The ESP Workout with Stephanie Thielen just posted. No, this is not an aquatic fitness class of mind-bending experiments of clairvoyance, telepathy or precognition. Instead, this water fitness format features 45 minutes of exercises that target skill-related fitness components that can help your class members excel in their daily activities, recreational pursuits and fitness activities.
Aquatic Fitness Class at-a-Glance
ESP stands for Endurance, Strength, Power. This 45-minute class format combines all three components in four 9-minute exercise combinations. Each 9-minute segment features non-stop cardio (Endurance) for 4 minutes, muscle conditioning (Strength) for 3 minutes, and a combination of cardio and strength (Power) as an explosive finish to the block. Watch Stephanie talk more about the workout and then read on for a better understanding of how skill-related fitness training can improve your class members' overall health and wellness.
Improving Daily Living Activities
By Stephanie Thielen
Component of Physical Fitness
Often, we read about the five health-related components of physical fitness which include cardiorespiratory endurance, muscular strength, muscular endurance, flexibility and body composition. These components can be a useful guide to help you achieve physical fitness and promote good health to ensure you lead a well-rounded, active lifestyle.
Exercising has many benefits and some of them are immediate, like improved mood, sleep, insulin sensitivity, and blood pressure. Noticeable benefits after a few months of staying committed to an exercise program include increased muscle mass and flexibility.
Component of Skill-Related Fitness
What you might not be aware of are the six skill-related fitness components that help to develop your level of fitness beyond the basics. Skills include agility, balance, coordination, power, reaction time, and speed. These skills improve performance and your ability to excel in an activity, whether it’s recreational or competitive.
The Workout
The ESP workout is combination of endurance, strength, and power. This is an excellent combination of skills to improve your overall health as well as integrating skills to level up your performance.
Endurance: the ability of your heart and lungs to fuel your body with oxygen; your body’s physical capability to sustain an exercise for an extended period.
Strength: the ability of your muscles to exert force against a resistance.
Power: the ability to perform a task as quickly and as forcefully as you can; power is a combination of speed and strength.
Get Fit and Improve Performance
Many activities we do daily along with life-long activities require a degree of endurance, strength and power. Here are two examples of the ESP in action.
Walking/Running
- Endurance: walking/running several times a week will help to improve your ability to walk/run for longer amounts of time without fatigue.
- Strength: adding leg strength training exercises such as lunges and hip circles can help to improve your ability to walk/run for more distance.
- Power: incorporating power exercises such as squat jumps will help you to walk/run a specific distance but in a shorter time.
Tennis / Pickle Ball
- Endurance: regular exercise that raises your heart rate prepares the body for sustained performance on the court. On average a tennis set is 40 minutes with match lasting several hours. A pickleball match can last up to 75 minutes.
- Strength: adding strength exercises such as lateral lunges, chest presses, and cable rotations help with lateral movement on the court and a strong upper body to serve the ball.
- Power: jumping drills such as one and two footed jumps over cones along with medicine ball throws trains for the explosive power you need to add speed to a serve.
No matter what physical activity you are doing, there is some degree of endurance, strength, and power needed to improve performance. While the ESP workout is not specific to any sport or activity, the aquatic environment is a great way to incorporate these skills. The property of the water lets you train all three skills without having to move to a different environment or use equipment. Practice the ESP workout regularly and notice how your endurance, strength and power improve some of your daily living activities.
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Fitmotivation extends gratitude to Stephanie for returning to Florida for more filming and for sharing her passion with subscribers. Check out her other Fitmotivation videos and stay tuned for more videos posting this fall.