Understanding the Rate of Perceived Exertion (RPE) scale is like having your own intensity meter providing constant feedback on your exercise routine. The Borg RPE scale (see chart below) gives you an idea of how hard you are training and whether you need to pick up or slow the pace. Having a good approximation of how fast your heart is beating during exercise is a way to ensure you are exercising to reach your goals. RPE Defined The Borg RPE rating scale ranges from 6 to

With the new year in full flow, new gym memberships started up, a personal trainer in your sights, it's also a time of year when fitness resolutions are blown within the first two months, or minor injuries are picked up that effectively put a halt on your plans to lose weight, put on more muscle, run more, or other best endeavour goals. It is worth ensuring your training is focused on shorter term goals for a longer term gain, and therefore the importance of base conditionin

I like kicking.  I like squatting, and cycling.  In fact, I enjoy training... a lot.  And sometimes, my body likes to tell me it's feeling stiff, and so of course the natural and common sense thing to do is stretch tight muscles.  See my article The Routine of Stretching for thoughts on that specific topic... However, in more recent years, there's been fantastic mainstream exposure and explosion of foam rollers in the health and fitness industry, and banding of the term

During my training sessions for competitive full-contact karate tournaments, and indeed amongst many of my peers in other sports, there was always the feeling of the need to train longer and harder to see improvements.  This lead to training days that felt flat, heavy and tiring, resulting in a circular battle of wanting to train harder, because performance in a previous session was sub-optimal; from there we start to see Overtraining Syndrome occuring.  However, as I wrot