Now Is The Perfect Time To Reassess Your Fitness Program

Some of you will be excited by all the motivational talk about jumping into fitness, starting new programs, looking forward to a fit new year.

For these readers, in my third ever post, I gave you 4 steps to starting a fitness program.

Quickly outlined for those who haven't read it and can't be bothered going back:

1. Test your fitness to work out where you are at and where you you might be particularly weak.
2. Look at your schedule and find spaces where you can realistically do exercise.
3. Start slow - you are starting a lifestyle of fitness, not training for a competition next week.
4. Be fit for fitness sake - that is to say, make sure you have your motivation sorted out.

However, some of you will have been plodding or powering away at a program for quite a while.
In Australia, you might have started it in spring with the warming weather, so have been going for 3-4 months on your program. You find all this talk of starting anew a little bit boring, and want something more aimed at you.

Well, this is aimed at you: start again fresh!

When was the last time you tested out how much fitter you are now? Have you reviewed your program? Have you taken into accounts changes in your schedule this coming year; new family member, changes to your working hours, a new must-see TV program?

Every few months you should be reassessing your fitness and the program to make sure it is correctly adapted. Are you increasing the distance, weight or speed to make sure you are being challenged, and your muscles have not just adapted to the same repetitive motions?

Here are some steps to help you reassess your current program:

- review your goals: are you still aiming for the same thing, or have you found something new to aim towards?

- what have your results over the past few months been like? Have you continued to improve, or have you actually seen a decrease in performance? Can you pin-point what is working and what isn't?

- Is your program balanced? For a while you might want to focus on improving a particular area, such as increasing your arm strength, but for long term health and vigor, you need to make sure you are building up all aspects of your body in equal proportion. This will reduce the risk of injury (and funny bulging muscles out of place!). Also, mix up your high intensity with slower, longer sessions to build both speed and endurance (as well as allowing your body to recover, see below).

- Time for variety! No matter why you are exercising, every now and then chuck in something completely new just to keep your body on its toes. If you are a jogger, try a crossfit workout. If you are a weight lifter, maybe a gymnastics class. Be adventurous and look out for new things!

- Finally: are you factoring in enough rest? Muscles are built when your body repairs from the work of a session. So if you don't give it time to repair, you are just damaging yourself. Hard sessions can easily be mixed in with some aerobic exercise which will increase your fitness and means you don't need to do nothing on your rest days. 'Active Recovery' is what it is all about, just make sure it is recovery and that you don't start pushing yourself again. 

Now that you have considered all this, here are some more practical thoughts on your training plan.

The plan should be both weekly (eg. Monday - Strength training, Wednesday - Endurance/long run, Friday - speed work, etc.) and on a larger cycle to ensure increased performance over the year. 

For evaluating the actual weekly activities, keep in mind FITT:

• F - frequency - how often should/can you exercise?
• I - intensity - how hard should you exercise?
• T - time - how long should each session last?
• T - training activity - what exercise or training activity will help achieve your fitness goals?

An easy way to develop the larger framework of a program is to work in four week cycles: for the first 3 weeks increasing speed/strength/distance by 10% each week, and then fourth week is a recovery week, so keep everything light. Then start again and keep building up. The week recovery will make sure you aren't over training.

So, this week's challenge is to actually take the time to sit down and write out your goals and plan a proper program for the next few months, until it starts getting cold (a good time to change your exercise patterns to include more indoor activities!)

And if you have any questions, or good suggestions, please share!

Sneak Preview: 

Tomorrow I'll look at some tips for starting a strength training program. They are really nothing to be scared of, and can leave you feeling (and looking) great! Climb steps in a single bound, carry shopping with one finger! All this, and more...

Maffetone Method Part 2: The Practicals.

So, are you intrigued yet about how to actually apply this method?

Well, as mentioned in the previous post, the Maffetone method is not a rigid program such as Couch to 5k which tells you what to do every workout of the week. Rather, it is a set of principles for how to approach exercise (as well as diet and lifestyle, but here I’m going focus mainly on the exercise component).

