Most people try to incorporate some aspects of physical fitness into their daily lives. Even if you don’t lift weights or run several miles a day, small exercises and healthy changes to eating habits can make you feel stronger and more energetic. There are dozens of untrue myths about fitness that always get passed around from person to person, though, and believing these myths can hinder your attempts at achieving physical fitness. Here are five of the most common untrue fitness myths:
Running can hurt your knees.
Many people believe that running can have a negative impact on the joints. A study from 1999 showed that runners have a greater risk than non-runners of developing osteoarthritis later in life. However, newer research shows no connection between running and knee or joint problems. Researchers at Stanford University tracked more than 1,000 runners and non-runners for more than 20 years, and they found no difference in the knees or joints.
Running can often help maintain healthy cartilage instead of wearing it down, and joint problems are more often caused by problems like obesity than regular exercise. However, if you regularly go on long or rigorous runs, you should also do a total-body strength workout once or twice a week to strengthen the muscles that support the knees.
Exercise can counteract bad eating habits.
Experts say that about 80 percent of your physical health and appearance is reflective of your diet, and only 20 percent is reflective of exercise. It’s impossible to compensate for a poor diet with rigorous exercise, and many people also overestimate the number of calories they burn while exercising as well as the other positive effects of exercise. While exercise is important, having a good diet should be a priority if you’re trying to improve your fitness.
You can target specific areas for fat reduction.
Reducing fat in one targeted area of the body, or spot reduction, is not possible. Although you can target specific areas of the body to build muscle, fat disappears evenly from your entire body over time. If you perform strengthening exercises for specific parts of the body, the stronger muscles should become visible once enough excess fat has been broken down.
In order to function, muscle cells need triglycerides, which are stored in fat cells. Triglycerides break down and enter the blood stream, where muscles can use them for fuel. Because your muscles draw them from the blood stream, triglycerides can come from anywhere in the body. Therefore, you can’t control which part of the body breaks down fat first.
The more you sweat, the more muscle you build.
People who have more muscle sometimes sweat more than people who don’t. This is usually because their bodies have adapted to exercise and have improved the ability to cool down quickly through sweating. However, sweat is just your body’s way of cooling down, and it isn’t a sign of how much muscle you’re building or how effective your workout is. You may sweat more during an easier workout than during a tougher one if the conditions are different. If the temperature in the gym is warmer than usual or if you’re doing a workout outside in the hot weather, you’ll sweat more regardless of how much muscle you’re building.
Crunches are the best way to get great abs.
Crunches are the most well-known exercise for building abdominal muscles, but they’re not the most effective. “Crunches burn very few calories, so if you need to lose excess fat on your body before you can see your abdominal muscles, you’ll need to incorporate other exercises into your routine,” said TRUE Health and Wholeness. They also can hurt your spine over time because the exercise requires you to repeatedly bend your back.
There are a variety of alternative exercises to crunches that can be more effective at building abdominal muscles, especially if you incorporate a combination of them into your workout routine. Some of these exercises include front and side planks, bridges, and stability ball exercises.
