How much fitness is too much fitness?

cdoesthehula

Hello everyone.

This morning, I watched this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6U728AZnV0

As someone who is at their beginning of their journey back to fitness, it is interesting. The suggestion is that fitness and health aren't linked in the way we have previously been led to believe.

My chosen sport is cycling. I have loved it all through my life, and in the past have been a very good (by club standards) cyclist. But there was always a feeling in the back of my mind that some of it wasn't good for you.

In Britain, the golden age of public health was the 1950s. Everyone smoked, the food was very unhealthy, but we were much more active. Heart disease and diabetes were extremely rare. Obesity was a medical condition.

Club cycling was massively popular, and if you look at the length of historic routes you see that the distances covered were much longer than they are today.

If you look at this (utterly charming) film from 1955, you see the amounts of riding they were doing. Look at how effortless it all is! They get off and walk when they get to steep hills.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qyz5d3entBw

We have lots of advances now that have led us to push ourselves in ways that weren't possible before. But is that a good thing? I was speaking to one of my Facebook friends yesterday. She is a very fit 25 year old and did a sportive yesterday. She is really suffering today, though the route was only 40km.

I'm just rambling, really. But I did think it was interesting. I'd love to hear your thoughts.