Mix Up Your Workouts – Fitness Trick & Tip #9

Have Success, Plan Your Workouts

Mix Up Your Workouts – Fitness Trick & Tip #9

Mix it up – Mix up your workouts.  Sounds simple, but what does that mean?  Without going into a to of detail I am going to explain a big picture way to “Mix It Up.”

Well, here it goes.  High Intensity workouts and training is great on days when you have tons of extra energy.  However, knowing you have a killer workout planned after a tough day at work may not be exactly what you need.  Oh, and yesterday’s workout was a killer too and you’re still pretty sore.  Pounding your body every day isn’t the best way to get, keep, or maintain a healthy body.  A good workout program, good training program, or even a good group exercise based workout program has high intensity, moderate intensity, and low intensity workout days built in or scheduled.  All of your workouts are not going to be a new record of some type.

Following a well thought out program with varying intensities is a great way to keep improving, keep healthy, and keep your body feeling good and fresh.  This allows yourself to know what days you will need to “bring it” for your workouts and what days you don’t have to get as pumped up for your workouts.  So what do you need to do?  Plan It Out!

Why Is Planning Your Workout/Training Program Beneficial?

Example 1 –

If you know ahead of time when your workouts are going to be high, medium, and low intensity you can plan your schedule.  Just like anything else you are putting yourself in best position to push through that very intense workout.  Not that you don’t want to be able to kick butt and do your best in your medium and lower intensity workouts, but lets face it, if they are lower intensity you shouldn’t need to get all that psyched up for them.

Example 2 –

You know your Tuesday workouts are always your best.  You have the most energy, and for whatever reason (maybe many) your Tuesdays just rock!  Mondays and Fridays are usually your lowest energy days and you know even though those days feel difficult, they are typically days you’re not your best.  Perfect, Monday can be a medium intensity day, Tuesday can be a high intensity day,  Wednesdays can be a “rest day” or a low intensity day.  Thursday can be a higher intensity day and Friday can be a lower intensity day.  Boom!  Finish the smaller details with what exercises make sense for those days, or set your distances or times if you are a runner.

Put some thought into it.  I left some parts vague because this is a big picture article.  Don’t get caught up in the smaller details, start with staggering your intensities.  Set a plan, review your progress and adjust accordingly.  If you need some help let us know.  That’s what we do.  Check out www.LakeCountryTraining.com and give us a call.

-Matthew