Category Archives: Fitness

Physical Activity Recommendations from WHO

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WHO (World Health Organization) has developed global recommendations for health. Their recommendations include frequency, duration, intensity, type, and total amount for three age groups, including 5-17 years old, 18-64 years old, and over 65.

For children 5-17 years old:
It is recommended that children should have at least 60 minutes of moderate to vigorous activity per day.
Over 60 minutes has greater benefits.
Most of the activity should be aerobic, but include muscle strengthening.

For adults aged 18-64:
The recommendation for this age group is 150 moderate-intensity aerobic activity through the week or 75 minutes vigorous-intensity activities.
Aerobic activity should be spurts of 10 minutes or more.
For added benefit, increase moderate-intensity to 300 minutes per week or 150 vigorous activity per week.
Muscle-strengthening should take place 2 or more days a week.

For adults over 65:
The recommendation is similar to aged 18-64: 150 minutes moderate-intensity aerobic or 75 minutes of vigorous-intensity activity per week.
Aerobic in spurts of 10 minutes or more.
For more benefits, jump up moderate activity to 300 or 150 vigorous-intensity activity.
Older adults with poor mobility should work on balance and to prevent falls 3 or more days per week.
Muscle-strengthening 2 or more days per week.
If they cannot do the above, they should be as physically active as their abilities allow.

http://www.who.int/dietphysicalactivity/factsheet_recommendations/en/
http://www.who.int/dietphysicalactivity/publications/9789241599979/en/

Vacation Tips to Maintain Fitness

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Well-known fitness expert Chris Powell has some tips for you as he showed on Good Morning America to maintain fitness when you are on vacation. He has some lighter quick exercises you can do so you do not lose what you have built your fitness level to.

According to Chris, your cardiovascular system de-conditioning starts in 7-10 days. Muscles start to atrophy in 2 weeks and you will see loss in strength in 3-4 weeks. Once you are on vacation and stop exercising, it may even be harder for you to get back into your routine.

Some of his routines are as short as 5 minutes each. He starts with “sofa” squats on the front of a chair in 20-second intervals with 10 seconds rest in between for 5 minutes for lower body. He then moves to the back and does some pushups on the back of the chair for another 5 minutes in 20-second intervals for upper body. He then goes on to do 10 back lunges, 10 Hindu pushups, and 10 jack knife crunches on the chair.

You Should… or You Shouldn’t…

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How often have we heard these words from people? “You should…eat more vegetables” or maybe “You shouldn’t…eat bread.” Sometimes words can get in our way of success. Well meaning people can sabotage our success especially when it comes to dieting or fitness.

There have been times when I thought I was doing pretty well only to have some well-meaning friend or acquaintance sabotage it completely. Once, I was feeling pretty good having lost 13 pounds only to be told it didn’t show. Another well meaning friend said, “Some people are just always going to be heavy.” This came right after completing goal weight in Weight Watchers. I guess being within the guidelines isn’t good enough for some people!

Sometimes we can’t help what others think or say. We can only help our response to it. Don’t let the turkeys get you down! Just go on and ignore the nay-sayers. Keep up the good work and stay the path.

Fighting Obesity

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If you are fighting being overweight, exercise alone is not the answer. There was a recent study by the American Diabetes Association done with mice. They had running wheels in their cages but they would lock them for several days at a time. What they found was interesting. When the wheels were locked, the mice roamed around the cage expending energy through walking around. When the wheels were then unlocked, they would run the wheel, but decreased expending their energy off the wheel.

Let’s equate that to us. When we exercise at a gym, on a treadmill, take a walk or however we get our spurts of exercise, do we tend to sit around more because we “got our exercise in” rather than keep the momentum going? Do we tend to eat more when we do more vigorous exercise thinking you can because you exercised? We may need to take a step back and look at what we are doing with exercise and eating regimen.

A new way to exercise

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So there is nothing new about treadmills. And there is nothing new about VR, or virtual reality. Put the two together, and you do have something new. An Austin, TX company, Blue Goji, is using VR to make fitness more fun. It is called the Infinity Treadmill.

You will need to wear the safety belt while working out. You see, VR can cause motion sickness but the treadmill has you simulate movement, so they claim the motion sickness will not be as much. The disconnect between movement and just being in one place isn’t as much an issue since you are moving while doing it.

Don’t expect to add this to your home gym, however. The cost will be a hefty $12,000. It may be seen in the future at higher-end fitness centers or rehabilitation or physical therapy clinics. They expect it to be ready in 2019.