Fitness enthusiasts often covet, yet misunderstand, the concept of muscle tone and definition. Exercise physiologists define tone as the minute contractions in your muscles when your body is at rest. Fitness professionals might use the word "definition" to describe the visibility of your muscle tone. Because a layer of excess body fat around your muscles hides any muscular definition, the ideal muscle toning program combines resistance training with aerobic exercise and dietary modification.
Lat Pulldown
Unless you are extremely overweight, you probably do not have excess body fat accumulation around your upper back. Exercises that engage these muscle group thus produce satisfying results in a relatively short time frame. The lat pulldown, for example, works the latissimus dorsi, which runs down the side of your back, and the rhomboids, which pull your shoulder blades together. Your biceps assist the movement. Sit upright and reach for the bar. Bend your elbows and bring the bar down to your chest. Return with control.
Cable Push-Pull
During the cable push-pull exercise, your body works as a unit and performs important, yet often neglected, rotational movements. This full-body exercise engages your obliques, your hip rotators and your arm, shoulder and upper back muscles. Set up the cable machine with one high pulley and one low pulley. Stand facing the low pulley and step back with your left leg. Reach up and grab the high pulley with your left hand, and hold the low pulley with your right hand. Bend your right elbow and move it behind your body. Simultaneously straighten your left arm and reach forward. Rotate your right hip and rib backward and your left hip and rib forward. Finish one set, then switch sides.
Gliding Pushup
Finding an exercise that works your pectoral muscles, your core and your triceps is no easy feat. The gliding pushup, which combines the benefits of the chest press, the chest fly and the plank, proves that one exercise can do it all. It requires a slippery surface, such as a slide board or a newly waxed floor; a set of gliding discs; or a pair of slide board booties. If you do not have either of these products, two hand towels will suffice. Place both hands in the booties or on top of the towels or discs. Assume a pushup position and engage your core for spinal stability. Bend your elbows to perform the pushup, and slide your hands together as you straighten your arms.
Adductor Ball Bridge
The adductor ball bridge engages your core muscles, hamstrings, gluteals, inner thighs, and internal and external hip rotators. Lie supine with your legs extended and the stability ball between your lower legs. As you lift each vertebra from the floor to create a spinal bridge, squeeze your inner thighs toward each other. For your next set, use your external hip rotators to turn your legs out as you ascend into the bridge. Turn your legs in their hip sockets so that your heels face the ball and your feet turn away from each other. Turn your legs back to parallel alignment as you imprint each vertebra back into the floor.
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