Are you ready for spring? These 8 tips will get you back in shape!

Spring has arrived! Nature with its warm days is luring us out of indoor gyms. Do a little bit of spring cleaning in your training routine and freshen it up with some outdoor activities, new training techniques, and get ready for all kinds of adventures that summer has to offer! We give you 8 tips that will allow you to enjoy this spring to the fullest, support your health and performance.

1. Remember your goals

Before you get started on any kind of spring detox or challenges, look at your New Year's resolutions and ask yourself how you’ve been doing in the first quarter of this year. A lot can happen during four months’ time, we easily forget about our plans and promises we’ve made to ourselves. We’re only human. It’s important to check your plans regularly, not only in your mind, read them out loud, monitor your progress, and have clear priorities. This will help you understand what you need to work on during this spring.

● Read more: 3 steps to break bad habits

2. Make your plate colorful

Our supermarkets get filled with fresh and local fruits and vegetables when spring arrives. It’s much easier to eat these essential foods now than during winter and they are cheaper with much more variety. You can find strawberries, radish, or asparagus. If you’re Slovak, you’re also waiting for our traditional sheep cheese which is best in May. It’s rich in probiotics, iron, zinc, and protein. If you add these spring treats onto your plate, you can overcome the dreaded spring lethargy and boost your performance during training.

3. Go outside

Spring is made for outdoor activities! It doesn’t matter if you like walking in the city, hiking in the mountains, or riding a bike. The weather isn’t so hot like in the summer months and trails aren’t filled with tourists just yet. Your choice depends on your physical shape and your health. You should pick a sport you like, and you’re interested in getting better at it. If you spend time outside in nature, you get away from your everyday struggles and you boost your cardiovascular health. Last but not least, thanks to time spent in the sun, you’ll get a lot of vitamin D and endorphins!

Our tip: Adding some cardio in your routine you’ll burn more calories than during weight training. Since winter is usually about getting bigger, this is the moment to lose a bit of that excess fat. Start with one or two 20-minute cardio workouts a week. With time you can make them last longer and do different aerobic activities. Don’t burn out your potential at the beginning!

4. Freshen up your training routine

Besides doing outdoor cardio training, you can try these to improve your training:

a) techniques to make your workouts more intense (supersets, drop sets, forced reps)

b) reward yourself with a new fitness outfit – discover new pieces that inspire you to train and do diverse sport activities

c) update your workout playlist – create a playlist with songs that will pump you up and with the newfound energy you’ll be inspired to reach your goals

d) add more explosiveness and dynamic to your trainings: box jumps, jumping rope, plyometrics

e) discover new equipment and make your workouts more interesting with fitness balls, kettlebells, expanders, ropes, weighted vests

5. Take care of your mental health

Healthy mind in a healthy body goes both ways. You shouldn’t forget about your mental health. Has it ever happened to you that you skipped training because the night before your thoughts about the future kept you awake? Or perhaps you ate your way out of a stressful period at work? If you’re experiencing feelings of loneliness, anxiety, stress, dissatisfaction with the direction of your life, you should try to find a way to be more mentally balanced. Be good to yourself and change the inner dialogue to a more rational and kinder one.

6. Get your flexibility back

The winter is over, and you could feel stiff especially if you focused on volume in your training or stopped working out altogether. Start your spring workouts with regular warmups to increase your mobility and flexibility. You can get extra flexible by doing regular yoga or Pilates exercises.

7. Join sports clubs and competitions

As a fitness and bodybuilding lover you have a sports spirit inside of you. Bring him to life by joining a sports club or a local competition. Are you a good swimmer? Become a member of the local swimming club. If you like switching between running and weightlifting look for an approaching crossfit tournament and start preparing for it. During the summer months there are many sports events, you should prepare now under the supervision of a trainer. Don’t be afraid to compete in something that is new to you.

8. Set new micro goals

I assume that while reading previous paragraphs, you already got some ideas about activities and competitions you could do this year. Don’t let these ideas slip away! Grab a pen and write them down. Choose the ones that you enjoy the most, the ones that fit your lifestyle and work or school schedule. Don’t forget to create a micro plan with a clear beginning and end.

As the year goes on, you can end up with multiple micro goals. It’s important that they are somehow connected to your big goal. If your plan is to compete in a bodybuilding competition in 2022, starting a prep for an ultramarathon won’t be very useful for you. Big goals show you the way and the micro ones keep you on track. Pump yourself up with the right kind of spring challenges. The choice is yours!