Many people enthusiastically begin a fitness campaign at the beginning of the new year. This is great, however, injuries often occur when there is a sudden increase in the duration, intensity, or frequency of your activities. Many soft tissue injuries can be avoided through proper conditioning, training, and equipment. Other tips include:
Balanced Fitness: Develop a program that includes cardiovascular exercise (at least 3 x 30 minutes of activity that increases your heart rate per week), strength training (particularly important as you age), and flexibility (a yoga class or session or pilates at least once a week).
Don’t do too much too quickly: Add new activities and exercises carefully, whether you’ve been sedentary or very active, and don’t try to do too many new exercises at one time. Gaining too much weight or distance too quickly can set you back severely. Overtraining and not allowing your body adequate rest periods can exhaust you and set you up for injury.
Wear the right equipment: Change your shoes every 6 months if you are very active or if they start to show signs of wear. Wear comfortable, loose-fitting clothing that allows you to move freely and release body heat.
Stay hydrated: Have a drink at least every 15 minutes or so while you exercise and drink water regularly in your daily life to rehydrate.
Warm-up: Before your workout, slowly increase from a walk to a jog, bike spin, or gently mobilize your arms and legs by jogging in place and twisting your arms. Warming up increases heart rate and blood flow and loosens tendons, ligaments and joints.
Cool Down – In my opinion, this is more important than the warm up and should be the final part of your workout routine. As muscles cool down immediately after cardiovascular exercise (even sports like swimming), stretching is vital to prevent them from becoming short and tight. Reduce the speed of your movement or activity in the last 5 minutes before stopping and then begin to stretch slowly and carefully until you reach the point of muscle tension. Hold each stretch for 10 to 20 seconds and then release slowly, ideally repeating 2 or 3 times for each muscle group. Don’t bounce the stretch. For example, if you’ve been running or cycling, be sure to stretch your entire leg (calves, hamstrings, quadriceps), glutes, and lower back muscles, and include rotational back stretches.
Rest: Schedule regular days free from vigorous exercise and rest when you are tired.
Don’t limit yourself to exercising on weekends: try to do at least 30 minutes of moderate exercise every day, breaking it up into 10-minute chunks if you’re short on time.
