Well Being
Fit despite challenges
Y. RAMAKRISHNA
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People with disabilities need to pay as much attention to their fitness levels as do others.
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Photo: S. Subramanium
Can’t ignore it: Focus on quality of exercise and recovery.
Everybody has limitations. Some are visible and some are not. Some are physical and others are not. To assist those who face physical challenges, scientists have spent many years researching their challenges and finding ways to assist them to become
self-confident. They need to become self-reliant and independent and able to participate in physical fitness programmes. Just like everybody else they have a right to it, too.
Impact on health
It is very easy for a disabled person to become sedentary. This lack of movement impacts health in various avoidable ways. First of all, with little or no physical movement, food intake must be regulated. Strictly. In fact, when someone has a physical challenge, their food consumption must ideally be exactly half of what an able bodied person eats. Any physical exercise will be highly beneficial to keep the body healthy and all the other functions operating normally.
In the past, adolescent athletes in wheelchairs used the same programmes as able-bodied sprinters. These sessions concentrated on quantity rather than quality with very little recovery time between repetitions.
Today, things have changed. It is found that concentrating on low volume training and long recoveries between repetitions with a major emphasis on quality work is a lot better to enhance performance.
The focus is more on quality and recovery in between. This form was earlier thought to be detrimental. Resistance and weight training improve functional ability and mobility for people with physical disabilities.
Heart rate monitoring, despite the minor glitches, is still the most widely used technique for monitoring exercise intensity. It should be included more widely, including in group classes like aerobics, dancing, yoga, etc.
For those with physical challenges, the trainable muscles are limited and they may have impaired cardiovascular function. The disabled athlete’s anaerobic threshold may differ from an athlete without disability.
Another factor to be kept in mind is that someone with physical challenges may be on medication that will limit their body’s response to physical exercise. That, however, must not be an excuse not to exercise.
The writer is Sports Development and Training Manager, FitnessOne India Ltd.
Benefits
Strengthens all muscles.
Helps facilitate the flow of air in and out of the lungs.
Improves blood circulation and reduces risk of blood pressure and clogging of blood vessels.
Increases total number of red blood cells in the body, facilitating transport of oxygen quickly and efficiently to the different parts of the body.
Improves mental health, reduces stress and incidence of depression.
Stronger heart improves pumping efficiency and reduces resting heart rate.
Tones muscles throughout the body.
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