When considering exercise there are generally three types of people.
The first is the extreme athlete who knows exactly what to do to keep on top of their game.
The second type is those of an average to high fitness level who enjoys exercise and sport and maintains their fitness all year round.
The third and most common type is the person of low to average fitness who can never get into a steady exercise routine. They normally ‘Yo-Yo’ on their diets and exercise often starting with new year resolutions and finishing in February or March to start again 4-6 weeks before the summer holidays by which time its much too late.
The key to a healthy lifestyle is consistency. Someone who has never exercised before needs to start slowly and progressively increase their fitness level and once they have achieved their goals they need to work to maintain that level.
It’s very hard both physically and psychologically to achieve past goals such as a target body weight or running a marathon in a certain time after a period of no exercise.
People also have to be careful not to ‘overtrain’ as that can lead to ‘burnout’ and ‘staleness’ which have negative effects such as amongst other things fatigue, mood swings, cold like symptoms, impaired performance and loss of concentration.