How to boost your cardio health

Strap on your running shoes, it’s time to boost your cardiovascular endurance and pave a smoother path to your fitness goals! Cardiovascular training is often overlooked when tailoring a training programme, but it should be addressed with the same level of precision as when it comes to weightlifting. Let’s dive into the details of why your cardiovascular health should be a priority.

Cardiovascular fitness, what is it?

Cardiovascular fitness, or cardiovascular endurance, measures how well, long and the intensity at which your body can perform moderate to high intensity workouts for an extended period of time.

Delving more into what exactly cardiovascular fitness is, it can be measured by the capacity of how well the heart, lungs and blood vessels (which all form part of the cardiovascular system), can supply oxygenated blood to the activated muscles while you are training. Cardiovascular fitness can also be defined as ‘aerobic exercise’, which means ‘requiring free oxygen’.

Exercises to try

When the word ‘cardio’ becomes a topic of conversation, one imagines walking or running as the only options. However, a successful cardio routine can be far more exciting than limiting yourself to a single exercise.

HIIT

Also known as ‘High Intensity Interval Training’, this training is a type of interval training based on incorporating intense bursts of movement to increase your heart rate. The goal of HIIT is to work harder instead of longer, while still getting a cardiovascular boost.

Spinning

Do you want to burn calories, relieve stress and improve lung health all in one session? Spinning can help with that and much more. Spinning provides a challenging high-intensity workout, which will improve your heart health and increase your cardiovascular stamina. Spinning is a great option for those who are just starting out as well as avid spinners.

EFT (Elite Fitness Training)

Our upgraded take on CrossFit, EFT, is a terrific alternative to traditional cardio training and conditioning. Many of the exercises in EFT boosts your oxygen consumption when compared to traditional cardio training, which we mentioned is how your aerobic level is measured. EFT also incorporates high intensity interval training, with the movements focused on strengthening and conditioning with functional movements.

Tips on maintaining your cardio health outside of the gym

Keeping your cardio health in check while you are going about your day-to-day routine outside of the gym can be maintained if you incorporate some important lifestyle tweaks:

Unwind and relax

Studies have shown that stress, especially chronic stress which result in high levels of cortisol, increases blood cholesterol, blood pressure and is a common risk factor for heart disease. At Body Action Gym we offer a variety of relaxation options for you to take advantage of, such as: hydrotherapy with our sensation showers, saunas and steam rooms.

Get enough sleep

Getting enough sleep promotes a healthy heart and the less you sleep the higher your blood pressure becomes, which can increase your risk of heart disease. We recommend a minimum of 7 hours of sleep to ensure optimal heart health.

Maintain a balanced diet

A well-balanced diet is not only important for your cardiovascular health, but it will also ensure you are healthier all-round. Specifically, for a heart-healthy diet, health experts recommend diets that are low in sodium, in saturated fats, in processed food and excessive sugar. For more on a balanced diet tailored to you, speak to one of our professional trainers.

How Body Action Gym can help you

As a 6-star rated fitness facility, we have considered all facets of how to work towards a healthy body and healthy mind. We encourage you to join one of our group classes such as EFT, Spinning or HIIT which we have already outlined, along with a variety of other sweat inducing classes too. See our group class offerings here.

When you join as a member, we help kickstart your fitness journey with a 12-week wellness course, where your current fitness level is assessed, and we assist in helping with how your goals can be integrated with our facility.

As a world-class facility that boasts world-class equipment, we now offer Technogym’s intuitive state-of-the-art Biostrength ™ range. Experience adaptive training like no other and get results 30% faster.

Get in touch with us today for a tour or a consultation to kickstart your fitness journey.