In addition to training my brain through science, I am also passionate about training my body through physical activity. My regular fitness activities aim at enhancing cardiovascular endurance, gaining strength, and improving flexibility. I believe that the combination of these three elements helps to maintain a healthy body and a good balance for life in general.

Cardiovascular endurance

Cardiovascular health is integral to any physical activity. Basically, any activity that involves moving your body is a cardiovascular exercise, which helps to pump blood to the heart efficiently. As often as possible, I try to do indoor/outdoor fitness activities to enhance my cardiovascular endurance. My activities include walking, hiking, running (either on the treadmill or outdoors), skiing, mountain biking, and team sports (such as soccer, tennis, badminton, and volleyball).

Physical strength and endurance

Strength training is important to increase the load that muscles can withstand (i.e. force per muscle fiber's area) and is normally achieved through weight training [1]. In addition to strength, improving muscles' endurance (i.e. how long muscles can hold a load) is also important. For improving endurance, body-weight training is an important element. Since I started my graduate studies, I have been regularly practicing weight and body-weight training to enhance my physical strength and endurance. As a result of these practices, I have been able to transform my body.

Flexibility

Like any other structure, the body needs to have flexible joints and connections to allow its structural elements (such as bones and muscles) to move smoothly. For example, using the analogy of a building for the human body, if the building is designed to be stiff without any flexibility, it will become fragile and eventually fail. Therefore, joint (such as back, knee, and shoulder) injury may occur when one focuses on building muscle without doing stretching exercises to improve flexibility. I faced this challenge when my shoulder got injured during weight training and thereafter I decided to incorporate yoga to my exercise routine, which helped me to improve my flexibility and lower my risk of future injury.

Reference

[1] D. B. Chaffin, G. B. Andersson, and B. J. Martin, Occupational Biomechanics, Wiley New York, 1999.