If you find that your workweek is too busy for exercise, there’s no need to worry. Engaging in regular daily physical activities and incorporating exercise on weekends can still provide significant health benefits.
Activities like biking, hiking, or doing intensive yard work over the weekend can be enough to lower your risk of disease, even if you don’t work out during the rest of the week. A recent study published in Circulation found that meeting the recommended amount of physical activity offers significant health benefits, regardless of when you do it.
Benefits of Weekend Warrior Exercise
Shaan Khurshid, co-senior author of the study, noted that concentrated activity is becoming more common due to busy schedules making it challenging to stick to a regular exercise routine.
Exercise has been shown to have numerous benefits beyond disease prevention, including improvements in cognitive function, weight management, and metabolic health. Increasing physical activity levels can also enhance sleep quality, provide more energy, and reduce the risk of stroke and obesity.
While being a “weekend warrior” can be effective, it’s essential to balance activity throughout the week to prevent overuse injuries and allow for proper rest and recovery. Incorporating a variety of exercises targeting different muscle groups and ranges of motion can help reduce the risk of injury and enhance overall fitness.
Making Exercise a Priority
Experts recommend that any movement is better than none, so if weekends are your only opportunity to exercise, take advantage of it. Engaging in physical activity, whether spread throughout the week or concentrated on weekends, can have significant benefits for your health and well-being.
“Just find a way to move every day, however works best for you and stick with it,” he advises.
McDowell stresses the importance of incorporating physical activity into daily routines, even if it’s just for a few minutes. She explains that even brief periods of movement can have positive effects on bone density, gut health, and mental well-being. In fact, it only takes 12 minutes to start seeing improvements in cardiovascular health.
She introduces the concept of baselining, which involves determining the maximum duration an activity can be performed before fatigue sets in. This baseline serves as a benchmark for gauging one’s capacity, with gradual increases of 10 to 20 percent recommended each week when designing fitness programs.
For instance, if you can walk for 30 minutes without feeling tired this week, aim for 35 minutes in the following week.
To incorporate more movement into daily life, Leggett and McDowell suggest practical strategies like setting specific workout times on the calendar, partnering with a friend for accountability, or keeping exercise equipment near the TV for quick sets during leisure time.
Khurshid emphasizes the significance of everyday activities, such as climbing stairs or doing household chores, in meeting recommended activity levels. The study found that even “weekend warriors” managed to accumulate some activity throughout the week through daily tasks.
He highlights the value of activity trackers in monitoring overall movement, emphasizing that it’s impractical to cram all physical activity into a single day while neglecting others.