But, that doesn’t mean you can’t develop a practical application. In order to create a program, you need to include two aspects in order to be considered suitable by Maffetone standards:

1.     The majority of your exercise program should be focused on developing aerobic fitness.

2.     Every exercise program needs to involve ongoing testing to evaluate its effectiveness and to identify when problems start to arise.

Aerobic Fitness = Working out at your Maximum Aerobic Heart Rate:

If you google Dr. Maffetone, you will find quite a bit on his 180 formula. This is a method for working out your maximum aerobic heart rate.

As mentioned in the series on heart rate, a lot of programs are based on exercising within particular heart rate bands, usually based on a percentage of maximum.

However, Dr. Maffetone suggests that instead of working on a percentage of maximum, which can be difficult to work out and is very variable between individuals, you should work out within a 10 bpm range of your maximum aerobic heart rate, worked out by his rough formula:

180 – your age, then:

-       Minus 10 if you are recovering from serious injury or illness or have been on long term medication.

-       Minus 5 if you haven’t exercised regularly for the last few years, have been exercising with an injury, have been regressing in training or have more than 2 colds per year 

-       Stay at this number if you have been exercising regularly for a few years without any problems.

-       Plus 5 if you are a competitive athlete who has been improving and had none of the above problems.

(Though note that over 65 or under 16 this needs to be individualised as the formula breaks down a bit).  

So, for me it would be 180 – 29 and minus another 5 as I get colds all the time = 146.

Then take 10 to give you your range. So, the majority of my workouts should be between 136-146 bpm.

Now, if you go and try that, you will find out why the theory has been considered with some skepticism: 140 can be a walk for a lot of people. I went through a really annoying stage where the range was just in between a jog and walk, so I did this sort of shuffle thing when outside, or just put up the incline and walked when on a treadmill.

However, the claim of the program is that if you continue to do this, you will get faster, but your heart rate will stay the same, demonstrating an increase in your aerobic fitness.

In turning this into a work, he includes a long warm up and cool down of 15 minutes each, slowly building up to the required heart rate and then building down again. This can result in a ‘workout’ of only 15 minutes at the require heart rate, or for beginners it might even just be a warm up and cool down.

In developing a long term program, he recommends spending 3-6 months doing nothing but aerobic work, and only after that, once you have a suitable base, can one or two anaerobic sessions can be added.

Testing:

The second important aspect of the method is constant measurement in order to tell if you are actually improving.

As the method claims to focus on building aerobic fitness and increasing the body’s fat burning, he suggests two tests that should be done on a monthly basis to ensure everything is on course.

1.     Fat Burning: Obviously if you increase your fat burning ability, this should be seen in a decrease in body fat content. While this can be worked out using complicated measurements, he suggests just using a waist to hip measurement ratio to see if the program is working.

a.     So once a month (not more often) you should measure your waist at the height of your belly button, and again at the widest part of your hips.  Then work out your waist to hip ration: waist/hip.

b.     He argues that if your aerobic system is developing properly, this ratio will gradually diminish, along with your excess fat.

2.     Speed: Similarly, Maffetone recommends conducting a Maximum Aerobic Function Test (MAF test) once per month. The test requires maintaining the same heart rate over the same distance or time, and repeating the test every month.

a.     For example, I would try to maintain a heart rate of 145 over a distance of 1 mile and ideally every month my time would improve. Or I could test myself for 10 minutes and see how far I got in the same time.

b.     He starts with examples of 1 mile, but does mention that some prefer to do a longer distance such as 5 miles to add an element of endurance. Either is fine, though with the 5 miles he notes the time for each mile for comparison.

c.      He argues that if your MAF test results start to worsen, it is an indication that there is a problem such as excess stress, dietary/nutritional imbalance or a physical problem.

