- November 14, 2023
How Exercise Snacks Can Boost Your Fitness in Minutes
“Exercise snacks” refer to short, intense bursts of physical activity that can be easily incorporated into daily routines. The idea behind exercise snacking is to break up longer periods of inactivity with brief, yet effective, bursts of exercise. These short bursts can be as simple as 7 minutes of vigorous activity and as little as 60 seconds of movement and these can be performed multiple times throughout the day.
For example, instead of sitting for prolonged periods, a person might engage in a quick session of marching on the spot, star jumps, squats, or lunges. This approach is based on the concept that accumulated short bouts of exercise can have positive health effects and contribute to overall physical fitness. Research suggests that incorporating short workouts into your day can be an easy and effective way to improve fitness, boost metabolism, and reduce sedentary behaviour. It’s particularly beneficial for individuals who may find it challenging to set aside larger blocks of time for traditional workouts.
HOW DO EXERCISE SNACKS WORK?
Examples of Exercise Snacks
Exercise snacks work by incorporating short, intense bursts of physical activity into your daily routine. The key is to engage in brief exercises that elevate your heart rate and increase energy expenditure. Here’s how exercise snacks typically work:
Short Duration: Exercising snacks are designed to be short, typically lasting a few minutes. The idea is to make them brief enough to be easily integrated into your daily schedule.
Intensity: Despite their short duration, exercise snacks are often intense. This means engaging moves that use multiple muscle groups.
Frequency: They can be done multiple times throughout the day. For example, you might perform a quick set of exercises in the morning, another during your lunch break, and one more in the evening. The goal is to accumulate these short bursts of activity to achieve health benefits.
Variety: You can vary the types of exercises you include in your exercise snacks to target different muscle groups and keep things interesting. This also helps prevent overuse injuries that may occur from repetitive movements. Opposite you can find 20 Exercise Snack Ideas
Adaptability: One of the advantages of quick workouts is their adaptability to different fitness levels and environments. They can be tailored to suit your fitness level, and you can perform them at home, in the office, or even outdoors.
Breaking Up Sedentary Behavior: One of the primary purposes of exercise snacks is to break up long periods of sitting or sedentary behaviour. Incorporating short bursts of activity helps counteract the negative effects of prolonged sitting on health.
Consistency is Key: While individual exercise snacks may seem short, the cumulative effect of incorporating them consistently throughout the day adds up. Over time, this can contribute to improved cardiovascular health, increased energy expenditure, and other fitness benefits.
Workout snacking and shorter workouts are something I have spoken about for years and years and as they say, less is more, so start your exercise snacking journey today. Lucy