Steve HowardJanuary and September are the months of the year with the most visits to the gym. First, to be a month of good intentions, and second, to be next for a vacation full of excesses. This gym joining formula, forcing to walk and exercise, can work for people who love sports and are active as it motivates all year long but for those who don’t like it or not practiced regularly, the approach to a healthier and more active lifestyle should be different.
Choosing an exercise that best suits a person’s tastes, without expecting immediate results in the short term and enjoying the process, is the advice of graduate Mikel Arce. in physical activity and sports sciences and personal trainer. “Knowing what you want will help you follow the motivation you need,” he says.
From experience he knows that you need to walk calmly and that “beating yourself up one day a week without getting pleasure from it does not work as well as three days and enjoying it.”
For starters, motivation is key. According to Jesús Hernandez González, personal trainer for Blua de Sanitas, we must think that we all had to start someday. If you want, you can, ”encourages. His advice: “start today, not Monday or next month.”
Goal setting is another one of his tips. “The first step in a marathon is to put on your shoes, start the house from the bottom,” he says and makes it fun. His recommendation: look for an activity that caught your attention or you have long wanted to try. ”
Do it in a group, according to the expert, is also another very motivating option. “Playing sports or exercising in a group creates more satisfaction and commitment than one-to-one activities for people who are just starting out.” For this reason, he encourages to go out “with the company whenever possible” and seek support. “Ask for help if a sports professional has the opportunity to help you through the process and make the first moments more bearable.”
But if the problem is not motivation, but laziness, then, according to Arce, it is best:
- Register for group events or meet other people. This will “make us leave home as we made a commitment.”
- Use mobile apps that make us study at home. They offer both guided and cycling lessons.
- Join a gym. This is compelling at first, but sometimes it is not enough, so it is advisable to “assign someone or clarify the goals that we want”.
- Complete a realistic and accessible challenge.
- Share your experience. “Keeping an agent informed can help keep the agent active.
- Tell your loved ones. “They can take us off the couch and motivate us.”
- Please rate small changes. “One thing you do to improve your day increases your chances of getting better every week.”
- Surround yourself with active people.
- Create healthy habits.
According to this expert, there are two types of profiles of people: those who go to the gym alone, and those who go to groups.
In recent years, there has been a trend towards personal trainers. In fact, according to their data, “the national trend is towards hiring well-trained professionals and strength training to reap the benefits of working on this ability at any age and in any discipline.”
For these more “individualistic” people, their advice is to choose the best specialist to help us: “The one who makes people suffer and hurts every day is not the one who does it best but the one who gradually improves your condition without these pains.
For those who go to the group, he advises to keep doing so, as this formula “can be motivating for many when it comes to class.” If you meet someone, “it’s easier than walking alone, and the atmosphere that is created in the group helps him,” he recalls.
Tips for running, cycling or going to the gym
According to Hernandez Gonzalez, “considering that walking is the main human movement, the recommended sport would be Nordic walking.” The discipline is “simple, cheap, global, fun and easy to learn,” he says. In addition, “it can be done anywhere, preferably in contact with nature and suitable for any age.”
It would be a good start for him, but if a person does not have time for any actions during the day, Arce’s advice is: “be physically active in everyday life and pay more attention to it.” For example, “cycling, walking or ice skating for short trips is very good, as well as stopping in front of the bus to do the rest on foot or climb the stairs at home. These are small gestures that add up “and are very important to get a taste for physical activity.
By activity or sport, If a person loves to run or wants to do this sport, which is so fashionable in recent years, Arce’s advice is “to adapt to it a little. It is not recommended to start running 10 km at one stroke, but it is recommended to do short jogging with walking, for example, when the heart is working, but the joints are not much affected, “he explains.
In this sense, the expert recalls how important it is to conform to your practice. “Many times people start a race to get in shape and they are out of shape to run. This is a mistake as it is an activity that should be performed technically well and with minimal preparation. ”
If a person chooses a bicycle for sports, his advice is to adapt and start with short walks, learn how to ride a bicycle in order to walk calmly with I pedal correctly and, without fear of changing gears, learn to walk in a group and get up. »
If you choose a gym, it is recommended to “get information about what you can and cannot do depending on the goals and physical condition of the person or join a specific activity and you would like to start”.
Best sport by age
When you start playing sports, age plays an important role. Hernandez Gonzalez advises combining several exercises to make him even healthier. “Choosing one activity may not be the most beneficial,” he says.
In his opinion, the ideal would be “to practice a little, taking into account a number of considerations that should be taken into account according to the specific conditions of each person.”
Thus, in the case of children, he advises that “they should devote themselves to playing and practicing various sports in order to promote proper psychomotor development and improve their motor wealth.” “In recent years, he regrets that” he falls too early into a specialization that does not stop causing developmental problems, sometimes irreversible, such as early tissue degeneration in some areas of the body that present functional difficulties in subsequent decades or, for example, hormonal disorders different types that interfere with such natural processes as menstruation in women. ” This is important to keep in mind, the expert believes.
In the young group, “it would be advisable to continue to engage in sports of all kinds that are more focused on improving the musculoskeletal system in order to generate funds that serve as a reserve for the next decades,” says the Sanitas expert. p>
Meanwhile
adults “must take care to maintain their muscle and bone mass as much as possible, as we lose a significant percentage of muscle mass over the past decade, followed by degeneration of bone mineral density, especially in postmenopausal women, motivated by a sudden drop in estrogen “. In men, “it’s more progressive, but it’s the same.”
With this in mind, a sport that includes exposure and strength development will be, according to Hernandez Gonzalez, the most recommended for adults. While you might think this is negative, impact sports are advisable because “they motivate bone building and prevent osteoporosis, with a host of health benefits that keep our musculoskeletal system in good health.” On the other hand, strength development is important as it maintains and generates muscle tone, which is also associated with improved overall health and bone health, ”he says.
In the case of older adults, “it is important to maintain muscle mass through sports that involve strength and impact, but with the context of each one”. Sports that have components of “balance and global control over the body are usually a great addition to their overall performance,” he notes.
Tips not to quit
The beginning of the year – playing sports is the first and easiest step, the task is to continue it throughout the year and forever, because over time, motivation in many cases disappears, giving way to laziness, In this sense, what advice can you give to keep the habit 365 days a year?
Arce offers a series of tips that can prevent people who decide to play sports from stopping doing it:
- Take your time. “Labels do not exist and have their own risks.”
- Choose a discipline or exercise well.
- Find a good coach who motivates you to follow and guide you.
- Perform and evaluate results using various tests and exercises where improvement is evident. For example, “the distance traveled with the same intensity at different times of the year can be measured, the weight that can be moved in the machine can be measured before and after, the mobility that we have acquired in certain movements, the speed that we are able to print on object or at the distance we dropped it to see improvements in coordination that make movements cheaper for us or that make movements we haven’t done before. ”
- Also helps to take a photo of the beginning and other photos that compare results Here he recommends that the photographs be in profile, on both sides and behind, so that when they are visible the person in front will see information that is less visible from the side, and vice versa. Thus, the person will be aware of many changes and at different levels that will increase the motivation to continue on this path.
- Weigh yourself in the knowledge that the weight is not fat, as people often become obsessed with weights and numbers, when the perimeters and folds of the body, which are different, are also important. “