Be­ing phys­i­cal­ly ac­tive is a ma­jor step to­ward good heart health. It’s one of your most ef­fec­tive tools for strength­en­ing the heart mus­cle, keep­ing your weight un­der con­trol and ward­ing off the artery dam­age from high cho­les­terol, high blood sug­ar and high blood pres­sure that can lead to heart at­tack or stroke.

It’s al­so true that dif­fer­ent types of ex­er­cise are need­ed to pro­vide com­plete fit­ness. “Aer­o­bic ex­er­cise and re­sis­tance train­ing are the most im­por­tant for heart health,” says Johns Hop­kins ex­er­cise phys­i­ol­o­gist Ker­ry J Stew­art, EdD. “Al­though flex­i­bil­i­ty doesn’t con­tribute di­rect­ly to heart health, it’s nev­er­the­less im­por­tant be­cause it pro­vides a good foun­da­tion for per­form­ing aer­o­bic and strength ex­er­cis­es more ef­fec­tive­ly.”

Here’s how dif­fer­ent types of ex­er­cise ben­e­fit you.

AER­O­BIC EX­ER­CISE

What it does: Aer­o­bic ex­er­cise im­proves cir­cu­la­tion, which re­sults in low­ered blood pres­sure and heart rate, Stew­art says. In ad­di­tion, it in­creas­es your over­all aer­o­bic fit­ness, as mea­sured by a tread­mill test, for ex­am­ple, and it helps your car­diac out­put (how well your heart pumps). Aer­o­bic ex­er­cise al­so re­duces the risk of type 2 di­a­betes and, if you al­ready live with di­a­betes, helps you con­trol your blood glu­cose.

How much: Ide­al­ly, at least 30 min­utes a day, at least five days a week.

Ex­am­ples: Brisk walk­ing, run­ning, swim­ming, cy­cling, play­ing ten­nis and jump­ing rope. Heart-pump­ing aer­o­bic ex­er­cise is the kind that doc­tors have in mind when they rec­om­mend at least 150 min­utes per week of mod­er­ate ac­tiv­i­ty.

RE­SIS­TANCE TRAIN­ING

What it does: Re­sis­tance train­ing has a more spe­cif­ic ef­fect on body com­po­si­tion, Stew­art says. For peo­ple who are car­ry­ing a lot of body fat (in­clud­ing a big bel­ly, which is a risk fac­tor for heart dis­ease), it can help re­duce fat and cre­ate lean­er mus­cle mass. Re­search shows that a com­bi­na­tion of aer­o­bic ex­er­cise and re­sis­tance work may help raise HDL (good) cho­les­terol and low­er LDL (bad) cho­les­terol.

How much: At least two non­con­sec­u­tive days per week of re­sis­tance train­ing is a good rule of thumb, ac­cord­ing to the Amer­i­can Col­lege of Sports Med­i­cine.

Ex­am­ples: Work­ing out with free weights (such as hand weights, dumb­bells or bar­bells), on weight ma­chines, with re­sis­tance bands or through body-re­sis­tance ex­er­cis­es, such as push-ups, squats and chin-ups.

STRETCH­ING, FLEX­I­BIL­I­TY AND BAL­ANCE

What they do: Flex­i­bil­i­ty work­outs, such as stretch­ing, don’t di­rect­ly con­tribute to heart health. What they do is ben­e­fit mus­cu­loskele­tal health, which en­ables you to stay flex­i­ble and free from joint pain, cramp­ing and oth­er mus­cu­lar is­sues. That flex­i­bil­i­ty is a crit­i­cal part of be­ing able to main­tain aer­o­bic ex­er­cise and re­sis­tance train­ing, says Stew­art. “If you have a good mus­cu­loskele­tal foun­da­tion, that en­ables you to do the ex­er­cis­es that help your heart,” he says. As a bonus, flex­i­bil­i­ty and bal­ance ex­er­cis­es help main­tain sta­bil­i­ty and pre­vent falls, which can cause in­juries that lim­it oth­er kinds of ex­er­cise.

How much: Every day and be­fore and af­ter oth­er ex­er­cis­es.

Ex­am­ples: Your doc­tor can rec­om­mend ba­sic stretch­es you can do at home, or you can find DVDs or YouTube videos to fol­low (check with your doc­tor if you’re con­cerned about the in­ten­si­ty of the ex­er­cise). Tai chi and yo­ga al­so im­prove these skills, and class­es are avail­able in many com­mu­ni­ties.

FIND YOUR FAT-BURN­ING ZONE

Dur­ing any work­out, ex­er­cis­ing at your fat-burn­ing heart rate can help pro­mote weight loss. This zone is where you burn the most calo­ries per minute.

To find your fat-burn­ing zone, you will need to cal­cu­late your max­i­mum heart rate first. This is the max­i­mum num­ber of times your heart can beat dur­ing one minute of ex­er­cise.

Your max­i­mum heart rate is 220 mi­nus your age. For ex­am­ple, if you’re 40 years old, your max­i­mum heart rate is 180 beats per minute (220 – 40 = 180).

Gen­er­al­ly, your fat-burn­ing zone is 70 per­cent of your max­i­mum heart rate.

If your max heart rate is 180 beats per minute, your fat-burn­ing zone is 70 per­cent of 180, or 126 beats per minute (180 x 0.70 = 126).

With this num­ber, you’ll know how hard you should work to sup­port weight loss.

While 70 per­cent is the av­er­age fat-burn­ing zone, every­one is dif­fer­ent. Some peo­ple might en­ter the fat-burn­ing zone at 55 per­cent of their max­i­mum heart rate, while oth­ers might need to reach 80 per­cent. It de­pends on var­i­ous fac­tors like sex, age, fit­ness lev­el and med­ical con­di­tions.