By David Saunders | UPDATED: 10:28, 26 February 2020
Andrea is the Founder and CEO of a lifestyle brand with a mission to help busy, driven people maximize their lives. A fitness expert and life strategist, Andrea has guided clients in New York and Los Angeles for 25 years.
Over the past decade, Andrea honed and codified her unique, real-world fitness lifestyle into “5 Life Strategies,” a learnable, actionable set of principles she uses to help her clients ramp every area of their lives. These principles have become the foundational underpinning of the Andrea Marcellus brand and all its offerings.
Andrea’s signature “in-the-moment” workouts are known for motivating busy, aspirational clients to unlock their own personal formulas to be their fittest, strongest selves – not just physically, but also mentally. Andrea spends much of her time with clients on mentality as she believes the ability to harness mental focus and energy is the #1 contributor to developing strength and flexibility – and vice versa, as physical power generates confidence and emotional stability.
The following exercises are from Andrea Marcellus, fitness expert, author of The Way In: 5 Winning Strategies to Lose Weight, Get Strong, and Lift Your Life, and CEO of AND/life
Hip bridges are an excellent core strengthening exercise that engages the glutes through active (concentric) contractions while developing the quads, hamstrings, abs and postural muscles isometrically.
The swan is a targeted exercise for your posterior chain. Ease into the exercise by just lifting the lower body off the floor for 30 seconds and slowly add time from there, up to one minute. Swan exercises are key to healing chronic back pain (be sure to clear this move with your doctor if you have had issues). Daily practice of this exercise can keep you pain free for the long-haul.
Diamond Leg Abs — The best abdominal exercises target your transverse abdominals. By keeping your knees open, you disengage the hip flexors to maximize recruitment of abdominal muscle fibers. With your feet above your hips and your knees open to make a diamond shape, curl up into a crunch position.
From there, take a breath and exhale your stomach down. This is key to activating your transverse abdominals, the deepest part of your ab muscles that wraps around like a corset providing you stability and strength.
Holding your crunch position, lower your legs in the diamond shape halfway to the floor, or as low as you can while keeping the abdominals pulled in. Hold for 30 seconds, working your way up to one minute.
Half Plank — This powerful exercise quickly creates functional strength and stability in the chest and shoulders. From a plank position, bend your elbows to drop your chest halfway to the floor and hold. Your elbows should be pointed away at a 45° angle, not 90° (straight out from your shoulders). Start with 30 second intervals, working your way up to one minute.
