Cardiorespiratory Fitness: Mid-Term Review

• Mid-Term Review Class

Cardiorespiratory Fitness

• Cardiorespiratory fitness is the ability to persist in a physical activity using oxygen for physical exertion without fatigue.
• Relates to how efficient the heart and lungs function.

Performance Related Fitness Components:

• Speed: The ability to perform a particular movement rapidly.
• Power: The ability to generate great amounts of force against a certain resistance in a short period.
• Agility: The ability to change or alter direction of body movement during activity with quickness and accuracy.
• Neuromuscular Coordination: The ability to integrate the senses including visual, auditory, and proprioceptive.
• Balance: The ability to maintain equilibrium while moving or standing still.
• Reaction Time: The time needed to produce an appropriate and accurate physiological or mechanical response to an external stimulus.

Mental and Physical Benefits of Regular Physical Activity

• Physical Benefits: It increases muscle size/strength, strengthens the heart and improves efficiency of the vascular system.
• Improves lung function, Improves function of digestive system, Enhances nerve-muscle coordination.
• It helps to maintain a healthy weight, contributes to improved flexibility and postural control, and generates more energy.
• Mental Benefits: Regular physical activity improves symptoms of depression and anxiety, increases social engagement and well-being.
• It betters quality and duration of sleep, attention and engagement in health habits, and moral and ethical code of behavior.
• It affects mental health, increases serotonin levels in the brain, enhances motivation and emotional well-being.
• It provides an improved ability to handle and cope with various life stresses.

Physical Activity vs. Exercise Activity

• Physical Activity: Anything, including exercise, that causes the body to use more energy than at rest.
• Examples of Physical Activity: Sweeping, playing catch, mowing the grass etc.
• Exercise Activity: Structured, regimented, and a controlled program of activity.
• Wellness: satisfying your needs regarding mental and emotional stability and social consciousness.
• Wellness includes adapt-ability, spiritual and moral fibre, and, physical health consistent with your heredity.
• Physical Fitness: the state in which the various systems of the body are healthy and functioning efficiently.
• It enables engagement in work, activities of daily living, recreational pursuits and leisure activities.
• It helps with being healthy, resisting hypokinetic diseases, and meeting emergency situations.

Healthy People 2022 Objectives

• Aims to improve physical activity, overweight and obesity, and tobacco use.
• Focuses on substance abuse and responsible sexual behavior.
• Emphasizes mental health, injury and violence prevention and environmental quality.
• Aims at improving immunization and access to health care.

Health Related Fitness Components

• Cardiorespiratory Fitness
• Muscular Strength
• Flexibility
• Muscular Endurance
• Body Composition

Beginning a Fitness Program and Setting Personal Fitness Goals

• One must first determine personal reasons for wanting to be fit.
• This helps in selecting specific activities to reach fitness goals.
• Establish a baseline of current fitness level to know where one is going.
• The SMART Principle should then be used to set specific goals.
  • S: Specific
  • M: Measurable
  • A: Attainable
  • R: Realistic
  • T: Timely

Sleep Recommendations

• Most people do not get the amount of sleep they require to maintain an optimal level of physical or mental health.
• Recommendations:
  • Adults: 7-8 hours
  • Teenagers: 9-10 hours
  • School-aged children: 11-12 hours
  • Infants: 16-18 hours

Risks of Insufficient Sleep:

• Breakdown of the immune system.
• Increased risk for hypertension, heart disease, stroke, and kidney disease.
• Increased risk of weight gain.
• Decreases ability to retain and process new information and recall previously learned information.
• Increased likelihood of developing feelings of sadness or depression.

Sleep Hygiene

• Practices to improve sleep include going to bed and waking up at the same time every day.
• Avoid eating a large meal within two hours before bedtime.
• Avoid drinking alcohol before bed.
• Avoid strenuous exercise within one hour before bed.
• Turn off all electronic screens at least 2 hours before bed.
• Avoid caffeinated beverages within 8 hours of sleep.

Ways to Address Stress

• Coping: attempts to manage or control stress using techniques that alter physiological and psychological consequences of stress.
  • Can be negative or positive.
• Defense Mechanisms: techniques to persevere harmony within a person and provide some senses of adequacy.
  • Does not involve actually dealing with the stress.
• Stress Management: techniques that attempt to reduce quantity and quality of stress.

Relaxation Techniques

• Brain-to-Muscle Relaxation Techniques:
  • Yoga
  • Meditation
  • Mental Imagery
• Muscle-to-Brain Relaxation Techniques:
  • Massage
  • Biofeedback
  • Progressive Relaxation

Response to Stress

• An interrelated process including:
  • The presence of a stressor.
  • The circumstances in which the stressor occurs.
  • An individuals interpretation of the situation.
  • That individual's typical reaction.
  • The resources that person has available to deal with the stressor.

