Principles of Exercise

FITT PRINCIPLE

Frequency:

 Refers on HOW OFTEN you will exercise.

 Training sessions in a week.
 4-5 times a week

Intensity:

 Pertains to HOW MUCH effort or work you will exert in exercise. HOW HARD the session is.
 Can be influenced by work difficulty and the balance between work and rest.
 3km – 100m per minute

Time:

 Relates to HOW LONG you will exercise per session. The specific training method
 The length of the training session or the length of specific activities that take place during a training.
 30mins – 15minutes to and fro

Type:

 Determines WHAT KIND of exercise will help you achieve your fitness goal.
 30mins – 15 minutes to and fro
 Weight training, continuous, flexibility, sprint, etc.
 for the heart – walking

OVERLOAD

 States that the only way to improve fitness is to increase over time.
 This can mean increasing the amount of resistance, increasing the amount of time, or increasing the speed.
 Training must be raised to a higher level than normal to create the extra demands to which your body will adapt.
 The chronic overloading of muscles through exercise causes adaptations to perform better in exercise.

SPECIFICITY

 A principle of exercise that states that specific kinds of exercises must be done to develop specific aspects of the
body and specific aspects of fitness. Basically, exercise in a manner that will get you to your goals.
 Training must be specific to the sport or activity, the type of fitness required and the particular muscle groups.
 Only the specific muscle groups overloaded by exercise and respond and adapt to become stronger.
 Exercising a certain body part or component of the body primarily develops that part
 To become better at a particular exercise or skill, you must perform that exercise or skill.
 The way you exercise should be specific to what you want to accomplish.

PROGRESSION

 A principle of exercise that states that a person should start slowly and increase exercise gradually.
 As your body adapts to training, you progress to a new level of fitness. To then take this to the “next level”, a
gradual increase in intensity is needed to create an overload.
 A gradual and systematic increase of the workload over a period of time will result in improvements in fitness
without risk of injury.
  To continue seeing gains and improvements from an exercise program, the intensity of the exercise must
gradually become increasingly more challenging.
 In order to improve strength and endurance, you have to progressively increase the frequency, intensity, and
time of your workouts.

REVERSIBILITY

 This principle states that if you don’t maintain a regular exercise program, your state of physical fitness will
regress. In other words, use it or lose it!
 The effects of training are reversible.
 When we stop exercising, the adaptations developed in response to exercise revert back to their original state.
 Once a training stimulus is removed, fitness levels will eventually return to baseline. “Use it or lose it.”

ADAPTATION

 With continued practice, your body will eventually turn a new sport, activity, or movement skill into second
nature.
 This is the process that the body goes through during the recovery and rest periods and changes to become
better at dealing with training stresses and demands.

INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES

 This principle maintains that no two individuals will benefit from exercise exactly the same way physically or
psychologically. Difference in genetics, age, experience, body size, and health status can all affect the outcomes
of a workout.
 Each person has a different response to an exercise or training program and each person needs to exercise and
train accordingly
 One’s exercise routine varies based on a person’s unique metabolism and adaptations to exercise.

INITIAL VALUES

 Improvement in the outcome of interest will be greatest in those with lower initial values. In other words, those
with lowest level of fitness have greatest room for improvement.

DIMINISHING RETURNS

 Refers to the decreasing expected degree of improvement in fitness as individuals become fit, thereby
increasing the effort required for further improvements.

REST & RECOVERY

 The body needs time to be able to rest and recover in order for adaptation to occur. After a workout, your body
and muscles need time to recover in order to grow stronger.