Physical Fitness

Chronic disease: A disease that develops gradually, then continues over a long period of time. Health-related fitness: Fitness qualities that are necessary to maintain and promote a healthy body.

The five components of health-related fitness are body composition, or the ratio of fat body tissue to lean body tissue; cardiorespiratory endurance, or the ability of your blood, blood vessels, heart, and lungs to deliver nutrients and oxygen to all of your body's cells during activity; flexibility, or the ability of joints to move through a full range of motion; muscular endurance, or the ability of a muscle to keep working over a period of time; and muscular strength, or the amount of force that a muscle can apply in a given contraction.

Metabolic rate: The rate at which your body converts food energy into energy that keeps you alive. Physical fitness: The ability of the body to perform daily physical activities without getting out of breath, overly tired, or sore.

Resting Heart Rate (RHR): The number of times the heart beats per minute while resting.

Skill related fitness: The components of fitness that are necessary for good athletic performance. The six components of skill related fitness are agility, balance, coordination, power, reaction time, and speed.

FITT: A formula made up of four important parts (frequency, intensity, time, and type) involved in fitness training.

Frequency: Exercises need to be performed at least three to five times per week.

Intensity: If you are training 50-60% of your maximum heart rate, an hour of training is necessary. If you are training 85% of your maximum heart rate, twenty minutes per session is enough.

Time: The higher the intensity of the workout, the less time you need to use per session.

Type: Any aerobic activity that keeps your heart rate at it's target heart rate zone is good exercise. Repetitions: The number of times an exercise is performed.

Set: A fixed number of repetitions followed by a rest period.

Target heart rate zone: A heart rate change within which the most gains in cardiorespiratory health will occur.

 Physical benefits of being active include a good ratio of fat mass to muscle mass maintained, blood cholesterol levels are kept within a healthy range, metabolic rate is increased, more blood and oxygen flow, more calories are burned, and muscles become more efficient at controlling movements.