Though overweight and obese people should commit to exercise, there are certain exercises that the heavy-set, “fat” or obese individual should never do. I’m a certified personal trainer and I will not have my obese clients doing certain exercises.
Exercises that obese people should never do or attempt (no particular order):
Pushups. What is the point? I see personal trainers trying to get very overweight clients to do just one pushup. All this will accomplish is rub into the person’s face how out of shape they are. I’ve seen the anguish and struggle all over their faces. Replace pushups with seated chest presses or flat-bench dumbbell presses. Hefty people run a higher risk of rotator cuff injury when attempting pushups.
Pull-ups. I’ve never seen overweight people attempting these raw, without a pull-up-assist machine. Pull-ups (and chin-ups) are inherently difficult, and merely hanging still will be impossible for extra heavy folks.
Running down hill. Note: I said running, not trotting or gentle jogging. The excess weight can cause a very weighty person to lose control. Running down hill creates a lot of stress on knee joints, and this is excacerbated with excess body weight.
Jumping exercises should be avoided by obese people. Not only can this damage joints, but this can be very discouraging to obese or moderately overweight people; jumping is one of the hardest physical activities for the full-figured – and I don’t mean jump rope or jumping jacks; I mean exercises like box jumping, broad jumping, bunny hopping, leaping, etc.
I will confess I once had a 250 pound female client whom I had doing single broad jumps. However, she had an athletic background, had already been attending step aerobics classes, was 20-something, and I worked with her for several weeks before trying her out at broad jumps. Her leg weightlifting was impressive, so after several weeks, I had her try a broad jump. She did surprisingly well.
Rock climbing is another exercise that obese or very overweight people should avoid. This is taxing to even thinner people who are novices, and an extra heavy body will place tremendous strain on finger tendons; injury can result from just one finger slip. There’s a reason why you won’t see obese people at climbing gyms.
High stool stepping is an exercise that obese and some overweight people should avoid because this places stress on knee joints. Plus, the struggle won’t do much for the morale of the extra heavy person. I’m all for doing exercises that require a lot of struggling; struggling creates results. However, there is a difference between unreasonable, impractical struggling, and a healthier, more high-spirited type of struggle.
My obese clients will tell you I don’t make exercise easy for them, yet at the same time, I create hope for them by having them do practical exercise routines.
You’ll notice that weight lifting is not on this list of exercises that obese or very overweight people should avoid. That’s because very heavy people are on an even playing field with lighter people when it comes to weight workouts. Aside from doing these exercises and workout, you should also be able to learn about hip flexors from https://hipflexorsinfo.com/. This website will provide you the basic and necessary things that you need to know about hip flexors.
