Top 5 Fitness Goals
Fitness means different things to different people. A marathon runner will look at fitness completely differently to a baseball player or a weight lifter. An athlete might have a fitness goal to improve his/her mile run time by 30 seconds or a weight trainer might want to increase their bench-press by ten pounds.
With all the many different variables in mind we have selected the top 5 fitness goals that will apply universally to all athletes that train on a regular basis. If you do not set any fitness goals when training, your training program will not be designed with any objective in mind. It's like going for a drive with no destination you will not get anywhere even if you enjoy the trip.
Quantifiable measurable results are the only way to ensure success for any fitness athlete. From sports specific training to getting stronger, more powerful or quicker, if you don't have a plan then you plan to fail. The following points would be fitness goals for all athletes.
Choose a health goal
If you are a sports person then your training that you do will tell you if you are improving your performance or not on the sports field. If you are training to gain muscle you will be able to see whether you are successful or not, however the experts recommend that a health goal is selected so that the holistic objective of your training activities can be recorded. From decreasing your cholesterol count to reducing your total body-fat a health goal should be selected.
Drink more water
We often hear people talking about drinking 2 gallons a day of water with sport science telling us that we need 8 glasses of water a day when exercising on a regular basis. Staying well hydrated throughout the day speeds up recuperation, increases energy, increases the ability to concentrate and will reduce any hunger cravings you might get during your day.
Select rest days
Training too much causes a wide range of problems including muscle mass loss, slowing your metabolic rate and lowering your immune system. This can only be avoided by selecting your rest days correctly to avoid over-training especially for those highly motivated individuals who want to train all day.
Feel the muscle contraction
This fitness goal is more specific to weight trainers but can be applied to any activity. If you are not thinking about what you are doing and specifically looking to increase the contraction of the muscle targeted then you will not get the results you are looking for. For weight trainers this would mean concentrating specifically on the targeted body-part or muscle group and not on the supporting or helper muscles.
Try at least one new movement every month
No matter what sport or activity you do on a regular basis for health and fitness you need to constantly stress your body. Our bodies are designed to adapt to stress, lifting the same weight or running the same distance in the same time week after week will not develop any improvement or growth. Don't allow yourself to get bored with training, there are always countless improvements that can be attempted or implemented. From switching from free weights to machines or doing a different form of cardio, the list is endless.
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