Beginner fitness part 1 - improving strength, stamina and suppleness
Ways to improve stamina, strength and suppleness
So, you want to get
started in fitness? It’s never too late to get into
shape. Whether you're looking to improve your stamina, strength or
suppleness our beginner guide will show you how to do it enjoyably and
effectively…
The main components of fitness are the three ‘S’s: stamina, strength and
suppleness. Each attribute brings different
body and health benefits,
and requires a different type of
exercise to achieve.
Ways to improve your stamina
To improve stamina (your ability to ‘keep going’), you need to do
aerobic or‘cardiovascular’ exercise. Cardiovascular exercise is the type
that really helps your heart — studies show that even 30 minutes
walking a day can lower bad cholesterol (LDL) levels and reduce blood
pressure — and its high energy demand helps you shed excess pounds, too.
This kind of training generally uses the large muscles of the body,
such as legs, bottom, back and chest, and is of a reasonably prolonged
nature (in other words, 20 minutes, rather than two minutes!) It should
be intense enough to make you warm, sweaty and a little breathless but
not so intense that you can’t sustain it for any length of time. If you
are able to maintain a conversation (albeit a slightly breathless one!)
you’ve got the intensity right. To begin with, it’s duration rather than
intensity that matters. The tougher stuff comes later on!
Ways to increase your strength
Strength training, as the name suggests, is all about improving the
strength of your muscles. But even if you aren’t interested in building
up your biceps or streamlining your thighs, this type of exercise is
important because it strengthens the ‘connective’ tissues, such as
ligaments and tendons, and helps to preserve bone density, so you are
more pain and injury-resilient. There are also benefits that are nothing
to do with the muscles and joints. Research shows that a higher muscle
mass helps to preserve your metabolic rate as you get older (when
normally, it would be falling). Strength training also enhances the
body’s glucose uptake, lowering the risk of diabetes, and can help you
maintain a healthy blood pressure.
Strength training (or ‘resistance training’) is traditionally done in a
gym using weights but that’s certainly not the only way to do it! As
long as the muscles have to ‘resist’ an external force that is higher
than what they are used to, they will get stronger. Whether that force
is a dumbbell, an elastic resistance tube or even gravity, is
unimportant, as far as your muscles are concerned. There are many
exercises you can do without equipment at home, and we’ll be looking at
these in part 2.
Ways to increase your suppleness
Finally, let’s look at flexibility. People usually think suppleness
means being able to wrap your legs around your neck, or at least touch
your toes — but really, it’s just about being able to move your joints
and
muscles through their full range of motion. As we age, our
flexibility declines rapidly as collagen fibres within the muscles
stiffen. It’s vital that we stretch and mobilise regularly, to ensure
that we don’t end up stiff and immobile, with short, tight muscles. Good
flexibility is an asset both in daily life (reaching that top shelf)
and sport (stretching out to return a tennis ball over the net)— and
being supple helps you maintain good posture, as well as minimising your
risk of getting injured during activity.
Fitness experts recommend that we include all three types of training in
our weekly regime. The table below offers guidelines on how much we
should be doing of each type. But don’t worry if it’s beginning to sound
as if getting fit is destined to take up half your waking hours —
Beginner fitness Part 2 is full of practical ways to
fit in exercise to improve your stamina, strength and suppleness.
