Comfortable

By Stan Peake Innovative's GM

The word ‘comfortable’ has a lot of connotations, and most are very positive. When we think of comfortable, we often think of relaxation, our favorite couch, spending down time with people we enjoy, or ‘comfort food’ at the end of a stressful day. Maybe cozying up close to the fireplace with hot chocolate on a winter day.

In any event, for the purposes of realizing our fitness goals- ‘comfort’ can also be detrimental. Specifically, choosing to remain within one’s comfort zones can put up barriers in terms of what a person will try, or how hard they are willing to work to achieve those goals.

A ‘comfortable’ working pace for most people is usually between 70 and 75% of their maximum heart rate. At this workload, the heart rate is increased and we are burning calories, but not at a rate consistent with most of our goals. This workload translates to what is called “long slow distance” training, and is best suited to endurance training which should generally be done for longer than an hour – possibly as long as many hours (6+) depending on goals.

For those of us that have goals of making big changes to our fitness level and body composition, we have to learn how to be comfortable getting outside our comfort zones, and working at higher intensities.

It’s also crucial we deviate from the norm and take on new things. Instead of 3 sets of 10 repetitions for each exercise – fitness based destinations such as hiking the Inca trail in Peru… hiking the Grand Canyon or West Coast Trail… biking in the mountains or in Moab, Utah… or multi-sports such as triathlons or adventure races… heli-skiing, the list goes on – all serve to provide variety, purpose for our gym-based training, and a sense of accomplishment.

While we all want a degree of comfort in our lives – we must also manage that with a sense of completion. Let’s all get outside our comfort zones a little more in 2009 and take something on that’s new, that scares us a little, and hopefully inspires us to do great things and see better results!