Physiological Response to Stress

• Alarm: Fight or Flight response, primarily a nervous system response.
  • Increased heart rate, Increased blood pressure, Increased respiratory rate.
• Resistance: Adjusts to the stress and returns to normal balance.
• Exhaustion: Occurs when the stress persists for a long time.
  • May result in illness or death.

Dietary Precautions to Decrease Risk of Cancer

• The American Cancer Society recommends.
  • Reducing total fat intake.
  • Eating more high fiber foods.
  • Eat foods rich in Vitamins a & C.
  • Including vegetables in diet.
  • Avoiding smoked, cured, or charred foods.
  • Limit alcohol consumption and avoid overeating/obesity.

Exercise Principles

• Overload: The system must work harder than it is used to working.
• SAID (Specific Adaptation to Imposed Demands) Principle: Gradual increase in frequency, intensity, time, or duration.
  • Overtraining may lead to burnout or injury
• Progression: The workout gradually becomes more intense until the desired level of fitness is reached.
  • Without overloading the system, progression does not occur.
  • Progression is important for motivation.
  • The Interest level remains high as long as you continue to see improvements.
• Consistency: Set aside some time for fitness and make it a part of your routine.
  • The least desirable times to exercise are after a meal or before bed.
  • It is recommended to work out at least 3 days a week to see improvement.
• Specificity: Physical systems will respond and adapt to the specific demands placed on them over time.
  • Training should be specific to the activity and to the individual's abilities.
  • Increase training loads over time and frequently enough to prevent detraining and allow adaptation.
• Diminishing Returns: The greatest fitness gains will be seen early on in an exercise program.
  • After the initial increase, the gains will continue, but at a slower pace.
  • Fitness benefits acquired from exercising are only sustained if he or she maintains the exercise program.
  • People should continue to exercise throughout their lifetime to prevent these gains from being lost.
• Reversibility: Some or all of the gains made in strength, flexibility, and endurance will be lost if the program is stopped.
  • In growing children and teenagers, some gains achieved from increased loading may be retained after the program ends.
• Individuality: No two persons are exactly the same concerning goals, motivations, and states of physical fitness.
  • Not everyone will progress at the same rate.
  • A person's exercise prescription needs to be tailored to objectives, needs, functional capacity, and interests.
• Safety: Injuries often occur as the result of poorly planned programs.
  • Start out slowly and progress accordingly.
  • Seek help if you are unsure how to progress.

Benefits of a Warm-Up

• Prepare the body for activity, Increase blood flow to working muscles.
• Improve the efficiency of movement and biomechanics, improve mental readiness for movement.
• Decrease the risk of injury.

Basic Components of an Exercise Program:

• Warm-up routine
• Workout or conditioning activity
• Cool-down period

Variables for Cardiorespiratory Training

• Aerobic Activity: An activity during which the intensity is low enough that the cardiovascular system can supply enough oxygen.
  • 20-60 minutes of activity.
  • Intensity is typically between 55-85%.
• The amount of training sessions ranges from 2 sessions per week for untrained individuals to 3-5 sessions for trained ones.
• Duration involves someone exercising for 20-30 minutes at the desired intensity level.
  • Can be broken into bouts of exercise and its equally effective.
• Type of activity must be aerobic in nature and something you enjoy.

Components of Cardiorespiratory Fitness

• Depend on the coordinated function of the heart, blood vessels, the blood, and the lungs:
  • The capacity of the Cardiorespiratory System To Carry Oxygen Throughout the Body.

Fast vs. Slow Twitch Muscle Fibers

• Fast Twitch Muscle Fibers: Type of muscle fiber used for speed or power activities such as sprinting or weight-lifting.
  • Not dependent on oxygen, fatigue quickly.
• Slow Twitch Muscle Fibers: Type of muscle fiber that is resistant to fatigue and is more useful in long-term endurance activities.
  • Requires large amounts of oxygen for contraction, more resistant to fatigue.

