8 mistakes that can wreck your fitness plan - Stay motivated - Revolution Health

Driven perhaps by a New Year's resolution or a simple realization that now is "The Time," you've finally joined a gym.

Or maybe you've slinked back into the one you've been avoiding for way too long. And this time you're determined, committed to a regular workout schedule and ready to join the legions of regular exercisers.

But since about 50% of people who start an exercise program drop out within 6 months -- and 75% to 90% quit by the end of one year -- you probably should have a plan beyond hoping for the best. To help, we've compiled advice to help you step briskly past the potholes that can ruin the road to fitness:

•    Failure to set near-term, attainable goals. "Losing 50 pounds is a long-term goal," says Walter R. Thompson, Ph.D., fellow of the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) and professor of kinesiology and health at Georgia State University. Thompson suggests a realistic, tangible goal like losing 1 pound a week. Anticipate likely pitfalls such as missed workouts, and have techniques for surmounting them, says Richard Cotton, a Carlsbad, Calif.-based exercise physiologist and certification director with ACSM. That way, even if you're buried on deadlines, you will at least get one workout in on, say, Wednesday, then a couple more over the weekend.

•    The routine rut. It's easy to fall into a pattern of using the same gym machines in the same order every time. But your body, ever shrewd, grows accustomed to predictable activity and actually becomes more efficient in completing the tasks. The result: You burn fewer calories and gain less muscle per workout. "Give your muscles a shock," suggests Rachel Seligman, an American Council on Exercise-certified personal trainer in San Francisco, by sometimes doing weights before cardio and vice versa. "Increase the weights when you can lift them easily." (You should feel muscle fatigue at 8 to 12 reps). She also suggests taking a class like Pilates or yoga just to change things up a bit.

•    Undervaluing weight. To get and stay fit -- not just slim, but fit -- you need to incorporate strength training, according to the ACSM. Developing and maintaining strong muscles carries numerous benefits, including: helping protect ligaments, tendons and other connective tissue from injury; giving you the muscular stamina to work out longer than you'd manage with weak muscles; and helping with balance and stability.  And while strength training can yield bulky muscles, it doesn't have to: By opting for slightly lighter weights (i.e., something you can lift 10 to 12 times in proper form before muscle fatigue), you will develop leaner muscles, according to the ACSM. Lifting heavier weights (i.e., ones you can hoist 6 to 8 times before muscle failure) will develop bulkier muscles. (Body type plays into this as well: Stocky people tend to add visible muscle mass much more easily than those with leaner frames.) The ACSM recommends 2 to 3 strength training sessions a week, focusing on 8 to 10 exercises that target major muscle groups. Couple this with 4 or more days of moderate-intensity cardio for a balanced exercise regimen.

•    Losing focus. The gym is full of distractions -- "Fear Factor: Fitness Edition" on TV, year-old copies of Architectural Digest, muscle heads bench-pressing weaker gym members -- but it's important to focus on your exercise, Cotton says. "You need to be present for strength training." When weight training -- with free weights or machines -- pause at the top and bottom of each motion, and focus equally on the downward, or eccentric, phase, when the weight is going with gravity. "That's where muscle lengthening takes place," Cotton says, and that helps prepare muscles for performing functional eccentric movements like setting down a heavy box at home, according to the American Council on Exercise (ACE).

•    The long and the meaningless. Riding a bike for 90 minutes at minimal effort level is neither a great workout nor an efficient use of time. You need to put in enough effort to fatigue your muscles and get your heart rate up. That's why spin-cycling (aka spinning) classes, for example, bring participants through a series of intervals -- some short and intense, some longer and plodding -- and include warm-up and cooldown periods. Walking on a treadmill or gently pedaling a stationary bike for extended periods without ever breathing hard or sweating will not yield as much cardio benefit as, say, 20 to 30 minutes of intervals that keep your heart rate in the 65% to 85% of max range, according to numerous expert groups including ACSM and Mayo Clinic. The reason: Intensity -- not exercise time -- forces the body to pull in more oxygen, says Jonathan Ross, a Bowie, Md.-based certified trainer and ACE's 2006 Personal Trainer of the Year. By challenging yourself with higher-intensity exercise, you can increase your ability to move oxygen to your muscles.

•    Motion without form. If you're pulling on the treadmill's bar to keep up, then you've set the speed and/or incline too high. If the weights come crashing down after you struggle through a lift, then you're not controlling your movements. Stay within your active range of motion; adjust weight machines so they don't pull your body out of its natural range. Row with your chest facing forward, not down. Keep your knees from extending outward past your toes when doing squats. Engage your core when doing any lifting with your upper or lower body. (This helps stabilize you to prevent injury and further strengthens your torso.)

•    The big fat lie. "You can do crunches until you're blue in the face, but [that] won't melt fat [specifically] off your stomach," says Kevin Dunn, an ACE-certified personal trainer and physical therapist in Okalahoma City. Or, more succinctly: You cannot spot-reduce fat. No matter where you target your exercise, the body sheds fat from either areas with the largest fat deposits or equally from across the body.  So if you tend to pack on weight around your thighs first, that will be the last fat your body will burn. The hard truth: To lose fat, you must burn more calories than you consume. Shoot for a 300 calorie-per-day deficit, which will help you lose about 3 pounds per month safely and without feeling like you're starving. "Treat your abs like your other muscles," Ross says. "You wouldn't do 200 squats or push-ups."

•    Too much too soon. So you missed a couple workouts or gained 5 pounds or still haven't been to the gym you joined Jan. 2. But now -- NOW -- you're ready to see immediate results. Three words: Take. It. Slow. Trying to compensate for missed workout time by blasting weight sets or sprinting through a cardio workout can cause injury, Cotton says. And even if you escape hurt, an overzealous workout often leaves you so sore that the gym is the last place you want to go. Taylor says: "If your goal is 40 minutes of [sustained] cardio, start with 10 minutes. Next time, do 10 minutes, 30 seconds." Keep up that progression until you reach your goal or your body tells you to back off -- for example, if you experience joint pain (or any sharp pain) or general muscle soreness that lasts more than a day.

8 mistakes that can wreck your fitness plan - Stay motivated - Revolution Health

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