Fitness has always been confused with having a great figure. It is generally, the state of being healthy. It is necessary to have a healthy body so that we can focus on other important aspects and people in our life rather than spending most of our precious time being sick and grumpy. Fitness can be achieved by the intake of the right amount of nutritious food, proper exercise and adequate sleep. The combination of all the above factors is necessary and failing in any one field will not guarantee the thing that we are looking for i.e., fitness.
Even though the definition of fitness for men varies from individual to individual, the basics will definitely include increased strength, greater immunity and endurance, increased flexibility, better structural composition and more muscle. Muscles hold the key to burning more calories, hiking up your resting state metabolism, improving strength and improving your looks unlike fat. So, here are some physical fitness ideas that will help you make a permanent impact on your body and give you the physique that you have always wanted.
The exercise regimen generally consists of cardio workouts and weight training. Cardio training is good for burning calories. But, weight training is important for toning specific parts of the body and for building muscle.
The number of repetitions or reps done in weight training depends on the exercise being done and why it is being done. The effectiveness and the number of reps is also affected by the person’s metabolism, genetics, age, nutrition, physical condition and mindset to name a few. The process of lifting weights brings about a stress on the body and the body tries to compensate this condition by developing muscles.
The number of reps to be done has been a topic of debate since time immemorial. The low reps generally range from one to five. They essentially bring about neurological change rather than actual increase in muscle size. They make you stronger neurologically and the strength comes from specific adaptations in the nervous system to deal with the stress of lifting weights. Medium reps range from six to twelve. Here, the adaptations are not so neurological as they are cellular and metabolic. There is considerable increase in muscle sizes and you gain strength as well. For higher reps ranging from thirteen to twenty, the changes are purely metabolical and not neurological. The higher number of reps only increases the local endurance and there is very little increase in strength and size of the muscle. There is no distinct line separating the neurological adaptations from the metabolic adaptations.
Eventually, after some period of weight training, a point of no change is reached. Now, comes the time to try different procedures, increase or decrease the number of reps and experiment with different weights.
It is advised that athletes or persons looking for an increase in strength and speed should train in the one to five rep range. People looking for increasing their muscle mass should mostly train in the six to twelve range. They should also train in the three to five range to get more strength and power. They should also do some of the training in the more than thirteen range so as to develop slow twitch muscle fibers, improve density of mitochondria and bring about an increase in capillarization.