Training to be Fit and Healthy

30 Nov Training to be Fit and Healthy

What is being fit and healthy? What is the best way to get fit and healthy? What is fitness?
Now there is a question! Being fit is being the best you can be, to feel good about yourself, to cope with a number of situations, to have a good sense of your abilities and spatial awareness, to have good motor skills, to be healthy and to minimize the chance of injury.

How do we achieve this?

Well it has to be a multi faceted approach. It’s interesting in this day and age, the age of the fun run, the amount of people who think that doing a half marathon is the “be all and end all” of fitness.
Doing a fun run is great but it is one aspect of fitness. You also just have to look at the amount of people who just run all the time and how many injuries they start to pick up.
There are many aspects to fitness, if we work on as many of them as possible, we will keep the body guessing, which will keep the results you want happening. You will improve your overall health and your joint health and thus reduce your susceptibility to injury.

So what are the areas of fitness and health?

• CV endurance
• Stamina
• Strength
• Flexibility
• Power
• Speed
• Coordination
• Agility
• Balance
• Accuracy

So for the endurance athletes out there… you have another nine to go to become a well balanced, fit and healthy individual. Same for you bodybuilders or any body else who is just focusing on one discipline or sport.
Unless you are an elite level athlete with a cash reward reason for training a mono discipline, cross training is the most practical, efficient and healthy way to get your body into great all round shape, whether you be man or woman, young or old.
The body is a very clever thing and it likes to adapt, it likes to find the easiest way to get through life. If you are doing the same thing over and over again the body becomes extremely efficient at performing those movements, which means less energy burnt, less adaptation, less new muscle, and while that is great for competition, it limits the amount of overall fitness you possess and reduces the actual conditioning you get while training; rather than continuing to improve, you simply maintain a certain level of fitness (also known as a plateau).

So how do we do it?

Some disciplines work better when done by themselves, where as others can be mixed up. For example our Sweat and Tears program is split into 4 days but we cover all of the 10 areas of fitness and health in those 4 days.
Let me show you:

• Day 1: Strength Training – Free weights (during these sessions we work on maximal strength, hypertrophy (muscle growth), power, strength endurance, flexibility
• Day 2: Cardio Sessions – endurance, intervals, speed, flexibility
• Day 3: Mixed Conditioning – Callisthenics (bodyweight exercises), free weights, intervals, mixed energy systems, strength endurance, CV endurance, flexibility, accuracy, coordination
• Day 4: Boxing/kickboxing – mixed energy systems (CV endurance, speed, power, flexibility, accuracy and coordination

We then start the rotation again.
This style of training allows you the ability to vary the stress placed on specific muscles and on your cardiovascular system.

Two other great advantages of this style of programming

1. Learning new motor skills – this is great for both the brain and the body. Science shows us that the more things we learn, the better the body and the mind become at adapting to new situations, movements and even thought processes. The skills are transferable ie doing new and varied stuff in the gym has a marked and dramatic positive impact on how you perform at both home and work.
2. Avoiding training burnout – you won’t get bored and that keeps you motivated to do more as you are still having fun.
Of course all of this needs to be backed up with a really good nutritional plan and proper recovery/relaxation time.
So get out there… mix it up and enjoy!
More Info: To find out more about our all NEW Sweat and Tears program contact us via email or call us on 02 9400 2561