Two out of every three Australians fail to meet the
Australian Government’s recommended guidelines for
exercise — a mere 30 minutes of moderate-intensity
activity for five days of the week. If that’s you, here are
four ways to help you get moving out of the inactive
group and into long-term health and fitness.
New Year
Revive your fitness
routine for the
BY DR NICK FULLER
E
ach year, we set our New Year’s
resolutions, and for many this
includes the goal to kick the extra
kilos. We incorporate our new
exercise routine into our lives only to get
disheartened when we don’t see any change
on the scales.
Why do we give up so easily?
The overwhelming majority of us — a
massive 70 per cent — are not meeting the
recommended level of activity, so when we
do add in some exercise we are only getting
to the recommended level for general ‘heart
health’ guidelines. We need to be doing this
30 minutes on five days of the week as a bare
minimum for ‘heart health’ and then adding
a variety of exercises and intensities as part of
a fitness plan on top of this to achieve weight
loss.
To add to the frustration, we often start
activities we don’t even enjoy or won’t stick
to long-term — such as going to the gym or
starting with a personal trainer. So what do
we do? In frustration, we quit, having wasted
our money, and go back to our old ways, as
it is all too hard and no fun, especially if we
don’t see the kilos shifting from the scales.
To break from this pattern, try reviving
your exercise routine by following these four
tips this summer!1
Find something you enjoy
Next time you start an exercise routine,
take up something you enjoy — no
matter what it is. If it’s walking, then
walk. If it’s running, then run. If it’s
playing tennis, then play tennis. Just don’t do
the same exercise or work at the same inten-
sity every day. And don’t be disheartened
if you don’t see the weight changing when
you start your exercise routine — it will go
down if you do enough and if you mix up the
type of exercise you are doing. People give
up on exercise plans because they don’t see
the weight shift on the scales when they first
start off, but in reality your weight is unlikely
to change unless you were already meeting
the 30 minutes of activity for five days of the
week. So it’s all about getting to that bare
minimum level first as part of your incidental
day-to-day movement and then including
some structured activity on top of that.2
Exercise when it suits you
Often we hear that fasting in
the morning before exercise will
increase how much fat you burn.
This is absolute nonsense. You are
not going to burn more of your fat because
you are fasting. You will burn exactly the
same amount of calories — and the number
of calories will depend on the type of exercise,
not the food or lack of food you may have had
beforehand. So this means that you are no
better off exercising in the morning comparedto the evening. Exercise when you can and at
a time you most enjoy.3
Incorporate a range of
exercises and variety of
intervals
It’s important to incorporate a
range of different exercises and
focus on the amount of exercise and intensity
of the exercise rather than one particular
muscle group. Another common fallacy is
that doing a lot of crunches or sit-ups will
help you to lose your tummy. The unfortunate
truth: there is no such thing as targeting fat-
loss in a specific area — and the stomach can
be the most stubborn area to see a difference
in. Crunches will help muscle tone, but you
will only lose weight off your stomach if you
are burning more energy than you are putting
into your body and hence will lose weight off
your entire body.4
Add bodyweight training
to your program
Despite what you might think,
weight training will not make you
bulky. Resistance training is not
going to stack on the muscle, but it will offer
variety to your exercise routine, which is
important for not only losing weight, but also
maintaining the weight loss. Muscle burns
more energy than fat, and therefore the more
muscle to fat you have in your body, the more
energy you will burn at rest. Incorporate a
bodyweight exercise circuit into your home —
or you can do this at your local park or a gym
that you feel comfortable going to — and mix
up your routine by adding new exercises to it
every few weeks.DR NICK FULLER leads the research program
within the Charles Perkins Centre at the University
of Sydney and is the author of Interval Weight
Loss (2017, Penguin), in which he details the only
scientifically-proven way of redefining the weight
your body wants to be — to ensure you lose weight
and keep it off. For more information, visit http://www.
intervalweightloss.com.auoxygenmagAU Jan/Feb 2018 55