FITT Principle

• FITT "Principle"
  • Frequency
  • Intensity
  • Time
  • Type

Types of Cardiorespiratory Training

• Continuous Cardiorespiratory Training: Long duration training is typically performed at the same intensity throughout.
  • Usually low to moderate intensity, involves full-body, continuous rhythmic activities (such as running, swimming, cycling).
• HITT Cardiorespiratory Training: Intermittent activities performed at high intensities followed by periods of rest
  • Circuit training can be a type of HIIT workout (as long as the intensity is high).
  • Results in a higher level of workload being performed for a longer duration than continuous work.
  • Mostly used for trained individuals, can be dangerous to start for untrained individuals .
• Speed Play Cardiorespiratory Training: A type of workout that involves jogging at varying speeds over varied terrain.
  • Less regimented than HIIT (intervals are not standardized). Allows for a lot of inter variability between individuals.
  • Not great for in-season/sports specific training. Better used as an every day/offseason training method.

Energy Systems

• Aerobic Activity: An activity during which the intensity is low enough to allow the cardiovascular system to supply enough oxygen.
  • 20-60 minutes of activity with an intensity typically between 55-85%.
• Anaerobic Activity: An activity during which the intensity is so great that the demand for oxygen is greater than the body's ability.
  • 10 seconds - 2 minutes with an intensity typically between 85-100%.
• The three energy generating systems function in muscle tissue to produce ATP (Adenosine Triphosphate).
  • ATP is the energy used by our muscles for movement.
    • ATP - used during short sudden outbursts of activity.
    • Glycolytic - when stored glycogen is broken down into glucose to then be metabolized into ATP in muscle cells.
    • Oxidative - only one that requires oxygen, and metabolizes carbohydrates and fats to generate ATP (generates the most ATP).
  • The system the body uses depends on activity intensity/duration.

Heart Functions Improved by Cardiorespiratory Fitness:

• Increased Cardiac Output: The amount of blood the heart can pump in one minute.
  • Heart Rate x Stroke Volume.
  • Pumps 5 Liters/minute at rest, and can raise to ~20L/minute with exercise(>60L in endurance athletes).
• Increased Stroke Volume: Amount of blood being pumped out of the heart with each beat.
  • ~70ml/beat at rest, increasing until the heart doesn't have enough time to fill anymore between beats.
• Decreased Heart Rate: Amount of times the heart pumps blood in 1 minute.
  • Stroke volume improvements from exercising will reduce an individual's heart rate.

Muscle Definitions

• Muscle Strength: Ability to generate maximum force against some heavy resistance.
  • Improving strength plays a role in fitness, injury prevention, and rehabilitation.
  • Muscular strength imbalances may result in abnormal movement/gait and impair normal functional movement.
• Muscle Endurance: Ability to perform repetitive muscular contractions against some resistance for an extended period.
  • There will likely be muscular endurance improvements as muscle strength increases.
  • They are two different physiological adaptations that need to be practiced/trained to maximize improvements.
• Muscular Power: Ability to generate a large amount of force quickly.
  • Mostly related to sports skills.

Muscle Contractions

• Isometric: Muscle produces a contraction, but there is NO change in the length of the muscle.
• Isotonic: Muscle produces a contraction with change in the length of the muscle.
  • Can be referred to as either Positive (Concentric) or Negative (Eccentric).
• Isokinetic: Muscle produces a contraction but maintains a specific speed.
  • Requires a machine to produce.

Eccentric vs. Concentric Contractions?

• Concentric (Positive): Muscle length is Shortening while tension is created.
  • The Force Generated in the Muscle Is Greater Than the Resistance.
• Eccentric (Negative): Muscle length is Elongated While Tension Is Created. -The Resistance Is Greater Than the Force Generated in the Muscle.

Training Techniques to Improve Muscle Strength, Power, or Endurance

• Core stabilization training.
• Progressive resistance training.
• Isometric training.
• Isokinetic training.
• Circuit training. Functional strength training.
• Plyometric training.
• Body weight exercises.

Factors the Influence Muscle Strength

• Neuromuscular Efficiency -The Initial Increases Strength Occurs Because of Neural Adaptations (not increased muscle size.)
  • Even in a Trained Individual, Performing a New Skill/Exercise May Initially Create Improvements Due To Neuromuscular Efficiency and Not Increased Muscle Size
• Looking for improvements in Motor Unit Excitation
  • Efficiency With the Signal Traveling From the Brain to the Muscle To Contract -More motor Units = Stronger Contraction
• refers to our Positions and Movement Patterns During Specific Exercises/Movements
  • certain Positions Help Maximize the force
• Strength Peaks Around 20-25
  • depends on Individual, Training Volume, and Diet, -Can Continue To See Strength Improvements Well Into the Late 30's
• As We Age:
  • harder To Hold Onto Muscle Strength
    • Losing At About 1 Percent Every Year After the Age of 25 -Consistency Becomes Increasingly Important in Order To Hold Onto Those Strength Improvements