PATH FIT 2 EXERCISE BASED ACTIVITY

Did you know:

 Exercise is a form of physical activity,

 But physical activity does not require exercise.

What's the difference?

Physical activity is more than exercise

 Exercise is a structured program of activity geared toward achieving or maintaining

physical fitness. It is actually a sub-category of physical activity.

 Physical activity is any form of exercise or movement of the body that uses energy.
Some of your daily life activities—doing active chores around the house, yard work,
walking the dog—are examples.

Aerobic
Aerobic activities make you breathe harder and make your heart and blood vessels healthier. These
include:

Walking

Dancing

Swimming

Water aerobics

Jogging and running

Aerobic exercise classes

Bicycle riding (stationary or on a path)

Some gardening activities, such as raking and pushing a lawn mower

Tennis

Golfing (without a cart)

 Flexibility
Flexibility-enhancing activities ensure a good range of motion in the joints. Loss of flexibility can be a
predisposing factor for physical issues, such as pain syndromes or balance disorders. Gender, age, and
genetics may all influence range of motion. Flexibility exercises include:

Stretching

Yoga

Tai Chi or Qi Gong

Muscle-strengthening
Muscle-strengthening activities build up your strength. These activities work all the different parts of the
body—legs, hips, back, chest, stomach, shoulders, and arms—and include:

Heavy gardening (digging, shoveling)

Lifting weights

Push-ups on the floor or against the wall

Sit-ups

Working with resistance bands (long, wide rubber strips that stretch)

Pilates

What is fitness?
Fitness includes cardiovascular functioning, which is improved by aerobic activities that
get your heart and lungs working faster. It also includes muscle strength, flexibility, and
balance. You don't need to get fancy, expensive equipment to improve your fitness.
Walking is an example way to get physical activity that is available to almost everyone.
Many house and garden chores can help build strength as well.

Why is Physical Activity Important?

Physical fitness offers lots of health and other benefits! Here are eight key
reasons why exercise is important:.

1. Decrease risk of disease

2. Feel great physically
3. Look better
4. Sleep better
5. Live longer
6. Keep in shape so you can enjoy leisure activities
7. Avoid injury and safely perform work and home chores
8. Increase mental health and social wellbeing

The last point is especially interesting. According to studies in the Lancet

physical activity brings “a sense of purpose and value, a better quality of life,
improved sleep, and reduced stress, as well as stronger
relationships and social connectedness."

Sitting Is Dangerous
Lack of physical activity is associated with increased risks of:

 Anxiety, stress, and feelings of depression

 Developing many preventable conditions, such as high blood pressure, coronary heart
diseases, diabetes, osteoporosis, colon cancer, and obesity
 Dying prematurely

Researchers even suggest that the sedentary lifestyle so common in our culture is more
deadly than smoking. They believe that 6-10% of the world’s non-communicable
diseases (such as heart disease, diabetes, and certain kinds of cancer) are caused by
physical inactivity.
A word of caution
While exercise is undoubtedly beneficial, it is not true that the more exercise you do or
the harder you work the body, the better the results. Too much or too arduous physical
activity can lead to injury. It is essential to maintain a balance between working out the
muscles without overdoing it. Know that your body gets stronger during rest and
recovery.

Include Aerobic Activities

Helpful tips to get started
One way to set your goals and monitor your level of physical activity is to know
your target heart rate . Make your cardiovascular workouts hard enough to break
a sweat and get your heart pumping faster. Learn how hard you should work out.

Walking is one excellent cardio-respiratory exercise that almost everyone can do.
Walking 10,000 steps a day can improve health and fitness. (It takes a little more
than 2,000 steps to walk one mile.) Many people discover when they begin
wearing a pedometer that they only average between 900 and 3,000 steps a day.
Learn how to start your own walking program.

Aerobic activity improves your cardiovascular health and helps protect against heart
disease. It also improves your physical energy and produces endorphins that improve
your mood.
What you do and how often and hard you exercise are determined by your goals,
present fitness level and health, interest, and convenience. It is important to choose an
activity you enjoy and that fits your lifestyle and tailor it to your fitness level. This will
help you make exercise a habit. It's also a good idea to choose more than one type of
exercise to give your body a more complete workout and to avoid boredom.

