I am officially an over achiever

Today my trainer showed me a notice from the corporate headquarter of the 24 hour fitness gyms that he received in the mail. The notice defines the exercise guidelines as defined by the USDHHS, The American College of Sports Medicine and the American Heart Association.

According to these guidelines, in the Adult (ages 18-64) category the suggested guidelines recommended 30 minutes of moderate exercise (raking leaves, play golf, biking or car washing) five times a week or 15 minutes of vigorous (climbing stairs, play sports or walking uphill) exercise 5 times a week. For added cardio fitness one should increase the above listed activity/activities to 60-90 minutes 5 days a week.

For strength exercises they recommend 8-10 strength training exercises with 8-12 repetitions of each exercise and cite push ups and sit ups as good examples.

As the trainer Pointed out to me I routinely live in the hour a day of weight and resistance training along with an hour a day of cardio involving elliptical, running, treadmill, or indoor trainer, 6 days a week plus another couple of hours of biking during the week.

Apparently this makes me an over achiever. I've never before been considered an over achiever so this makes me feel very good, but also a bit appalled by the rather low standards of these institutions.

I think the bar is set way too low. Too many people look at these recommendations as a norm or maximum and view anything over and above as obsessive...which we all know is bunk.

Seems a little low to me...but I think we're in good company as 'over achievers' on this forum! :)

Seems low to me too? But then again, I wouldn't have anywhere near the time for 2 hours of exercise a day unless I could average it out over the week. And I don't even have kids or a family to care for.

I try to make up for not having time to exercise on the days that I teach by pacing and bouncing on my toes all afternoon. But...hardly equivalent.

60-90 Minutes of cardio exercise 5 times a week plus added strength training doesn't seem so low to me?
Of course there will be a lot of people on this forum who do more, but it's probably still way more than the average person does...

I'm not sure if I average more than that (there are recovery days or some days where I can't get any exercise in).

Marni, your training schedule sounds hard - you can be very proud of yourself :)

When you look at the minimum (the 15 minutes of raking leaves 5x a week) it does seem minimal. But, if you do the "recommended" of 60-90 minutes 5x a week, I think a lot of us would fall in that category. Like today, I did a 30 minute run on the treadmill and 10 minutes of core work. I sweated. My HR was up. But, I don't have time for more. I do stuff like this twice a week, maybe three times. Sure, I am doing 1-3 hour rides a couple of times a week later in the season, as well as lots of short rides of about 45 minutes. I do stuff 6 days a week. Something. I just choose not to do the type of training that some people here do. I am not training for anything and I like some down time...
And people think I am obsessed.

It sounds like we are all overachievers but how many people do you know outside of your training circle, that actually do the recommended amount?

DH and I train at least an hour a day, most days more than that and sometimes twice a day. The weekends are filled with long swims, runs and bike rides. I will admit that training for triathlons consumes your life and doesn't leave much time for anything else besides work and sleep but I love it. It's become our lifestyle. At my age, I figure I only have about 8 years of training this hard if I don't injure myself, then I will slow down. I wonder what the guidelines will be then?

:)That's great marni.

Meanwhile I just walk 6 kms. round trip these days to work.

You are an achiever and it keeps you healthy.

Way to go Marni!! Doesn't it feel good? I'm always surprised when my dr. mentions that I workout WAY more than most people. Especially since in the company that I keep, I work out WAY LESS than most of them ;) I get probably 7-8 hours of working out a week total. But in the summer its more as I play with the kids outside and take them for walks/bike rides.