How active are you? Do you go to the gym? Run 3 times a week? Lift weights every day?

Thats great but what about the times when you can’t make it to the gym? Lets be honest it happens to all of us, even me and I spend the majority of my time already in the gym training clients!

So what can we do on these terible days!?! Well as 1 in 4 of us class our job as office based we need to try to look at how we can bring the workout to the office! Now I’m not talking about getting hot and sweaty as that isn’t an option unless we want to really offend the poor people we sit next to! There is no reason though why we can’t exercise a huge range of muscles from where you are sitting right now.

In fact, lets get started now. For the rest of the time you read this short blog I would like you all to stand up and use the arm rests on your chair as bars to perform tricep dips! Not got arm rests? Thats fine, just swing the chair around and use the back rest! Now this isn’t the sort of exercise on its own that is going to get you hot a sweaty but after a short minute the majority will sure know that you have been doing it!

Now then what other exercises could you perform within the undoubtable small space you have to work with? Squats? Why not! In fact the chair that you were sat on is a great guide as to how deep you should be trying to squat. Most of you out there will probably be performing to shallow a squat in the gym anyway so this is a great tool for working on quality over quantity (my clients will know that phrase all too well from our sessions!) So lets change the exercise now guys, stand up tall then squat down until you can just feel your derrière touching the seat, but don’t sit down, stand up again! Easy right? Lets see how you are doing in another minute!

If you think about it the exercises you could do from this very spot are endless, the only limiting factor is you! Look around you? Is there something fairly heavy to hand? Im not talking about a 20kg plate here, just a couple of lbs is fine! Lets see, A file? A water bottle? A big book? A bin!!?! (You’d better leave the monitor where it is!) Whats stopping you holding onto it and doing some lateral raises? Anterior raises? Bicep Curls? Wide and narrow up right rows? Shoulder Presses? Take the chance to do some rotator cuff strengthening, you will thank yourself for that one when you do get to the gym and realise you can lift more than normal! How about getting away from holding things again for a minute? Why not move on to doing some press ups against the desk? You could do some lunges?

Now what about if we move away from the desk completely!? Chances are you take the lift between floors. DONT DO IT! I manage to shift heavy massage tables up and down floors so theres no reason why you can’t do it with that box of paperwork! Why not make yourself take two steps at a time and treat each one as a deep lunge? Going to the kitchen or photocopier? Why not do a couple of tuck jumps, not that energetic? Star jumps will do! Feeling a little self conscious, then just find a quiet corner every office block has them! Actually why should you be the one feeling silly? Chances are the people that are wondering what your up to are the ones that are coughing and spluttering as they trudge their way to the kitchen biscuit tin for the umpteenth time whilst they loosen their belt another notch!

Ok lets stop the squats now I think you’ve got my point! So how do you feel? Not hot? Not sweaty? but hopefully your heart has been pumping a little harder than normal!