20 October 2024

Older and Stronger

Kirstin Ahmed
Healthy aging, Healthy body, Personal trainer in Brighton

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Older and stronger

As we enter middle age, fitness goals often shift toward maintaining health, mobility, and strength rather than high-intensity, competitive goals. However, that doesn’t mean you can’t be in the best shape of your life! Brightonfit personal training programs tailored for middle-aged individuals are designed to meet the unique needs of this stage in life, ensuring longevity, strength, and overall well-being.

Here’s everything you need to know about training in middle age

Why Training is Important for Middle-Aged People

As we age, our bodies undergo several changes, such as:
– Decreased muscle mass (sarcopenia)
– Reduced flexibility and mobility
– Slower metabolism
– Increased risk of chronic diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, and arthritis.

Incorporating a well-rounded fitness routine that includes strength training, cardiovascular exercise, flexibility, and balance work can help counteract these changes, improve quality of life, and boost energy levels. With the help of a Brightonfit personal training program, you can develop a routine that fits your lifestyle.

1. Strength Training: Prevent Muscle Loss
One of the biggest concerns for middle-aged individuals is muscle loss. Regular strength training, at least 2-3 times a week, can help preserve and even build muscle mass, which boosts metabolism and supports joint health. We can guide you through safe, effective exercises that target major muscle groups without over-stressing your joints.

2. Cardiovascular Health: Keep Your Heart Strong
Cardiovascular exercise is crucial for maintaining heart health, reducing the risk of heart disease, and managing body weight. Aim for at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity cardio per week, which can include walking, cycling, swimming, or light jogging.

3. Flexibility and Mobility: Stay Agile
Flexibility naturally decreases with age, which can lead to stiffness and reduced range of motion. Incorporating stretching and mobility exercises into your routine can help maintain joint flexibility and prevent injuries. Matthew is our Brightonfit mobility expert and he can introduce you to yoga or dynamic stretching routines to enhance flexibility and keep your body moving freely.

4. Balance and Stability: Prevent Falls
Falls are one of the leading causes of injury among older adults. Incorporating balance training—such as exercises using balance boards or stability balls—into your routine can improve coordination and reduce the risk of falls. We can show you how to focus on exercises that strengthen your core and lower body to improve balance.

5. Nutrition and Recovery: Fueling Your Body
Training effectively in middle age isn’t just about the workout; it’s also about nutrition and recovery. Proper nutrition plays a vital role in muscle recovery, fat loss, and overall health. A well-structured diet that includes adequate protein, healthy fats, and complex carbohydrates can support your fitness goals. Additionally, getting enough sleep and allowing your body to recover between workouts is crucial to avoid injury and burnout.

6. Tailored Personal Training for Middle-Aged Clients
Whether you’re new to exercise or returning after a long break, working with a Brightonfit personal trainer ensures that your workouts are tailored to your specific needs We can adjust exercises based on any pre-existing conditions or limitations, helping you build strength and fitness while avoiding injury. The personalized approach ensures steady, sustainable progress.

9 April 2019

To eat workout calories back or not?

Kirstin Ahmed
diets, Nutrition, Personal trainer in Brighton
hunger, improve fitness, intermittent fasting, macro nutrient, muscle gain, weight loss, workout calories
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workout caloriesSo you’ve put some effort in calculating your macro nutrient requirement (macros) and you know how much you are burning in your workouts. Chances are you are looking to generate a small daily deficit in order to shift a few pounds, or you are aiming to avoid over eating. If you want help or more advice with this step please call any of our Brighton and Hove personal trainers

Your workouts will give you a few hundred calories per day to hypothetically consume (assuming they were not part of the initial calories in/out calculation). This would hold your calorie deficit at the same level that you calculated…. meaning that you could eat these calories back and still reach your goals in the same period of time.

Reasons that you should eat these calories back:

  • If your calculated macro deficit is close to 500kcals/day. Adding this deficit to the ones lost during your workout multiple times per week could put you at risk of reducing your metabolic rate (when the body senses it does not have sufficient fuel it makes changes to conserve energy such as a reduction in metabolic rate)
  • If you are hungry. All hunger is not the same! But all hunger is generated because your body is warning you its low on fuel. Hunger can be a useful tool to manipulate hormone levels that perceive levels of satiety (a key tool used in intermittent fasting), however assuming you are not fasting you should respond to your hunger signals and eat something.

