I get asked many fitness questions every day. I’ve compiled the top five most frequently asked fitness questions to share with you. If you have any another fitness questions for me, please post it in the comment section below.
When is the best time to exercise?
Getting to the gym or hitting the road for a run needs to be convenient to be sustainable. The best time of day is the one that suits you and your lifestyle and schedule. For some it’s bright and early, for others on their way home from work or after the kids have gone to bed. Find your best time of day, schedule it and do it!
What’s the best activity or type of exercise to do?
Choose activities you enjoy. You are more likely to participate and return to activities you like and find fun. If you need set appointments and someone to be accountable to, get a trainer or book into a scheduled series (e.g., eight-week bootcamp). Choose exercises that involve multiple joints and muscle groups and ideally that can challenge both your strength and cardio fitness at once or pair strength and cardio exercises into sets.
Why am I not losing fat?
Exercise is an important weight-loss tool, however it doesn’t work alone. Exercise will make you fitter and stronger, will make you feel great and will assist in weight loss. For best results, you need to evaluate your diet and nutrition too. Are you eating well? Are you respecting portions/serving sizes? Are you fueling your body with the right combination of foods? Are you reading labels? Journal every thing (solid and liquid) that touches your lips for three weeks to see what’s going on. You might be surprised.
How often should I exercise?
The Canadian Society for Exercise Physiology recommends, for adults, 150 minutes of moderate (sweat a little, breathe harder) to vigorous (sweat a lot, feel out of breath) per week plus strength training twice a week. See more details and age groups Canadian Physical Activity Guidelines.
Give your muscles sufficient rest; they need time to recover after strength training. For full-body strength training, skip one full day between sessions. Alternatively, you can train opposing muscle groups on alternating days or upper body one day and lower body the next.
Will weight training make me look like a bodybuilder?
No, unless you take steroids or lift extremely heavy weights and train for the purpose of competing and bulking up. While every woman is different and some of us will build more prominent muscle tone than others, none of us will bulk-up by taking a BodyPump class or using kettlebells or following a common workout routine. Look at your friends who workout regularly, walk through a gym and take a look at the women strength training, do they all look like bodybuilders? No. Now go lift some weights, it’s good for you.
Katya Mohsen is a personal trainer with more than 10 years of experience in fitness and sports training. Catch her practical fitness advice Thursdays on Slice.ca