If you want to increase aerobic benefits, try adding more vigorous activities and
increasing the time.

How to Check Your Heart Rate?

Right after you stop exercising, take your pulse: Place the tips of your first two fingers
lightly over one of the blood vessels on your neck, just to the left or right of your Adam's
apple. Or try the pulse spot inside your wrist just below the base of your thumb.

You need to raise your heart rate to a certain level called your Target Heart Rate and
keep it there for 20 minutes to increase your cardiovascular fitness.

To figure out your Target Heart Rate, use this formula: (220 - your age) x 70%.

For example, if you are 28, it would look like this: 220 - 28 = 192 x 70% = 134
beats/minute.

To check your heart rate during exercise, count your pulse for 10 seconds, then multiply
by 6. Compare this to your target rate.

Count your pulse for 10 seconds and multiply the number by 6.

Check your pulse periodically to see if you are exercising within your target zone. As you
get in better shape, try exercising within the upper range of your target zone.
 Include Strength-Building
Muscle-strengthening activities make muscles do more work than they are
accustomed to during activities of daily life. Muscle strengthening includes
strength training, resistance training, and muscular endurance exercises.

Research has shown that strength training increases power and endurance
and also:

 Helps control weight by boosting the metabolism

 Halts bone loss and even restores bone
 Helps prevent bone fractures from osteoporosis
 Improves balance and flexibility

In addition, in women age 40 or older, strength training helps prevent loss of

muscle mass.

Muscle-strengthening activities include:

 Exercises using exercise bands, weight machines, hand-held weights
 Calisthenic exercises (body weight provides resistance to movement)
 Digging, lifting, and carrying as part of gardening
 Carrying groceries
 Mindful movement exercises, such as yoga or tai chi

A strength training program may include free weights or weight-training

machines. But you don't need extensive equipment to do strength-training.
You can do Pilates mat work, using simply a stability ball, or do exercises that
use your own body weight for resistance, such as push-ups, sit-ups, lunges,
squats, and dips. You can also use common grocery items, such as soup
cans or a bag of rice.

How long should you spend?

No specific amount of time is recommended for muscle strengthening, but
muscle-strengthening exercises should be performed to the point at which it
would be difficult to do another repetition without help. Development of muscle
strength and endurance is progressive over time. This means that gradual
increases in the amount of weight or the days per week of exercise will result
in stronger muscles.

Flexibility and Balance Exercises

Add stretches to increase flexibility
Flexibility exercises can improve overall ease of movement, decrease stress
on the joints, and reduce risk of injury. Because flexibility exercises help
improve blood flow to the muscles, stretching an injured muscle will speed up
your recovery.

Although they are not specifically recommended in the Physical Guideline for
Americans, the American College of Sports Medicine recommends that you
incorporate flexibility exercises a minimum of two to three days per week into
your overall fitness program.

Most fitness centers have posters with stretches for all muscle groups that you
can do after an aerobic exercise, when your muscles are warmed up. Mindful
movement exercises, such as yoga and tai chi, are also excellent for
developing flexibility, and Pilates can improve flexibility, as well as core
stability.

Include exercises to improve balance

Good balance can help prevent falls. Balance training helps improve your
equilibrium and your ability to withstand and quickly recovers from situations
that make your balance unstable. In addition, balance is essential for various
sports and fitness activities.

To improve balance, you must improve your core strength so you can have a
good base of support and control movement.Core strength can be improved
through Tai Chi, Pilates, and core specific floor exercises. Yoga is also
excellent for developing core strength and balance.

Older adults at risk of falls should do balance training three or more days a
week. Examples of these exercises include backward walking, sideways
walking, heel walking, toe walking, and standing from a sitting position. Tai
Chi exercises also may help prevent falls.
 Other simple exercises to improve balance include:

1. Standing on the balls of your feet with your arms straight out to the sides, then
slowly lowering your arms to your sides
2. Standing on one foot with your eyes closed
3. Walking very slowly, focusing on lifting and placing each foot