Regardless of why we joined up for this challenge, it is obvious that there is a buzz going on.  People where I work have been talking about their challenge activities, and some have even been considering fitness goals and activities well beyond February.  That is a significant effect!

We’re early into this challenge, but the people involved seem to be pumped up.  I’ve even heard from more than one that they can already see that they need to revise their original goal – upward.

When you exercise, you stress your body.  As your body recovers from the workout, it responds by adapting – by rebuilding itself stronger than before to handle the increased physical stress of the exercise.  What that means is that your body will be able to sustain that original level of intensity for a longer time, or it will be able to sustain a more intense workout in the same amount of time.

Doing this challenge for a month, you will probably notice that you get less tired doing the same amount of exercise.  That means your body is adapting to the exercise.  You may also notice that you can actually do the same work faster over time.  My suggestion is that you continue increasing your amount of effort and/or your time/number of reps in gradual upward steps, which will keep challenging your body to physically adapt to more and more effort.

If you like to keep a log or diary of your exercise activity you will be able to see this effect in action. Record things like number of repetitions, how many minutes it takes you to do a certain task, how many minutes you can hold a position like plank, how fast you run, what weights you are lifting, etc. You’ll  probably amaze yourself.

A good fitness challenge should push your limits in a reasonable way, and it should basically showcase your body’s ability to adapt to physical exercise.  The net result, over a month, should be a noticeable increase in your ability to do physical tasks.  That means you will become increasingly better-suited to do physically active tasks, and that is what is known as “fitness”.

Keep challenging your limits, and strive to improve your overall fitness.  Send me some stories of your experiences as you take charge of improving your personal fitness.