IELTS2 - 'demanding sports and special diets and physical fitness'

In some societies it is increasingly common to try to achieve good health and fitness through physically demanding sports, special diets, or preventative medicine conventional or alternative. Some people, however, believe that the best way to stay fit and healthy is simply to lead a normal life. To what extent do you agree or disagree with this opinion?

Above is the topic on which the essay is to be written and below is the essay which i wrote. I would like to know suggestions for improvement and is this essay too long? And to how many words should i limit the IELTS Academic Essay 2?I know it says to write at least 250 words but is it OK if i wrote about 300-325 words?

The world is becoming more health conscious day by day. Staying fit is the order of the day and many people are trying their best to keep fit by incorporating changes in their lifestyle. Although there is nothing wrong in being healthy, people tend to take the rough path and forget that even small changes in their lifestyle and simple exercises can help them lead a healthy and active life.

The first thing that comes to a normal person's mind, including me, when he hears the word fitness is-the gym. People spend hours building their muscles and burning calories in the gym or by playing physically demanding sports. This hard work does pay dividends by giving them a physically fit body but does staying healthy only mean being physically fit? Being healthy means to be both physically and emotionally fit. One needs to be stress free too. Sometimes spending a lot of time trying to just physically fit or eating according to special diets, which doesn't satisfy the taste buds, will make the personal unfit emotionally. Over focus on physical fitness should be avoided and sometime must also on mental exercises like yoga and meditation.

Apart from these, simple lifestyle changes should also be incorporated like avoiding fast food and one must also try to walk to short distances whenever possible. Another major factor these days is smoking. Smoking severely affects health and it should be avoided. These simple steps also help a person to lead a healthy life.

In conclusion I would like to say that though health and fitness can be achieved by physically demanding sports and special diets, it may affect mental fitness. However I disagree that by simply leading a normal life in today's world is the best way to stay fit. Minor changes in lifestyle such as avoiding fast food and walking everyday coupled with simple physical and mental exercise will help achieve the goal of leading a healthy life.

Hi Vassan,

First, I believe it is fine if you can manage 325 words within the time allocation for this task. However, you need to be conscious about time because it has a major bearing on this type of exams :)


Your introduction seems pretty good. You have taken a good entrance to your theme topic and explained it briefly, but impressively. The only weak point is that your opinion is not that well presented. Tell the reader very clearly in which side of the argument you are with;


Here it is not clearly said that you support the idea of leading normal lives is the best way to stay healthy. Leading a normal life means something different to doing exercises ... that idea doesn't come from what you have written. For example, you can say this;

People tend to take the rough path with routine physical exercises, strict nutritious diets and medicines in order to stay fit and healthy. However, they forget the fact that leading a normal life is the best way to have a healthy happy life.


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Split this sentence to two;
This hard work does pay dividends by giving them a physically fit body. But does staying healthy only mean being physically fit?--------- a very good point and it is well presented :)


You have very good ideas and also you write well.... Keep practicing with time. You can surely go for a good score )

"This hard work does pay dividends by giving them a physically fit body but does staying healthy only mean being physically fit?" avoid giving question as much as possible.

I think "burning fat" would be better.