January 26th 2011

"He who smiles rather than rages is always the stronger." Japanese Proverb

Midweek already, can’t believe how quickly this weeks going nor that it’s the last week in January already! Soon be Easter, how much would you like to have lost before the Chocolate Eggs descend on us again?

Yesterday morning whilst walking the dog I realised that some of us may miscalculate activity ProPoints earnt, as the pocket guide explains Activity ProPoints for length of time, whilst I walked Alfie for the same length of time as the day before we didn’t cover as much ground as he was mostly sniffing lampposts and walls etc, luckily I had my Weight Watchers pedometer on which was counting my steps rather than the time (although there is an active setting on it for such as an exercise class), also because I didn’t get to have the second walk with Alfie, I chose to cook a meal instead (don’t worry mom took him so he didn’t lose out), I only earnt 6pp yesterday instead of the 8pp the day before.

This week we’re asking how can you do just a little bit more than you do now, to get a bit more active? I’m well aware lots of you either dislike the idea intensely or have lots of reasons for not doing more! The thing is adding activity into your day can not only help with your weight loss goals, but it can help you to keep the weight off for good, and can make you feel great! Why do many of us find it difficult to fit in exercise? "Too busy" is often the answer. So how about some tips for breaking down activity into achievable chunks.

We are all aware that we should be moving our bodies more to stay fit and healthy. A major study shows that 90% of successful weight maintainers are active for around an hour every day. The latest recommendations from the British Heart Foundation is that for good health, we should all be getting active for at least 30 minutes of moderate intensity activity for 5 days or more per week. This may seem like a lot of time when you're juggling work, home and family, but the good news is that you can break this hour or 30 minutes down into smaller, more manageable chunks, and still get great results.

The cumulative effect of exercise

Performing three, ten-minute sessions of activity in a day will give similar (and significant) health benefits when compared to performing a continuous activity session of 30 minutes. The crucial factor is the total time spent being active, not whether it is continuous. The minimum time should be 10 minutes, and remember – you don’t have to sweat it out at the gym!

Here are some examples of 10 minute activities to build into your day:

· Walk a mile before breakfast
· Cycle to and from work
· Walk the kids to school
· Perform 3 different lower body exercises in the evening (if you have a monthly pass check out Weight Watchers website for exercise ideas & demos)
· Perform 10 minutes of an exercise DVD (The Y Plan DVD has 6 x 10 minute routines) also apparently Sainsbury’s sell solution dvds that have 10m sessions on them too.
· Get off the bus or train one stop early and walk the rest.
· Walk to the shops and carry shopping home.
· Try skipping – one minute on and one minute off x 5, I had a member who could only manage 1 minute when she bought a skipping rope after winning on the raffle, she eventually worked her way up to 30 minutes and lost pounds and pounds!
· Clean the car by hand, this saves money too.
· Sweep the drive or rake up leaves.
· Walk up and down stairs. Don’t leave things at the bottom of the stairs until you have a pile that need to go upstairs!
· Turn the radio up and dance around the lounge or the kitchen, I did this whilst cooking my meal yesterday, Alfie thought it was a new game.
· Take the kids over the park and actually play with them on the roundabouts and seesaws – be careful of those slides though we can get wedged at the top us ladies ;-)

Set yourself a goal to increase the activity in your life, and build up those ten minute chunks from 3 times per day to 4, 5 and eventually 6. When time allows, try to change things around, so perhaps go for 2 x 15 minutes one day, and build up to 2 x 20 minutes.

Remember that you will earn activity ProPoints values too – check out the ProPoints pocket guide to see what your activity can earn you.

Why not have a Walking Wednesday! xx