Numerous individuals, who are anxious to accomplish their fitness objectives speedily, often lean to drastic measures just to see the desired results. Could wearing weights around all day amplify your fitness achievements, regardless of whether you’re involved in strength training for a sporting event or aiming for rapid weight loss?
Wearable Weights
Lifting weights will doubtingly help you build a little muscle, improve endurance and burn more calories. Walking around wearing weights is an adequate substitute for resistance training without dedicating your whole time to it if you don’t have much time to spend on a workout. Here are the wearable weights you can use:
You may also start at home with dumbbells: Dumbbells Workout at Home for Beginners
Weighted Vest
Weighted vests are widely used to promote muscle endurance. It can build a bit of muscle for your body, but not as bulk as what weightlifting provides. Wearing a weighted vest is like wearing a heavy pack on hiking.
Choosing a Weighted Vest
Wearing the vest for long periods is hard enough. Therefore, a bit of comfort while carrying it will at least make it bearable for you. One way to ensure comfort while having the weights on while carrying out your daily activities is to get a size that fits you well. It also helps that you still have free movement when you’re wearing the weighted vest. This is to ensure that you can still carry out other exercises and other activities while your body weight is loaded.
You may also find this helpful: Sandbag Training
Watch What You Wear
Starting with the heaviest available pound of weighted vest won’t provide you with excellent or quick results. What you’ll have instead is a bad case of body pain, especially if you’re planning to wear the vest for consecutive days. Why power through a lot of weight when you can start with just 5 pounds for the first week. Gradually, you can put on added weight once you feel your body has adapted already. As weeks go by, you will notice that you will develop the strength to put on extra weight.
Take Care of Your Health
Every exercise must be done in moderation. The same goes for wearing a weighted vest. Avoid wearing the weighted vest all day long. Take it off at least for an hour to give time for your muscles to recuperate. Having a heavy load for long periods can cause strain on your lower back, shoulders, and joints. To avoid getting sore, you should do some stretching to reduce pain and aches.
Maintaining a good posture while having weights on you is extremely important to keep your form. Hunching while carrying a few pounds for long periods could lead to more serious health problems that affect your bones and muscles. Also, if you’re wearing this gear during exercises, make sure that it will do you good rather than harm.
Ankle Weights
Ankle weights are convenient to use as you need to strap them to your ankles, and you’re good to go. However, having them worn all day will cause inconvenience to your joints and may produce long-term health problems. Nevertheless, hyper-gravity training involving ankle weights is proven to help muscle build, strength training, and calorie burn.
Benefits of Using Ankle Weights
By wearing ankle weights, you can increase the challenge of your usual exercise routine, leading to better fitness results. They help in making the targeted muscles such as quadriceps, calves, and glutes stronger. The resistance created by the weights causes your body to exert more effort – hence, developing your ability to take on heavier weights and demanding tasks that involve the leg muscles.
Ankle weights also offer convenient and compact exercise equipment that you can bring and use without preventing your range of movement – allowing you to continue on your other task at hand if you’re wearing weights while working. Even just walking with your ankle weights on makes a difference. It helps in maintaining bone density as these weights add impact forces that condition your bones.
Risks of Wearing Ankle Weights
Not all the time; you can wear ankle weights for every available leg exercise. You’d probably think that ankle weights are good to use for walking or doing aerobic exercises, but it’s not. Having them on while doing aerobic exercises will cause muscle imbalance. It also poses a risk of injuries to joints, ligaments, hips, and back. But don’t worry, you can still do some wearing ankle weights. Just be sure to ask professional fitness trainers and doctors for advice.
Safest Ways to Wear Ankle Weights
Just because this kind of weight poses some risk of injuries, it doesn’t mean that you can’t gain good fitness results from ankle weights. Again, as mentioned, everything must be done in moderation. Unfortunately, this weight is not recommended to be worn all day. It is prescribed to limit the duration of use at least 3 times a day for a minimum of 20 minutes per session.
Avoid wearing heavy ankle weight, especially if you’re starting. The recommended weight to wear is between 1% to 2% of your body weight, and you gradually increase the weight as you progress. Do not exceed to wear 3% of your body weight.
Conclusion
Wearing weights help you burn more calories, make you stronger, build muscle and provide increased stamina. But wearing them all day long may cause serious injuries in the long run. As much as you want to get fitness results as quickly as possible, wearing them all day is not the answer.
It is still best to use wearable weights related to the workout you are doing. Do not rush yourself into powering through hefty pounds of weight. Always start with a smaller weight and add extra gradually. Wearing a weighted vest is much safer to use for a longer period compared to ankle weights. But you still have to seek a piece of professional advice to make sure it will bring the best benefits for your body.
Lastly, always put your health first. It’s good to have a stronger body but do not overdo it at the cost of other parts.
