How To Keep Fit From Home During Lockdown

With shorter daylight hours, colder weather conditions, and now lockdown restrictions to contend with - meaning UK gyms have closed their doors once again - it's understandable that you may be feeling unmotivated when it comes to keeping on top of your fitness goals this season.

However, keeping fit and healthy from the comfort of your own home won’t feel like a chore if you follow these handy tips and tricks. From connecting online with a fitness friend for motivation to ensuring you always pencil in plenty of time for your essential home workout, we’re here to help keep you on track! Carry on reading to see our top tips and find out how you can make them a reality this lockdown.

This top tip of ours is particularly helpful if you ever find yourself struggling to find enough hours in the day to fit in working, exercise, family time, and other daily housekeeping commitments during lockdown - plan it out! When it feels like there’s never enough time to step onto that treadmill or whip out your yoga mat for a home workout, pencilling in a dedicated time slot can help you claw back some hours in your day.

Especially pertinent during lockdown when all the days seem to blur into one, staying on track by planning out your workout periods can make your days feel longer and much more productive. To give you a hand, we suggest investing in a daily planner or personal organiser that’ll encourage you to mark out dedicated time slots throughout your day.

Not to mention fitness trackers are also an affordable and easy way to remind yourself when you need to add some more steps to count, keep yourself motivated, and ensure you don’t forget your planned home workout. Fitness trackers and smart watches can even track your heart rate and calorie consumption to help tackle high blood pressure, lower cholesterol levels, and even aid weight loss.

Whether you can fit in an hour or two of meditation and pilates before you head off to work or you’ve chosen to replace your group fitness session with a solo outdoor workout, a physical planner can improve your organisational skills and encourage you to commit to working out.

For avid runners and bikers, there’s a huge array of space-saving treadmills and stationary exercise bikes that can provide you with the same gym or outdoor experience - just without the chilly weather or commute time. As a result, you’ll save coveted time going to and from your workout spot, and if you have little ones at home, you can keep an eye on any unauthorised household activity they might be getting up to while they’re away from school!

Alternatively, if you prefer the open road or simply don't have space in your home for larger fitness equipment, why not consider updating your typical workout routine into a sport that can be easily practised indoors in compact areas with minimal fitness equipment?

OnBuy recently carried out a survey to discover consumer fitness habits in lockdown. The research found that 67% of respondents are planning to buy small fitness equipment like dumbbells, elastic bands and fitness balls. If you’d like to join them and make your home workout routine more interesting, productive or efficient, then consider adapting your current choice of exercise/sport or exercise routine to include a selection of these fitness accessories.

This includes yoga and pilates alongside a range of exercise moves (crunches, squats, push-ups, high knees, jumping jacks, etc.) that can be swapped, adjusted, and edited from your routine to suit the areas of your body that you’d like to focus on, giving you a personalised indoor fitness routine. Another option if you’re a full-time parent is to get your kids involved, so you can focus on your physique while they’re having fun trying to copy your unique yoga moves!

Thanks to the many advances in both fitness equipment and home gym technology, you now don’t even have to leave your cosy abode to experience an effective and satisfying home workout, perfect considering the new national lockdown measures! The survey conducted by OnBuy also shows that 44% of the respondents would prefer working out at home, so why not join them by investing in some high-quality home gym equipment?

Your traditional outdoor fitness routine with friends can be easily turned into a lockdown-appropriate indoor affair with the right exercise equipment and gadgets! While exercising outdoors alone or socially distanced with a friend is allowed (at least for now!), you could choose to work out at home with a group of friends via Zoom, Skype or any other video sharing platform to provide extra motivation while you share fitness tips and tricks.

Alternatively, why not enlist a workout buddy from your household to discourage you from bailing on those home gym plans and prevent you from climbing into bed and popping on your favourite TV series? Simply having someone to inspire you to smash through your workout goals can make all the difference as to whether you achieve your weight loss or muscle-toning targets!

As we keep mentioning, those winter lockdown days can feel so short sometimes that it’s difficult to ensure you fit in those mood-boosting workouts. Whether you prefer to tackle your fitness routine every day or every week, minutes can still slip away until you're left with no decent workout period left!

However, if you flip your thinking and start making the most of those (often tiny) pockets of time throughout your day, you’ll start to realise just how much more you can fit in. By way of illustrating, there’s a whole host of little activities that you can spread throughout your day to boost your steps, tone your muscles or simply keep yourself active without taking up your time or requiring any costly fitness equipment.

This includes simple everyday tricks such as, taking the stairs instead of the lift on your way into work (if you’re not working from home), as well as opting to walk to your local convenience store instead of nipping there in your car. These changes might seem insignificant, but they all add up and you can even keep an eye on your activity level by wearing a sleek and practical fitness tracker or activity watch.

Alternative ideas for overloaded parents could also include joining in with a physical game or sport your child is playing, or trying to keep up with them as they let off some steam at the park! Whether it’s a speedy 10-minute workout or a game of footy in the garden, all that matters is that you’re keeping your body moving.

According to the survey conducted by OnBuy, Youtube is the main go-to place for gathering those essential exercise tips, with 50% of respondents saying they would turn to the video streaming site to watch gym experts demonstrate exercises - making this platform especially useful for home workout beginners. 

This is because you can discover a wealth of instructive fitness tutorials online from a wide range of workout experts alongside exercise amateurs to ensure your workout is safe and effective. Whether you choose to use a range of exercise equipment or you’d prefer to go without, knowing how to get the most out of your home workout routine will be the key to your success.

Don’t forget about your little ones while they’re away from school either! They’ll need their regular dose of PE, so it’s worth checking out fitness tutorials on YouTube from the likes of Joe Wicks (also known as The Body Coach) for exciting and child-friendly PE tutorials that your kids can follow, as well as an array of children’s 5-minute workouts to keep them entertained and active.

Thankfully, keeping fit doesn’t have to mean heading to the gym or locating your dumbbells. Staying active can be as simple as taking an online dance class or piling on the coats, scarves, and gloves to go for a brisk and invigorating walk with your household during this winter lockdown. Alternatively, if you live alone why not pop on your most comfortable pair of headphones and get those feet moving?

Above all of our handy lockdown fitness tips, we suggest trying to enjoy yourself as much as possible! Working up a sweat shouldn’t feel like a chore and can even release endorphins that can reduce both stress and anxiety. Find a sport or activity that makes leaving the comfort of your bed an hour earlier something you actually want to do. You won’t regret it!