How To Exercise While Staying At Home

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Whether you've been self-isolating for weeks, affected by the gym closures or a regular when it comes to home workouts, GHN have put together some of our top-tips for working out whilst at home. Even if keeping in shape isn't your top priority there's no reason why you can't use exercise to keep your mind & body busy.

Ready? Let's GO!

Cardio

Ok, so you might be limited but there's still ways to get your heart rate up.

Stairs – you might not look at them the same way again but they are ideal to get the blood pumping! Ever used the Stairmaster? If you have you’ll know how effective stairs can be. If you’re going to run the stairs just do so on the way up and walk on the way down for safety. If you don’t have stairs in your home you can use jumping jacks or burpees – these can be done with a tiny amount of space and can really get you to exhaustion quickly (especially the burpees – phew!)

GHN Top Tip - Stick your favourite workout playlist on & blast it out like you're in the gym surrounded by a group of people & hold yourself accountable for each & every rep. You can subscribe to Amazon music for less than £4 a month and take advantage of their ready to go mixes perfect for fat-burning workouts.

 


Resistance/Weight Training

Trickier, but not impossible. If you tend to lift very heavy weights, but you can still stimulate your muscles effectively from home. The amount of weight available to you at home may be smaller but there are other ways to challenge the muscle without having access to lots of equipment. You can use bodyweight, resistance bands or weighty items in the home to create a resistance workout, and use the following tools to make it effective:

  • Tempo – increasing the time under tension. For example, if you normally take 1 second to lift the weight and 1 second to lower it try slowing that down. Even with a much lighter weight by taking 5 seconds for the lift and 5 seconds to lower it you will challenge the muscle more than the same weight for just 1 second.
  • Volume – increasing the number of reps and/or sets. Sure, if you normally bench press 100kg for 3 set of 10 reps you will find 3 sets of 10 press ups a doddle. But 5 sets of 20 press ups could prove to be a challenge. Not enough? How about 10 sets of 20? Now drop and give us 20!
  • Frequency – how often you stimulate the muscle is a key driver of development. When you lift very heavy weights you must factor in recovery time. If the load is reduced you can stimulate the muscle more frequently. Let's say you currently train say 3 days a week, push/pull/legs, so every body part gets trained every 7 days with heavy weights. At home you may have a fraction of the weight to work with and you can train 6 days with an upper body/lower body split. This would mean each muscle gets trained 3 times every 7 days instead of 1. That’s the principles done, but now you’re without the arsenal of gym equipment at your gym, what are the options for working out from home?


Body Weight – easier for some body parts than others. There are some high school P.E. essentials to call on here like press ups, dips, squats, crunches, lunges and calf raises.

Everyday Objects – dumbbells and kettlebells may be conveniently shaped for workouts but they’re just heavy objects. The likelihood is you have loads of heavy things hanging around the house. If it’s safe to do so you can use them like you would use a dumbbell. You can also take a gym bag or even a shopping bag, fill it to a weight that works for you with items like bottles of water/drinks, canned food and use them to make your bodyweight exercises more challenging, or to replicate your usual dumbbell movements like side lateral raises for shoulders, bicep curls or bent over rows.

Resistance Bands – if you have them ideal, if not Amazon are stocking them at a reasonable price & you can get them delivered safely. These are a great piece of kit for stimulating your muscles without weights. They give you great flexibility as you can replicate the movements of gym machines and dumbbells and are typically very affordable.
Movement & Stretching

Want something a little more low key just to keep your body moving & give your mind a break? This can be especially good for those who are now working from home where they would have been interacting with colleagues. We've written an article all about taking 10 minutes out to move your body in a controlled & thoughtful way, you can view it here '10 minute stretching for a strong & healthy body'.

Want to increase the intensity after your stretching? No problem, blast your core with these 5 Fat-Burning Ab Exercises. We've armed our training section with a wealth of our Upper Body | Lower Body & Aerobic Training Workouts you can adapt to enjoy whilst at home.

Above all, during this time please listen to the Governments warning & keep safe guys.

How To Exercise While Staying At Home

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GH Nutrition was founded in 2015 by an ex-professional sportsman Grant Hodnett and is based in Warrington, Cheshire, UK. Whether it's better nutrition, a healthier lifestyle, or that next big competition, GHN is the ultimate in providing the products you need to achieve your physical performance and results. 

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