Fight or Flight Fitness

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‘Survival of the fittest‘ goes the famous saying.

But what type of fitness will increase your survival? Just by flipping this famous and apt saying, the most useful fitness is one that will increase your chance of surviving. That seems an obvious point, once you think about it.

There is the general health fitness that will reduce your chances of dying of the epidemic world wide rise of insulin resistance, metabolic syndrome, diabetes, and obesity which all contribute to cardiovascular disease, among a host of other diseases. Any fitness plan that improves the above condition would contribute to better survival in our modern world - and fight or flight fitness will accomplish this (I will explain in future articles).

What are the other situations/conditions that fitness will have an effect on surviving? In the past you needed it everyday of your life just to survive the day. You needed to out-fight attackers and outrun predators (defined by something or somebody you would lose a fight to) - fight or flight. You also probably needed to throw various weapons (stones, spears, etc) for the same past two reasons.

Now humans society developed first at the kin level, but grew to include tribe, village, town, city, nation, etc and arguably our level of individual fighting decreased (though I am sure there could be competing arguments). What is accepted that our modern developed world physical fighting is limited. However, there can still be the situation when you might need the skill and ability to defend yourself.

Fight or Flight choice:

Now in a modern day situation of a confrontation - be it you are being mugged, or just got yourself in the wrong situation - you have two options; fight or flight. You must make an educated decision of what is the best choice. But if you think you are less skilled, size disadvantaged, out gunned, or out numbered - you best choice might be flight - and you better be quick about it.

Flight:

You are not going to be able to stretch, limber up, or warm-up before you have to bust your butt out of your current predicament. Hence one of the most important aspect of fight or flight fitness is sprinting at the drop of a hat (should trademark this). We will be talking about sprint training as well as doing extensive sprint training (if you follow along with the training posts). Of course there will be a gradual buildup to sprinting at a drop of a hat (but once you get there you will have it when you need it).

When was the last time you really sprinted in your life?

So without babbling anymore today I will offer my suggestion for today’s exercise routine (with all the disclaimers of you should see a doctor before starting a new exercise program, you should gradually build up both distance and intensity, etc, etc).

Try sprinting (does not have to be all out - judge based on your current fitness and the last time you actually sprinted in your life) with limited to no warm-up (but don’t go full out if you are not use to this new form of exercise). I would suggest sprinting up a slight incline for 2 reasons: one sprinting up hill will reduce impact (and hence reduce chance of injury) and two by sprinting uphill you will also get more a strenght workout.

Tomorrow, I will tell you how I made out with my sprints and continue detailing the ideas and implementation of fight or flight fitness.

This blog will offer fitness that may keep you alive.

In most survival situations you will not be given a warm up period as you have to fight or flight. You will not know when you have to travel 20, 30 or more miles (and I doubt you will have to travel exactly 26.2 miles - the length of a marathon) and nobody will be handing out ’sport’ drinks to you. You will have to travel all those miles with what ever you happen to be lucky enough to start out with - or find along the way.

Fight or flight fitness is all about preparing you for these type of situations - even though they will be very rare. But maybe even more valuable on the day to day level is the suggestions and exercises I will be offering will get you in fantastic shape in an efficient manner.