Staying Healthy As You Age With Exercise
Today’s seniors have a huge stereotype to overcome, mainly that of being thought of as weak or fragile. This is an unfortunate but widely believed misconception. However, I can prove to anyone’s satisfaction that this preconceived notion is simply untrue. We can all benefit from recent changes in attitude and advance into our later years as healthy, happy, satisfied individuals. All we have to do is follow some simple and effective strategies to grow strong and vital.
Daily exercise is the single most important thing that you can do to stay healthy and have a high level of endurance as you age. Think of all the sports you played, and all the times you worked out when you were young. Why should anything change just because you’ve turned 40?
Any form of physical activity that you were able to do when you were young should still be appropriate today. You may find some limitations will apply when first starting out, but anyone can increase muscle mass and resiliency at any age. Many forms of prolonged exercise are excellent for endurance and the preservation of your health.
Jogging has been cited as one of the easiest ways to start, though there are some reasons to start out more slowly that you once might have when you were very young. Advancing too far too fast will result in injury and disappointment.
Incorrect aerobic exercise won’t improve your aerobic capacity, or the functional capacity of your cardiovascular system (your heart, lungs, and blood vessels). In fact, it will shrink your muscles, heart, and lungs. Not only that, but it will eliminate your reserve capacity, the heart and lung’s ability to deal with strenuous situations (heavy lifting, for example) or physical trauma.
When you start out swimming, it’s important to monitor your body’s signals. Breathlessness, dizziness or pain should signal you to get out of the water and rest for awhile. One of the reasons swimming is such excellent exercise is that it makes all your major muscle groups to work together. It’s easy at first to get carried away and become exhausted the first few times out. You’ll find that swimming can be the miracle exercise your body’s been looking for.
The PACE program focuses on variation; alternating between periods of exertion and recovery. By increasing the intensity and changing the duration of the intervals, your heart and lungs will build up the reverse capacity that was lost over years of the wrong kind of exercise.
As with any age, it’s important to rest an average of one day a week to allow your body to heal from this accelerated activity. Once you have put in a few months of pleasant, enjoyable physical exercise, you may suddenly find you’re feeling at least 20 years younger.
Graham McKenzie in an online content syndicator for ground breaking new fitness equipment device that increases an athletes peak performance by an additional 13.8%.
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