There will always be new apps, new fitness trends and new fitness influencers reinventing the wheel and creating content to promote healthy living.
Many of us have busy lifestyles and find it difficult to integrate physical activity into those schedules, so we look for the short duration, high intensity style activities that will give us the most bang for our buck. While that can be great, it is also important to keep in mind that our exercise is meant to be diverse, all-encompassing and purposeful in order to decrease our disease risk and ultimately prolong our lives.
The American College of Sports Medicine and the Center for Disease Control worked in conjunction to create Physical Activity guidelines for the healthy adult that will allow us to do just that, decrease risk of developing cardiovascular disease and maintain a healthy lifestyle.
Here are the take home points to think about when scheduling your weekly workouts:
Move Your Way Adult Physical Activity Guidelines
Move More, Sit Less:
Anything is better than nothing! Often the task of exercising is so daunting, that people give up before they even start. Taking a walk around the neighborhood, or the office, during the day can still be beneficial, so start there!
Aerobic Physical Activity:
While we often shorten the phrase to cardio, aerobic physical activity that gets our heart pumping is an incredibly crucial part of our routine. Our body responds to the stress we put on it, so we need to make sure we incorporate 150-300 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic physical activity, or 75-150 minutes of vigorous-intensity aerobic physical activity into our routines. The preference is to spread this throughout the week, performing at 3-5 rounds of 30 to >50 minutes of activity at the various intensity levels.
The Talk Test:
How do we determine moderate and vigorous intensity? There are a multitude of scales out there, and a rising number of fitness monitors that can help you track. One of the easiest ways is the Talk Test. A person doing moderate-intensity exercise can talk, but not sing, during the activity. A person doing vigorous-intensity exercise cannot say more than a few words without pausing for a breath.
Examples of aerobic physical activity:
- Brisk walking
- Running/jogging
- Swimming
- Bicycling
Strengthening:
All the sweating and heart pumping action of aerobic activity is great, but we can’t forget about strengthening the muscles we are using during those types of activities. Muscle strengthening at moderate or greater intensity at least 2 days a week that involves all major muscle groups is the current recommendation. If you are someone that likes to split up your workouts, don’t fret! That’s a perfect way to split it up, just make sure you include everything! A great way to do this is adding functional movement patterns that require lots of different muscle groups throughout your workout.
Examples of muscle strengthening:
- Bodyweight exercises
- Dumbbells or kettlebells
- Resistance bands
We at FX Physical Therapy have developed “The Movement Physical”, which is a quarterly preventative screen to evaluate a healthy individual’s movement in order to identify limitations that could lead to decreased performance, potential injury, and/or pain. If you are looking to start living out a more healthy lifestyle and need some guidance, let us know! We’d be happy to perform a Movement Physical and set up a preliminary physical activity program for you!
While the recommendations above are generalized to the healthy adult, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has Physical Activity guidelines for youth, older adults and those with chronic health conditions. Check out https://health.gov/our-work/physical-activity for more information!
