Article # 414. Tips on Improving Stamina

Tips on Improving Stamina

In sports and other physical activities, it doesn't matter if you have the will if you don't have the wheels. Being able to perform an exercise or activity once or for a very short time may not help you achieve your workout or competitive goals. Increasing your stamina, also known as endurance, will help you perform longer. Varying your workouts and maintaining proper nutrition will help you increase your stamina.

Exercise Aerobically

When you exercise aerobically, you increase VO2 max, which is your body's ability to use oxygen during exercise. The more you increase V02 max, the more capacity you have to continue exercise. Aerobic exercise not only improves stamina, it also decreases fatigue. Less fatigue will allow you to work longer.

Examples of aerobic exercise you can do to improve your stamina include: cycling, swimming, jumping rope, aerobic dancing, rowing, jumping jacks, skating and jogging. Exercise machines like treadmills, ellipticals, exercise bikes and rowing machines also provide aerobic workouts.

Perform these exercises at 70 to 80 percent of your maximum heart (MHR) for 20 minutes or longer (as your stamina improves), three or more times per week. To calculate your MHR, subtract your age from 220.

Exercise Anaerobically

Anaerobic exercise is high-intensity, start-and-stop exercise, like tennis, football or volleyball. Anaerobic exercise is done at 80 to 90 percent of your heart rate and can't be done for long periods of time (more than 60 to 120 seconds). This type of interval training makes the recovery portion of a workout important, because you continue to use your cardiovascular system during the entire workout, even when you're "resting" (known as the active recovery phase).

By training this way, you improve your ability to recover for the next point or play. Without this ability to recover, you will be playing tired and fatiguing sooner during your match or game. Anaerobic training will increase your capacity to do anaerobic activities, like tennis, football or volleyball, longer.

Examples of anaerobic exercises you can do to increase stamina include sprinting the straightaway of a track and then walking the curves, or bounding (with giant steps) from one end of a gym to the other, then walking back. You can use the exercises or machines in the above list of aerobic workout options, exercising at high intensity for 30 to 60 seconds and then recovering for 90 seconds or several minutes.

Eat Well

During exercise, your body calls on your muscles to perform movements as well as to burn the energy source (fat or glycogen) you are using for that exercise. If you do not have adequate supplies of fuel, your body will not be able to sustain your exercise. Eat an adequate number of calories from carbohydrates, proteins and fat, based on your height and weight to support your desired activity level.