Have a quick skim through any Health and Fitness magazine, website or app and it won’t be long before an exercise programme will be offered to you with the promise of helping you reach your personal goals in no time at all. 

It’s a tempting offer to take up the challenge with a clear plan already in place to follow, but are the risks worth the reward and will it really get the results you want for all the hard work you are planning to put in?

Does one individual exercise programme work for each and every one of us?

Worth considering before you take the plunge:

Individual differences

We all move, think and behave differently from each other plus we have different metabolic rates, skeletal joint ranges and responses to exercise.  

Understand your own individual differences, learn about them, and most importantly work with them not against them to see sustainable progress.

Stress

Exercise in all forms is a controlled amount of physical stress to your body in order to adapt to the required effort. But what intensity and duration of stress is the right amount for you personally?

It is essential to know your own starting point to avoid possible injury and ensure you progress safely towards your desired goals.

Progression

It won’t be very long before the programme nudges you to step things up a bit by adding more weight or adding more work (sets,reps,load or duration).  Whilst progress is good of course, are you progressing too fast for you and are you allowing yourself the right amount of recovery time between your exercise. 

Make sure you have slept well and fueled yourself ready for the new increase in exercise?

Knowing when you are ready to progress to the next stage and moving at the right pace for you is paramount to long lasting change.

Time

One of the most common problems with starting and following a new routine is finding space in your day to fit it in alongside your work, family, friends and all the other ‘essential’ little things that just always seem to last longer than planned.

The secret to achieving your goals is to ensure your exercise programme fits in with your everyday life, so something you do as a matter of course rather than ‘in addition’ to everything else. 

 Allowing yourself time to incorporate new activities is essential to ultimately achieving your goals. 

Plus, before you add anything else to your day make sure its achievable with all your other priorities. 

Edit your day first and adopt a smarter (not harder) plan for your day ahead.

Once you have established what you want to achieve then it’s time to plan carefully, set achievable goals, make time in your day and create in effect a programme that fits you and your life.

It’s about you.

At Coach London, it really is all about you! Following detailed discussions, all our members have bespoke programmes developed with their goals and objectives and level of fitness in mind. 

If you would like help or advice to develop or start a programme, please contact us at info@coachlondon.uk or call 44 (0) 207 315 4260

The Coach Team