Q: I’m finding it’s harder and harder to motivate myself to go to the gym. I know once this weather gets warmer I’ll struggle to make it even one day per week. What can I do?
Easy peasy lemon squeezy.
Compete.
Practice for something. Anything. A 5k. The Ageless Strength Badge. An obstacle race like the Big Dawg Dare. Our upcoming indoor triathlon. Setting a personal best in the mile. Bench pressing your body weight for 10 repetitions.
Really, it can be anything.
Just compete.
Remember when you played a competitive sport in high school. You didn’t train. You practiced. And because you were practicing for an event (game, race, etc.), you rarely missed a workout. Of course, there were workouts you wanted to miss, but you didn’t. You pushed through because you knew you were going to be tested.
But what if your only goal is losing weight?
Practice for something, and as a byproduct of your practicing, you’ll lose weight.
This happens all of the time when a runner decides to run her first marathon or half-marathon.
She’ll train using HIIT and weights with the sole goal of losing weight, and 2 months later, she’ll have lost just a pound or two.
Frustrated she gives up.
Then a friend convinces her to run a half marathon with her. Now, she’s practicing 4, 5 and even 6 days per week, sometimes up to 2 hours. She’s hitting personal bests in practice runs almost weekly. She’s excited about the upcoming race because she’s about to do something she didn’t think she could. She even forgets about losing weight.
And bam it happens. She first notices her pants fitting a little looser. Then people start asking her what diet she’s on. So she steps on the scale, and voila, she lost 15 pounds.
How?
Is running that much better than HIIT or lifting weights?
Did she go Paleo?
No. She practiced.
Whereas she was only training 2-3 times per week when she was doing HIIT and lifting weights (and she was usually missing at least one workout per week because she just couldn’t motivate herself to hit the gym), she was now practicing double, almost triple, that much for her race. And if you double or triple your exercise volume, you’re burning a lot more calories over the course of your training plan. And if you’re burning more calories, you’re probably going to lose more weight.
That’s the magic of practicing for something.
So pick something and start practicing.
Or, you can just copy mine:
In the next 6 months, run a 5k under 21 minutes and deadlift 2.5 times my body weight.
Training for 5k will “trick” you into burning a lot of calories during your practices, and hence get you looking like you’re ready for the beach. Training for 2.5 times your body weight will “trick” you into maintaining and possibly even increasing your muscle mass so you don’t lose it all while practicing for the 5k. The result – one jacked dude…
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