The Psychology Of Fitness

With Summer winding down everyone seems to be taking a vacation.  As such, the question comes to, what can you do when you’re traveling and don’t want to go to the hotel gyms (if you have access to a gym)?

Vacations are meant to be enjoyed and should be somewhat relaxing.  What this means is you should simply be more active – walk more, go swimming, don’t spend more than half your waking hours sitting down and you should be fine with the whole “more active” component.  To enhance the burning of some extra calories and to retain most of the muscle you have, there are a number of quick circuits you can do that take anywhere between 5 – 10 minutes.  These circuits will give a quick boost to your metabolism and should not cause any big fatigue.  Add the walking in and these circuits will help to burn some extra calories by stimulating your metabolism before that walking.

Here is a quick circuit that can be completed daily and really can be adjusted to anyone’s skill levels.

Do Anywhere Circuit
A – Jumping Squats
B – Push-ups
C – Bicycles

There are a number of ways that you can do this circuit.

Different Techniques
1 – The easiest and most straightforward is to simply do 3 sets of 10 reps and call it a day.

2 – You can do descending sets with this circuit.  What this means is that you can start with 8 reps with each movement, then move down to 7 reps, then 6 reps and finally 5 reps.

3 – Either of these methods you can add a time component and make it a challenge to try and beat your previous times.

4 – You can also add one rep per day.  So day 1, you do 3 sets of 10.  Day 2, you do 3 sets of 11.  Day 3, you do three sets of 12, etc.

5 – To make it harder, you can do more reps.  This means you can do three sets of 20 or higher.  You can also start higher with the descending sets.  Start at 15 reps and work your way down to 5.

Now that I’ve given you the methods and the basic exercises, you can also adjust each exercise if it’s too easy or hard. Let’s go through each exercise.

Exercise Variations
Jumping Squats:  Instead of Jumping Squat, you can simply do squats with no weight.  If that’s too hard, you can sit down on a chair and that can act as your “squat.”  If the jumping squats are too easy, you can do jumping lunges.  If that’s still too easy, you can add a weight or something heavy enough to make it more challenging.

Push-ups:  Instead of a standard push-up, your first alternative should be a push-up to plank.

If that’s still too hard, you can drop to modified push-ups (better known as “girl push-ups”).  If that still doesn’t work, you can do push-ups with your hands on a counter top, table or wall and your feet slightly slanted behind you.  If those push-ups are too easy, you can elevate your feet, you can do jumping push-ups, diamond push-ups, judo push-ups, spiderman push-ups or any of the various push-ups you can think of.

Bicycles:  Most people should be able to do bicycles. If you can’t then you can simply do opposite arm/opposite leg reach, where you bring your foot down every time.  To make it harder, you can add a weight (or something heavy in your hand) and alternate between fast bicycles and slow and do it for time (1 – 2 minutes) instead of reps.  In other words, you would do 20 seconds fast, 10 seconds slow for 4 rounds and that’s one round of that movement.

Your Game Plan
A – Pick Your variation of the exercises you’re going to do.
B – Pick your method.  Most people pick between the straight 3 sets of 10 or the descending.
C – Complete your routine everyday in the morning and then go for a walk on the beach (or wherever you’re at)
D – Don’t feel so guilty when you get back from vacation because you were active.

 
Enjoy and if you have any questions, leave a comment below.