And that’s it. Work out at an aerobic heart rate and keep measuring yourself to make sure you are improving.

So, your challenge for this week:

Work out your Maximum Aerobic Heart Rate range, and then do initial tests to work out your waist to hip ration and baseline MAF test score.

Next post, I’ll look at some of the critiques of the method and general verdicts.

Heart Rates Part 2: Maximum Heart Rate

So, have you worked out your resting heart rate yet? 

Well, now that you have that, the next important figure to work out is your maximum heart rate. Why, I hear you ask? (Well, probably not, but you should, because it is an important question).

Maximum heart rate is not the rate that you should aim to exercise at, just to make that clear at the beginning. However, a lot of training programs work on a series of exercises that focus on maintaining a particular % of your maximum or your heart rate reserve (more on that in a later post). Therefore, to use these programs most effectively you need to know your max. 

Many of you would have been told to calculate your maximum heart rate based on a formula that uses your age. 

The most common formula I've come across is 220 - your age = maximum heart rate. (Some now adjust that to 226 - your age for females).

Therefore, since I'm 29, my maximum would therefore be 191 or 197.

Online calculators like the one at My Dr ask only for your age and from that tell you what you should be working out at, apparently using the 220 formula as they recommend 191 for me.  

Anyone else see any problem with this? That all males and females, regardless of exercise history, health, anything like that all have the same maximum heart rate? True maximum heart rate does not change like resting heart rate does, but still, there must be more variation than that!

Considering 2 years ago I used to sit on 198/199 for roughly half an hour once a week, I some how doubt that those figures given are my maximum. (By the way, totally do not recommend working at that level, I just had little choice.)

There has been a lot of research into the area, which I think has been summarized nicely by Brian Mac, who then allows you to enter your age (though didn't ask for gender, which is strange as that is one variable he discusses), sport and level (average/elite) and will then give you a range of answers based on the different research he discussed. Highly recommend you check it out to show how much formulae can vary.  

However, while using a formula can be alright to give you a general idea, since they can vary +/-20 beats, it's probably worth doing some testing yourself. 

© Julos | Stock Free Images & Dreamstime Stock Photos

An accurate, but expensive, way is to go to a sports clinic and actually have a maximum heart rate stress test performed. They hook you up to a whole lot of fancy equipment and make you run on a treadmill. The results come with a lot of other important and interesting information, so is worth the money. The only downside that I've heard from friends (I haven't done it myself) is that you are doing a one off test. If you are slightly sick that day, aren't prepared to push yourself as hard as you otherwise might, etc. the results can come in lower than they might otherwise be. 

The other cheaper, but less accurate on a once off test, is to perform similar tests yourself. 

NOTE: I recommend having someone with you when you do this, in case of a medical emergency.

Also, you will need a heart monitor for this. Using the ones on a treadmill isn't really practical, as it is not safe to run with your hands on the grips over a speed of about 6.5km/h. A band around your chest with a watch that you can program with your age and gender is much better. (I'll do another post later on different models of heart rate monitor. For this, if you haven't got one yet, try to borrow a good one off a friend, or you can pick up cheap ones at Big-W and places like that usually for around $30 (the expensive ones start at around $200, so you are saving a lot).)

Polar (heart rate monitor company) gives these two tests to try out: (note that they expect you to know what 85% of your maximum heart rate is already, which is a bit counter intuitive, but you can use a formula for a basic number).

Sub maximal heart rate test

A sub maximal test is not as specific as the VO₂ Max test, however it is more individual than the age based formula and it can be performed readily in the field.

Example 1: Running

Ensure the Polar heart rate monitor is set to display heart rate in beats per minute. You must first perform a 15-20 minute warm up with your heart rate gradually reaching 85% of your maximum heart rate.

Now, on a running track or other open environment, perform a 2 minute run at maximal effort, recover for 2 minutes (either remain stationary or slow walk) and then perform a second 2 minute run at maximum effort. Take note of the highest heart rate value reached either in the first or second interval and add 5 additional beats to the highest value. This number can now be used as your maximum heart rate.

