Getting Back To The Gym

Gyms are open! Time to get back in! I was on a roll before, time to pick it up again! All this walking and jogging over lockdown has kept me in shape so I'll be fine!

Just Be Careful

Easy there Tiger, just be careful. Whether it has been 4 months or 13 months since you last stepped through the gym doors, if you've been spending each day walking or jogging to stay in shape then your body will have adapted to that and away from what it was able to do before. You may feel like you'll be able to get back to your previous level of bench press quickly but if you've not done much upper body work in that time, you will have lost a bit of what you had.

Keep On Walking!

There is also no need to stop what you have been doing as well. Don’t lose those gains made by just stopping. Whilst there may be time constraints that could limit how much you are able to devote to some of these activities, if your body has become adapted to 60 minutes of steady lower limb work, it may not have the capacity to comfortably allow compressing that into 30 minutes of higher intensity work. It may require some reorganisation in your day but much of this good work you have been doing can be continued.

Return Steadily

This is not to say don't go back to the gym. There has been a lot of sensible advice around taking things steadily on your return which is worth heeding. It is better to feel a little frustrated that you could have done a little more whilst building your work back up during your first 3 or 4 sessions back than to go back too hard too soon and injure yourself meaning more significant change to your gym program.

And Enjoy It!

As always the key thing is to enjoy your exercise time. Any type of change within an exercise program carries an element of risk, the size of that risk is consistent with the size and volume of change within that program. There is no need to fear that change so long as it is steady and progressive rather than a great leap in one direction or other.

Have fun!

If you have any persistent niggles, aches or pains don't soldier on in silence making them worse. Get in touch with us if you need us.

Words by Paul Martin.