The Fitness League exercise system is a whole-body approach aimed at improving overall fitness and energy levels to enable you to get the most out of your life – whatever your life!

Regular low impact exercise can significantly improve your health and fitness, without risking damage to weight bearing joints. In fact a recent report (European Heart Journal 2000) suggests that it has just as much effect on lowering the risk of heart disease in women, as more energetic exercise. Combining exercise and correct posture with dance and movement will help you get the most from your body's potential for good health, but it will also improve poise, balance, and the way you carry yourself - why not make the most of what you've got?

It is very important to unwind at the end of a busy day, and a regular low impact exercise class will certainly help to leave stress and tension behind, leaving you feeling refreshed and relaxed, but also with new found energy and confidence that you can put to good use.

Everyone needs to exercise, whatever their age. Apart from reducing stress levels, regular exercise improves the function of the heart and lungs, strengthens the muscles to increase stamina, keeps joints supple, and increases circulation.

Start exercising with The Fitness League now and carry it on throughout life. Classes are for everyone, whether you're new to exercise or an old hand, and they are flexible so as to let members exercise at a pace and level to suit their own lifestyle. They're also inexpensive, fun and sociable.

Whatever lifestage you are at, The Fitness League have a class for you. For details of your nearest class search our UK class database, by teacher, town, county or area.

As a woman who leads a busy life you need as much energy as you can get, whether you’re working full or part time, constantly clearing up after teenage kids, or looking after grand-children. Regular exercise is the key to boosting energy levels, but it doesn’t have to mean pain and the panic of that competitive edge at the gym! Events

We all suffer from stress and some of us actually seem to thrive on it, but too much stress can become destructive. Some warning signs are panic attacks, sleeping and digestive problems, tiredness, forgetfulness and headaches. Stress can also mimic physical illness and the symptom vary in each individual.

Exercise is an excellent de-stresser. At least thirty minutes of aerobic activity results in a positive mood change and has been shown to reduce anxiety and muscle tension. Although ultimately one has to face the situation causing the stress, exercising acts as a temporary distraction and enhances feelings of personal control. In addition, exercise results in the increased production of endorphins, the ‘happy hormones’ helping us cope with stress.

A Fitness League class, usually about an hour long, is an excellent way to exercise and has the added benefit of allowing you to help relieve your stress by talking and laughing as well!

Most people reach the peak of their flexibility around the age of 10. After that, over a period of years, the range of movement diminishes as the muscles and tendons around the joint shorten.

Streching keeps your body flexible.

Stretching helps to lengthen the muscles and tendons making them more flexible. As you get older, regular stretching may help to keep you mobile. Keeping the tissues around the joint pliable helps slow down the onset of common degenerative conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis.

If you have restricted flexibility, however, it can be harmful to compensate for a lack of movement in one area by concentrating on stretching another: Your goal should be all-round flexibility.

Benefits of stretching:

• enhances physical performance
• optimises learning, practise and performance of many types of skilled movements
• increases physical and mental relaxation
• promotes development of body awareness
• reduces risk of joint sprain, muscle strain or back problems
• reduces the severity of painful menstruation (dysmenorrhea)
• reduces muscle tension

Breathing is an automatic bodily function. Every day we do it up to 20,000 times without a thought, but most of us don’t use the full potential of our breathing to feel energised and to keep in good health.

Most people breathe only with the top part of the body, which means that they are not fully lowering the diaphragm and expanding the lungs and so are not making the full use of their lung capacity. This is how you breathe if you feel anxious or depressed and it can itself induce stress and tension. Limiting your breath also reduces the oxygen intake to your body and leads to tenseness of the diaphragm, thus restricting movement around the large bowel and causing constipation.

Good posture is very important

Poor breathing is usually connected with poor posture, physical stiffness, tense shoulders, a curved spine and a rigid pelvis, all of which disturb the natural balance of the body. When your breathing is out of balance, the diaphragm, abdomen and pelvis are also out of balance.

Posture is one of the key parts of the Fitness League’s exercise system and something that your teacher will work on regularly – often without you realising! Many exercises are carried out with strong ‘central control’ of the abdomen and these will help you improve your posture, thus helping your breathing. Your classes may also occasionally involve specific breathing exercises which you could then carry out whenever you want to.