Since this time of year is filled with sports, you’ll likely be on the couch an awful lot. So why not combine bursts of exercise with your sports-watching? It’s the perfect way to stay active.
You might be wondering, how do I stay active during TV time? It is easy:
- First thing first, make sure you don’t have a lazy mindset. You’ll never feel motivated to get off the couch unless you commit to doing it before you grab the remote.
- Try short, sneaky exercises that really burn calories as you think about staying active.
- Plan your exercise bursts around key moments that you care about in the game. These make for fantastic reminders to get up and be active. For example, if your team scores a touchdown you need to do ten jumping jacks. Adding five each time you score a touchdown.
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Now it’s time to check out the sneaky exercises:
1. Staying Active with Jumping Jacks
- If you do jumping jacks, you are performing a form of aerobic exercise.
- This is good for your heart and your body because it is a form of endurance training.
- These help your body in a different way than strengthening exercises, although they both burn calories.
- Try doing around 100-150 jumping jacks throughout a game based on different key moments.
2. Staying Active with Push-Up Exercises
- Push-Ups can be hard for some people. If you can’t do them with your knees up, do them with your knees down. This way you can still watch TV.
- Alternatively, instead of starting in a plank position, use a table or wall. This way the push-up is slightly easier because you aren’t holding up your entire body weight against gravity.
- Assume the same position you normally would, but instead, lower down with your arms by your side with your hands on the wall or the table.
- This is a great muscle-strengthening exercise that can also burn calories and teach you how to stay active while watching sports.
- Maybe repeat this exercise three times throughout the game and do anywhere from 5-10 push-ups each time.
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3. All you need is stairs
- There are two great exercises that you can do on any staircase during commercial breaks.
- The first one is a simple sprint. As soon as a commercial comes on, you can run to the staircase nearest to you and sprint as fast as you can up the stairs. Then, jog back down and do it again 2 or 3 times. This will definitely make you winded because it is a good endurance training activity. It’s super easy because you barely have to leave the couch. It also only takes 1-2 minutes.
- The second stair exercise is a lunge. Instead of running up the stairs, lift up one leg and place it two or three stairs ahead of the other one. Hold the lunge for a bit and make sure your legs are aligned properly with the leg in front at a 90-degree angle. Then, use your strength to move the other leg up two more stairs. Continue until you reach the top of the stairs and then jog back to the bottom.
- Repeat this 2-3 times before the commercial ends.
- Rotate between the first and second stair exercise for each commercial break.
- You can even add in a rotation where you rest during a commercial break after you do the last two on the stairs.
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4. And now it’s ab time
- Lastly, to tone your abs, perform a crunch exercise on the ground that lets you watch your favorite sports while you work out.
- You can try a “reverse crunch.” to make it easier to watch TV as you do it.
- Place your body flat on the ground and raise your legs off of it. Pull your knees into your stomach and then push them up to the sky while lifting your butt into the air. As you lower back down, use your core muscles to pull everything back up again.
- This works your ab muscles and burns a few calories.
- You can do this three times as well in between your jumping jacks and push-ups.
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Conclusion
These exercises are really easy ways to stay active while watching TV. They give you a reason to get up and move without making you grab weights or go to the gym.
Obviously, you can decide how many minutes of your TV time you will use to get up and stay active. Doing any or all of these exercises will benefit you more than doing nothing while watching sports.
However, these exercises alone are not enough to improve your health for the week. Make sure you also work out a few days of the week by doing things like brisk walking or jogging.
