How Much Exercise is Just Right?

With the Health Secretary recently announcing that we should all be taking more responsibility for our health and ‘making better choices’ about our diet and fitness, are you wondering, like me, just what you can do to live a longer and healthier life as you get older?

As a reminder, the Government guidelines for the amount of exercise an adult should do per week is at least 150 minutes of moderate exercise or 75 minutes of high-intensity exercise. Unless you’re a fitness fanatic, you might find these figures daunting.

However, it might be better to think about these figures over the week - 10 minutes of exercise a day is already 70 minutes, so add a 45 minute class to that and you’re nearly there!

And of course, if you’re just starting out, you should start small and build up to improve your stamina and if you’ve been injured, you will also need to take it steady.

Ideally, your exercise should be a mixture of different things – whether that’s different classes, a run, brisk walking, cycling, swimming or weights sessions. This gives you a great balance of cardio work, stretching and strength training. Combining strength and cardio exercise is the most effective way of reaching and maintaining a stable level of fitness and ensuring that you have a safe, balanced and enjoyable workout plan.

Try to incorporate rest days into your fitness plan as your muscles need time to recover and if you overload your joints and tendons you could cause an injury or a long term problem like Tendonitis.

Don’t underestimate how important sleep is – with seven to eight hours per night your body will grow stronger, burn fat and rebuild damaged muscles while you sleep.

We can all get a bit complacent with the same routine every single week as the body gets used to a particular workout, so step out of your comfort zone and vary the intensity and duration of your exercise. Why not mix it up with a variety of fitness classes – from Pilates to Boxfit to Clubbercise – there’s a Gemma Pearce Fitness class to give you all the variety you need! www.gemmapearcefitness.co.uk