to really reap the benefits of Tabata training, it's the intensity part that gets you into shape, not the four minutes."
  

Four minutes to fitness? Maybe not, but clearly, based on the evidence, short-burst, high-intensity training is the real deal. 

The racquetball drop shot is very difficult to execute. A successful drop shot will be hit with enough momentum to barely reach the front wall. It should hit the front wall no higher than about 16 inches and then quickly bounce twice. The drop shot is exactly like a golf putt which drops the ball into the cup on its last revolution.

The drop shot is hit with very short push with the racquet. There is no arm swing. The trick is to use a loose wrist to brake the ball's impact on the racquet face. Blocking the ball will absorb its energy and speed.

In addition, hit the ball between waist and knee level. If a drop shot is hit above waist-high, it is not likely to die in the front court. In most cases, hit the drop shot down-the-line.

If you opponent has the center court position and is watching you hit the ball, then it is foolish to attempt to hit a drop shot. The ball is much too lively and will stay up long enough to be easily re-killed by an attentive opponent.

But there are three cases when the drop shot can be very effective:

1. The No-Looking-Back Player - If you play against someone who focuses exclusively on the front wall, then it is likely that they will not see you hit a drop shot from the back court. And, when they do finally see the ball hit low on the front wall, it will be too late for them to retrieve it.
2. The Fading Quarterback - Often after serving, some players rapidly drop back too far into the back court. So a good opportunity to hit a drop shot is when your opponent is backing up.
3. The Blast Shot - If your opponent has hit you a blast shot, then you are racing to the very front of the court. If you can, get to the side of the ball, wait for the ball to drop below knee level, and hit a very soft drop shot down-the-line.