Important Note: Please check out this forum post titled “The Simple Guide to Getting into Shape Discussion” for more information and to comment and contribute on this developing guide to fitness. Thanks!

Before the industrial revolution, fitness was defined simply by how well you could perform your tasks of labor. It was purely functional. It was efficient, and it was necessary.

If you did not have the cardiovascular stamina to survive long hours of work, or if you lacked the muscular strength to carry heavy weight, then it was safe to say that you were going to have a very, very difficult time working manual labor.

In those days, it was even considered good to be heavy and out of shape, since someone who wasn’t in shape clearly wasn’t doing manual labor, and thus, was rich.

After the industrial revolution, all of this changed. Outside of a few jobs that are still around today, like mining, construction, and shipping, jobs no longer required the intense physical strength and endurance that they once had.

The general populace stopped possessing the natural fitness that was just a few years before absolutely necessary, and seemingly, physical strength and endurance was wiped from the public conscience.

Weight Lifting: For Circus Freaks Only?

Despite being off the radar for the general population, there was one segment of society that had continued interest in physical strength and endurance. The strongman.

The strongman was someone who was physically powerful, had endurance, and could perform enormous feats of strength. Strongman made their living by being a part of the circus.

[A strongman pulling a heavy weight with his teeth back in the 1920s. Don't try this at home!]

Their circus acts were the precursors to modern day weight lifting competition like powerlifting. When fitness came back into style, the strongman had a tremendous influence in the kind of workouts that were developed, and recent movements like Crossfit would most likely never have surfaced without the strongman.

Fitness - Back In Style

In the 1960’s, physical conditioning was back, with a vengeance. Due to an extremely popular book on cardio penned by an exercise physiologist and a physical therapist who were both in the United States Air Force, there was a new cardio craze.

People were now gauging there fitness levels not by how much they could lift, but by how much endurance they could have. The new thing was to train the heart, not the muscles.

That being said, outside of running and the power lifters, there was a new push for people to gain functional fitness outside of cardio by use of weight lifting and body weight exercises. Fitness was now on the radar, and while it would go through many changes in the coming years, it wasn’t going to go away.

Why Fitness is Important

Fitness has been shown to give you more energy, help fight sickness, strengthen the heart, make day to day tasks easier, and help you feel confident and look good.

The important thing with fitness is going about doing it the right way. If done wrongly or without knowing what you need to do to accomplish your goals, you risk injury or just wasting your time. If done correctly, you open the door to taking control over your body, your physical strength, and your health. We'll go greater into detail about how to go about fitness correctly in the coming articles.

Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/aerobic_exercise
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/physical_fitness
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/strongman_%28strength_athlete%29

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