Tighten your abdominal muscles and stand up. Make it easier: Sit on the edge of a chair with your feet hip-width apart and arms crossed over your chest.

Squeeze your buttocks as you stand to help you balance.

Let your arms swing forward to help you balance. Movement: Slowly bend your hips and knees, lowering your buttocks about eight inches, as if you're sitting back into a chair. Starting position: Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart, arms at your sides. It's important to feel some muscle fatigue at the end of the exercise to make sure you are working or training the muscle group effectively. It will likely include body weight exercises like squats, push-ups, and lunges, and exercises involving resistance from a weight, a band, or a weight machine. Strengthening your muscles not only makes you stronger, but also stimulates bone growth, lowers blood sugar, assists with weight control, improves balance and posture, and reduces stress and pain in the lower back and joints.Ī physical therapist or certified personal trainer can design a strength training program that you can do two to three times a week at a gym, at home, or at work.

Strength training will also help you stand up from a chair, get up off the floor, and go upstairs. Regular strength training will help you feel more confident and capable of daily tasks like carrying groceries, gardening, and lifting heavier objects around the house.

Make it harder: Lift your knees higher, march faster, and really pump your arms.Īs we age, we lose muscle mass. Make it easier: March slower and don't lift your knees as high. Breathe comfortably, and don't clench your fists.Look straight ahead and keep your abs tight.Alternate marching feet wide and together (out, out, in, in).March four steps forward, and then four steps back.Movement: Bend your elbows and swing your arms as you lift your knees. Starting position: Stand tall with your feet together and arms at your sides. Try brisk walking, swimming, jogging, cycling, dancing, or classes like step aerobics. Over the long term, aerobic exercise reduces your risk of heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes, breast and colon cancer, depression, and falls.Īim for at least 150 minutes per week of moderate-intensity activity. Combined with weight loss, it can also lower 'bad' LDL cholesterol levels. If it's just because you are deconditioned, then you will need more aerobic exercise to help condition your heart and lungs and get enough blood to your muscles to help them work efficiently.Īerobic exercise also helps relax blood vessel walls, lower blood pressure, burn body fat, lower blood sugar levels, reduce inflammation, and boost mood. If you're too winded to walk up a flight of stairs, you need to see your doctor for a medical evaluation. It gives your heart and lungs a workout and increases endurance. Aerobic exerciseĪerobic exercise, which speeds up your heart rate and breathing, is important for many body functions. Here, we list what you need to know about each exercise type and offer examples to try, with a doctor's okay. In reality, we should all be doing aerobics, stretching, strengthening, and balance exercises. People do what they enjoy, or what feels the most effective, so some aspects of exercise and fitness may be ignored. But we tend to limit ourselves to one or two types of activity. Strengthening, stretching, balance, and aerobic exercises will keep you active, mobile, and feeling great.Įxercise is key to good health.

Aerobic dance workout