Don't do just one thing.
Should be simple, right? Makes sense, right?
Well, if that's the case how come some people do only one form of exercise, consistently, persistently, day after day. And in many cases, they think they're getting great exercise, all they need.
Nuh-uh, it doesn't work that way.
In fact, if you only do one form of exercise, especially if it's single plane exercise like spinning, treadmill running, stair climbing, or working out with weight machines, even if you vary the frequency, duration, and intensity, you "Hamay strengthen one set of primary and secondary muscles just fine, but because they operate only on one plane of movement, other secondary muscle groups in particular are liable to injury.
I'm not a medical guy or a certified personal trainer (used to be the latter, but not now), but it doesn't take much knowledge, sophistication to understand that if you only practice running forward, for example, that the muscles to run backward won't get strengthened. ("Ha!", you say, who wants to run backwards anyway? Okay, then how about moving quickly sideways, think that might be useful sometimes?)
Anyway, I could go on and on with plenty of obvious examples, but the point is you need to mix up your workouts if you want to maintain your optimum fitness or even just to kind of stay in shape.
So not only do you need cardio (daily, please!), strength training, flexibility, and stretching, for the best overall effect you also need to vary what you do in each of those categories, and realize, that just because one type of cardio exercise or one weight machine may be your favorite or the most convenient, you could be fooling yourself into thinking your getting adequate workouts and, even worse, you could be setting yourself up for injury.
So mix it up, try different stuff, frequently. You're less likely to get bored, you 'll be less likely to plateau in your conditioning, you could very well have a lot more fun, AND you'll improve your overall fitness and injury prevention levels.
And don't just take my word for it, ask a real trainer or health professional.
In fitness and health,
