How to plan your weekly training sessions

February 22, 2019

Once you’ve got a career and a family, let’s face it - staying in shape is not easy. Indeed, carving out some time for physical activity is much harder than it first seems. On the other hand - staying in shape is extremely important as well. Sure, looking good will give you more self-esteem and you’ll have more energy, but being healthy is an even more crucial benefit. So, if you want to achieve all of this, you’ll need to plan your weekly training sessions carefully.

We have a few simple tips:

Pick your exercices

So, you’ve decided to plan your weekly training sessions and devote yourself to a healthier lifestyle. That’s great, but as with most things, the beginning is the most difficult part. Indeed, once you reach automaticity and develop a daily habit, all of this will come naturally to you. But of course, the question is - where to start? If you ask us, before you even think about your daily schedule, you should first focus on what kind of exercises you want to do.

Your case is unique. We have different bodies and needs. And the exercises you’ll want to include in your training sessions will depend on what you want to achieve. Regardless of whether you want to gain mass, work on your definition, or simply lose weight, there’s one key exercise you shouldn’t miss. And that’s running! Especially if you’re in this for the health benefits - running will keep you vital and healthy for a very long time. This isn’t a random claim. Just take a look at all the people who started running in their youth - all of them live well into old age.

/caption: Running is the most beneficial thing you can do for your health! /alt: A man tying his shoes before a run, representing what you do after you plan your weekly training sessions.

Make all the preparations beforahand

Especially if you’re short on time and work with a very tight schedule, making all the preparations is incredibly important while you plan your weekly training sessions. Trust us - if you just go out and start training and running, you’ll be working on a trial-and-error basis. And by the time you’ve figured out what suits you and what you need, you’ll have lost weeks with inefficient training. So, for starters - do all the research before you go out to train. Browse the internet for exercises, and find out what kind of exercise suits you.

Running can be a cheap, always available method of improving your body in any way you want to. For example - you can practice different types of running during the week. A longer weekend run will do wonders for your general endurance, while on other days, you can go on a hilly run to increase strength. Also, research all the equipment you need beforehand. Luckily, running doesn’t require anything, except for an innovative running pack. Having one of these will allow you to take anything you need with you, not worrying about going out without your keys or your phone. Second, pick the right running shoes.

jumping with running

Know when to rest

Once you decide that you need to train to stay fit and healthy, at first, exercise will be painful and perhaps tedious. But soon you’ll start enjoying it more and more, as you start feeling the results. Trust us - pretty soon, you’ll be tempted to work out every single day. And if you plan your weekly training sessions correctly, this might even be possible. But while working out definitely has major benefits, knowing when to give your body some rest is equally important. If you don’t do this, you risk injuries or just getting burned out.

So, if you ask us - running is something you should do every other day. And if you’re doing other types of workouts, include these on your days off, as long as they’re not too cardio-heavy, and don’t affect your legs too much. Allow your hips, and your feet some rest if you don’t want to mess them up. And on the days when you have a lot of free time on hand, you can do longer, but slower runs. These will still give you a decent workout, but you won’t push your body to its limits. After all, you can’t always exert yourself.

Shake things up while you plan your weekly training sessions

As you’ll see for yourself soon enough, exercising can be pretty damn fun, once you really get into it. Especially when you become a runner, there’s a huge endorphin release in your brain known as ‘runner’s high’ - which will keep you elated and happy for hours after you’ve finished running. But with that and the positive body changes you’ll start noticing, after a while, you can get stuck in a rut. The same old routine of workouts might get boring, which is why it’s important to change things up when you plan your weekly training sessions.

And that’s possible even with running - while the kind of run you do can stay the same because it suits you, there are ways of refreshing the routine. For one, you can simply choose a different route every few weeks; getting to know new and unfamiliar scenery while running is one of the most fun things you can experience. Also, if social running is more your thing than listening to music or an audio book, you can call up some buddies to run with you. And best of all - you can switch partners every week, so that you always have something new to talk about.