Your regime
Fitness principles are universal but a fitness regime is personal
The “perfect” regime with the fastest route to a destination is not necessarily the best route. A regime is useless if it cannot actually be followed for a consistent enough time to make desired change, which is why the best regime is usually the most simple, understandable and maintainable to follow. The best fitness regime is the one which best manipulates the principles of fitness to you, your life and your definition of fitness success.
Fitness results are the natural consequence of effectively following the full cycle of train, fatigue, recover, adapt and repeat.
TRAINING is the purposeful manipulation of movement and stress.
FATIGUE is the context dependent stress, in the right amounts, to cause potential change.
RECOVERY is the purposeful manipulation of Lifestyle factors (stress management, sleep, nutrition, hydration and movement/play) to recover from the stress of training as well as re-energise for the next training session.
ADAPTATION only occurs when recovery capacity is greater than training (and life) stress. Successful management of training AND lifestyle are the costs that must be paid to rebuild the body a little better than before.
REPEAT is the necessary variable for turning little improvements into big changes over time. The greater the desired adaptations, the greater the need to consistently repeat the whole cycle over a long period of time.
A fitness regime puts the whole training puzzle together balancing individual training variables (fitness) with individual recovery efforts (see lifestyle) to cause adaptations that work towards a personal definition of success (see success).
Remember, training is only the first part of the whole process and must include sufficient recovery to pay for the improvements. This is why there is always something we can do for our fitness, whether through actual training or through improving recovery potential. Improving lifestyle factors improves the ability to train well and to recover sufficiently afterwards, improving the ability to adapt. The whole process must be considered, including the purpose of those adaptations within the big picture. Fitness can improve health if training improvements contribute positively to overall wellbeing and quality of life. Fitness can improve happiness if training improvements contribute positively to a sense of purpose and worth, therefore improving quality of mind. Fitness can improve performance, if training improvements contribute positively towards a desired outcome or result.
It is important to know that a fitness regime doesn’t need to be blood, sweat, tears, going beast mode or going hard or going home. Far from it. Adaptations occur from individual challenge based on your current training level. Initially, an effective fitness regime may simply involve floor work to practice controlling your anti-movements, building your movement awareness and core strength.
“The goal of the gym is to train for something, not to become really good at going to the gym.”
Training regimes have many factors within the key principles of fitness which influence the whole plan and can be very complex, but complexity can be the killer of consistency which is why I find it best to keep things as simple as possible, especially when starting out. I find the best place to start out is to begin moving with purpose with a friend.
The best fitness regime is the one which brings about/maintains desired adaptations with the lowest effort, over the longest time period, for your definition of success.
Starting any new journey can be very daunting, especially a new fitness one, so having an effective template/plan to follow can be a great motivator especially if you understand why you are doing it and you can see the roadmap of progress. Fitness can easily fall into the background for many reasons, so having someone else on the same journey can help keep you consistent and moving forward. This is why I have tried to explain the whole process so that it can be followed with others and progressed at any rate. There is no need to rush to build a successful regime, but you must keep turning up.
Life is always changing, so your fitness regime will too. This is why it is important to remember the principles of fitness rather than strict protocols you must adhere to. This enables you to adapt your regime to work with your current life demands, not against them, helping to keep you consistent with fitness whatever life throws at you. Remember, there is always something you can do with your fitness training, whether progressive towards a goal or just for the maintenance of your health and happiness when life gets busy :)