Foundations of Personal Fitness

Foundations of
Personal Fitness
Chapter 3 – Designing a Personal
Fitness Program

Lesson 1 - Health-Related
& Skill-Related Fitness
Health-Related Fitness: This is your ability to
become and stay physically healthy.
Skill-Related Fitness: This is your ability to
maintain high levels of performance on the
playing field.
While your level of skill-related fitness is reflected
in how well you perform a physical activity, you
level of health-related fitness provides a
measure of your physical health. Improving in
one area may lead to improvements in others.

Health Related
Components of Fitness

Skill Related
Components of Fitness

3 Principles of Training
Overload
Progression
Specificity

Lesson 2 - The Overload Principle
In order to improve your level of fitness,
you must increase the amount of regular
activity or exercise that you normally do.

FITT Formula
Frequency = How often
you exercise

FITT Formula
Intensity = How hard
you are exercising

FITT Formula
Time = How long you are
exercising

FITT Formula
Type describes what
exercise you are doing

Lesson 4 - Principle of Progression
As your fitness levels increase, so do the
factors in you FITT.
Progression involves gradually increasing
the intensity & time of activity to continue
achieving overload

Progression Principle

Lesson 3 - The Principle of
Specificity
Overloading a particular component will lead to
fitness improvements in that component alone.
Specificity means that
you must do ‘specific’
exercises to improve
each of the 5 health related
components of fitness.

Lesson 5 –
Warm Up, Work Out, Cool Down
Component
Warm-up
Type of Activity
Cardiovascular, stretch, low-level
calisthenics, walking
Time
(minutes)
10
Workout
Cardiovascular Conditioning:
walk, jog/run, swim, bike, crosscountry
ski, dance, stair step, in-line
skating
Muscular Conditioning:
calisthenics, weight training
20-50
15-30
Cool down
Walking, stretching
5-10

Warm Up
The warm-up is a portion of a complete workout
that consists of a variety of low-intensity
activities that prepare the body for physical work.
Primary purpose: to raise your heart rate
gradually before physical activity or exercise.
Which in turn will raise your muscle temperature
and allow your muscles to work safely and more
efficiently.

Active vs. Passive Warm Up
An ACTIVE warm up raises body temperature by
actively working the body systems centering on
the muscles, skeleton, heart and lungs.
An active warm up will have two phases:
Cardiovascular phase – gradually increases the
heart rate and body temperature (i.e., jogging slowly,
stationary cycling at low resistance, etc.)
Muscular-skeletal phase – designed to loosen up
the muscles and connective tissues (i.e., static
stretches)

Check for understanding:
An active warm up consists of
a cardiovascular phase and a
muscular-skeletal phase.
What phase of the warm up is
this athlete performing?
Answer: Muscular-skeletal Phase

Active vs. Passive Warm Up
In contrast, a PASSIVE warm up raises the
body temperature through outside heat
sources.
(Ex: blankets, hot baths, saunas, or skin
creams)
*Obviously, the active warm-up is a far more
effective way of preparing your body for physical
activity.

2 Types of Active Warm Ups
Specific warm up vs. General warm up
Specific = structured primarily for skill or gameoriented
activities.
Example: a specific warm up for basketball might
include lay ups, jump shots and upper and lower body
stretches
General = less structured, usually used for individual
activities.
Example: a general warm up for swimming or
jogging might include running in place, calisthenics,
and various stretches

Warm Up Guidelines
Remember to do a cardiovascular and muscular-skeletal
phase in every warm up
Start slowly, and gradually increase intensity
Warm up for five to fifteen minutes in temperate weather.
When it’s cold, increase time
Design a specific warm-up intended for your exercises or
physical activities
Make your warm-up intensity high enough to produce an
increased heart rate, increased breathing rate, and a
light sweat

Workout
The workout phase of your fitness
program is the period of time that you
should spend daily, or almost daily, in
physical activity or exercise.
A well designed workout phase should be
based on scientific exercise principles and
tailored to your personal fitness goals.

Sample Fitness Prescription for a
Teen
Frequency
3-5 days per week
Intensity
Time
Type
Resistance-
Weight Training
Flexibility
Moderate to vigorous &
continuous if possible
Accumulate 20-60 minutes
on each session
Walk-hike, run-jog, bike,
cross-country ski, dance,
skip rope, stair climb, swim,
inline skate, endurance
games
8-10 exercises, 2-3 times
per week
Include warm-up and cooldown
stretches

Cool down
Every bit as important as the warm up!
The main job of the cool down is the
opposite of the warm up: it is to lower your
heart rate gradually

Cool down
Like the warm-up, the cool down has two
phases that should occur in this order:
Cardiovascular cool down: consists of moving
about slowly and continuously for three to five
minutes following physical activity.
Stretching cool down: involves
three to five minutes of stretching.

Critical Thinking:
If a friend tells you that she started an exercise
program to improve her physical fitness but quit
after 2 weeks because she didn’t see any
improvements, what would you tell her?
Possible answers:
She didn’t stay with it long enough, it takes longer
than 2 weeks to get out of shape – so it will take
longer than 2 weeks to get back in shape.
She may have unrealistic expectations.
She can improve her chances for success by learning
more about personal fitness