How to Stay Fit During the Holidays
The holidays are here! Time for friends, family, and food. Is there a way to keep your physique this season? Who wants to hit the gym constantly over the holidays? Not me! This expert drops by to give us some simple tips that you can use this year to stay fit during the holidays!
Want to stay fit during the holidays?
The Holiday season is here, and with it comes the season to be happy, thankful, and, most of all, stuffed! Speaking of stuff, some fitness enthusiasts actually don’t like the season as it often derails them from their current training routine.
Depending on where you are, the gyms might be closed due to heavy snowfall, the weather might be too bad for your usual run, or sometimes the food you’re “scheduled” to eat is no longer available.
What’s worse is the sudden influx of parties, and late-night eating and drinking could spell disaster for your fitness goals!
Don’t panic! Here are 5 effective ways to stay fit and strong during the holidays!
1. Revise your schedule
Everything starts with a plan, as not planning is planning to fail. Get your notebook and list all your holiday activities, arranging them so that you can squeeze in an hour or two for your fitness routine.
It could be as simple as doing a 20-minute HIIT workout in between shopping for gifts and decorating the house or hitting the gym right after office hours and just before a really late Christmas buffet.
When you plan it out, stick to your schedule as much as possible. If one particular day is too tight, make it your official recovery day.
Recovery days aren’t exactly “cheat” since muscles also need to rest.
2. Start the day earlier
Most people prefer to work out in the afternoon or after office hours, but this could be devastating during the Holiday season, as sometimes gyms close earlier or your buddies want to go out somewhere and have a few drinks.
Whether you like it or not, you’ll have to change your workout time for a few weeks, and sometimes, it means getting up earlier than usual.
Yes, it’s hard to accept that despite the cold weather and the stronger bond between you and your bed during this time, you must exert an extra ounce of willpower to get your workout done and over with as soon as possible.
Ending your workouts earlier in the day will allow you to spend the rest of the day doing something else.
3. Skip the iron
If you want to stay fit during the holidays, the gyms we go to often require a few minutes of driving. If you live in a place with plenty of snow this season, then expect heavier and slower traffic than usual.
If you get stuck behind the wheel instead of the squat rack, then you have really accepted the fact that you’ll have to spot your gym buddies some other time.
Don’t worry about not getting a decent workout since you can definitely take advantage of learning bodyweight exercises right inside your home.
There are plenty of bodyweight exercises available, such as push-ups, squats, and burpees. Not to mention their multiple variations, which can sometimes make the exercise require more effort than simply lifting heavy stuff.
4. Train with volume
In conjunction with tip no. 3. You should get your workout fixed with plenty of volume. This is especially useful if you’re often the type of lifter who just goes for 3 reps per set due to the weight of the barbell or because of a program you’re following.
You can try to offset the lack of weight on your shoulders by simply training enough to ensure your body misses the single-digit reps it’s usually fond of.
Volume training also allows your body to build up endurance and overall stamina, which is crucial when competing in games requiring tons of energy and twice as much lung power.
Crossfit games and the Tough Mudder easily come to mind, but volume training can also help you go the extra mile with your runs or get one more rep in before the failure.
5. Indulge in discipline
We can’t avoid eating the food we want to avoid at all times, and this fact cannot cause us to be more stressed during the holiday season. Our personal trainers cringe at cupcakes, peppermint candies, cookies, milk, chocolate, ham, and many other foods.
While this is the season to “let go,” it’s always better to exercise some restraint.
While you can always just pop in a few diet pills for weight loss, it would be a lot smarter (and cheaper) to keep the following set of rules in mind:
- Have a little bit of everything but only a little: Feel free to take a bite out of everything just to taste it. This will also prevent you from being tempted to gorge on food uncontrollably.
- Put as much as only one plate can hold: Limit yourself to a single plate and fill it up reasonably so you won’t return for seconds.
- Don’t eat foods available throughout the year: Go for the food that rarely shows itself. Skip brownies, cookies, and candy bars.
- Prioritize vegetables and lean meat: It’s important to fill yourself up with proper nutrition before you eat buffers or empty calories.
- Skip the soda, go for water, or a bit of red wine instead: Soda has sugar and extra sugar in your diet isn’t worth the extra hour at the gym. Red wine is healthy, but just don’t go overboard. When in doubt, water is your friend.
- Remove yourself from the table as soon as you’re done: Avoiding the sight of food is the best way to prevent overeating.
- Talk to people: The longer it takes for you to eat, the less likely you will eat too much, and what better way to kill time than to actually socialize? Talk to the friend you haven’t seen in months or catch up on what the squad’s been up to while you were busy with work.
Wrap-Up
The Holiday season is a season of happiness and thanksgiving, so do yourself a favor and make sure your body will be happy and thank you once the season ends!
Stay fit during the holidays, and Happy Holidays, everyone!
Robert James likes to tell people how to grow their money and how to naturally lose body fat. He’s currently writing about the best natural sleep aids aside from healthy fruits and will deliver a complete review of natural supplements he’s taken in the future.
He owns a small website catered to his passion to write about health and fitness. His main weapon against weakness is the kettlebell.
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