Setting Goals!!

Setting Fitness Goals

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Many people make the mistake of setting their fitness goals too high when they embark on an exercise program. This leads them to abandon their plans out of frustration and impatience. Setting manageable goals is key to maintaining a fitness program over time.

If you have been completely sedentary you need to start out your fitness regimen by working towards small and realistic goals. These can be as simple as walking around the block once a day for a week, and adding another block each subsequent week until they reach the 30 minutes recommended by health professionals. A few sessions with a personal trainer can help you set reasonable goals for weight-bearing exercise like weight training. In the beginning focus on overall conditioning rather than building muscle. Check with staff at your gym or fitness center for recommendations about what exercise classes are right for your current fitness level.

How many times have you heard of people join a gym and go flat out everyday for a week, then slowly let it slip back until they stop going altogether apart from the odd guilt session!

When you’re just starting out, it’s easy to make rash promises like exercising every day. It’s hard for even people in top condition to make time each and every day for training. Start off three or four days a week and build up from there. If you’re taking up a new sport like swimming, skiing or golf, consider taking lessons with a professional so that you develop good habits from the beginning.

If you’ve been getting moderate exercise your goals can be a little more ambitious. If you’re walking the recommended 30 minutes per day, why not add hand weights to your routine? This might also be the time to consider adding more weight to your lifting or taking an intermediate fitness course. You may also be ready to speak to a personal trainer about beginning to work on building specific muscle groups.

Once you’ve attained a high level of fitness, then it’s time for some serious goal setting. Plan to run a marathon or participate in a 5K walking event. There are many of these events run to benefit charity, giving a double benefit of both funds raised and health benefits to participants. When preparing for an event of this nature, return to your early habit of setting small, realistic goals. Add miles to your run on a weekly basis until you are able to complete the full distance. Speak with your trainer to establish a regular schedule of weight-bearing exercise that will help improve your stamina and flexibility.

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Originally by: Jonathon Hardcastle

Great Fitness With Safety

Take care with your fitness!!

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A recent article in the New York Times, “Doctors See a Big Rise in Injuries As Young Athletes Train Nonstop” highlights a serious and growing health concern for teenagers and their parents. Typical injuries include stress fractures, cracked kneecaps and frayed heel tendons and damage to the alignment of the spinal column brought on by excessive flexing. As the article states, “…doctors in pediatric sports medicine say it is as if they have happened upon a new childhood disease, and the cause is the overaggressive culture of organized youth sports.”

The consequences of this new “disease” can be very serious, often requiring many months of expensive rehabilitation or even surgery. Some young athletes are left facing a lifetime of pain and physical restrictions.

The article emphasizes the role played by pressure from coaches and parents and by a culture in many sports that places so much emphasis on performance, and on winning, that players often ignore the pain signals coming from their bodies.

I was struck by the parallels between this teenage phenomenon and the wave of injuries reported during the early stages of the fitness boom of the 1980s. At that time, there were a great many newspaper and magazine reports of everything from severe shin splints caused by prolonged running on concrete to serious back and neck pain due to improper methods of weight lifting.

I can well remember the sudden influx of students during that period who came for Alexander Technique lessons after giving up on demanding exercise regimes because of pain or injury. They just wanted to learn how they could get back to where they were before and sadly that was not always possible. It seems that when a new fitness or sports trend begins, there is a heavy price to be paid by some participants.

What strikes me about both the current spate of injuries and the one that took place two decades ago is that in both cases, a huge emphasis on QUANTITY of exercise almost completely obliterated any concern with the QUALITY with which the exercise was performed. All too often fitness programs tend to be about things like how many miles you run, how many pitches you pitch, or how many hours you swim rather that how well you’re using your body as you run, pitch or swim.

It’s a bit like driving a car as fast as you can, for a long distance, without bothering to learn how to drive it well!

I am convinced that the current over-emphasis on quantity is one of the main reasons there are still so many sports and fitness related injuries. Sometimes it comes from the athlete him or herself – perhaps reflecting a common cultural idea that more is better. Sometimes it comes from outside. That certainly seems to be a large part of what’s going on with some young athletes today.

Anyone who studies the basic ideas of the Alexander Technique will very quickly see just how important the quality of one’s posture and movement is to the effectiveness and safety of any activity. This is true whether it’s a vigorous activity or something as mundane as using a computer or even watching TV. And if they decide to take up a new sport or fitness program, they have the knowledge and ability to approach it with skill, and with an appropriate level of body awareness and care.

I guess the moral is once you find a good trainer and a good gym or place to workout out they will be part of a great workout routine that is safe and achieves(smashes) your fitness goals!!

Take care and have fun!

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Originally by: Robert Rickover