Keep track of the latest in diet and fitness Twitter trends and opinions with this weekly post. Not only will AOL Health's Twitter alias Healthpop and That's_Fit ask fitness-related questions and share the best responses with you, we'll scour the Twittersphere for the latest buzz on everything from good eats to exercise routines gone bad.

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Hauling your cookies to the gym is tough enough without the added stress of irritating workout habits from other gym-goers. From awkward staring to uncleaned exercise equipment, see what gym and workout pet peeves drive the fine folks on Twitter a little bonkers.

You know that you need to add weight-lifting to your workout routine but you may not be sure which routine is best.

Just like any other time you start a fitness program, you'll want to start out slowly.

First, you'll need to start with one or two sets of eight to 12 repetitions. If you're older, injured or unsure of your strength you can do 10 to 15 reps with less weight. When you can lift a weight eight to 12 times and it gets harder to lift during the last rep, you'll want to add a little weight and decrease the reps.

Even if you're a seasoned weight-lifting veteran, alternating the workouts is key. You shouldn't do arm workouts and shoulders exercises on consecutive days. You should avoid working on legs consecutively, too. It's important to vary how you're focusing on strengthening different muscles. For instance, you may want to start by isolating the shoulders. At your gym you can do an overhead press, lateral raise or front raise to work on this body part. Start with two sets of eight to 12 repetitions.

Other parts of this workout might include strengthening the chest via the bench press, chest press machine or push-ups. You can work on your back as well in a seated row machine. To build your biceps you can work on bicep curls, hammer curls and concentration curls using hand weights. As for the triceps? You can do tricep extensions.

As you alternate days to work on your lower body, you can try squats, lunges, leg-press machines, deadlifts or calf raises. As for the abdominals, there are always crunches, oblique twists and pelvic tilts.

If you begin your weight training regimen at your health club, the fym should have staff to supervise and answer specific questions.

Now that you've got your weight-lifting routine set, check out That'sFit's cardio workouts.

Men and women become less fit as they age, according to a new report in the October 26 issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine.

This should come with a big "duh". But it also comes with some good news.

First the not-so-good news. "The U.S. population is aging and is becoming more obese and sedentary", the authors tell us. No surprise there. But it's a vicious circle. Cardiorespiratory fitness of both sexes declines with age: two of the best indicators of cardiorespiratory fitness are body composition (fat vs. muscle) and physical activity.

The more fat you've got and the less active you are, the higher the chances of disease, not to mention the ability to function independently.

And by the way, the decline gets worse after age 45, and it's worse for men than for women.

What to do, what to do?

Researchers from the University of Houston studied about 20,000 women and men between 20 to 96(!) in a study called the Aerobics Center Longitudinal Study between 1974 and 2006. The 30 years of data collected on such a large group of people offer some strong take home messages for anyone who wants to age well. (Here comes the good news.)

Obsession with youth is not only the plague of modern society. In the 1930s, a retired British army officer stumbled upon a remote monastery in the Himalayas where the monks were rumored to have found the fountain of youth. Amazed by their age-defying health and energy, he attributed their vitality to a series of yoga-like postures they practiced daily – as had generations of monks for thousands of years. These Five Tibetan Rites are believed to work by stimulating and balancing energy centers in our bodies called chakras that correspond to each of our endocrine glands. "They're like electricity transformers, receiving and regulating energy and transmitting it throughout the body," explains Sydney-based Carolinda Witt, who's been teaching the rites for more than seven years.

Witt says practicing The Five Rites is like flicking these energy switches to ON. And they're easy to do. In fact, she's made modifications that focus on breathing and building core strength so you don't have to be a veteran yogini to get yourself, well, turned on. Plus, it's yoga, so you'll create a leaner, stronger body! Start with three repetitions of each posture daily and in order. Add two per week until you're doing 21 in about 10 minutes. When you finish each move, pause and take three energy breaths. The directions are below.

Rite #1: Spinning
Harmonizes chakra spin rates. Improves balance, focus and coordination.

Rite #2: Modified Leg Raise
Strengthens and tones the core, hips, lower back, legs and neck.

Keep track of the latest in diet and fitness Twitter trends and opinions with this weekly post. Not only will AOL Health's Twitter alias Healthpop and That's_Fit ask fitness-related questions and share the best responses with you, we'll scour the Twittersphere for the latest buzz on everything from good eats to exercise routines gone bad.

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Hopping on the treadmill and sweating it out on the elliptical are things of the past for many of Twitter's fittest tweeters. They've put traditional workouts on the back burner and are trying something new. Check out which exercise waters they've tested.

When you move your arms in virtually any direction, your shoulders (a.k.a. deltoids) are either in charge or, at the very least, involved. The ingenious design of your shoulder joints makes the shoulders one of the most mobile, versatile muscle groups in your body. It also makes it one of the most vulnerable. Fortunately, if you commit to doing some basic shoulder training on a regular basis you'll keep your "delts" strong and supple and have a better chance of staying injury-free. It'll help balance out your body's curves too. Want to slim your hips? Chiseled shoulders broaden the upper body and polish your posture, creating the illusion that you've shrunk and reshaped your hips. Plus, firmed up shoulders look killer in tank tops. To get your shoulders in shape, try exercises.

Click through the photo gallery below for our step-by-step workout guide.




Ideally, you should own three sets of dumbbells for shoulder work; typically 3, 5 and 8-pounders. When you first try the accompanying shoulder routine, start with your lightest weight. Do 1 set of each move, 8 to 15 sets per set, 2 to 3 times a week. Once you can easily complete 15 reps of an exercise, move up to the next heaviest weight or try the "challenge yourself" version. Rest assured that going heavier won't bulk you up -- we promise. On the contrary, it'll help you shape, tone and strengthen your shoulder muscles a lot quicker than sticking with a weight that's too light to have an impact.

