Workouts are amazing for general wellness. They are part of the complex treatment and rehabilitation after various diseases. If you exercise incorrectly, you can damage your body – the greatest number of injuries and complications occur in amateur sports, including self-training in fitness clubs without proper training.
Before choosing a sport, decide on the desired result: to lose excess weight or change the shape of a certain body part, to relieve stress or increase physical endurance.
Determine Your Fitness Level
To determine your level of fitness, you should take simple tests.
The cardiorespiratory test is walking down the street for 12 minutes at maximum speed. If you fail 1.5 km, you have a low level. A good score is over 2 km.
Post-exercise pulse estimation – for four minutes ascend and descend the stairs alternately with both feet. A normal result is if the heart rate after that does not exceed 94 beats per minute.
Squat or floor press: Failure to complete the exercise for one minute is low endurance. Performing the exercise for more than three minutes is an adequate level.
Coordination of movements – stand up straight, with your feet shoulder width apart and your hands at your sides. Close your eyes, lift your leg. Holding balance for at least 20 seconds is a good indicator.
Low indexes are not a reason to refuse physical activity. Systematic health-improving exercises increase the body’s endurance. With average values, choose general physical training. A high level allows you to choose any sport.
Take Your Health Status Into Account
Virtually any disease, except during exacerbations, needs to be accompanied by therapeutic exercise. A physical therapist should choose a set of exercises after a preliminary examination and identification of contraindications to therapeutic gymnastics. All serious exercises are performed strictly under medical supervision.
Consider Age When Choosing an Activity
Young people from 17 to 29 years old are better to choose activities based on the preliminary preparedness of the body. Groups from 30 to 49 years old, with no sports experience, are suitable for health-improving physical training.
After 50 years old, select contraindicated anaerobic load – exercises in which the body lacks oxygen. At this age, it is better to choose a set of activities aimed at improving the cardiovascular system and weight loss.
Nordic walking is popular. It is minimally traumatic, involves all muscle groups, is effective for rehabilitation after many diseases, and is as accessible as possible. You will need special equipment for the exercise.
Consider Body Structure and Character
The choice of sport should correspond to the constitutional adaptation to certain physical activities. Tall and thin people are better suited to athletic sports rather than weightlifting. People of short stature are unlikely to succeed in basketball, but they will have a significant advantage in gymnastics.
Character traits are an important part of the choice of sport. For sociable, fidgety personalities, sports games and martial arts are suitable. Those who are resistant to prolonged stress, calm, balanced will like running for medium and long distances, biking, skiing, swimming. Those who are withdrawn and shy will like individual lessons.
Such recommendations are rather arbitrary. Everything is determined by a person’s motivation and goals.
Determine the Purpose of Your Workouts
Before choosing a sport, it is important to determine the goal of the activity. To increase strength, you need weight-bearing exercises, weightlifting, and weight-training on machines. Rowing, athletic walking, running will help improve endurance. Agility is developed by aerobics and figure skating. You can sharpen the speed of movement with the help of skating, cycling or sprinting.
Willpower and creativity can be developed by applied sports. Recently, hardball, laser tag, and equestrian sports have been gaining popularity.
Flexibility could be improved by various kinds of gymnastics and athletic dances. Jumbo-Fit is a combination of dance and aerobic elements. Allows you to effectively lose weight, develop flexibility, and correct posture. Cardio-strip – a complex of exercises that will help to correct the figure and make the movements more plastic.
If you can’t decide on a goal, you can do simple physical activities daily: spend more time outdoors, dance, help friends or relatives with their work in the country, take the stairs instead of the elevator, walk one stop on foot and drive less.
After a while, you’ll want to exercise your body more and more thoroughly. You can invite friends or colleagues: run or swim together, play team sports.
Calculate the Duration and Intensity of Exercise
Exercise will benefit and cause positive changes in the body only when the load is optimal. To maintain your form, repeat exercises twice a week. Improving results will require increasing repetitions to three times a week. Higher results are achieved if you train 4-5 times a week.
Beginners start with short, 15-minute, low-intensity exercises twice a day. The first time you should take a break every 30 seconds, gradually reducing it.
The duration and intensity of exercises are calculated on the basis of heart rate and rhythm, breathing rate, intensity of body overheating and sweat production.
The pulse rate should be monitored throughout the exercise. Its maximum values are calculated according to the formula: age is taken from 220, the result is multiplied by 0.8.
Frequency of breathing in the norm increases in proportion to the load: up to 30-40 per minute. Breathing should be fully restored within 10 minutes. Be sure to record the results of your workouts with pedometers, heart rate monitors and fitness bracelets.
If your pulse rate, respiration rate, shortness of breath, dizziness, darkness in the eyes, a strong feeling of heat, and profuse sweating are exceeded, you should stop the exercise. If the feeling does not improve within 10 minutes, you should undergo a medical examination.
Similar to betting with live betting odds, sports should be properly dosed. Optimal load in each case will help determine the sports doctor. After the examination and studying the anamnesis, he will give recommendations on the frequency and intensity of exercise, assess the risk of adverse effects and complications, and select a program for individual training.
Why Exercise Regularly
Hypodynamia, weakened muscles and sedentary lifestyle increase the strain on the heart. It wears out much faster. The less we move, the faster we put our heart out of action.
Regular physical activity ensures full utilization of nutrients to maintain optimal energy levels. It promotes the burning and elimination of excess substances. It brings the smooth muscle organs into a normal tone. It keeps the respiratory, bone, endocrine, and mental systems functioning.
People who lead sedentary lifestyles related to work or habits most often neglect exercise. They underestimate their benefits and consider them an unnecessary waste of time. But exercise improves concentration, memory, productivity, and even creativity.
Those who quit smoking find it easier to achieve results by exercising. The lack of nicotine is poorly tolerated by the body due to a lack of dopamine in the brain, which leads to poor concentration, emotional discomfort.
Providing the benefits of exercise for the body can be physical activities that are properly planned. Intense strength training for an unprepared body will do more harm than good. Too strong stimulation of muscle fibers leads to energy robbery of important body systems, delays the output of decay products and does not contribute to the reduction of excess weight.