To address Mustaq’s question, there are a couple of different important points to answer your question, regarding unplanned weight training.
First off, working out anything unplanned, does not accomplish anything. If we start right from the beginning, you need to understand the choices in the area of fitness that exists, and what each of these options can (and cannot) do for you.
For instance, if you get interested in Cardio sports such as Long Distance Running, Bicycling, Swimming etc, that’s really great. But, you need to understand that they don’t get your body very strong overall.
Strength Training has its benefit with regard to getting you very strong overall, builds muscle (I am not talking about body building), gets your bones dense/strong, so that they don’t fracture when you fall etc., improves your sense of balance, so that you don’t fall (this is especially important as you get older…think of how many elders among us have fallen and broken their hips!!!)…
What’s more Strength Training improves your heart health greatly and also improves your Cardio !!!
And then, there are other things like Yoga, which improves your body flexibility…and many other options.
Once you get to understand the options and choose what might be best for you, then, please set a goal for your fitness. Then work towards the goal. This really is the difference between “Exercising” and “Training”
Exercising is what you do in the gym, whenever you go there and without any plan or purpose or knowledge about what to do (and how to do). So, if you see people on the treadmill, that’s what you do… If you see people on the lat pull-down, that’s what you do… and if you see people doing bicep curls (gosh !!!!) then, that’s what you do. This accomplishes NOTHING.
This is one point. The other point is, let’s take the instance where you see people on the Bench Press. So, you also proceed to do some Bench Presses. So, you start low and see the other guys do 80 kgs (or more) bench press. You want to do 80 too, so you try that yourself !!! Bam… you don’t know proper form, and the weight is just TOO heavy for you…for today. So, you get yourself injured… Really bad… And, then, you can’t go to the gym again for a long time.
So, on both the above counts, please ensure that there is no unplanned activity with regard to fitness/health.
Just as nothing else (such as anything at your work place) happens without a plan/purpose, the same holds true for your fitness regimen too.
Let us know if you have any more questions…