Unfit women 'would rather be attractive than active' as 80% fail to work out

A quarter are put off getting fit because they don't like the way they look when they're working out or playing sport.

The findings come in a study which reveals that 80 per cent of women do not exercise enough.

Government guidelines suggest women and men need to do five half-hour bouts of exercise a week in order to stay healthy.

This might range from light jogging to a cardio-vascular workout - anything that slightly raises the pulse and increases the temperature of the body.

However, the research showed that while 60 per cent of women believe they do enough exercise, only 20 per cent actually do.

It seems the female aversion to sport is deep-rooted.

A quarter of those questioned blamed the way they were taught games at school for their dislike of physical activity - 60 per cent said they preferred non- competitive exercise.

Furthermore, half said they felt there was more pressure to be thin than to be healthy.

Experts predict the number of women participating in sport could fall by more than 5 per cent by 2017, which would mean 1.25million fewer females taking less exercise than is deemed healthy.

This, they say, is likely to fuel the country's obesity crisis. It would also put in jeopardy the Government's target of getting 2million more 'low-activity' people fit by the 2012 Olympics.

More than 2,000 women were polled for the research carried out by the Women's Sport and Fitness Foundation.

The research aims to look at how women participate in sport and how fitness levels can be increased in the future. Statistics show fitness levels among women have not increased in the last 20 years - despite mounting medical evidence pointing to the importance of a healthy lifestyle.

They also suggest the only way to get women on the fitness bandwagon is radically to alter the way in which Britain embraces sport.

Sue Tibballs, chief executive of the foundation, said: "The way women are portrayed in fashion and the media makes them feel greater pressure to be thin rather than fit. Girls think it is more important to be attractive than active, and many are inhibited from exercising because of low body confidence.

"It's time we provided women with the activities and facilities they want, where they want and when they want.

"There is a fitness crisis and it's set to get much worse."

Statistics also showed that black and ethnic-minority women and those on low incomes were the least likely to exercise.