Monday, January 28, 2013

'Guide to Athletic ABS!' DVD Chapter 4: Making Fitness Fun

So what most of you who have actually been following our slow (but FREE) release of my 'Guide to Athletic ABS!' DVD (featuring Chelsea Cruz), might not realize is that:
1. We shot the ENTIRE 'DVD' in 1 day. (To put this in real-world perspective, for the Perfect Fitness 'Ab-Carver Pro' I just did, we shot for a 12 hour day to produce a 1 MINUTE TV spot!)
2. We shot the entire DVD in 1 take.
3. We shot it in January '12, (1 year ago today!) when the sun was setting around 5:15 PM, so daylight to film in was scarce!
4. The executive producer, Gregory Mantell, happens to NOT be an 'early-bird' and he was sleeping on my sofa.  At 0600 on shoot day, I was running around amping getting everything ready and he was literally out cold dreaming.  We didn't start rolling camera until almost 9 AM!
5. We shot at 4 different locations and we managed to pull it off, but as you will see in this latest and final chapter, (Making Fitness Fun!), we kind of ran out of light & subsequently footage, so its just a fun little bonus of clips, but if nothing else you get to see the beautiful & fit, Chelsea Cruz bust out some dance moves, so it's worth pressing play!

But what is cool, is we released the entire high-def 'DVD' on YouTube, FREE - over 60 minutes of jam-packed information on exercise, nutrition, my holistic-approach, 'Abs-Awareness', basic abs & core physiology, and more.  So be sure to hit up YouTube and just search 'Max Wettstein's Guide to Athletic ABS!' and all 4 chapters will come up...perhaps not in order.  While there, you will also see trailers for my first DVD, my Guide to 'Amazing ABS!' - only avail on DVD, but hit me up if you want a copy.

Making fitness FUN, is the key, if you want to keep it consistent and not be limited by traditional fatigue barriers acknowledged during blander workouts.  Once it becomes fun, you forget about the grueling time left on the clock, and exist in the present moment, and trigger reward-neurotransmitter dopamine, and want to keep going.  The easiest way to achieve this is to participate in some kind of sport. I'm not saying that you don't have to push yourself or feel some sort of discomfort from exertion, but if you're adequately challenged & immersed in something physical that you enjoy, you're more likely to push through and charge ahead, upping your intensity inherently.

Here's a sample of Chelsea & I making fitness fun in our own unique ways, yet still an effective full-body, FUNctional workout:

...and the direct link here: 'Max Wettstein's Guide to Athletic ABS!: Making Fitness Fun!'

Some folks have it in them to torture themselves for hours on a treadmill, or bootcamp class, but if that is not your style, then FIND YOUR SPORT!
-Best,
Max  & Chelsea
www.maxwettsteinfitness.com

Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Men's Fitness magazine editorial & workouts, FEB '13 Issue

I have a few workouts in the Men's Fitness magazine FEB 2013 issue shot by photographer Dustin Snipes.  I did not write these workouts, but while doing them for the shoot, I did find them to be technically correct and effective.  Pick up a copy on stands now, or subscribe digitally, or just go to their website and check them out.  Thanks for your interest! - Max

Thursday, December 27, 2012

Perfect Fitness 'Ab-Carver Pro' has finally launched.

The newest & perhaps most effective home-exercise Ab product to hit the market, called the Ab-Carver Pro that I worked on with Perfect Fitness, (maker of Perfect Push-up & Perfect Pull-up) has finally launched and is now available at Ab-Carver Pro dot com  and via TV infomercial sales, and soon in retail sports' stores.  It looks like a futuristic, yet still simplistic version of the oldie-but-goodie Ab-wheel that you roll out to prone with, yet there's more than meets the eye at first glance:

Monday, November 26, 2012

Longevity & Athletic Performance: Is Intermittent-Fasting the Key Strategy to Achieve Both?

