If you want to be optimally healthy, including staying fit, happy, and vital, exercise is essential. Most people are well aware of this, yet many do not exercise and, among those who do, many fall short of reaching their fitness goals.
Part of the problem is the advice itself, as recommending “exercise” is about as useful as recommending a “healthy diet.” Unless there are more specifics… length of time, intensity, activities… many people will fail.
This is true even if you’ve been following conventional exercise recommendations, many of which are now outdated. And even though there’s a vast amount of information available to teach you how to best exercise, not all of it is accurate.
If you’re ready to start an exercise program, or improve the one you’re already using, keep reading. Following are several of the most common fitness myths – and what to do instead.
6 Fitness Myths to Avoid to Get the Body You Want
Myth #1: Crunches Are the Key to Flat Abs
Crunches will provide some toning of your abs, but you'll get “flat” abs only by burning off fat. This means fat-burning exercises are going to be essential. In fact, research has shown that doing abdominal exercises alone—even when performed five days a week for six weeks—has no effect at all on subcutaneous fat stores and abdominal circumference.
High-intensity interval training (HIIT) is among the best fat-burning exercise out there, but even core-building planks and bridges will burn fat (and work your abs) far more effectively than crunches. You can find six more tips to burn your belly fat here (and five of them don’t include any exercise at all).
Myth #2: More Sweat Equals a Better Workout
Virtually any type of intense exercise will prompt you to sweat, but the amount of sweat isn’t an indication of how many calories you’ve burned. Remember, sweating is a natural, essential body process designed to help your body stay cool, so exercising in warm weather (or in a heated room, such as in Bikram yoga) will create more sweating.
While you can’t use your amount of sweat as a gauge of exercise intensity, you can assume that if you haven’t broken into a sweat at all your exercise is probably not intense enough. Additionally, sweating in and of itself may be beneficial (independent of its association with exercise), as it can facilitate toxin excretion. And many with untreated hypothyroidism have a hard time sweating at all.
Myth #3: Running Is Bad for Your Knees
Running will not necessarily “ruin” your knees, as you may have been told. In fact, research shows that osteoarthritis of the knees is no more common in older adults who engage in long-distance running than in those who don’t.
That being said, women are up to six times more likely to suffer from a knee injury due to running, compared to men, because they may have an imbalance in strength between their quadriceps and hamstrings. Regular strength training, including of your legs, is therefore important if you’re a runner.
Personally, I was an avid runner for over 40 years, but I now prefer HIIT for my aerobic exercise, as it is safer, more efficient and more effective. If done appropriately, however, running can be an effective part of your overall fitness plan and may even help you to live longer. But you must keep it moderate, and find your own “Goldilocks Zone.”
Dr. James O'Keefe, a research cardiologist and former elite athlete, recommends running no more than 20 miles per week, spread out over three to four days, at a speed of about five miles per hour. If you run farther or faster than that, you may lose all the benefits, and the associated health risks can rise to the magnitude of the couch potato—literally—according to the science.
Myth #4: Stretching Is Essential for Recovering Faster
