The first part of our “Shaking Things Up” series explained the basic concept of the Power Plate and how one can manipulate amplitude and hertz to obtain one’s fitness goals. In this section we will look into reasons why an individual would want to incorporate this training tool into one’s workouts.
Speaking from experience, my team and I have been using the plate to stimulate more muscle growth, bring out more definition, burn more calories, increase strength, burn fat, and help prevent osteoporosis for over 3 years.
Let us first look at the way in which the plate helps with strength. When one performs an exercise on the plate (whether it be squats, lunges, crunches, push ups, static rows, dips, etc.) the individual is not only working voluntary muscles, but also involuntary muscles. This will stimulate more muscle growth, and by using more muscles, will burn more calories as well. When an individual is on the plate for only 30 seconds and has the hertz set at 30 (this is the lowest setting) the individual will contract his muscles 900 times! This is awesome because it is working not only slow twitch muscles fibers, but more importantly to those of us looking build more in short durations (30 seconds to 1 minute), stimulates the fast twitch as well. This is unique because traditional weight training only uses one or the other. What this means is, we can make our sessions shorter thus decreasing the likelihood of over training and allowing us more time to do our cardio and/or pose.
In regards to getting more definition using the Power Plate, remember you are contracting the muscle 900 times just standing on the plate, so one will work more muscles and burn more calories, thus allowing more definition to be seen (keep in mind you you do need to eat properly as well).
A 6 week study of 2 groups in 2003 showed the group using vibration training three times a week in their routine had an 18% increase in their resting metabolism, while the group that did similar exercises without vibration had a 2% decline.
One of my specialties is training individuals for bodybuilding, figure, and fitness competitions. I am also the official trainer for the Miss Arizona USA and Miss Teen Arizona USA pageants, along with a majority of our clientele as regular fitness individuals. No mater your fitness goal, imagine getting ready for an event where you want to look as “tight” as possible. Wouldn’t you want your metabolism to be as high as possible in order to burn more calories and lean out quicker? This may enable you to decrease the amount of cardio you need to do and/or consume more calories. Either of which will allow you to maintain your muscle mass more efficiently. Incorporating the plate with conventional weight training and diet will enable you to achieve better results.