Fitness column: What fitness trends of 2019 are unsustainable?

The fitness powers that launched the top ten exercise tricks this year, which frankly may have little influence on your next workout. The challenge with most trends is that they disappear as quickly as they arrive. What makes the list this year is often missing from the next.

Here's a quick review of the trends of 2019 (in no particular order) with a few notes on staying power and whether they can boost your health and fitness goals.

Body weight training

Resistance training accomplishes far more than I can fit in this small space. Bodyweight training (ie, push-ups, chinups, etc.) can be done at home with little or no investment. The challenge with bodyweight training is to know what to do when the load is too light or too heavy. With exercise, progression is needed to improve – it's when free weights or resistance bands are useful.

Maintaining Power: Body weight training is not going anywhere. It's a great addition to most workouts.

Fitness Technology

I'm not a big fan of fitness technology. This material is popular not because it works, but because it is modern and looks good. We used to measure fitness for health and performance. Now we track the sleep and the number of steps between your chair and the bathroom. Good old perseverance and hard work is a distant memory.

Staying Power: Sales of wearable technologies are skyrocketing – much like obesity rates. Hmm, maybe there's a correlation. That said, if it works for you, kill yourself. This bling is here to stay – at least until they plant a chip in their brain.

Curious conscious and sober eating

Seriously? Sober curious Eating and drinking with abandonment has become socially acceptable – I dare say encouraged. (Ah, the first world problems.) This year, it seems that abstinence from food and alcohol has received fashionable names. "Wow, I wonder what sobriety looks like. Maybe I'll take a turn!"

Staying Power: Overindulgence is an epidemic and I love the tendency to moderation – not so hot in the names of the modern. Food and alcohol dependence should not be taken lightly. This material is too serious to be labeled with pretentious labels. Let's see if he stays.

Group Training

Even show, different packaging. The step class steps have been replaced by spin bikes, rowers and treadmills – mainly because they produce better results.

Maintaining Power: Group training has existed for years and will continue to thrive in evolving formats. Working with friends increases persistence, and is great for extroverts and people who love crowds, people over five and whooping cough. But you need to find the right fit, since some classes can be quite hardcore.

Shorter classrooms

Finally! The abbreviated class length is being updated for research. In front of cardio, more is not necessarily better – better is better.

Keeping Power: Most people (with the exception of hardcore) have little time or desire for one-hour classes. I hope demand continues like this. If not, just leave the middle of class and lift some weights.

HIIT

Long-lasting cardio sessions to lose weight followed the path of the dodo, although there are certainly enough people chained to mats. Did you know that they used to chafe prisoners on treadmills as torture devices in prisons? No joke, but I digress.

Stamina of energy: Unless the research changes, attacks of HIIT (high intensity interval training) produce the most efficient cardio burn. Boot camps, sprints, ladders, spin bikes and rowers seem to work best. I'll let you know if things change.

All Natural Protein Bars

Somehow it made a top ten list this year (he said with rolled eyes). I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest that 99 percent of you do not need protein supplementation. However, I could be off by one percent.

Maintaining Power: This will be a hit with people looking for an easy solution – or a chocolate bar with protein. Newsflash: Protein supplementation does not help you lose weight, but proper nutrition. Hold the protein bar (and its wearable technology) and get a salad. Better yet, find a watch that presses it every time you overeat.

Older Adults

Not only is this fashionable, but it could have a huge impact on swollen health spending. All research points to incredible results when the elderly exercise. Believe it or not, our more than 55 clients tend to produce the most dramatic gains.

Staying power: this is a difficult one. Make it affordable and people can buy because prescription drugs and euchre are far more tempting than exercise and healthy eating.

Simple Solutions

Increase fruits, vegetables and whole grains. Add regular movement (especially resistance training). Subtract processed foods. I know, this is boring advice, but it produces results through simple changes in your diet and habits.

Staying Power: Proper nutrition and exercise will always be waiting for you.

Paul Robinson has 30 years as a personal trainer, executive, speaker and consultant in the fitness industry. He owns Personal Training at Kneifel Robinson (KR), with his partner Monica Kneifel Robinson, serving St. Albert & Edmonton. KR specializes in helping beginners, boomers and gymnastics phobics to succeed in the studio and online. You can reach them in [email protected]; http://www.krpersonaltraining.com