Understanding Physical Fitness: Warm-up, Endurance, Strength, Flexibility and More

Posted on Sep 11, 2024 in Physical Education

What Does Warm-Up Mean?

Exercises are always performed before physical activity or sports to adapt the body progressively to further effort.

Benefits of Warming Up:

  • Avoids muscle injuries
  • Delays fatigue
  • Facilitates mental preparation and cardiorespiratory adaptation
  • Increases joint movement and helps reduce stiffness

General Warm-Up

A general warm-up can be broken down into two stages: general and specific. The purpose of the first stage is to get all the parts of the body moving for the following activity. In general, warm-up, there is a mix of dynamic and static exercises.

Parts of the Warm-Up:

  • Jog along raising your arms
  • Move your arms in circles
  • Rotate your body from side to side
  • Run side step, backward, stepping, and sprinting

Specific Warm-Up

The aim is to achieve a more specific type of preparation and includes exercises that are similar to the subsequent activity.

Key Principles:

  1. Totality: Exercises involve every part of the body.
  2. Specificity: The warm-up exercises should be chosen in keeping with the characteristics of the subsequent activity.
  3. Progression: The intensity and difficulty of the exercises and the movements required of the joints need to be increased gradually.
  4. Duration: Should be of proper duration.

Endurance

Endurance is the physical ability that enables a person to carry out a task for a prolonged length of time, either tolerating or delaying the onset of fatigue.

Types of Endurance:

  1. Anaerobic Endurance: Short-term, high intensity, there is a lack of oxygen, and energy runs out in seconds.
  2. Aerobic Endurance: Long-term, moderate intensity, there isn’t a lack of oxygen, and energy runs out in hours or days.

Health Benefits of Endurance:

  • It improves the blood circulation system.
  • Improves the functioning of the respiratory system.
  • Muscles adapt to exercise.
  • Improves a person’s state of mind.

Improve Endurance:

  1. Non-Stop Running: Consists of running for an extended period of time at a steady, even pace on flat and preferably soft terrain.
  2. Circuit Running: Is a method that involves doing gym exercises for a set amount of time and alternating between periods of work and rest.
  3. Progress Tests: Are used to assess a person’s endurance level.

Factors That Influence Endurance:

  • The capacity of the respiratory and circulatory systems
  • The number of mitochondria
  • Type of muscle fiber
  • Energy levels
  • Age
  • Intensity of the exercise

Strength

Strength is the capacity to use our muscles to overcome resistance or offset it.

Types of Strength:

  1. Maximum Strength: Is the capacity to resist maximum weight in relation to the person’s potential (applied when the weight is very heavy).
  2. Resistance Strength: Is the capacity to move a light weight repeatedly over an extended period of time and depends on the capacity of the muscles (used when climbing stairs).
  3. Explosive Strength: Is the capacity to overcome weight by moving with great speed (used in fast movements: throwing a stone, jumping, etc.).

Improve Strength:

  1. Static and Dynamic Exercises: In static exercises, we adopt a posture with our body and maintain it for a specific length of time. In dynamic exercises, we move our body or part of it by working on the muscles with sufficient intensity to enable them to adapt to fatigue.
  2. Body Weights and Additional Weights: Exercises can be considered bodyweight if the opposition to be overcome is solely that of our own body.

Progress Tests:

  • The horizontal jump test without a run-up measures strength.
  • The 30-second trunk flexion/extension test.

Factors That Influence Strength:

  • Muscle mass
  • Type of muscle fiber
  • Shape and arrangement of the muscle
  • Task, training, and coordination
  • Age and gender

Flexibility

Flexibility is the physical capacity that enables us to perform a wide range of movements.

Components of Flexibility:

  • Joint Mobility: Means the ability to move a joint.
  • Muscle Elasticity: Is the ability of muscles and tendons to lengthen and return to their original shape.

Positive Effects of Flexibility:

  • Correct and balanced body posture
  • Movements can be performed efficiently
  • Facilitates blood flow to the muscles
  • Reduces muscle tone

Improve Flexibility:

  1. Dynamic Exercises: Are included in the general warm-up stage and are considered to be suitable for sports training.
  2. Static Exercises: Involve maintaining a position in which the joints reach their limit for a set length of time.

Factors Influencing Flexibility:

  • Age
  • Gender
  • Genetics
  • Temperature
  • Mental state
  • Time of day

Motor Skills

Motor skills evolve from movements people use in their real lives and are essential for acquiring higher levels of dexterity.

Motor Abilities:

Motor abilities facilitate the control of movement and represent the potential required to learn motor skills.

Coordination

Coordination is the ability to perform movements by synchronizing the various parts of the body efficiently with minimal effort.

Factors Influencing Coordination:

Along with the data furnished by sight and hearing, coordination allows us to know if the task is performed efficiently.

Balance

Balance is the ability to struggle against gravity to stay in the same position.

Factors Influencing Balance:

  • Projection of the center of gravity
  • The organs of balance
  • Age

Speed

Speed is the physical ability that enables us to make movements as quickly as possible.

Types of Speed:

  • Reaction Speed: Is the time it takes for the nervous system to transmit an order to move.
  • Gestural or Movement Speed: Refers to the minimum time we need to perform a specific movement.

Factors Influencing Speed:

  • Nervous system
  • Type of stimulus
  • Number of body segments involved
  • Training
  • Age
  • White muscle fibers
  • Frequency of the strides