Example 2: Cycling

Ensure the Polar heart rate monitor is set to display heart rate in beats per minute. You must first perform a 15-20 minute warm up with your heart rate gradually reaching 85% of your maximum heart rate.

Now, at the base of a hill which has a steady gradient of approximately 4-5%, perform a 3-4 minute seated climb at maximal effort, in a gear that allows you to maintain a cadence of 60-70rpm. Take note of the highest heart rate value reached. Add 5 additional beats to the highest value and this new number can be used as your maximum heart rate.

These are good as they are pretty simple, and as long as you have a heart rate monitor, you can do it almost anywhere, any time. 

However, as a rower, my favourite is based on the Concept 2 suggestion. It is hell, but I think more accurate. Please note, this is for generally healthy, fit people without any heart conditions.

They suggest a Step Test. The Polar method is two sets of maximum effort, which is good that they did it twice but most of the time when we jump from a lower rate to a higher rate, we don't really know how far our maximum really is. This test, on the other hand, gets you to work up step by step until you utterly cannot continue ('until you blow' is their wording).

Most gyms will have a Concept 2 rowing machine, but make sure you know the proper technique before trying to do this test or you might end up straining something or taking out someone else's eye (oh you laugh, but not as much as I laugh at the people who think they can row at my gym!). 

It's easiest if you know how to set the machine to do 1.30min intervals. If not, I recommend having a friend next to you monitoring your heart rate and reminding you to step up ever 1.30mins. 

Start off rowing at an easy rate that gives you a heart rate of 140bpm. If you have already warmed up, you only need to do this for 1.30mins, but if you haven't warmed up already, I personally recommend just doing a few more minutes to make sure you don't injury yourself. 

Now, if you can put your display so it is showing watts, every 1.30mins step up 25 watts. If you can't get it to display watts (though it's quite simple, just press the 'change display' button until it cycles through to watts) then you can just do it based on split using the table below.

Watts	25	50	75	100	125	150	175	200
500m	4:01.0	3:11.3	2:47.1	2:31.8	2:20.9	2:12.6	2:06.0	2:00.5
Watts	225	250	275	300	325	350	375	400
500m	1:55.9	1:51.9	1:48.4	1:45.3	1:42.5	1:40.0	1:37.7	1:35.6
Watts	425	450	475	500	525	550	550	600
500m	1:33.7	1:32.0	1:30.3	1:28.8	1:27.4	1:26.0	1:24.7	1:23.8

And as the name 'Step Test' suggests, you keep stepping up every minute and a half until you feel like you are going to die. 

Well done, that's your maximum heart rate. (Though, some people do recommend adding on 5bpm all the same.)

So, this week's challenge: using either one of the Polar Methods, or if you are feeling brave the Concept 2 method, test out your maximum heart rate.

Heart Rates Part 1: Your Resting Heart Rate

Why should you know your own heart rate before, during and after exercise? Why monitor your heart rate, and does working out at specific heart rates work better than at specific speeds?

This is the first in a series of posts on understanding your own heart rate and how to use that information to better tailor your exercise programs. Understanding your own heart rate, your maximum hr, your anaerobic thresholds, and your resting rate is pretty much fundamental for beginning any sort of serious exercise program.

In a later posts I will look at working out your maximum heart rate, understanding the different thresholds, and exercise programs based on working out at specific heart rates, such as the much discussed Maffetone Method. But today we start at the beginning: your resting heart rate.

Your heart rate, as might be very obvious, is the speed at which your heart is pumping. When your muscles require more blood, your heart pumps faster, when you are at rest your heart pumps slower. However, a higher heart rate doesn't always mean you are doing good things to your body. Your heart also pumps faster when it is stressed or sick, or if it is working very inefficiently.

So, do you want a high resting heart rate or a low one?

