The 3 things you need to know to get fit fast
The 3 things you need to know to get fit fast
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When most people think about getting fit, they often think about long hours at the gym sweating it out on the bike or treadmill. The truth is, it can be much easier than this.
Firstly, when we talk about fitness, we are not talking about fatness.
Fitness is the ability to do the activities that you would like to do. It doesn’t necessarily mean that you have a flat stomach.
If you think about it, we are all fit enough to sit on a couch, I am hike fit but I am a long way off marathon fit. If you want to be fit, it is important to think about what you want to be fit for.
If you are trying to reduce your body fat percentage, then this is a different goal than fitness, and exercise is only a small component of this puzzle. If you want to lose body fat the first place to look is your diet, but for most people it is waaaaay more complicated, with factors like hormones, sleep, alcohol, stress, and environmental toxins all coming into play. If you want to lose body fat, I recommend Dr Libby Weaver’s excellent book, Accidentally Overweight to help solve your puzzle.
If you want to get fit, read on.
How to get fit fast
To get fit, we recommend the FIT protocol.
Frequency of exercise – most important
Intensity of exercise – next most important
Time spent exercising – least important
Say your goal is you want to walk the Great Ocean Walk. You will need a good level of cardio fitness so that you get up and down the hills and plough through the sand stretches.
Following the FIT protocol, you want to be exercising regularly. You can’t expect to get fit, if you are only exercising once a month. Our recommendation for something like the Great Ocean Walk is to be exercising 2-3 times per week. If you could exercise 4-5 times a week that would be awesome, but it isn’t necessary if you are exercising with intensity.
Intensity is really important and it is heaps more efficient. How do you know if you are exercising intensely?
If you can sing while exercising – that’s low intensity.
If you can’t sing but you can talk – that’s moderate intensity
If you can’t talk (but you can still breath) – that’s high intensity
In an ideal world, you would exercise at moderate intensity (sorry, no Adele karaoke!) for 15-20 minutes per session, including about 4 minutes of high intensity. That’s all. 20 minutes total, but don’t skip out on the 4 mins of intense exercise. It doesn’t need to be 4 consecutive minutes. You can do 4 x 1 minute blocks, or 8 x 30 second blocks. You could do 14 x 18 second blocks!! Whatever you like, but make sure you get your 4.
And that’s it. There is no need to spend hours in the gym, if you are getting your heart pumping regularly.
So remember, if you want to get fit fast, follow the FIT protocol and you will be at your goals in no time.
