Fighting (Exercise)

Exercise. You’re going to need it to take down those monsters attacking innocent travelers in the forest, and to eventually destroy Fat Ass, the vile dragon lurking in the caves north of town.

Before giving you tips on exercising and what it could do to get you healthy and lose weight, I should tell you that exercise is not the most important thing to focus on during a journey of pound-shedding. Diet still reigns in that respect, as it controls your food intake to begin with. Exercise just boosts your body’s proper breakdown of food and keeps all your systems running better. That being said, it’s time for you to kick some tail by burning extra calories, feeling better mentally and physically, and being able to function like the true hero you can be.

First of all, you need to set some realistic goals. None of this “New Years Eve resolution” bullshit, I mean goals that you will actually accomplish. It’s all in tricking your brain! You could say to yourself, “I’m going to exercise every day.” That’s fine and dandy, but what happens when you start counting “opening cans” and “walking down the stairs to my basement to play Shadowrun” as exercise? No, you need to be more specific, or your brain will let you get away with the dumbest reasoning. Try this instead - ”I’m going to walk around the block every day after work.” Or maybe, “I’m going to do 20 minutes of cardio exercise every single day.” Instead of vague plans you can make excuses for, now you have the beginnings of an easy-to-follow schedule.

Once you set these straight-to-the-point goals, don’t deviate. Not even one bit, or you may begin to slide. Let’s say you “don’t feel up to it” tomorrow, so you only complete half of your workout time… Then the next day, maybe you’ll only do half again because you’re still not feeling completely up to it. With this deviation, you’re likely to keep whining to yourself until you quit exercising completely! You are your own worst enemy, so don’t let yourself… um… get… to yourself. Get control of yourself, self!

As with the dieting section in Gain HP, I am not going to tell you to stick to certain exercises or make plans for you to specifically follow. Your doctor knows best for all of that. I will, however, lead you to some beginner basics and discuss the benefits to you. Hopefully all of this will get you motivated and ready to do workouts that are just right for you and your character class.

If you are in a wheelchair or have disabilities, your primary physician or rehabilitation coach knows the best exercise for you.

For the rest of you, walking is as basic as it gets, and it has fantastic health benefits. Whether on a complex belt and pulley contraption (treadmill), inside the covered merchant and mixed wares market (mall walking), or just strolling around your village avoiding pickpocketing knaves (do you live in the ghetto?), you will be getting a decent cardio workout that is great for your heart, lungs, and calorie burn. You can’t lose on this one, and for most of you without gym access or fitness equipment, this will definitely be a wonderful start.

Shoot for a goal of at least 30 minutes, and walk just a bit faster than normal to start out with. As you get stronger and your body gets more used to it, go ahead and push ahead a little harder. Make it a brisk pace, but don’t overdo it and tire yourself out too quickly. For all of you out there that work desk jobs or no jobs and aren’t used to moving more than a few yards a day, this is going to be taxing at first. But, good news! Your body will very quickly adapt to exercise-focused walking, and all the burning in your calves, ankles, lower back, and lungs will start to go away quickly.

Aside from walking, if you can gain access to gym equipment – stationary bicycle-type machines, step climbers, and the like – it will provide additional types of workouts to spice up the variety a bit.

If you are heavily overweight (by over 75 pounds or more) or you are not used to exercise at all, I certainly don’t recommend jogging or running right away. The excess weight coming down around you with each bouncing step can easily pull and hurt your muscles, put your bones out of correct placement, make too much work for your heart and lungs, and even cause you to break or tear something that will make exercise impossible or worse. Imagine your skeleton. Now imagine the body mass in and around it – the organs, the muscles, the fat, the skin… Now imagine how it looks in your head, how much is bouncing around your normal-sized human skeletal frame underneath it all. If you laughed to yourself because it looked ridiculous or your eyebrows went into a “concerned” position because you saw your toothpick-like skeleton snapping under the weight, then chances are you better walk instead of jog or run to begin with.

Cardio exercise as seen in workout videos is fantastic and can help motivate you with a tv trainer and energetic music (and sometimes hilariously goofy extra helpers), but only try them if your body type is currently right for it (see the paragraph above).

Need some ideas on exercise, or would you just like to make everything a little more interesting? More like a video game? Do you have an iPod or iPhone? Then you have to check out this killer fitness app called “BodyFate” by BodyFate LLC. It will challenge you to burn calories with various cardio and muscular exercises that don’t require machines as well as give you tips, encouraging quotes, and trivia. All this with a good amount of humor, attitude, and easy instruction. Plus, as you proceed with your workout, you gain the ability to skip over certain exercises or get a few minutes of rest. Add in an extensive setup screen and the ability to listen to your own music as you work out, and this really is the best and most fun fitness app I’ve ever tried.

