Exercise: How to get started?

Usually the first step is always the hardest, especially when you’re making a change. Fear of aches, pains and injuries keeps many would-be exercisers from lacing up their runners and heading out.

The solution is simply to be realistic about your goals. Push yourself too hard and you’ll wind up sore and discouraged. Exercise sensibly and you’ll gradually build strength and endurance without getting hurt. Also:

• Have a complete physical examination: Before you jump into serious exercising, it’s important to get a complete physical examination done, if you are over 40, if you are overweight, or if you have a history of smoking or heart disease. The tests should include a stress test – also called a treadmill test or stress ECGdefine – which measures how the heart responds to exertion.

• Don’t take up a sport to get into shape; instead get into shape and then take up a sport.

• Start with one day of working out followed by one day of rest. Your eventual aim should be to exercise five (or more) days a week, alternating harder workouts (vigorous aerobic exercise) with easies ones (stretching and /or light weight lifting).

• Always warm and cool down: Warming-up gets your muscles ready and your heart pumping so that you can exercise without straining anything or depriving your muscles of oxygen. Before starting, stretch all your muscles and do some deep breathing. Cooling down should also include the same things – stretching to get the muscles back to their resting length and deep breathing to slow your heart rate and keep the oxygen flowing to all your organs.

• Wear the right clothing: Keep in mind that your sensations of cold and heat will change as you work out. Exercise, which produces heat, increases both sweating and blood flow to the skin.

o Avoid exercising in high temperatures and high humidity. If humidity is low, your body can lose a lot of heat when sweat evaporates.

o Put on extra layers of clothing in cold weather to keep from losing too much body heat.

• Drink up: Sip water before, during and after exercise, especially when exercising in warm conditions. Don’t wait until you feel thirsty - by then, some of your body organs are already under stress. Otherwise, you may become dehydrated, which makes your body less effective at cooling itself.