On the other hand…..you may want to reconsider not eating workout calories back because studies have shown that it is common to overestimate calorie burn and underestimate calorie consumption so your calculated deficit may not be accurate.

It really comes down to what your goal is, how hard and long you are exercising for and how good your macro calculation is.

23 March 2018

Brightonfit personal trainer workouts

Kirstin Ahmed
brighton personal trainer sessions, Exercise routine, Female fitness, Personal trainer in Brighton, Personal training, Weight lifting, Weight loss
brighton personal training sessions, HIIT sessions, HIIT training
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Ever wondered what kind of workouts we do? Well the answer is we do all of the workouts we ask you to do! Otherwise how would we know what to ask of you and where the difficult sections were and how to coach you through and design a balanced program?

This Brighton personal training session is designed for intermediates. It should take you about 45mins and some of the exercises use a weight (ball, kettlebell or dumbell), you should be able to perform this at home, in a park or your gym.

The session is split into 3 x 15 minute sections. Each section contains 5 exercises. You should aim to complete each exercise 10 times each side (ie split jacks) or 20 time if using both sides of your body together (ie a box jump). You must not rest between exercises and when you get to the end of the first 5 you rest for up to 60 seconds before repeating 4 more times. That will be the end of the first section and you may rest for up to 3 minutes before repeating the same format for the second and third section.

This is a fast paced session, each exercise must be performed with the focus on form, power and speed with the goal of keeping your heart rate as high as you can for as long as you can whilst maintaining form.

The explosive exercises (tucks, jacks, jumps, squats and thrusts) are very important to make sure you are really jumping/pushing hard and fast in combination. These are the plyometric sections of the workout and improve the power capacity of your muscles in a slightly different way to some of the pure strength based ones.

This workout can be repeated as often as you like. Remember not to train on sore muscles. You will develop lean muscle and burn excess fat very effectively training like this, but remember even as personal trainers doing these sessions we don’t rely on just one type of training and we mix these sessions up with running in Brighton and Hove, pure strength training and training specifically for the sports we play and recommend that you do the same. Watch this blog for more training sessions.

Click on the photo below for a link to a bigger image you can print out if you like.

Let us know how it goes….any questions, get in touch.

brightonfit personal trainer workout

24 December 2011

Brighton loves you

Kirstin Ahmed
Personal trainer in Brighton
brighton ad hove, brighton lifestyle, exercise locations in hove, gyms in brighton, healthy brighton, hove lifestyle
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The main reason I found a place that I could call home in Brighton lies in its unspoken rule of inclusivity. I moved here when i was 21 and potless, I had a few bags of stuff and a Renualt 5 and worked on a farm in West Sussex.
Back in those days the only thing I cared about was being free, and that meant having a motor!She was a banger, I don’t recall what was wrong with her but by the time she made it to Brighton the only way she would start was a rolling start or a jump if she konked out on the flat.
I was strong and powerful in spirit and would never hesitate to charge down hills with the driver door open and my hand on the steering wheel building up enough speed before I hopped in and flipped her into 2nd gear….but when it came to flat starts I often found it hard to build up enough speed to do the same.
To this day I recall the pivotal moment of the start of my love affair with Brighton was in one of those flat starts, early one morning on my way to the farm when some fella stopped his car at the lights I was stranded at and helped push my car with me. My exact thoughts were “How refreshingly unassuming people seem here, it doesn’t seem to matter in this city that I’m some ragamuffin” I just wasn’t used to it, Southampton is quite a different kind of city! Not a big deal you may think but its kept me here for 15years!
And from the farm a side step into the gym; an extension of the love of movement and physical prowess. But most importantly a place where everyone is stripped down to their bare essentials. What I mean by that is that millionaires rub shoulders with musicians, black people with white, gay with straight and men with women. Its a melting pot where the only interest in all the threads of the all inclusive Brightonian demographic is that of fitness. Yet again a place that I can call home, somewhere that I can be myself and grow and learn irrespective of what society sees me as.
I think we all love that, there is a commonality running through our band of merry warriors that unites us all. Yet again its beauty lies in its unassuming unspoken (none of them read this anyway;) acceptance. Portrayed perfectly by an old kickboxing instructor of mine: We were sitting next to each other at a show and I remember saying to him “That blokes shit isn’t he?” to which my instructor said “No he’s great for just getting into the ring”

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