For a few months now, many of us have been working from home, with a commute that extends from the bedroom to our desk, and when going to meetings or to see colleagues, involves no more than opening a Zoom screen.
And although more and more offices are opening up, for many that will be at least another month or so. And in the meantime, we’re becoming more and more inactive. Even if we’re going out and doing training sessions, the impact of hours and hours of sitting without moving more than our mouse, soon takes effect, both in terms of the unwanted Covid Belly as our daily step count and therefore calorie burn goes down, and in terms of stiff hips, necks, shoulders and backs, all of which risk undoing our training.
Make sure you pay even more attention to your pre workout mobility to ensure that you’re ready for your training session. But could you also build some more movement into your working day? Here’s some ideas:
1) First set a goal – how often do you plan to do the exercises? Every hour? 3 times a day? Every time you make a cup of tea? Ensure it’s achievable. How about setting a stretch goal (what you’d love to do if possible) ad a minimum target.
The aim isn't to be dripping with sweat, just to build a bit more movement and maybe burn a few more calories than you would have otherwise.
And don’t give up if you don’t manage it, just restart where you are.
2) Choose a few exercises – don’t aim for everything, just pick a few of the ones you most need (which usually isn’t the ones you most like!). Have a list and rotate through them. Choose some that you can do whilst on calls, and others that you do between meetings.
Here's the recent Facebook Live session where I go through them all:
Upper body - mobility
Thoracic
'Stop' open up
Traps
No money/ band pull apart
Posture check – tripod
Lower body - mobility
Seated glute stretch
Seated adductor stretch
Standing
- Couch
- Bench hip
- Bench hip with rotation
- Open and close the gate (with kick back)
Upper body - strength exercises
Press ups (desk or chair)
Triceps press
Lower body exercises
- Posture check – from feet, to knees, to pelvis, to core, to shoulders, to neck, to eyes
- Wall sit
- Balance e.g. feet in line, one foot, eyes shut
- Stork
- Frog squats
- Lunges
- Goblet squats
- Calf raises (aiming for 3 sets of 35, 3-4 times a week)
But dont worry about the detail too much, something is always better than nothing, so just aim to get a bit more movement into the working day, have fun!
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