As a beginner, how many days of the week do you work out ?

bcp58fm6gs
bcp58fm6gs Posts: 1 Member
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As a beginner, how many days of the week do you work out ? 8 votes

1 day a week
0%
3 days a week
62%
cwolfman13papercut2kangelatdavidson2002Maribel2680Rituppul2020 5 votes
5 days a week
37%
talexisshnkrnrynnh4gmhj5mvj 3 votes
7 days a week
0%

Replies

  • Lietchi
    Lietchi Posts: 6,809 Member
    When I started my weight loss, I didn't exercise at all, I just increased my step count when I realized (through using a step tracker) how terribly little movement I was getting and when I noticed it gave me extra calories to consume.

    I then started walking on the treadmill, at increasing speed, incline and duration. Probably 2 to 3 times a week, to start. Then I progressed to running. And strength training and occasional indoor rowing. I currently (2.5 years later) work out nearly every day, but it was a very gradual increase (organic, it came naturally as I lost weight and got fitter).

    I think frequency is a relevant factor, but intensity and duration is too. Some people prefer short workouts at a higher frequency, others prefer longer workouts less frequently.
    The key is not overdoing it and building up gradually, no bonus points for suffering 🙂
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 34,168 Member
    I'm not a beginner. (I'm kind of a jerk curmudgeon, but personally, I wouldn't ask beginners for exercise advice, either, as a beginner.)

    As someone who was once a beginner, but (many years later) is now pretty active despite being old (66), I think the answer to your question ought to vary by person. I agree with lietchi.

    IMO, what you want is some enjoyable (or at least tolerable) activity that is just a manageable bit of challenge for you personally, and that fits into your life while keeping good overall life balance, i.e., enough time and energy for family, job, home chores, or other things important to you.

    Ideally, there would be a manageable challenge to your current strength, and to your current cardiovascular capability, either both of those from one activity, or from different activities.

    After that, your variables are duration, frequency, intensity, and activity type. As a beginner, you might choose to do some mild activity (casual walking, maybe?) relatively more often, or for a relatively longer time period. Or, if it's achievable for you personally as a beginner, you might prefer to do something more intense (faster cycling, maybe?) less often and for a shorter time period.

    As you gradually get fitter, you can change those same variables - duration, frequency, intensity, activity type - to keep that manageable challenge going, within your happy life-balance time budget. Being persistently exhausted from the exercise tends to be counterproductive for both fitness and weight management. It should be energizing, after maybe a few minutes of "whew" feeling right after working out, not miserable, punitive, tiring.

    When I was starting out being active, it was right after cancer treatment (surgery, chemo, radiation, other drugs), and I was in terrible physical condition. I started with some gentle yoga classes 2-3 times a week. As I started to feel better, I tried some other group classes, and tried some manageable walks or short, easy bike rides. Within a couple of years, I was taking strength training classes twice a week, rowing (on water or machine) several times a week, doing aerobics on video on the non-rowing days. And so forth.

    The basic official recommendations for healthy adults typically are to work up to 150 minutes of moderate aerobic activity per week (spread over 5+ days ideally) or a smaller number of minutes of more-intense activity; plus 2 days per week of strength-challenging exercise. More is fine, within reason.

    See, for example:

    https://health.gov/sites/default/files/2019-09/Physical_Activity_Guidelines_2nd_edition.pdf

    As a non-beginner, I work out 6 days most weeks, usually take one official rest day, but may do something mild that day (casual walk, yard/garden work, yoga, etc.).
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,865 Member
    3 days a week
    I put three, but "workout" is a pretty broad term. It would depend on what that workout is...duration, intensity, etc. When I first got into exercising I did 7 days per week, but it was going for a walk everyday and I just increased the distance over the course of a month.

    When I got to the point of doing 3 miles per day (about 4 weeks or so) I introduced myself to jogging with a structured C25K plan which was 3x per week. Once I completed that (8 weeks) I continued to jog 3x per week and re-introduced myself to the weight room with a structured 3x per week full body barbell program where my jogging would be done on my non lifting days and on my lifting days I would just go for a walk.

    Five months after I started my lifting program I decided I wanted to train for a sprint-triathlon. At this point I had also gone from 3 miles 3x per week to 3 miles 5x per week and had built an adequate fitness base for actually training for something like that...I had built my fitness up over the course of 8 months. For my sprint-tri I had to switch some things up in regards to how I was lifting in the gym, but continued to do so and added swimming and cycling to my schedule. I followed Hal Higdon's Triathlon 1 program which is 8 weeks.

    I never ended up racing the tri due to an injury a week or so before the event. But during my training I did find a love for cycling which became my main form of cardiovascular exercise. Over the course of the next five years I got really into endurance road cycling and doing multiple century and half century rides annually. I've sense retired myself from those, but 10 years after starting all of this good living I still get in some kind of exercise most days.

    The biggest thing to understand is that fitness is something that is built over time...kind of like a house. You have to lay a foundation before you start framing. You have to frame before you start putting the roof and the walls and dry wall up. There are a lot of steps in the process to get to the final product that's all pretty and decorated.

    As workouts and training go, I'm also a big fan of structured programming. Following a structured program is just like reading a guide book and will help ensure you aren't doing too much too soon or overdoing things and neglecting rest and recovery...the latter is very important to actually increasing your physical fitness and avoiding injury and overtraining.




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