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C HA NG I N G T H E G A M E I N H EA LT H A N D F I T N E S S
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38
EXERCISE & FITNESS GUIDELINES
Muscular Strength
is training your muscles to remain strong using
resistance such as Nautilus
®
strength machines, dumbbells, elastic tubing
or your body weight. In the past decade, we have learned that building or
maintaining muscular strength is extremely important for a balanced fitness
program. And it is especially important as we get older.
We have learned through a variety of studies that those individuals who just
train aerobically (without strength training) do maintain their cardiovascular
endurance over the years, but they generally lose lean muscle mass as they
get older. However, those individuals who combine strength training and
cardiovascular training can maintain their lean body mass as they get older.
What this means is that if you just do cardiovascular activity, your body will
naturally lose muscle mass as you get older, and that means that you will
actually get “fatter” as you age, unless you incorporate strength training.
We have also learned that consistent strength training helps maintain bone
and muscle mass as we get older. For women, strength training (along with
cardiovascular training) may also protect against post-menopausal bone loss
and osteoporosis in their later years.
And strength training is not complicated. It is recommended that you do 8 –
12 repetitions of 8 – 10 major muscle groups at least 2 days a week. However,
you don’t have to do all these exercises at once. You can break them up into
shorter workouts throughout the day. For example, you can do just upper body
exercises in the morning, and your lower body exercises in the evening. Or, you
can alternate strength exercises with cardiovascular exercise (often known as
circuit training) by switching back and forth every couple of minutes.
Flexibility
is being able to bend, reach, twist and turn with comfort and ease
as we perform daily tasks, play or exercise. It is perhaps the most ignored
component of fitness, but certainly the easiest one to incorporate into our daily
lives because it can be done anywhere and almost at any time.
To maintain your flexibility, you simply need to stretch. This could be as simple
as reaching for your toes, or reaching overhead when you wake up in the
morning. Or maybe you enjoy it so much that you would be interested in trying
the Nautilus
®
yoga workout video. You can even incorporate stretching into your
strength training workouts by stretching the muscles you have used immediately
after you have completed your exercise set.
