Heart Health and Endurance

Welcome again to my short series on exercise and health, and thank you for reading.

I used to be in the group of people who worked out inconsistently and felt like they were never really improving in their health until I became more disciplined about exercise and threw in some circuit training for more variety and excitement.

I think some reasons people give up on working out is that they don't see improvement.  Improvement takes sometime, and you just have to be committed.  If you work out every week, that's great, but don't expect to see as much improvement in a month as you'd see by working out 5 times a week for around 30 minutes a day.

If you'd like some non-professional advice that's still effective, I'll mention what's worked out for me.

I dropped 20 pounds from last year's average weight and exercise was a big component.  In my next entry I'll talk about eating right, though.

I was flipping through a review book for my USMLE Step 1 exam and I came across a section about running/exercise and what your body uses to power itself during different lengths of distances you run.  In summary, the longer you work out, the more fat you burn.  Of course, be safe and exercise responsibly.

Since I started working out, my average time spent on cardio (running or cycling) is 30 minutes.  It might seem like a long time, and it was to me at first, to be honest.  What I did was work my way up, starting with 10 minutes, and then incrementing that to 15, 20, 25, and 30 once I felt I was comfortable enough to handle the next "level."

Again, it's really rewarding feeling the first 20 minutes of your work out be a breeze, and the easier it becomes to exercise, I think the more you'll be inclined to exercise.

This all helps you build endurance, which translates to longer, more effective work outs, and more weight loss, your blood pressure becoming lower, and your heart becoming stronger (as you know, the heart is a muscle, and with more exercise, it becomes stronger and has to work less hard to achieve proper circulation).

Thanks for reading.