One of the biggest aims of fitness is to have your body able to do more with less effort. You want to be able to run faster with your heart pumping slower, because this means its not as stressed. Generally speaking, as you get fitter, your resting heart rate will go down. Your heart will be able to pump more blood with less effort.

Therefore, it is important to work out at the beginning of a program what your current resting heart rate is, which lets you know how fit you are now, and gives you a basis to see if you are improving later.

Working out your resting heart rate is super easy and needs only a clock that counts seconds.

It's best to take your resting heart rate just after waking up, but any time you have been lying still and not moving for a period of time will work (this is one of the few times I'm going to recommend watching TV, so enjoy it.)

Find your pulse either at your radial artery on your wrist just below your thumb or at your carotid artery in your neck. Make sure you are using just your index and middle finger to find the pulse, as your thumb has a slight pulse of its own and can confuse the counting.

Now, time yourself and count how many times it pulses in ten seconds. Then times this by 6 and you have your resting heart rate in beats per minutes. (You can also count for 30 seconds and times it by 2, if you feel this is more accurate, or count for the full 60 seconds, as with only 10 seconds miss-counting by one can have a much larger effect.)

It is suggested that:
60 or below beats per minute: = a fit athlete.
60- 80 bpm = average.
81-100 bpm = is high, but ok.
101 + bpm = not so good.

It is best to record your heart rate every morning for a week to try and get an average as its quite easy to have an unusual reading, such as waking up after a scary dream.

If you are serious about a new exercise program, particularly if you are an athlete, it is highly recommended that you take your resting heart rate every single morning. The major reason for this is that your resting heart rate will generally go up 10 bpm if your body is starting to fight an illness, and is a good indicator that you should cut down on your training until it returns to normal. This is an excellent way to try and avoid over-training.

Now that you know your resting heart rate, in the next post we will look at your maximum heart rate.

4 Steps to Starting a Fitness Program

So, you've found my blog and it's inspired you to start a new fitness program (or, more likely, you were inspired to start a fitness program and happened to stumble upon my blog: good going you!)

Let me guess, you have decided you will be able to work out everyday, and you will take on all of Crossfit's advice and do weights, endurance work, speed, power, flexibility work, every week, as well as buying all the latest equipment, new shoes, home gym, why not a Pilates machine? 

Don't do it to yourselves, people!

Everyone has heard this before, but I'm going to say it again: yes, set goals, goals are awesome, but be realistic.

Haven't been able to fit in ANY exercise for the past few months? Tried a few times and were so crippled with pain that you couldn't move for the next few days?

We are trying to create a lifestyle of fitness, not a few days. 

Follow these four basic steps, and it could be a lot easier.

1. Do some sort of fitness testing.
So, back in high school you were on the track team and could run 10km in under 40mins. So, you think 'it's been a few years, but not that much has changed, I'm sure I could do it in under 50 at least'. So you start going to the gym, setting the treadmill to 14km per hour (does that work out? I'm a writer, not a mathematician! Work with me here).
Or you test out touching your toes, and you are super at that, so therefore all the rest of your fitness aspects must be fine too. Right? Right?
You get my point.
Well, just in case you didn't: if you try to set up an exercise program without knowing where you are currently, you will either make it way too hard and get upset with yourself that you can't do it or try to and hurt yourself, or make it so ridiculously easy you will never improve.

2. Look at your schedule and be prepared to make sacrifices.
Surprisingly, even once you take up a new fitness goal you still only have 24 hours in a day and strangely, every day up until now you have managed to fill up all that time without including exercise. 
So, you can't just say 'I'm going to exercise between 8.30-9am' because that time is already taken with something. You actively need to identify areas where you can sacrifice what you were doing and add in exercise instead. If it means sleep, make sure you are still getting enough. My recommendation is to choose a few TV programs that you usually watch, but haven't been so good this season, and say that when it comes on, you get out the door.