Don’t worry, nerds! Even without an iPod or iPhone, there’s still plenty of extra nerdy activities to get into so that your geek pride won’t suffer at the likes of your workout. Why not try:

 

• LARPing (Live Action Role Playing), specifically with games in which boffing is a main portion of the event

• Paintball, Airsoft, and Laser Tag (what could be better than turning your favorite first-person shooter into a real-life game?)

• Wii Fit (for Nintendo owners) or Kinect (for Microsoft owners), which will offer plenty of games to help you stay fit, have fun, and track your progress

• Geocaching or Augmented Reality mobile games, which can actually get you to go outside and move around the world in real time

• Dance Dance Revolution, Pump It Up, Para Para Paradise, and other music / rhythm games with lots of movement

And ultimately, just consider the benefits of working out 10-30 minutes a day or more. Exercising will:

 

• Strengthen your heart, you know, so you can live longer

• Increase your energy and stamina levels so you don’t get worn out so quick

• Fortify your bones (almost like what happened to Wolverine, amirite?)

• Improve your circulation and help you breathe much better

• Reduce body fat to attain a more desirable weight

• Improve your balance and flexibility

• Level up your sex life (if you have one) and performance

• Tone your muscles and gain more strength

• Get deeper, more healing sleep

• Feel better about yourself, kick depression, stress, and anxiety to the proverbial curb

• Lower or eliminate your risk of high blood pressure, heart disease, strokes, diabetes, back pain, and osteoporosis

Ready to start training for your epic dragon hunt? Well, all right, then. let’s plan out what you’re going to do, whether it be walking or the other exercise listed above.

Okay, we’re ready to get going. Here’s one thing I suggest – work out for at least 10 continuous minutes every day. It takes about 5 to 7 minutes for an endorphin rush to be released while exercising, and that is when you start feeling fully “into” it, like a machine, and your body’s pain tolerance and excitement is raised. I would also recommend not working out for longer than an hour at a time, especially those of you who are packing quite a few extra pounds or haven’t exercised at all this year.

Before starting, here’s something you should know, and it was a golden rule for my generation growing up as well as the generations before it, but it’s been disproved and is obsolete now. DO NOT STRETCH BEFORE YOUR WORKOUT. Tests starting back as far as 8 years have shown that in the vast majority of cases, stretching before exercise actually leads to more risk of injury and muscle damage. Basically, your body tries to overcompensate when you stretch it by contracting, making the muscle more tense. When your muscles haven’t been limbered up yet (by exercising), tensing them up can cause lack of available motion and damage when you push them during the workout. Instead, you should stretch at the end of your workout, as you will see below. That way, your muscles will be loose enough to stretch a great amount without jacking everything up.

Now it’s time to start your workout. Begin with a warm-up, or in other words, start slow. Do your intended exercise, but start at the bottom and creep up to a comfortable level. Keep a steady pace for a few minutes. This will help loosen up your muscles to give you a full range of motion and lower the risk of you stretching them too far or injuring yourself. Turn that steady pace up eventually until you get to your regular speed.

Okay, now… Ready… set… go! You’re operating at normal speed, now ramp it up just a bit. Gradually increase your activity as you go on and become comfortable again, but don’t push yourself too hard. An optimal exercise is when you’re pushing towards your limit, but not breaking that limit.

As you end your workout, do yourself a favor and don’t just immediately stop what you’re doing. Near the end, slow down a bit, start winding yourself down. Get back to your normal pace, and then slower… slower… less activity. Think of stopping a car – you can either slam on the breaks and skid out of control, or you can ease the brake and come to a safe, completely controlled stop. You know which one is better.

And now, it’s time to stretch! Give your muscles the equivalent of a massage for their hard work. For a decent starter’s guide to proper stretching, please click here. Do not skip this step, this will actually improve your movement for the rest of the day and decrease or eliminate any pain which you might feel afterwards due to delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS). DOMS usually hits you within the next day or so, and it’s the leading reason why people quit working out right away, because they think they will hurt every single day due to exercise. Stretch after your workouts to avoid that mess!

There. Now that wasn’t so hard, was it? No way! You can do this! Remember, as your body becomes comfortable to your level of activity, ramp it up just a bit the next time you work out. If your body gets used to what you’re doing, the benefits will start to dull off. Instead, keep your body guessing and it will compensate!

Some final tips on exercise:

• Wait at least one and a half hours after eating before a complete workout, although basic, normal walks should be fine before that time

• Find a friend or loved one that will work out with you, or try exercising in public. With extra people around, you will find yourself more motivated and less apt to cheat or give up

• Do not lay down immediately after working out. For the best circulation and to make sure your body accepts your exercise, sit in a chair for a while if you need to

• Get comfy sports shoes that fit your feet perfectly, this has an incredible impact on your stamina and how well your body benefits from activity

• If you really bust your ass in a workout, don’t get cocky and think you can offset it by skipping the next workout. A constant schedule is the only way this will work!