Working from home has been quite the norm we’ve had to get used to these last few months. With the Coronavirus impacting practically every aspect of our lives, we’ve needed to make a few changes in our lifestyles.
One aspect in particular is becoming accustomed to working from home instead of the commute to the office and greeting people face to face in the workplace that we are so used to. Now, if the job role allows, we’ve had to resort to working from the comforts of our own home before it’s considered safe to return to work.
As this may have interrupted your activity levels, you might be looking for alternative ways to get fitness into your schedule to ensure you stay fit and healthy. One way to keep efficient and still be able to perform your job role is utilising your lunchtime breaks.
If you’re looking for something quick, but effective, here are 4 lunch break exercises that you can try to keep healthy everyday while you work from home.
As with all exercises, always start and end with warmup and cool down exercises to avoid injury.
1. Lunges
Lunges enable you to work the lower half of your body, in particular, your legs and bum. This is also a great exercise to perform at home considering you’re most likely sitting at home at a desk or on your sofa whilst you work. As you won’t be working your legs as much, this can keep them active and worked throughout the day.
This exercise can be more effective if you use free weights, but it isn’t necessary. To perform the exercise, it requires you to position one foot in front of the other with your knee bent and your foot flat. Position your other leg behind you to stretch your lower body muscles. Then, switch positions using the alternate leg and perform the exercise again.
2. Squats
Squats can be a rather gruelling exercise and one that’s a bit of a love or hate exercise when it comes to leg day. A bit of advice is to perhaps perform this one when you have a little longer to rest as it can stress your body a little more than the other exercises, particularly if you’re sitting on a chair all day. You’ll need to give yourself plenty of time to stretch and avoid cramp. Squats are again another exercise that focuses primarily on the lower half of your body.
This exercise involves mimicking sitting on a chair. Crouch down with your back relatively straight, your chest out and your legs shoulder width apart. In this position, you need to bend your knees up and down, lowering yourself to the ground as low as you possibly can with your knees remaining above your ankles as you go lower. Then, return back to a standing position and repeat this several times up to the number of repetitions that you do in your set.
3. Planks
If you don’t have time to work on separate parts of your body, performing a plank as part of your exercise routine can be extremely efficient. It doesn’t require any weights and is a timed exercise, which means you can concentrate more on the exercise itself rather than counting how many repetitions you’re performing. Just be warned that this can be an extremely difficult exercise to perform and really test your stamina and strength.
To perform a plank, you need to hold your body in an elevated position using your forearms, with your front facing the floor. You can use your hands if you feel more comfortable doing so too. The purpose of this is to hold your body in position for as long as you can, and you’ll feel plenty of your muscles working in the process. Gradually, as you get stronger and fitter you should be able to hold the position for longer each time.
4. Press Ups
For a more simple exercise, push ups are considered a universal exercise that helps to improve the strength of your upper body and general core physique. This can be great for increasing the strength in your chest and arms muscles.
This exercise requires you to lie on the ground in a planking position and lifting yourself off the ground before lowering yourself as close to the floor as possible with your arms. What’s extremely beneficial about the exercise is that you can do this at any time whilst you work and can be performed practically anywhere in the home. The effectiveness of push-ups are also based on the number of repetitions you do rather than how long you do it for, so it can be relatively quick.
Final thoughts
Looking after our mental and physical health is now more important than ever. We need to make sure that our health is at the top of the list for taking care of whilst we remain isolated at home. As well as considering performing the exercises, ensure that you’re also consuming a healthy diet, whether that be through your natural diet or having probiotic supplements, for example, engaging with friends and family through whatever methods we can and taking the necessary breaks that we need to prevent burnout whilst we work from home.
Written by Jamie Costello
For informational purpose only. Not intended to be fitness advice. When starting a new exercise, speak to your fitness trainer for guidance.
About the Contributor:
Jamie Costello is a Trainee Fitness Instructor, based in the UK. He is currently on furlough at the moment and is utilising his free time to expand his knowledge through researching and producing articles. In his spare time he does workouts at home and plays sports. He can be reached via email at costello.jamie88@gmail.com .
