REALISTICALLY, HOW MUCH EXERCISE SHOULD I BE DOING?
- Do you feel overwhelmed when it comes to exercise?
- Do you read about how you ‘should’ be doing this or that, especially as you age?
- Do you want to start exercising, but always have something else that needs to be done which is more important?
- Do you just not know what to do?
- Do you know what to do but just not motivated to do it?
- Do you exercise too much?
How many of those would you tick a yes for? Obviously, I have many different types of women reading my blogs/newsletters – some of you are sportswomen and train regularly, some of you may be sporadic exercisers and some of you hate exercise.
Everyone is different – energy, motivation, have niggles, disabilities – but you can ALL MOVE
Basically, here are my general suggestions for all women – remember it is very general and includes beginners and advanced exercisers, menopausal, 80 yr olds and 18 yr olds!!
- Exercise comes in all different types of movement, so if you are 18 or 80yrs old aim for periods of movement of at least 13 – 20 mins every day (walking/using the stairs/dancing/classes/climbing/gardening/anything so you aren’t sitting on your bum all the time!)
- Walk with a purpose – add walking to your day if you are not an exerciser
- Post menopausal women – aim for a minimum of 3 sessions of exercise every week – just make sure you get your heart rate up a bit
- Teenagers – you should be moving, jumping, running, dancing most days. Then make sure you have recovery time to chill too.
- New Mums – the best thing you and your baby can do is to get out EVERYDAY – come rain, come shine. Walk & think about your posture – walk tall. Aim for 15 – 30 mins. Come and join my pelvic floor & diastasis safe new mum classes
- Pre-menopause – 3 – 4 x a week. Time to start making it a habit, even if you haven’t exercised before.
- Full on exercisers who keep getting ill/injured/run down – if you are training 6x a week, totally shattered, keep getting injured, not losing weight, stressed a lot of the time, not eating well & maybe not sleeping well – you are one group I would say STOP, reassess & look at your rest & recovery days.
- Full on exercisers who feel great – Some may be exercising 6x a week and feel great. So long as you are getting good amounts of sleep, eating really well & have lots of energy. Keep it up and just make sure you listen to your body and start adding in more rest & recovery days or more sleep when you know you need to.
- Match your exercise energy with rest, sleep, good nutrition and recovery – too much exercise can affect sleep, energy etc and too little exercise can also affect sleep!!
Ideas for what you can do
Aim for 2x resistance sessions a week
even if you are a runner – either body weight squats, lunges, press ups, band/dumbbell rows a few times a week.
Join classes for strength/resistance
- Body conditioning or boxing classes or classes which include dumbbells are great.
- Resistance sessions can be body weight dance classes or yoga.
- As always, start bodyweight and move onto dumbbells. If you can get advice on how to do the exercises correctly.
- remember strenuous things like gardening, climbing – they are all going to be using muscles
Cardio – aim for 1 or 2 short sessions
You want to try and get out of breath a few times a week. It doesn’t have to be for long. Again, put a good tune on and dance!
- Do a 15 min HIIT session or go up the stairs 5 – 10x (walk down, never run down),
- Power walk up a hill 5x – you may have to walk up a steep hill on the way back from work, don’t avoid it, do it!
- Use a park bench and do some step ups (when no one is watching!!)
- Choose a class you will enjoy – there are loads of different classes at gyms, halls, etc. Any class that gets your heart rate up & you will want to keep going to.
- Combine a run with doing squats or lunges or press ups or burpees at different stages on the run.
What I do
I have been into sport and exercise ALL my life. I did all sports at school, hockey and rugby at Uni, then I rowed. I have always run & used cycling to get around.
I do go through phases of being lazy but after a while I will be back doing something.
I make sure I listen to my body – I get enough sleep and I do eat well around my sessions.
I used to be a runner – did marathons, 1/2 marathons, 10k’s etc and I didn’t really do classes, just ran.
Then I became a PT – my running lessened, I found triathlon club so I liked someone telling me what to do.
Then I hit menopause, hip/glute issues, hysterectomy and I ended up not being able to run so much. I did more sprint sessions and mixed in some HIIT exercises.
I then started focusing on weights – I did them when I was a rower and actually loved the feeling of being so strong. I now do 1x heavy weights session – generally quite a short session. I do a HIIT with weights session and I do a cardio/strength session. I run 1x a week, not long. Sometimes it is a short sprint session and sometimes just a 5k. I generally do something every other day, though when I do something 2 or 3 days on the trot I then make sure I get lots of recovery.
Over the years you can see I have changed what I do. I appreciate I have always been motivated to do sport and you may not. But for your health just think about 1 thing you would like to do or go and try a few things that fit in with your life and see what you like, then carry on with it!!
