Its Heart Month!
Improving your cardiovascular fitness is important to maintain a healthy heart. No matter what exercise you choose to do, 30 minutes a day at four to five days a week can be an ideal way. Listed here are some exercise suggestions to help you get started
Circuit Training
Any movement is better than sitting still when it comes to improving your heart health, but one of the best types of exercises to increase your cardiovascular fitness is circuit training. When you work out at a very high intensity the blood starts to pump a lot harder and that challenges the elasticity of your arterial wall. The improved elasticity stretches the arteries for better cardiovascular fitness. Alternating between upper and lower body exercises is an ideal way to get maximum results.
Lane Swimming
To workout your heart and lungs, you will love swimming. Lane swimming eight to twelve lengths of the pool does not require a lot of time and will give you a greater response to your health. Try varying techniques on different days. This could mean doing front crawl and legs only with a flutter board one day, and then back crawl and breast stroke another day. One swim technique guaranteed to bring up your fitness level is fist freestyle, which is using closed fists for any swim style. You have to work harder because you don’t have any swim paddle effect with the open hand.
Weight Training
Weight training is critical for people with heart disease. In addition to helping you burn fat, weight training is also good for bone health and your heart. When it comes to deciding what type of weight training to do, using your own body weight can be extremely effective. Incorporating proper progression is the challenge, which can be done by adjusting the tempo of your movements to increase the difficulty. For example, once you can do 20 push-ups with ease, challenge yourself by slowing down and counting to four as you raise yourself up and then again as you lower
Running
A steady run is obviously an excellent way to stay in shape, but running intervals will really push your cardiovascular fitness to the next level. Whether it’s sprints or hills, all you need is 10 seconds at a time. Keeping the intensity at 10 seconds will ensure you go all out. Start with four 10-second intervals per workout, eventually working your way up to 10. By doing the intervals first, only do you have the energy to do them, but this type of training will deplete some of the glycogen or carbohydrate stored in the muscle, allowing you to tap into stored fat more readily. Work hard enough to get out of breath and then take whatever minimal rest period you need to recover.
Yoga
You don’t have to be doing a high level of activity to increase your heart health. Pushing your heart rate up and down quickly can be hazardous to those who are out of shape. Yoga may not seem like an obvious heart health activity, but it is. Yoga is great for strength and muscle toning, and more active styles of yoga such as Ashtanga and Bikram can offer cardiovascular benefits, as your heart rate is elevated throughout the class
Cycling
Regular cycling can substantially reduce your risk for coronary heart disease, according to a large study done by the British Medical Association. The findings revealed that cycling 32 kilometres a week reduced the potential to develop heart disease by a whopping 50 percent. Cycling uses large muscle groups in the legs to elevate your heart rate, which helps to improve not only your cardiovascular fitness but also burns calories, and has even been shown to improve mental health.