Get creative for your fitness
With gyms shutting their doors because of coronavirus, the Pilbara News spoke to trainers in the North West to find out 10 essential exercises to do at home.
Working out at home can be tough, but Iron Worx co-owner Ibrahim Nuska said it was essential to find new ways of keeping fit and to be creative with your workouts.
Nuska said their gym was offering online workouts for their members.
“For us, we’re engaging our clientele in our private Facebook page, touching base with them more often and trying to keep people engaged,” he said.
“We’ve leased out our equipment, so our current members can come in grab barbells, plates, rowers, and every day we post a free at-home workout on our member’s group.”
Nuska said it was important to use your imagination when doing workouts from home.
“You can do bodyweight exercises, and you can do your sit-ups, air squats, push-ups, or go for a run,” he said.
“If you don’t have any equipment, work out with a backpack on, stuff books in it.
“You can put the backpack on and do lunges with it, go for a walk with it, it’s the added resistance to keep your body guessing.”
Another good way to push yourself, according to Nuska, was to add a timer to your workout routine.
“If you add a timer and say you’re going to work out for 10 minutes and push as hard as you can for that time, you’re going to push yourself to do as many sets as you can in that time limit,”
“Having that timer in the background is a good motivation to push your limits and empty your tank.”
Air squats — To fully engage the main muscles and not put pressure into your knees, it is best to squat to at least parallel. This means your hips and knees are parallel to each other. If you have knee issues or hip issues, then squat to a chair or box and make sure you fully sit and push out of the heels to keep pressure from the injured points.
Push-ups — The best push-up for max growth is to make sure your chest touches the ground. This means chest to the floor and full lockout of your arms on the extension up. If you are still trying to get your push up, the best advice, and what has worked for our clients is to go chest to ground on your knees. Then from your knees, push into a plank and reverse to go down.
Burpee — Yes, burpees, I love them, that’s right. They do everything for your whole body. A true burpee is like your push up chest to the ground, then jump the feet in on the push back up and reach above your head and clap. Again same scaling version as a push-up but step in and step out instead of jump in and out.
Planks — Want your core to be strong, engage it. Planks are great. Go into your push-up position, except instead of having your arms locked out have forearms on the floor breathe. Don’t forget to breathe.
Running — Yes, we live in the heat, but running should still be a part of the routine. It increases endurance and helps get those max lifts. Running seems basic enough, but inefficiency in your gait can cause you to hate it. So make sure chest is up, gentle landing on the feet and shoes that allow for your foot’s little spring mechanism to do its magic.
Skipping — everyone loves skipping, and a cheap rope from Kmart will do or even some rope. Think jump-rope for the heart like we did as kids.
Box jumps — Now my biggest suggestion for a box jump is if you don’t have a box use your couch or a bench that’s stable. Always step down. If you rebound bounce and jump down backward, you can snap your Achilles, and no one wants months of recovery. If you’re not confident to jump, step it up and make sure you stand tall at the top.
Sit-ups — There are so many variations of a sit-up. One that hits the core to its depth is butterflying your feet so feet together and knees out. If it’s too much, scale to what suits you best.
Thrusters — This will hit your shoulders, core, and quads. Using a backpack with a sand-filled bag inside or dumbbell or kettlebell drop into a front squat just like your air squat, from there as you stand up drive the bag/dumbbell that you have held on your front rack above your head and fully extend. As you return down the bag or dumbbell returns back to the rack position.
Tabata — 20 seconds on, 10 seconds off for eight rounds. Using all the above-mentioned, you can create a great Tabata to get the heart rate up. Cut your run to a shuttle run back and forth. Use a timer like WOD Timer to beep for each interval. Mix it up and get creative.
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