Their are numerous benefits to regular exercise. You may say as drummers or percussionists you get enough exercise with practicing or performing. Unfortunately, this can be a common misconception.
Regular physical activity and exercise are beneficial and extremely important for long-term health and well-being. Regular exercise can help protect us from heart disease and stroke, diabetes, high blood pressure, osteoporosis and obesity. There are also psychological effects of regular activity including improvement of our mood and management of stress.
Exercise and physical activity can be achieved in various ways. The various forms of exercise also bring specific benefits with each method. Exercise can be broken in aerobic exercise (cardiovascular, cardio) or strength training.
Aerobic exercise 20 to 30 minutes three to four times a week combined with some form of strength training and stretching at least twice a week have been shown to provide the greatest overall health benefits. For those of us that are unable to perform this level of activity, substantial benefits can be gained with 30 minutes or more of moderate intensity activity per day five times a week. Start slow and gradually increase the time and intensity of your physical activity. Starting out slow allows you to improve your fitness level without placing tremendous stress across you joints and muscles.
Aerobic exercise will improve cardiovascular (heart) and cardiopulmonary (lung) functions, increase maximal oxygen consumption (VO2max), lower heart rate and blood pressure, increase blood supply to muscles, increase good cholesterol (HDL), decrease blood triglycerides, reduce body fat and decrease body weight.
Forms of aerobic exercise include: walking, jogging, swimming, bicycling, climbing and jumping rope.
Strength training using weights, machines, resistive bands or medicine balls on a regular basis will increase overall muscle strength, increase tendon and ligament strength, improve joint and muscle flexibility, reduce body fat and increase lean body mass and improve balance and overall functional ability.
As you can see regular exercises greatest benefit might be improving our overall quality of life.
**If there are any health related topics that you would like to learn more about or like me to discuss in the upcoming year please email me with your topics or questions and I will be happy to bring those to you.