Many of us will tell ourselves that we cannot get fit or achieve our goals because we cannot afford it. Gym memberships can be expensive and the gym can be really boring! Many people think of exercise as something they have to do, not want to do. So what if we could make it fun?
As children, we made the most of the outdoors and got our exercise through playing and having fun. So why, when we become adults do we feel that going to the gym and trudging through a 30 minute run and 100 crunches is necessary to stay fit?
Here is a quick guide of how you can turn the outdoors in your very own gym and love exercising once again.
Hill Sprints
Hill sprints are a fantastic form of cardio, as they will burn a high number of calories in a short period of time. If you’re a busy person, this type of workout is perfect for you, as you can get your exercise completed within 10-20 minutes (depending on what you are doing) and burn the same (ish) amount of calories as if you were to do long periods of steady state cardio.
After doing hill sprints your metabolic rate is elevated for hours, even days after you do this workout, which is called ‘excess post-exercise oxygen consumption’ or ‘afterburn’. Meaning you will burn more calories sitting on the sofa watching TV! (… not that I promote that)
Workout:
Jog for 10 mins to make sure your body is ready to work hard.
Sprint for 20-30 seconds, walk for 40-60 seconds. This is one example of how you could structure hill sprints, where you have a structured time you sprint for and time you rest for.
Another option is called fartlek training. It is similar to interval training in that it is high intensity, however it is less structured.
When doing fartlek training you could choose to sprint to a certain lamp post or object then walk to the next one.
It is unstructured periods of high intensity and periods of rest, meaning each interval would be different. This is great to shock the body and keep it working hard, as it cannot adapt to working to a specific time period.
The Park
Believe it or not the park is the perfect place to get in an outdoor workout: monkey bars, benches, loads of space. It is the perfect place to train your full body with some tough bodyweight exercises.
The most important part of training is having a variety of training styles, to keep your body guessing and adapting.
Workout:
Jog to the park (5-10 mins, as a warm up)
8 x pull ups on the monkey bars (if you can!) or do two rounds of monkey bars
10 x press ups
10 x lunges
10 x tricep dips on bench
10 x step up onto a bench (per leg)
(Repeat this 2-3 times)
Jog or walk home!
The Beach
One of the most difficult places to exercise is on the beach. Running on the sand stops you from getting the force you normally would get from pushing off the ground when you run, as the sand absorbs the impact.
This means that you have to exert a lot more force to produce the same result as you would when running on the concrete or grass, meaning more calories burned.
So if you were to do an active workout on the sand, you would actually burn more calories than if you were to do the same workout on normal ground.
Workout:
(Make sure you are fully warmed up- do a little run and some arm swings and leg swings to ensure your body is ready to workout)
20 seconds of high knees
10 jumping jacks
20 seconds bum kicks
10 burpees
20 seconds jumping lunges
10 mountain climbers
Repeat this circuit 2-3 times to get maximal burn and results. If you find this easy, bump up the numbers!
Stretch off your body after the workout to aid with your recovery.
So whether or not you have access to a gym, why not try using the outdoors to get fit. There’s nothing better than mixing up your exercise, and you may actually find you enjoy it a lot more if you find some variation with what you do.
