National Fitness Day and keeping your heart healthy!

"National Fitness Day is a chance to highlight the role physical activity plays across the UK, helping us raise awareness of its importance in helping us lead healthier and active lifestyles.

National Fitness Day sees a huge range of activity options enjoyed by participants of all ages, such as ‘plank offs’, yoga and pilates classes, treadmill challenges, high-street HIIT classes, dance-offs, mass walks and many more."

Planks? Treadmill? HIIT? If that is not your thing then try a Medau Movement class - in fact, one lady said my class was perfect for 'ladies of her age' as the gym was intimidating and no one looked like her!

On Wednesday 26th September we will having our usual Medau Movement class at Elm Court. Those who come to class say that they enjoy it as it gets them out of the house, encourages the whole body to move, gets the muscles and the heart working as well as a good place to make friends. At the end of the session we are running (at a gentle dancers pace) the length of the hall without thinking about it! 

National Fitness Day is a great day to promote Medau, EXTEND and any other activity that gets you moving.  No time for a class? You do not need to go to the gym to work the body - just a few minutes dancing to your favourite songs in the privacy of your own home every day is enough. 

Today the BBC led with a story that a 'WHO report estimates that more than a quarter of people worldwide - 1.4 billion - are not doing enough physical exercise, a figure that has barely improved since 2001.'

I am not really surprised that people find it difficult to increase their daily activity - we all found it easier to sit on the sofa rather than walk round the block in the extreme heat of the summer months and soon the chilling winds, rain and frozen pavements will encourage us into winter hibernation. There needs to be signposts to classes and activities that people can relate to - images of people just like them enjoying exercise that they can enjoy. We all enjoy different things and we all have many different 'boxes' to tick. 

So, during National Physical Activity week bring a friend to a Medau or EXTEND class and see if it is 'the something' that ticks their 'box' and gives them 60 minutes of physical activity each week!