Almost a year ago, I made a suggestion for a great way to incorporate pop culture into your exercise routine. The following, although it can work, is not necessarily the most serious of exercise routines. On the other hand, if you’re not serious, then you’re laughing and likely having a good time. Laughter burns calories, releases endorphins and reduces your stress. So does exercise. So combining exercise and laughter is always a good combination.
Television Exercise Game
So how does the television exercise game work? Well here is the simplest idea. You can set up for you evening with a favorite show and do a series of jumping jacks, marching in place, sit ups and push ups during the commercial breaks. This will give you about 18 to 20 minutes of exercise for every hour of television watched and it’s the direct opposite of being a couch potato.
The Other Television Exercise Game
The other television exercise game asks you to decide on a target muscle group you want to work out for an evening. So let’s say you want to target your upper body. Decide from the get go what series of exercises you want to use. Let’s say you want to work on your arms, so you plan to do triceps presses, biceps curls, shoulder presses and push-ups. These all target specific muscle groups in your upper body.
Now, remember you need to know what you’re going to do and if you need hand weights or other equipment to do the exercises, you need to make sure you have them at hand. The idea, is to know what you’re going to do before you sit down to watch your show and to have a series of lines that you may or may not hear in the show and do your exercises when you hear those lines.
For example, if you were watching the show Heroes you may plan to do biceps curls whenever someone says: “Save the Cheerleader, Save the World.” You may do triceps presses when they say “Sylar” or “my father’s research.”
Got the idea? If you’re laughing, this is a good because you’re burning anywhere from 3 to 10 calories for every chuckle you let loose with. So imagine if you combine this workout with a comedy on television – you’ll really be burning some calories then.
Here are a few ideas if you’re looking for some:
- General Hospital – Every time Sam mentions her baby or Carly shrieks or Lucky refers to Elizabeth as my wife
- Bones – Whenever Booth calls Tempe Bones
- House – Whenever House pops some vicodin
- Lost – Whenever the Others are mentioned or the Island or the numbers
- Eureka – Whenever something weird happens
- The Closer – Whenever Brenda Lee Johnson says “Thank you, thank you so much”
- CSI NY – Whenever Mac says evidence or on CSI Miami whenever Horatio makes one of his Horatio one liners
Can you think of a show that would work better for you in this type of workout and what line would you choose for your cue?
Related Articles:
Let’s Talk About Our Muscles – Upper Body
Let’s Talk About Our Muscles – Lower Body
Weight Training Leads to Longer Term Results
10 Reasons You Should Strength Train