Monday, January 12, 2009

Three Pillars of Fitness

I've talked before about the four areas of fitness you need to be addressing - cardio, strength, balance, and flexibility. Here's three factors that should be incorporated so that you get the most out of your fitness program:

Variety - You should not be doing the exact same program day in day out for months or years on end. You might be overworking a certain muscle or using a certain joint to much in one movement pattern. You can add variety by trying new exercises every month or so. You can also change the reps, sets, time, weights, order, or rest periods.

Example: Your cardiovascular program at your health club consists of 1/2 hour on the treadmill three times per week. How about you do the treadmill one day, the bike on day, and walk some laps in the pool a third day?

Progression - After you do an exercise for a while, your body adapts to it. Then what? To see continued improvement you need to progress the exercise, or make it harder. This could be adding more time, more weight, more reps, more speed, etc.

Example: You always ride the bike at level 3 at around 70 rpms. Try doing level 4 for a couple minutes, then go back down to level 3 for a couple minutes, then back up to level 4 again. Systematically increase the time you spend on level 4.

Consistency - This is the most important one in my book. You can have the greatest program in the world, but if you only do it once a week, or you skip a month here and there when you get busy, you'll never see any real results. On the other hand, even a rudimentary program can produce positive results if you are consistent with it.

Example: You occasionally do exercises to improve balance when you think of it. Try to take a more structured approach and do balancing exercises on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday, or whatever days suit you best. Once you make a plan of what you're going to do on what days, it's much easier to be consistent.

How do you rate? Do you need more variety? Are you progressing your program? Are you consistent? Take the suggestions above and make some changes if needed.

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