Fitness

Tips for training during lockdown

 ADAM SIMPSON

WITH gyms still closed it can be easy to have fallen out of your exercise routine, I completely get it.

It’s just not the same training within the same four walls that you eat, sleep and work in every day.

On top of that, with limited equipment and no one to push you along its understandable that you aren’t as motivated as you were back in June.

I think it’s important to remember that you just need to lower your expectations for the moment or refocus your training goals.

Anything you can do right now is going to be great for not only your body nut your mental health as well.

Here are my top tips so that you can maximise your training during lock down:

1. Choose challenging exercises

– Strength training can be quite challenging if you are limited with equipment, but that doesn’t mean you still can’t make strength gains. Choose challenging body weight exercises where you don’t need a lot of weight to progress. Exercises like chin ups, 1 legged squat’s, 1 armed push ups are a great way to make simple exercises harder. 2. Get Creative – Try and use house hold items or things around your area instead of gym equipment. For example, you could fill a back pack with books to act as a weight to hold while squatting and lunging. You could use playground equipment for chin ups and inverted row variations to train your back muscles. In addition, you could use a member of your house hold to push against you and

provide you with some resistance while you do any regular dumbbell exercise. You are only limited to your imagination. So why not, see what you have lying around the house and think about how you could use it to replicate your regular gym exercises. 3. Refocus your goals – Why not use this time to chase some new goals, get out and go for a run. Pick a distance that you want to run, whether that be 2, 5 or 10km then time yourself and try and beat your time every few days. If you don’t like running, get out and give it a go anyway you might fall in love. 4. Use Technology – Using technology to track and monitor your exercise is a great way to increase your motivation. There are so many great bits of technology out there that you can track your exercise with. Heart Rate monitors, running and cycling apps are an awesome way to gamify your workouts. Having a score to try and beat is going to be far more motivating then just going for a jog. 5. Stay Connected – Get your friends and family involved in what you are doing. Set each other challenges, have virtual races, make your exercise fun. By getting more people involved you are going to be far more likely to stick to your training plan then if you do it alone.

If you are in a bit of a funk right now, get up and start something today. I guarantee you will feel better for it, so stop putting it off and go get it done ☺

Adam Simpson is lead trainer and founder at www. repetitionspt.com.au