Jenessa Connor

You train your legs for the trail, right? Now do the same for your upper body and make your days on the water easier. Bonus: These exercises work the same muscles that help you carry a heavy pack.

The best fitness trackers and apps for 2020.

Stamina is a quality we usually attribute to marathon runners or professional athletes, but it’s important for mere mortals, too. Increasing your stamina can help you perform everyday activities like gardening or shoveling snow more effectively. Boosting your stamina can help you improve your 5K time or help you better enjoy a friendly tennis match or a pick-up game of basketball. And because stamina goes hand in hand with cardiorespiratory capacity, increasing your stamina can also improve y...

The obliques aren’t the first muscles that come to mind when you think of strong abs. No, the rectus abdominis tends to steal the show with its prominent location and six-pack formation, while the oblique muscles are (literally) set off to the side. But when it comes to maintaining spinal stability and performing everyday movements like side bending and trunk rotation, the obliques are the essential muscles needed.
Exercises that Work the Obliques
The oblique muscles are often confused with “...

Among the ranks of aspirational body parts, like a thigh gap or six-pack abs, a bigger butt is on the wish list for many people. Of course, genetics play a role; if you’ve been naturally blessed with a bigger butt, consider yourself lucky. But for the rest of us with a flat-butt reality and bigger butt dreams, there is hope…but you’ve got to be willing to work for it. Here’s our guide on how to make your butt look bigger.
For more butt exercises that you can do anywhere, sign up for a free Op...

Watch a warm-up for any soccer team — from your local junior varsity squad to the World Cup champs — and you’re bound to see the toe taps exercise. A lot like jogging in place but with more precision, toe taps require the player to repeatedly tap a soccer ball with alternating feet, often while circling the soccer ball.
“Toe taps can be a great cardio exercise that, if you’re using an object as your target, also promotes proprioception (your sense of the position of your body),” says Cody Bra...

If you have tight iliotibial (IT) bands, IT band stretches seem like the logical solution. But dealing with this prevalent affliction (IT band syndrome accounts for 22 percent of injuries to the lower extremities, according to the National Academy of Sports Medicine) is not so simple. Most of the stretches recognized as IT band stretches don’t target the IT band. So if IT band stretches aren’t the answer, what is? Read on to find out!
Stretch all your muscles, tight or not, with Openfit’s Yog...

If you’ve grown a little bored with your typical bodyweight workout, try taking a step back — literally — with the reverse lunge. A twist on the classic forward lunge, the reverse lunge offers movement variety to help keep your brain engaged and your body challenged (and far away from the dreaded fitness plateau) while still providing many of the same benefits of the forward lunge, plus some unique ones.
“In addition to working just about every muscle below your waist — especially your quads ...

Even if the last time you hit the track was circa ninth-grade gym class, this 12-week plan can help you find your stride.

Losing, trimming, shrinking, and cinching? Hard pass. Faster speed, a stronger core, and a clear, focused mind? Let the gains begin.

How one D.C. bookkeeper turned a marathon-inspired side hustle into his main gig.

Your vacation days are spent, daylight is at a premium, and happy hour on the patio requires a jacket. The summer is officially over. And if you’re feeling some seasonal gloom, you’re not alone.
“There’s definitely a different tenor,” Pete McCall, adjunct faculty in Exercise Science at Mesa College, explains. “People are just kind of like ‘OK, now we’re back into the grind. We don’t have the freewheeling carefree schedule of summer. We’ve got to get the kids to school on time.’” Besides the w...