What is Fitness

Being physically fit can be very valuable to people. This is probably why the fitness industry is one of the largest globally and is worth nearly $100 billion. In connection with health and wellness, being physically fit has become a major aspiration for many. Spoken as if there is an invisible threshold you can reach if you exercise enough, then you will be rewarded with fitness.

While there is some truth in this, a big umbrella term greatly simplifies it with a different definition depending on the context you use and who you ask. We tend to reduce fitness to how we look. While body composition comes into play, that is only part of what fitness includes.

So what is fitness? What does it mean to be fit? How can we find a definition and value that fits us, encourages us to be involved, and plays a perfect role in our lifestyle? What are the different types of physical fitness?

When we talk about fitness, we usually talk about physical fitness. But there are other types as well. Skill-related fitness, nutritional fitness, mental and emotional fitness. It's a good reminder that our well-being is not just our body's ability to do squats.

In terms of physical fitness, our abilities can be divided into four categories: cardiovascular fitness, muscular strength, muscular endurance, and flexibility/mobility. Body composition can also be viewed as a component of physical fitness, but is not linked to a specific exercise; it just defines your body fat/bone/water/muscle ratio. Therefore, for this article, we will ignore it.

With physical fitness, you can succeed in one type and fight the other – an excellent reminder to broaden our perspective a bit when talking about fitness. People can have different fitness levels in various categories.

Cardiovascular fitness

Cardiovascular fitness is simply our body's ability to deal with oxygen. Especially the efficiency of our lungs and heart to receive it, carry it, and use it to fuel our movements. Activities that test and improve our cardiovascular fitness, or cardio we like to abbreviate, are things like running, swimming, cycling, and most sports.

Muscle strength

When we think of muscles, it's easy to think only of strength. The strength of a muscle relates to the amount of force a muscle can exert. It requires a specific type of muscle fiber. As our strength increases, the number of these fibers increases and so does our muscle mass. Power allows us to lift heavy. However, it's not the only type of muscle fitness.

Muscular endurance

Muscular endurance is the amount of time our muscles can work without getting tired. Maximum strength here is less important and more about the long-term demand our muscles can handle. Muscular endurance requires a different type of muscle fiber. Stamina allows us to go longer.

We need both muscular strength and muscular endurance. It's hard to have one without the other. The way you train in the gym will determine which type of fitness you develop more.

Flexibility/Mobility

Flexibility and mobility are largely underestimated aspects of fitness. They are neglected a lot. But without them, we cannot do all our bodily movements. Flexibility is the ability of our muscles to stretch and mobility is our range of motion within a joint. Maintaining good levels of these is integral to staying active and injury-free.

In reality, exercise doesn't just develop an element of fitness. Activities, workouts, and workouts will likely test multiple types of fitness at once. A Yoga session will likely test your muscular endurance, strength, and flexibility. A HIIT class will likely test your cardiovascular fitness, strength, and endurance. A weightlifting session will likely impact your muscle strength and endurance.

The point is not to be overwhelmed with everything we have to think about fitness. We don't need a checklist to mark. It's just about understanding the reductive view we've developed of what wellness looks like. Fitness means more than how much time we spend on the bench press.

How would you define fitness? At what point can we say we are fit?

As with most things, the answer to complex questions like this is often the same. Depends on the individual. Quantitative measures of fitness differ between men and women. Among the old and young. Between parents and people without children. The list goes on. NHS guidelines recommend that people aged 19-64 should do 150 minutes of moderate-intensity activity per week, or 75 minutes intensely. What is classified as intense will be very different depending on the individual and their current fitness level. Still unclear.

Wellness is a state of physical health and well-being, if we strip it down to the tiniest point, that is, we can fulfill a task. So what determines if we are fit is what we need to be physically fit?

For professional athletes, fitness means being fit enough to qualify for the Olympics. For the first-time marathon runner, fitness means being fit enough to finish the full 26.2 miles. We can always be motivated to do better, but that doesn't mean we're not good enough right now. It's a good start to remember that fitness is defined by the individual, not the appearance of the abs. It's time to recalibrate our mindsets and understand what wellness means to us and the role it should play in our lives.

How do you improve fitness?

Since we all have different starting points, the way to increase fitness will also be different. However, some basic training principles help us understand how changes will occur.

Educational Principles

1-Make specific

As we mentioned, the type of exercise you do should be specific to your goals. Don't expect to train one way and then excel at the other. If you want to run longer, don't waste time doing bicep curls.

This rule gets pretty elaborate even in a particular type of fitness. For example, you can develop incredible aerobic fitness and become an excellent runner. Still, you can't perform to a high standard on the bike if you haven't trained on it.

2-Progress plan

Doing the same workout over and over won't lead to any improvement. If the demands on the body remain the same, it will not need to make any changes to move forward. To see increases in fitness, you have to make it harder when it gets easy. This can mean different things depending on what you want to achieve. It could be more exercise per week, more weights, more repetitions, less rest time, or a faster pace.

3-Understand that it is recyclable

As the body changes to adapt to the demands, the changes will be reversed if those demands are no longer there. Your body will apply its efforts elsewhere. Therefore, if you don't train for a while, you can expect to lose some fitness. That's why it's so important to make it a habit that you can enjoy and maintain.

4-Prioritize recovery

All these adaptations to the body we are talking about happening while we are resting. This is why recovery is so important for improving fitness. Beginners will need more recovery than more advanced exercisers, so take your time for that. Not resting hinders fitness progress.

5-Remember your individuality

Many individual differences will affect how you develop fitness. Your natural ability and pacing are affected by genetics, age, and gender. Measure your fitness only against yourself and never against anyone else.

6-How to define fitness for yourself

Finding a role for fitness and exercise in our lives is about understanding and motivating the benefits it can bring us. Some people want to lose weight or achieve a certain appearance while some want to increase their strength or speed. Others want to feel good and activate those endorphins.

Defining your fitness goals is not as easy as it sounds. Start by thinking big. Then you can narrow your focus and understand exactly what you need to do at the gym and how often you want to go to achieve this.

Getting fit is undoubtedly the hardest part. When surveyed with a group of people, most believe that their fitness would increase if they had more time on their hands and were easier to do.