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Defining and Designing:
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Fitness is the ability to do whatever you ask your body to do.1 The President's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports defines fitness as: "The ability to perform daily tasks vigorously and alertly, with energy left over for enjoying leisure-time activities and meeting emergency demands. It is the ability to endure, to bear up, to withstand stress, to carry on in circumstances where an unfit person could not continue, and is a major basis for good health and well-being." 2
Is that YOU? Do you go home after a day at work and have plenty of vim and vigor left over? There are actually very few people who fall into the category of the truly fit. Even people who work out regularly are often not truly fit if their workout is neither balanced nor tailored to their body's needs. This would include people who regularly lift weights, but cannot run ˝ mile. And it would include people who run every day, but cannot do 20 sit-ups, touch their toes, and jump rope for 5 minutes without stopping.
Fitness is probably the most important controllable factor that you can do to improve your health and your life regardless of your age or physical limitations. It improves almost any pre-existing medical problem if done correctly and appropriately for your condition. It is essential in the prevention and treatment of Repetitive Strain Injuries (RSI).
Fitness is a necessary precursor to most sports. In order to perform at peak in a sport, you must first prepare your body through fitness. If you suddenly decide to play softball or go skiing and your body is not conditioned, you will most likely end up with an injury, or at least some sore muscles…and you probably won't perform very well. When you follow a fitness program, you prepare your body to perform at whatever sport you decide to engage in. In addition, if you have a favorite sport that you normally enjoy, increasing your fitness level specifically for that sport will improve your performance.
Before we plunge into the specific aspects of designing your fitness program, we would like to point out two things:
We all know there is no magic pill to take to gain and maintain fitness. Regular exercise sessions that are scheduled during a time that will always work for you and your family are most effective for your health and fitness. Having a variety of activities in your repertoire will allow you to work out regardless of the weather. As we said in a previous article, if you don't take time for fitness now, you should schedule time for pain and illness later.
Fitting exercise into your schedule is probably the hardest part about fitness until it becomes a habit. If you are truly too busy to take 45 minutes to 1 hour a day to exercise, breaking up your workout may be the only way to fit it in. It's not ideal, but it's realistic. If you have 10 minutes, it's fine to do some calisthenics or go for a casual walk. BUT, it is not adviseable to do aerobic, and especially not anaerobic exercise (as defined in the next section), without a warm up and cool down session. If you have a family history or known problems with your heart or blood pressure, jumping right into a workout without preparing your heart, and stopping exercise without slowing your heart rate, is when you are most likely to suffer a heart attack.
There is widespread agreement that there are four basic components to fitness.2 Your fitness program should include something from each of these four basic fitness components to gain proper benefits from the session, to avoid injury, and to avoid possible heart problems due to shock to the system. In addition, a conditioned body has much lower risk of experiencing RSI.
In addition to the four components of exercise, it is recommended that you consider four "ingredients" when selecting the right exercises for the workload portion of your sessions.1,2
The emphasis you place on each of these four ingredients depends upon your goals. For someone who wants to lose weight, the formula would be Regularity, Specificity, Progression, and Overload. If you want to improve muscle tone, overload is more important than regularity. If you exercise six days a week, three days should be devoted to firming and toning and the other three should be devoted to aerobic (see Cardiorespiratory Endurance above) and anaerobic activities. An anaerobic activity requires greater levels of exertion to the point where you cannot take in enough oxygen for muscle function, so you can only perform them for short bursts of time. Examples of this are running down the court in basketball, running wind-sprints, or jumping rope at "hot pepper" speed.
Your physical limitations are the most important consideration to make when considering your exercise options. Other factors to consider are your current and desired level of fitness, your lifestyle, and your body type. We'll discuss each of these in turn.
If you have medical problems, these must be addressed when you are designing your fitness program.1 The following are some exercises and activities and the body parts they impact the most. Avoid or alter the activities that will cause further injury. Take a list of your desired exercises to your doctor and discuss your fitness program with him/her. Your doctor will help you choose activities that are safe for your body and help you monitor your progress. Do not rely entirely on the advice of a fitness trainer.
If you have health conditions such as high blood pressure or diabetes, you must take these into account when you design your fitness program. If you are a smoker, heavy drinker, or you are obese, you need to see a doctor before beginning a fitness program.
Be honest with yourself about how fit you are and how fit you want to be. Once you have achieved a level where you are fairly fit, increasing the intensity of your workout will allow further improvement without adding time. Since most people are not striving to become world-class athletes, there is no need to work out more than one hour a day. If you are working out this much for a month and achieve no change in your fitness level, you need to reanalyze your fitness program.1
Heart rate is the best measure of your current fitness level, as well as measuring intensity of the workout. Working out within a safe level will improve your fitness level without endangering your health. The correct number of heartbeats per minute for you is called your "target heart rate zone." This varies based on your age.1,2 Younger people can safely put a higher load on their heart. Before engaging in any sport or fitness program for the first time, it is a good idea to have a stress test (EKG, ECG) if you are over 35 years old, just to make sure your heart is in good working order. You know you are in good shape if, within five minutes of completing a vigorous workout, your heart rate falls to or below 100 beats per minute.1
To take your heart rate, stop exercising and immediately, within 5 seconds, count the pulse at your neck, wrist, temple, or chest for ten seconds. Do not use your thumb to take your pulse since its beat will confuse your count. Multiply your 10-second count by 6 and you'll have the number of heartbeats per minute. The maximal heart rate is the number you should never exceed during any physical activity. The low end of your target heart rate zone is 70% of the maximal heart rate. The high end of your target heart rate zone is 85% of your maximal heart rate. You must exercise within your target heart rate if you want to improve fitness.
Maximal heart rate: 220 - your age (eg. If you're 45: 220-45=175)
Low end of zone: .70 x Maximal heart rate (eg. .70 x 175 = 122.5)
High end of zone: .85 x Maximal heart rate (eg. .85 x 148.75)
When you are beginning an exercise program, exercise so that your heart rate is at the low end of your target zone. It's more important to increase your time in low-intensity exercises rather than increasing intensity right away.
Your lifestyle dictates where, when, and how you should exercise. The SRI Fitness Center is an excellent place to exercise if you can schedule time into your workday. If course, if you don't like sweating in front of others, or for some other reason do not want to use the Center, there is another ideal place for working out. Think of a location that will work for you, such as home, trails, the beach, etc. If you travel often, do not plan a fitness routine that relies on exercise machines or fancy equipment that you will not have readily available on your trips. The best time to exercise is when you can devote at least 30 minutes to your program. Make exercise convenient and make it an enjoyable part of your day…or you will probably not stick with it.
Building up muscle in areas of your body that are bulky will make that area larger.1 If you tend to add fat on your lower body, you should avoid building lots of muscle in those areas that would push the fat outward on top of the growing layer of muscle. For example, with this type of body, avoid stair climbers, step aerobics, moderate to heavy weights for the lower body, leg presses/squats, and stationary bike with moderate to heavy tension. Recommended exercises are jumping rope, stationary bike with low resistance, moderate to heavy weights for the upper body, and light weights for the lower body with high repetitions. We recommend reading Reference 1 or 4 for further specific advise on deciding which exercises will benefit your body type. You will not find many fitness trainers who understand this concept, since most treat everyone as if they need to build muscle over their entire body.
Don't miss the next article that will discuss the prevention and treatment of sports and fitness injuries.
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