Fitness experts at Lehigh Valley Health Network and Healthy You Fitness in Allentown say people can do four simple tests at home to gauge their strength, flexibility and aerobic endurance.
It starts with seeing how many times you can you stand up and sit down on a chair in 30 seconds.
John Graham said, "Ideally we'd like to see people be able to do 30 repetitions. But a score above 25 is generally considered to be good."
The chair stand test checks lower body strength. The next test, the arm curl test checks upper body strength. Women should use a five pound dumbbell. Men, eight.
"Typically we would like to see people, once again, go one about every second and typically we look for a minimum of 27 is a good score," Graham said.
Next is the 3-minute step test. Using a 12-inch platform or step try to do 24 steps per minute. After three minutes check your heart rate. "That one measures your aerobic endurance. And what we're doing there is assessing your ability to continuously exercise in an oxygen rich environment which measures your heart and lung efficiency and level of health."
You can also check the health of your core muscles with curl up. See how many you can do in a minute, then try it again six months after you've been working out.
Doing this home fitness test before you start a new program and every six months after will help you test to see if you are improving or if you need to make changes. It can also help keep you motivated.
"When you know every six months you're going to retest to see if you've improved, you're going be more motivated to want to continue with your exercise program," Graham said.
For details about the test, visit:
http://www.lvhn.org/Healthy_You_Magazine/March_April_2010/Staying_Fit%7C5510
For assessment normal values, visit:
http://www.lvhn.org/assets/your_lvh/healthy_you/2010-03/fitness-chart.pdf