3. Start slow.
Okay, so jumping in there and feeling like a superstar on the first day does give you a little rush. But not being able to walk for the next three days tends to put a cramp on your style. (By the way, that wonderful feeling that springs up a day or two after you exercised, that's called DOMS - Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness. For a easy to understand article check out What Causes DOMS after exercise.)

I like Stew Smith's advice for starting a new lifestyle program: make it a year long project.
He divides the year into thirds and suggests spending the first 1-4 months doing nothing but aerobic exercise such as walking (jogging if you are a bit fitter), swimming, biking etc.  (For a good definition of aerobic/anaerobic if you are new to the terms check out this article at My Food Diary. Just to warn you, have only read this article, do not know anything else about the site.) He also suggests drinking a lot of water, which is good, but seems a bit random.
For this you can start with nothing but a pair of shoes, or even no shoes if you are into barefoot running, so don't put it off because you have no spare cash. Walking enough to make you breathless is all it takes.
In the next third, you can start bringing in strength and weight training. Try to stick to the 10% rule - only increase your workouts by a maximum of 10% at a time: 10% further, 10% longer, or 10% heavier weights.
By the final third, Smith suggests to start looking at other aspects of your life that could help in a healthy lifestyle, such as giving up smoking.

I like it because it's simple, sensible advice. 

4. Be fit for fitness sake.
This is something I'm going to talk about later, but are you exercising only to lose weight? Be honest, are you? It's fair enough, I've done it, lots of people have done it, the TV tells us to do it all the time.

However, more and more research is coming out which suggests that weight loss is actually 80% what you eat and 20% exercise. So, focusing on exercise alone is not the best thing for weight loss. It's also not the best thing for your exercise plan, because basically, if you find you aren't losing the weight, you stop being motivated to do the plan. And being fit is more important than being thin.

Having said that, here is my suggestion: struggling to lose weight and feel bad about yourself? Forget about it, and start an exercise plan focused on fitness for its own sake.

Trying to get out of bed early to go for a jog AND starve you is usually asking too much. Just starving yourself is unlikely to motivate you to also get out of bed at 5am (though admittedly losing some weight can make exercise a lot easier).

However, start exercising just because you want to be healthy and fit, and two things will happen:
1. You mood will improve. Exercise is a great mood enhancer (if you don't kill yourself).
2. You will want to eat better to feed your body so it can operate at its best.

You will want to eat better and suddenly have more will power to do so... it's a win-win situation.

Admittedly, sometimes after exercising, people can try to compensate and overeat, but I can't help you if you are determined to sabotage your own efforts. For aerobic exercise, you do not need to compensate by eating more unless you have already found you are losing large amount of weight, which for a lot of people is the goal.
(Guys, and some girls, I know you want to put on weight, but will have to wait until another post. Just don't think I've forgotten you, I haven't.)

That's just a brief introduction for those who want to start an exercise plan, but don't know how.
I've tried to explain all the specialised terms, without treating everyone too much life 5th graders (though those 5th graders appear to be damn smart), but if there is anything you are unclear on, let me know.

What is Fitness?

Fitness Definition

Where better to start than with a definition (yup, it's the old academic coming out in me). However, people do have seriously different concepts of what fitness is, so it's not as silly as it sounds.

A very detailed definition that I rather like comes from the Crossfit Journal. If you have never heard of Crossfit, they are insane and I love them, so you will hear more about the program. Feel free to check it out at www.crossfit.com

In their introductory journal article they have a very long and detailed definition of various aspects which should be considered under fitness which I recommend reading. However, these are summarised into ten points.

