Benefits of being strong!

Back on my schedule today again, the 6.10am run and the day off yesterday did me no end of good so im hitting this message today with no end of energy too!

 I like to talk about balancing your schedule throughout the week, and how important it is to have your week planned in a broad sense to make sure you are successful each week full stop.

You always need to be doing some strength work a minimum twice a week to boost your metabolism, increase the rate your body burns calories 24 hours per day, really firm you up all over, get you stronger and fitter all round.

For many years, doctors argued that weight training and resistance work of all kinds would simply give you a heart attack if you pushed it too hard and would give you high blood pressure too. We all know now that the opposite is true.

Making gains in your health and fitness plan is impossible without having resistance training in your plan.

Another myth that used to be put around was that strength training slowed you down a lot.

The heaviest users of weight training in the running world are always the sprinters. Try telling someone who can run under 10 seconds for the 100 metres that weight training/resistance training slows you down!

The realities are that the athletes were the ones finding out first what worked before the doctors. The doctors would then research the claims made by athletes and then verify all the amazing benefits that they were constantly reporting.

Now any sport from tennis, to football, to squash, to canoeing all use strength training as vital parts of their weekly training, year round!! None of this rubbish “i don’t want to get too big”!! If only that was possible that easy!!! Sportsmen are discovering the benefits of strength training in all sorts of different ways for their chosen sport, and are not “getting big and slow”, they are getting sharper, fitter and lasting a lot longer into their 30’s than ever before.

A lot of strength training is about avoiding injury too. Most people dont know that you are strengthening your bones and joints when you use resistance too. This makes your body work together in harmomy more, making the chance of injury much less.

When you get in old age, you want strong tendons and ligaments, as well as strong joints and bones to avoid falls for instance, and to do things that will still give you a high quality of life. We all want to be active into old age but you have to create a strong base and foundation first.

You need to do your strength work AND cardiovascular work (running, walking, cycling, swimming etc), thats a perfect balance!!

Have a great sunday and thanks for visiting!