A Guide to Managing Your Activity Levels During Social Isolation

There’s multiple reasons why getting a PT can help you through this period. You may already work with one and they will know you well so can design a programme that meets your needs. If you don’t have one – look for someone experienced, tell them your background and capability with training, what equipment you have and get a program designed to you! If your goal is weight loss oriented, discuss a diet plan and the effect of reduced activity on your body’s energy requirements – this will be important if you are weight loss focused and a PT’s input could be vital if you are unsure what you need to adjust. The final reason – PT’s are self employed and the down turn in business for them could be devastating, support someone who is self-employed and pay a small amount so they can help you but also to help them!

You’ll be glad to know that the decline in muscle strength occurs at a slower rate than that of the cardiovascular fitness. That isn’t a reason to neglect it however and we should look at ways to try and maintain our current strength levels, or even improve. As we age, we naturally lose muscle and soft tissues like ligaments, tendons, muscles and cartilage can all be affected by the ageing process. The many benefits from strength training as we age are undeniable on all of these tissues – plus they make us move better, improve our pain levels and ultimately reduce our chances of injury.

If you are eating extra calories currently  – put it to good use by moving some weight! Sedentary behaviour and low activity are a recipe for disaster for the body’s soft tissues such as muscles and tendons. They both respond to being loaded and forcefully contracted – when they aren’t, they decline in strength, capability and can even develop tendonitis, muscle atrophy and shortening of muscle length.

Your strength routine entirely depends on your home setup and the equipment you have available to you. Resistance programs with weights, kettlebells, elastics and body weight are all great forms to strength train! If you’re stuck for ideas, consult your trainer or have a look online.

The most important point is saved for last and it’s a topic which I think more people should know about in order to save them from injury and ultimately aid their progression with training over time. In professional sport the way in which training load (frequency, distance, intensity and weight of activity) is monitored, helps to reduce injuries and prepare athletes for an event making sure they are in optimal condition. In the elite sporting world this is done by a battery of tests and lots of special equipment including data analysis programs and GPS distance trackers which can reveal detailed information regarding performance.

Nearly all injuries happen when the affected tissue or body part is pushed beyond its capability and leads to structural failure. For example, impact injuries are unavoidable such as trauma from a bad tackle or a fall. However, the non-contact injuries such as  muscle pulls, joint irritation and tendon issues can be reduced or even totally avoided. This point is now super important in today’s unprecedented setting – if we suddenly start workouts we haven’t done before at a high intensity – it increases our body’s risk of tissue breakdown and injury. This could be because your joints aren’t used to a certain exercise, your body hasn’t performed at the speed or frequency that the workout is set at or you have been particularly sedentary and suddenly try to train a lot of new movements which your body just isn’t prepared for.

A great example of this can be generic bootcamp style fitness sessions in the park, the ones designed to make you vomit and render your body useless for a week (my pet hate). I’ve seen countless people in clinic, injured , due to the high intensity, one size fits all nature of the workout, which is poorly placed upon all participants, not taking in to account their background. You may have been the one who’s been injured like that – I’ve seen countless people in clinic and it’s a classic example of poor load management. Typically, the injury occurs within the first 2-4 weeks in a setting like this – mainly because it takes your body 6 weeks to adapt to a new stimulus – if performed right.

The solution – careful periodisation of training and planning. Start at low intensity and frequency, assess yourself the next day to see what effect it has on the trained area and then adjust the next workout accordingly. If its with weights, focus on slow controlled increase in weight used and record sets and reps to see how you can gradually progress – the increase over time is progressive overload which leads to your fitness gains. In running/cycling you can control this with a GPS app or step counter to measure your distance and ensure you don’t suddenly spike your distances or speed which if done too soon could lead you to injury.