Running with Moe May 7

It seems that most social media postings, or comments about people after the quarantine, is that almost everybody is going to get fat.  There was one poster that said after the quarantine “you will either be a hunk or a chunk.”  It meant that you could improve your fitness, or become lazy and add pounds to your frame.

For fitness minded people the extra time that required the person to be at home meant that there is now more time to work out, or to go for a longer run. For individuals that went to the gym to lift weights, it means no longer having to worry about opening or closing times to fit your workout in.  They now have all day to work out and can start or end whenever it suits them.  For runners, it doesn’t matter when they leave the house, or when they return.  If you wanted to increase your mileage for the week this would be the time to do it. A runner can add miles to a run and gradually build up to some pre-marathon runs.  Some runners have added a second run later in the day to improve their fitness.

However, if the person is an avid weightlifter the problem of not being able to get to the gym is very real.  The fact that in most cases the amount of weight at home is usually not as abundant as at the gym. There is also the disadvantage of not having a spotter for heavy lifting, so that so you are limited in the amount of weight you can lift safely.  And not many people at home have the variety of equipment needed to work the various muscle groups.  Equipment such as squat racks, lat machine pull downs, pec decks, bench press benches, rowing machines, and other machines are no longer available. For most people that have weights at home the routine you followed at the gym needs to be changed to fit what is available now.

I wondered what the reasoning was behind all the comments about gaining weight.  If you are not a hard core fitness person the lack of routine times can work against you.  When people have a set routine to follow, a workout is scheduled for a certain time period in your day. The routine of waking up at a set time, going to work for a set number of hours, eating meals at scheduled times, and working out before heading back to bed keeps you on schedule. I recognize how not having a routine works against you. Theoretically, you can go for a run or lift weights at any time, but the temptation to put it off until later is always present.  More times than a person can imagine, putting things off for a later time results in not getting the run or workout in at all.

There are also more temptations to miss, or interrupt, a workout at home then at work or in a gym.  At home there is a refrigerator to tempt you between sets of lifting.  The telephone will ring, or a text will arrive from a friend that is bored from staying locked up and who wants to visit. And a quick glance at what is showing on television is often followed by watching the show to the end.  The problem with interruptions in a workout is that it is hard to start up again.  The muscles cool down, any progression in increasing a weight now has to start over.  If you have a spouse, or children, there is a very good chance they will need something that will interrupt your workout.  Even if you have a “do not disturb” chances are you will be “disturbed,” especially if you have small children.

There is also  food temptations within reach.  That ice cream in the refrigerator, that snack of potato chips is on the table, and too many liquid choices other than water is right at home.  More often than not that other choice of a liquid has an abundance of calories,  much more than water.  The fact that you now eat at home, with more choices of food at meals, may not be the best.  If anybody in the household is a good cook that is a real plus.  But, for many single individuals trying to fend for themselves the quick and easy meal preparation is more the normal. Those peanut butter and jelly sandwiches you had as a child now make a comeback.  The number of snacks between meals increases for something to do out of boredom. Calories add up, the activity goes down, and the end result is added pounds.

As the days go by it seems that the amount of sitting down watching television increases.  Shows that were at one time never watched now become ‘can’t miss the next episode’ kind of viewing leading to binge viewing lasting more than 10 hours. I had one friend that would never think of watching the “soap operas” during the afternoon. Then he was confined to home following an injury for a time and became addicted to watching the soaps.

The thing to remember is that you have a choice as to what routine to follow and what actions to commit to. Instead of endlessly streaming Netflix, consider Increasing the miles on a run, adding minutes to exercise. Use this time to build healthy habits.