Background: My Training Progression & Evolution: Athlete ~ Model ~ Holistic Health

            As I age into my 40s I’ve witnessed my training & nutrition goals become more ‘holistic’ in nature and evolve through various phases, sometimes back & forth, from basically bodybuilding, to body-sculpting as a professional fitness-model, to training for athletic performance, to now training for holistic health and ‘longevity’.  I’d like to say that I’m getting wiser as I get older, but also I’m trying to stick around a long time too, being the father & coach of two daughters.  Ideally speaking, a truly complete training & nutrition plan should simultaneously and equally improve athletic performance, sculpt an aesthetically appealing physique, and, combat aging and age-related diseases.  If nothing else, to be sure, some kind of exercise every day, ideally outdoors, will go a long way towards accomplishing all of the above.  But if you’re a fitness aficionado there’s way more to this story, depending on what your primary fitness goals are.
For me personally, athletic performance and optimal function used to always trump all else fitness.  However, to be completely candid, there was a period during the peak of my fitness-modeling career when I was booking jobs weekly to include magazine cover-tries, that aesthetics actually trumped all my other training goals.  This amounted to me basically always striving to improve lean-body mass & body composition.  Being that I am a professional model and not a professional athlete, I have no regrets about focusing on aesthetics so much.  Now I’ve become more focused on total holistic-health, maintaining range of motion, and exploring longevity, AKA, anti-aging techniques.  I feel like this is a natural progression and evolution that most athletes will arrive at as they age and begin families.


Longevity & The Athlete's Dietary Conundrum...

Friday, November 9, 2012

Maui Family Vacation:) A surf trip sorta!..

     For the record you can never technically call a family vacation a 'Surf Trip' - and I've known this! Even if the whole family surfs, eventually the wife and kids will demand a break from the constant search...from all the gear...from all the risks taken to score an empty surf break chasing 3rd hand information.  And even IF you score that empty, firing break it still comes with all the unknowns:  Why isn't anybody else out?  Is it sharky?  Is it shallow reef?  Crazy currents?  Private access with ornery locals?  Surfers understand and appreciate that it's not just scoring waves, but it's also the excitement of the search and the cumulative reward of all the small discoveries along the journey...
Coconut palms patch found on the backside of Honolua Bay, Maui's NW corner
   

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

Abs & Fat Physiology 101: Your Internal Belly-Fat is KILLING you slowly right now...

     Greetings holistic-health and 6-pack Abs enthusiasts!  We have just released chapter 3 of my NEW 'Guide to Athletic Abs!' DVD.  As promised, all 12 minutes of information from yours truly is FREE - absolutely no hidden strings folks, (I've told you, I get compensated via Google Adsense Ads so I don't have to charge you EVER!)  In this chapter I discuss basic Abs & Core physiology and anatomy, then present my original concept of 'Abs-Awareness', and then dive into belly-FAT (not literally!), both subcutaneous and visceral - the former blanketing your 6-pack abs and the latter KILLING you slowly, pumping your mid-section with inflammatory chemicals and setting off a chain of slow-death micro-systemic events.  So what are you waiting for?  Click the 'play' button below on the embedded video or go directly to YouTube on the link below and watch it FREE now, and let me arm you with the information you need to not only improve your lean-body mass and reveal your 6-pack Abs, but also to make you healthier from the inside out and help you live longer!  Direct video link here: Chapter 3: Abs & Fat Physiology 101



Saturday, September 1, 2012

Light as a Feather, Stiff as a BOARD - Planking Workout!

      Light as a feather, stiff as a board!...It's time to PLANK!  Planking has great exercise VALUE because not only does it involve your entire core, but also you can plank anywhere - no gym required!  Perhaps no other single exercise strengthens your entire core as effectively as planking, recruiting your rectus-abs, transversus-abs, obliques, hips, lower-back and more.  But before you yawn out of boredom or claim you've "been there and done that in yoga class", check out my video below where I demonstrate at least 12 different variations of the plank, beginning with the most basic, to more advanced.  Towards the end I even incorporate weights, stability ball and suspension straps!  While not intended to be a sole workout in and of itself, at least now you will have plenty of planking options to refer to during your other functional & core workouts.  And if you happen to be a surfer, this will really help your 'pop-up', when you go from prone to standing in one move!  So check it out below the jumppbreak!...





...and here is the video direct link via youtube: Plank Variations with Max Wettstein Video