Russell Cox, director of Regenesis Fitness, believes the easiest way to look younger is to get fit. He tells us how being active and healthy is the best anti-ageing medicine.
I believe that by far the best way to look younger is to get really fit. Think about it – it’s always the fit, strong and lean people whose age we underestimate, sometimes by as much as a decade.
However, some of these hard-training exercise junkies may look younger, but do they feel younger? While some may, the extreme levels of training required to keep up with youngsters on the athletics track, swimming pool or sports field often leaves older participants with increasingly chronic aches and pains as they age. Ask any netballer towards the end of their career if they feel young!
So how do we look and feel young through health and fitness without overdoing it? A holistic and balanced training regime will go a long way to achieving both these goals. Striking the right balance between intense training and recovery training is the key.
The key is to not overdo the training, as this can actually age our bodies if we go over the top. Intense training is designed to bring about improvements in physical capability and requires us to push ourselves out of our comfort zones, by incremental increases in duration and/or difficulty. Recovery training is designed to nurture our body’s wellbeing and assist in recovering from a session of intense training. Recovery training is the key to feeling young.
Your local gym, fitness club or trainer can offer guidance with designing a personally tailored fitness program. Having your own regime will ensure you have the balance right for your lifestyle, special needs and to make sure you’re feeling younger as well!
Beginners guide to an anti-ageing fitness regimeA week’s worth of sessions should comprise the following 30-minute sessions: 2 x ‘No Brainer’ sessions where you are both directed and motivated by external factors. This may be a spin class, personal training sessions, running group or a team sports coach. In these sessions you turn up, try to keep up and are motivated by other trainers or the coach. 2 x ‘Personal Favourite’ sessions doing fitness activities you love. If you love tennis, play a couple of sets. If walking is your thing head out on your favourite route. If you’re a sucker for multi-tasking you could pump out 30 minutes of cardio in a gym while catching up on the news or reading. Anything you enjoy that requires continuous moderate intensity cardiovascular effort will be the ticket. 2 x sessions a week that include postural correction exercises; strengthening and stretching designed to re-correct any weaknesses in your posture. One session should be aimed at relaxation and recovery. Massage, a stretching class, gentle yoga or meditation fits the bill. Not addressing posture issues can lead to chronic pain, such as lower back discomfort in manual work and neck and shoulder pain for office-based workers. |
