Test Your Fitness After Lockdown
MOVEMENT RESTRICTION under lockdown has depleted our physical health. Gaining fat weight, losing aerobic capacity, strength, and flexibility are just some of the negative results of lockdown. The pandemic has raised our awareness of the need for physical activity.
Another major blow from lockdown and movement restrictions is social isolation. The way exercise helps improve mental health, motivation and mood has become the subject of wide discussion.
Covid-19 has also raised people’s expectations of the fitness profession, and Certified Fitness Instructors with technical expertise are in demand.
We all enjoy our workouts, happy to measure fitness by the amount of weight lost or muscle gained. Proper expertise, however, can offer a balanced assessment of your fitness level. A fitness ‘score’ can be useful in setting goals and tracking progress.
BASIC FITNESS TEST. We offer a service that could meet this expectation: a free fitness assessment with your membership package, called the Basic Fitness Test (BFT). The test takes 15 minutes to assess each of the four basic components of fitness - body composition, aerobic capacity, strength & flexibility. We add up all the scores and give you a final score on a scale of 1 to 10. Your target is to score 10.
Fitness score is adjusted for age. For example, we expect a 20-29 year old man to reach a top strength score with 36 pushups. The older age group of 30-39 year old men can get the same top score with 30 push ups.
Fitness score is also adjusted for gender. A 20-29 year old woman can be expected to score 38 on flexibility, while a male of the same age has to get 37 for a top score.
GYMS ARE OPEN. After two months of movement restriction, I would imagine most of us would have gained weight. However, our initial data shows that most of our regular members (throughout April-May till lockdown in the last week of Roadhamas) have actually maintained their weight over lockdown.
As a general rule, if you exercise regularly, the benefits of fitness are maintained up to 3 months. For example, if you weighed 65 kg at lockdown on 6 May, you may find that your weight has not changed when you weighed yourself this July as gyms opened. A possible reason for this is increased lean muscle mass, which in turn maintained a high metabolism over that time. However, you can lose muscle mass, just as you gained it.
FITNESS IS IN DEMAND. Not everyone visits the gym to become a bodybuilder and develop massive muscles with extreme exercise. Most come to the gym to improve their health through moderate exercise. Certified Trainers can advise clients with a customised approach to their personal fitness. An objective, science-backed approach will help you maintain exercise motivation and get the results you want.
