Friday with Heidi: 5 tips to restart your fitness routine …
How has your summer been so far?
We’ve had great weather haven’t we? Great for vitamin D but not so good for active Fit Campers who have melted in the heat some weeks.
Ah, but how has your summer been for fitness? Mine has been rubbish and despite talking a good talk I have been pretty rubbish at listening to my own advice. I really don’t like exercising in the extreme heat. Sunbathing, yes. Running, no.
However I have kept up a pretty good eating plan and that has helped me to stay on top of my weight and health despite the lack of activity. It’s not enough to stay healthy though and I need to get back into it.
With this in mind I thought I would share with you my top 5 tips for getting back into exercise after a break.
- Decide on the day when you are going to start again. Yes there are people who will tell you to ‘start now’, ‘there is no time like the present’. But quite honestly I like to revel in my own laziness for a few more days (or weeks) so I can rev up for a quality start.
- Choose something you like to do. It’s probably not a great time for starting something new when you’ve been out of action for a while. I’m not going to start kick-boxing this week when a jog around the block will be a better measure of how I can do and how I will feel.
- Take it easy on day one! Don’t expect the same results that you had 2 or 3 months ago. It will probably hurt, you’ll probably ache and you’ll curse yourself for leaving it so long. But you’ll also feel delighted you did it afterwards. Keep hold of that feeling instead!
- Plan it. Plan when you are going to fit this in. I always kid myself I have no time. It’s rubbish. You can always find time. You could do 2 minutes squats whilst cleaning your teeth. You could run up and downstairs several times whilst the kettle boils, you could hold a plank whilst the adverts are on. We can find time even when say we can’t.
- Do day 2. Day one is the easier, day two is the tricky one…make sure you get out there and do the next session. That’s the one you need to pat yourself on the back for, the one that takes you one step further towards making this a habit again.
So, when am I starting? Well it will be soon…trust me, just once I’ve written this email, scheduled this call and written a blog post…
To your continued good summer.