HOW TO KEEP FIT THIS WINTER

The mornings and early evenings are starting to be rather cool, winter isn’t far off now.

Unless you’re ultra serious about your fitness, getting out of bed in the mornings or going for a quick run after work just doesn’t seem like an option, right?!

Either way, the chance of you hitting the gym in the cold requires some serious effort. I know. I stopped running last winter and only recently started focusing on my fitness again. Almost a year. I lost all my fitness. Although I entered a few races, I didn’t run any of the major races I’d entered like the #Dischem21 at the start of the new year’s running season or the more recent #OmDieDam21. 

Things are so bad, I’m not running this year’s #OMTOM either, and it would have been hubbies and my first one together.  We’ve only ever run one other 21km race together, my first 21km race ever Dischem21.

With the weather cooling down so fast, the question now is, is it really ideal to start attempting to train now? 

Why not wait for Spring? 

The answer is, that if I can start now I will have my fitness back by Summer I have no doubt. 

I need to get my legs fit again. I need to get fit again. I’m considering participating in a few events later this year with the son and hopefully with hubby too, and now, yes now in this mad cold, is the time I need to refocus and start training.

In my attempt to kickstart the training I came across these Runners World workouts that are supposed to be great to maintain your running fitness over winter. Firstly forget about the distance thing, to start looking at running for time.

1. 20/30 minutes continuous  running at a comfortable pace
2. break your run into parts, e.g. 10 minutes easy in between 2x 10 minutes up-tempo run
3. start with a real easy pace for 10 minutes, followed by:

• run 5 minutes at a slightly faster pace
• recover for a minute with an easy jog
• run 3 minutes at an even faster pace
• recover for a minute with an easy jog
• run 2 minutes at an even faster pace than the past period
• recover for a minute with an easy jog
• run 1 minute giving it your all
• recover for a minute with an easy jog

and to stay motivated throughout the winter…

1. Set yourself realistic and achievable goals that you can review whenever you’re feeling like opting for the warm blankets instead of hitting the road for an easy 5km run
2. Enter the short races, 5km, and 10km races use them as an opportunity to test your running tempos 
3. Join your local group run or get a mate with similar fitness goals to join you and keep each other accountable 
4. Treat yourself to new running shoes or gear and use Winter to wear them in for the summer races (besides new gear is awesome!)

How do you maintain fitness or kickstart your fitness during the cold months?