Ever heard the saying use it or lose it? Well this is known in the fitness world as the 5th principle of fitness; reversibility. Reversibility happens when we stop exercising whether it be cardiovascular training, strength training or flexibility training. We can start to lose our fitness as soon as 2 weeks after stopping training/ exercising, something I know only too well when I go on holiday and don’t do any exercise. When I go back to work and start teaching my 20 classes a week by the weekend I can hardly move because of muscle soreness. It usually only takes a week to get back to my original fitness level, thankfully, but the longer you take off from exercise the longer it takes to get back to your fitness level.
This shows that consistency is key to maintaining and improving fitness, strength and flexibility, but this can also be applied to weight lost. Lots of people take up exercise to lose weight and upon reaching their target weight they give up exercise only to put all the weight back on again. To maintain long term weight loss you must maintain some form of exercise/ physical activity. If weight starts to creep back on you will need to increase the intensity of your exercise to continue to lose weight. If you are struggling with weight loss or improvements in fitness, please get in touch.
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