All forms of exercise have value. The issue, then, is finding the exercise that will give you the results you want and need. General fitness is a compromise, of sorts, between aerobic activity and resistance activity.

Ideally, the optimum general fitness exercise program will include the best of both these worlds. The proper resistance exercise routine can cause not only an increase in muscle tissue, but an aerobic effect as well. This simply means that while you are conditioning the muscles by weight training, you can condition the cardiorespiratory systems by shortening the rest periods between the exercises you perform. While this is true, it should also be considered that during resistance exercise, regardless of the shorter rest periods, there is little in the way of improved “fatty acid oxidation”. This simply means that the muscle’s uptake of fat and oxygen during the performance of activity is not significantly enhanced.

The term “general fitness” implies low-to-moderate intensity of effort, which is correct. To increase the intensity of effort in general fitness training, is to change your goal altogether. Whenever intensity of effort is great, there is a degree of adaptation undergone by the body. This type of adaptation is desirable to the “incremental” athlete, or to those interested in conditioning themselves for some sort of sport (there is an entire section devoted to sports conditioning). Generally speaking, for our purposes, general fitness can best be achieved through a combination of fast-paced resistance exercise, and the performance of low intensity, long duration, steady state aerobic activity (70% of maximum heart rate maintained for about 20-30 minutes per session, with sessions performed no more often than 3-4 times per week). If one were forced to choose between fast paced resistance exercise and low level aerobics for general fitness, fast paced resistance exercise should be the exercise of choice.

Establishing a General Fitness Routine

If you choose to establish your own routine, consider the following concepts.

Use a 2-day, split routine. This is to say, you should do half your muscle groups on day #1, then the other half of your muscle groups on day #2, then rest on day #3. In lay terms, the major muscle groups to be considered in creating these routines are the chest, back, triceps, biceps, shoulders, trapezeus, hamstrings, and quadriceps (perform exercises for abdominals, forearms, and calves randomly as needed). Stay in the area of 12-15 repetitions per set, to unassisted failure. This will provide for lean weight maintenance and energy depletion equally (the best of both worlds).

While the resistance athlete would focus more on heavy training (4-6 rep range) for size and strength, and the aerobic athlete would focus more on light training (20-25 rep range) for increased aerobic energy levels. As you can see, your performance in the 12-15 rep range represents the necessary compromise between heavy and light training, and will enable you to more quickly reach your general fitness goals.

Remember to take shorter rest periods between sets. Your recovery heart rate should be somewhere around 115 BPM. This is to say that your heart rate after a set needs to come down to approximately 115 BPM before you continue with your next set. Keep in mind that the faster you train the more reps you will drop in each following set. This is especially true in the beginner.

With time, you will reach a point where you are losing fewer and fewer reps. Wastes accumulate in the muscles after high rep sets, while at the same time blood presses against the muscles (pump). For this reason, wastes can’t get out, and causes the muscle to fail sooner in the next set. Two of the ways the muscle will adapt to this type of training is by #1) learning to remove these wastes more efficiently, and #2) by learning to store more energy. This is a desired effect for general fitness. Pausing slightly between reps will allow for prolonged performance.

These relaxation pauses give the working muscles time to eliminate more waste and to get more oxygen from the blood during the set, the muscle’s inability to do this would otherwise lead to premature exhaustion, and a less desired effect. Remember to perform prolonged, low level aerobic activity, as stated above. Never do aerobics, intensely or otherwise, before your resistance exercise routine. You will lose lean muscle tissue!

All-out intensity is not the key to achieving general fitness. Intensity has always been the down side of what everyone has incorrectly assumed is required to achieve their general fitness goals. The real keys are consistency and discipline in resistance exercise, and low level aerobic exercise performance. While increased intensity has tremendous additional benefits, it unfortunately is what makes exercise undesirable to most people. Worry about intensity later, after you are satisfied with your level of general fitness.

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