Stamina
Stamina refers to the ability to sustain prolonged physical or mental effort. It is a measure of endurance over time and involves being able to withstand fatigue.
When it comes to sports and exercise, stamina enables athletes to continue exerting energy and maintain performance during lengthy competitions, games, or workouts. Good stamina allows you to:
- Keep going without "hitting the wall" where you have to stop due to exhaustion. Athletes often hit this point in a marathon when glycogen stored in muscles gets depleted.
- Bounce back faster between intervals during a HIIT workout so more repetitions can be completed before having to take longer rests.
- Play at a high activity level during an entire soccer or basketball game without needing frequent substitutions.
Some key factors that affect stamina and endurance capacity include:
- Cardiovascular fitness: An efficient heart and lungs that circulate oxygenated blood to working muscles supports sustained activity.
- Fuel stores: Stored muscle glycogen and blood glucose levels fuel long bouts of exercise before being used up.
- Muscular endurance: Having fatigue-resistant slow-twitch muscle fibers allows for longer muscle contractions before reaching exhaustion.
- Mental focus: Pushing past physical discomfort requires mental grit and focus on pacing.
You can improve stamina over time by training. For example:
- Doing regular cardio like running, swimming, cycling to boost cardiovascular capacity. Start slow and increase duration and intensity gradually over weeks.
- Incorporating strength-training to build more fatigue-resistant slow-twitch muscle fibers.
- Adding interval training into workouts to mentally prepare for pushing through discomfort.
With training adaptations, exertion that previously caused exhaustion will feel easier over time as your stamina improves. Activities you do regularly that initially left you tired will eventually feel like you can keep going.