Mistakes to avoid: Don't arch your back as you lift and keep the movement in control so you don't rock back and forth to help lift and lower the weight. To avoid shoulder and neck pain, don't clench your teeth, hitch your shoulders up, or drop your chin to your chest. Keep these technique pointers in mind and you'll create a beautiful pair of shoulders with minimal risk of doing any damage. (If you tend to have chronic shoulder pain, consult with your doctor or physical therapist before you do these moves.)

Shoulders benefit from a bit of variety so change up your routine every month or so by doing 1 to 2 workouts with exercise bands or by tossing in a set or two on the shoulder press machine at the gym. Yoga is surprisingly good at toning and redesigning shoulders because so many upper body poses depend on them to move and support the entire body. Swimming, especially the crawl stroke, is also a good shoulder shaper.

Closet full of fitness gear? Work it into your Halloween costume this year.

When the Wii Fit came out, I was among many who wondered, "Is this a fitness tool or a video game?" After buying the Nintendo system and trying a few of the games (and experiencing the soreness the day after), my opinion was that, yes, the Wii Fit and Wii Fit Plus are definitely tools that can benefit fitness and facilitate weight loss.

Turns out I'm not alone. The UK Department of Health has decided to give the Nintendo Wii Fit Plus its approval, reports BBC News. This marks the first time the UK Department of Health has ever given a nod of approval to a computer game.

The biggest change consumers will notice is the addition of the Change4Life logo to the Wii Fit Plus. Change4Life is a campaign in the UK aiming to keep people from becoming overweight by encouraging them to exercise more and eat healthy.

If your weight, health and overall quality of life weren't reason enough to get active on a regular basis, here's another one that might get you off the couch: Working out can help you fight the flu this winter season. Well, that's according to a study on mice anyway. Researchers from Iowa State University have found that mice who regularly run on a treadmill experience flu symptoms that are far less severe than the symptoms suffered by their lazier counterparts. Even mice who only started exercising right before the flu had less severe symptoms, though the ones who were regular gym-rats (pardon the pun) had longer-lasting positive effects -- meaning their symptoms were diminished throughout the course of their illness, not just in the first few days.

The findings, published in the Journal of Infectious Diseases, suggest that exercise can really boost the immune system, and while it's not clear whether the results can be applied to humans as well, researchers are optimistic. And besides, it's already the general consensus that regular, moderate exercise helps improve your odds against illness.

Still, don't overdo it -- you can get too much of a good thing. According to Jeffrey A. Woods, a professor of kinesiology and community health at the University of Illinois, prolonged and intense exercise sessions can lead "to increased susceptibility to viral infection." His advice on navigating flu season? "I would recommend everyone get the annual influenza vaccination and the new H1N1 vaccination," he tells The New York Times.

The flu isn't the only thing that exercise is good for -- cardio is more effective than heart surgery.

OK, you have less than a week until Halloween, and you still don't have a costume. Don't worry -- for a fit beauty like you, looking festive and fabulous is a piece of (low-fat, sugar-free) cake!

Seek your inner athlete (doesn't matter if you actually play the sport) and put together a fun, fitness-focused costume using the suggestions below.

Marathon Runner
What You Need: Short little shorts, knee socks, a headband, tennis shoes and an old race tee (ask friends and family, or check your local Goodwill).
Bonus: A Walkman (an iPod will do, but I think the old school Walkman is a lot more fun) and a water bottle (fill it with whatever you like!).

What if instead of having surgery to open up a clogged artery, your doctor told you it would be a better idea to log 30 minutes on the bike? According to findings presented at the European Congress of Cardiology 2009, cardio can actually be more effective than going under the knife. Plus, it's a lot more fun and costs a tad less, too.

If it seems too good to be true, honestly, there's no catch. "A moderate aerobic workout like biking or brisk walking for about a half hour a day or at least five days a week can train your heart to be healthier so you won't need a stent," says Dr. Christopher Cannon, associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. A consistent exercise plan slows the heart rate and lowers blood pressure so your heart doesn't have to work as hard. "Therefore it can make do with a slightly reduced amount of blood from the blockage," says Cannon.

Cardiovascular risk gradually increases for everyone as we age, but the risk jumps sharply after menopause. "Although we don't know why for certain, it's likely estrogen acts as a protector against heart disease," Cannon says. "As estrogen levels decrease it leaves women more vulnerable." And here's a fact to ward off any thoughts you might be having resembling, 'this won't happen to me': The American Heart Association's latest figures show 1,314,000 angioplasties -- the procedure that inserts the stent -- were done in the United States in 2006.

Tom Cruise and wife Katie Holmes were recently photographed running together. My jaw dropped when I read that Cruise, who was ahead of the Mrs., turned around and yelled at her to run "harder" and "faster." I'm pretty sure that if I had been in the same situation, with my boyfriend commanding me to run faster, I would have turned around and run in the other direction.

Running with a partner has been demonstrated to help boost motivation. Knowing you have another person depending on you to show up helps keep you honest. Plus, just having someone to talk to and suffer through the tough times with you during the run can help keep you going when you might otherwise stop. Running with your romantic partner, however, can put a whole new and complicated spin on the dynamic.

Photo: Lester Cohen, WireImage

Despite all the headline-stealing heartbreak, getting dumped did wonders for Jennifer Aniston's figure. (And she's doing wonders for the image of the fit-after-40 crowd.) Find out how she and others have rebounded from lost love by getting fitter and hotter than ever.