"GENERAL PHYSICAL SKILLS
If your goal is optimum physical competence then all the general physical skills must be considered:

1. Cardiovascular/respiratory endurance - The ability of body systems to gather, process, and deliver oxygen.
2. Stamina - The ability of body systems to process, deliver, store, and utilize energy.
3. Strength - The ability of a muscular unit, or combination of muscular units, to apply force.
4. Flexibility - the ability to maximize the range of motion at a given joint.
5. Power - The ability of a muscular unit, or combination of muscular units, to apply maximum force in minimum time.
6. Speed - The ability to minimize the time cycle of a repeated movement.
7. Coordination - The ability to combine several distinct movement patterns into a singular distinct movement.
8. Agility - The ability to minimize transition time from one movement pattern to another.
9. Balance - The ability to control the placement of the bodies center of gravity in relation to its support base.
10. Accuracy - The ability to control movement in a given direction or at a given intensity."


Having said that, my absolute favourite definition of fitness/laziness comes from Terry Pratchett:
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In a sense that his tutors couldn't quite define, and much to their annoyance, Victor Tugelbend was also the laziest person in the history of the world.

Not simply, ordinarily lazy. Ordinary laziness was merely the absence of effort. Victor had passed through there a long time ago, had gone straight through commonplace idleness and out on the far side. He put more effort into avoiding work than most people put into hard labour...

People who didn't apply themselves to the facts in hand might have thought that Victor Tugelbend would be fat and unhealthy. In fact, he was undoubtedly the most athletically-inclined student in the University. Having to haul around extra poundage was far too much effort, so he saw to it that he never put it on and he kept himself in trim because doing things with decent muscles was far less effort than trying to achieve things with bags of flab.

Moving Pictures, Terry Pratchett.

So, my basic definition of fitness is to be able to do anything required with ease.

Fitness Tests

So, I'll finish today with two general fitness tests for you to try.

Australian Army: 
The Australian Army measure three things for fitness: push-ups, sit ups and then the infamous beep test (also known as shuttle run) or sometimes a 2.4km run.
You can download an MP3 for the shuttle run from the Defence Force website. There appears also to be some apps for this which could work well but I haven't tried any yet.

Male requirement: 15 Push-ups, 45 Sit-ups, 7.5 Shuttle run score
Female requirement: 8 Push-ups, 45 Sit-ups, 7.5 Shuttle run score

For Special Forces Direct Recruiting Scheme (SFDRS) candidates, the PFA standards are:
Male requirement: 30 Push-ups, 60 Sit-ups, 10.1 Shuttle run score

As you can tell from the above Crossfit definition, this doesn't cover a lot of areas such as flexibility or agility. However, it can be nice to know you are fit enough to get into the army.


BUPA:
I also have downloaded for free an app on my phone (I'm an apple girl, so I don't know if there is an android equivalent) by BUPA (It's an Australian health fund) that starts with a fitness test in four areas: flexibility, balance, core and strength.

Flexibility:
Keeping your legs straight, bend from standing to try and touch your toes, being careful of your back.
1 point if you can get just beyond your knees.
2 points if you can get halfway down your shins
3 points if you can get to your ankles
4 points if you can touch your toes.

Balance:
Stand on one foot with your other leg bent at 90 degrees (like you are about to step up onto a box) for as long as you can. You may use your arms to balance, but cannot hold onto anything.
1 point for 0 seconds
2 points for 5-10seconds
3 points for 15 seconds
4 points for 20+ seconds

Core:
The plank test. Start by lying on your front, tuck your toes under and push up onto your forearms. You should aim to maintain a flat spine. Hold it for as long as possible without dropping or raising your hips.




(image stolen from: femalesintraininggym.com, no it's not me, sadly)

1 point for 10 seconds
2 points for 20 seconds
3 points for 40 seconds
4 points for 1+ minutes.

Strength:
Distance hop test. Measure out 6 meters on a flat area. The aim is to cover the 6ms in as few hops as possible. Hops are on one foot only.
1 point for 7+ hops.
2 Points for 6 hops
3 points for 5 hops
4 points for 4 hops.

Based on these four exercises, BUPA suggest you identify where you need to improve (though this doesn't take into account cardio at all, which the beep test does).

So, try doing both tests and if you are confident, post below your scores.