Outdoor Fitness - Full Body Workout in the Playground
Who says you need a gym or proper workout equipment for a full body workout? Early last Saturday morning I met my personal trainer Philip Kavanagh from Limitless Functional Fitness and we went to the local playground (while the kids were still tucked up in bed) for a high intensity interval training (HIIT) session. There’s no fitness park or outdoor exercise stations near us but Phil assured me there’s plenty of bodyweight exercises that can be done in a playground giving you a great full-body workout.
We kicked things off with a pre workout run for about two kilometres at a decent pace to get warmed up before hitting the playground. Check out the video to see the exercise circuit Phil and I completed as well as some great outdoor training tips:
I hope you enjoyed that easy to follow HIIT workout. Here’s a recap of the exercises we completed in the video:
The Playground Workout Summary:
Full range pull ups - 12 reps
Push ups - 15 reps
Walking lunges – 15 lunges each side
Skipping – 100 jumps
Dips – 15 reps
Plank – minimum 60 seconds
Complete this circuit of exercises three times or more depending on your level of fitness. No resting in between the exercises but you should rest for 45 seconds and drink some water between each circuit. Once you have completed your circuits, finish the workout with a run back home. We brought a skipping (jump) rope with us but if you don’t have one of those you can substitute in burpees instead for a completely equipment free workout.
As you can see it’s so easy to get an inexpensive, effective workout; you just need to be a little creative. The weather can play a role but outdoor exercise is becoming increasingly popular with bootcamp style workouts happening in parks and beaches all around the country. I had a rant before about the lack of outdoor exercise stations in Ireland and I would still like to see more however for now it looks like I’ll have to settle for my local playground for my outdoor workout plans. A workout like this can easily be squeezed in to even the busiest of routines so no more excuses. Maybe you could workout while the kids are on the swings???
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Yours in health,
Brian