Motivation is the fuel of our life and in order for it to work without interruption, it needs to be taken care of.
In the summer you started running, cycling, and it was great. The sun rises early, the birds sing, the dew shines, the flowers smell. But in autumn and winter, it turns out that it is dark in the morning, and it is cold and lonely outside. How do you force yourself to get out from the blanket and go for a run?
Reducing the amount of sunlight and daylight leads to lethargy, loss of energy and affects our mood. This is due to two processes in the body that depend on the season and the amount of sunlight: the synthesis of vitamin D and the activity of the serotonin transporter.
Winter training is more difficult than summer training, the conditions around are noticeably less conducive to regular jogging. But if you stop training right now, then you risk ruining your mood, as well as increasing the likelihood of injury when you return to previous volumes.
In addition, even minimal, but constant activity has a positive effect on physical and mental health. So let’s take a look at 10 Proven Ways To Keep Motivated To Workout During The Offseason.
1. Setting an Interesting Goal
Goal setting is a great way to keep yourself motivated to workout. Answer yourself to the question: why do you want to continue to practice outside in winter? Try to formulate a specific, measurable goal. If you have a goal and understanding of the role of each planned workout, it will be much easier for you to go for a run.
The most successful goals in my experience of supporting amateur athletes are to keep training at least 4.5 hours per week for three months, run at least 10 km over the weekend, or complete the training plan by 70%.
Regardless of your current mood and goals for which you plan to play sports outdoors in winter, we recommend that you first of all read the advice of experts. Learn how to exercise during the cold season so that you receive only benefits from training, not harm to your health.
2. Small Wins with Every Workout
If the task of training in winter seems overwhelming, we recommend using discovery about the principle of mini-habits.
Your task is to formulate a plan for engaging in outdoor activities in winter, where the first step will be so small that it will not meet any resistance. Next, you need to make it regular and bring it to automatism. Small victories will give strength and energy for the next steps, just as small and more than feasible.
Monday. Put the jogging uniform in the car.
Tuesday. Schedule your workout.
Wednesday. Schedule a meeting with a friend after training, near the place where you are going to run.
Thursday. There is a uniform, there is time, there is someone to discuss success with! Let’s run!
3. Dynamics of Training in Numbers
Write down small reports about the workout performed (time, distance, heart rate, if you use a sensor, well-being). You will always have information about progress: how many kilometers you ran in a week, in a month, for the whole winter; how much time spent in training during all this time.
Look at the accumulated statistics after a while and feel a sense of pride and joy – this will boost your motivation.
4. Great Company
A powerful technique that will help you get out into the street in a sports form is a meeting with a company of like-minded people, a team, a club, and friends. If you love socializing, doing sports together is a great opportunity to have a good time.
And if you do not have such a company yet, then in social networks you can find associations of amateurs who train in one or another city park and join the training. Belonging to a friendly team is a very important factor in training not only at the amateur level, but also at the professional level. Use this opportunity.
You can become the initiator of such a movement: gather friends in a sports chat, exchange achievements and news, set common goals, and meet on weekends for joint training. Through the activity in such a chat, even the laziest can be involved in an active sports life.
5. The Pleasure of the New
Add elements to your outdoor workout that you enjoy regardless of the weather. It could be cool workout clothes, shoes, gadgets that you really love. To enhance the effect, place your favorite items in a prominent place to remind you of your sporting goals.
Or use another trick: plan your jogging route in the places you love. Choose a park or memorable places, sights that you would like to see.
6. Reward after training
An additional source of exercise pleasure can be the practice of rewarding yourself for completing a run. For this trick to work, you need to come up with a truly pleasing reward that you usually don’t allow yourself in your daily life.
Choose an enjoyable process that is always enjoyable. This will also take time, and possibly effort and money. Be prepared for this, the reward for training should not become a source of internal conflict.
7. Caring for Health
Allow yourself not to be a superman every day, do not push yourself out into the street in a twenty-degree frost or damp, rainy thaw, as well as after a hard day at work or a sleepless night.
Don’t be afraid to skip or not finish your workout. Even a few missed workouts doesn’t mean you’ve given up completely!
8. Minimum Tasks
If you are feeling well and you know that the workout will please you, but for some reason you are lazy, try the following technique: go through all the stages of preparation for the workout and tell yourself that you will just warm up and immediately go home, nothing more. Most likely, after the warm-up, you will want to continue.
When I myself was preparing for important starts, my coach recommended determining the desire to train after changing clothes and going outside. If at this moment the desire to train does not appear, then you can go home.
9. Variety of Sports
Competitions and sports celebrations are important to many. Find winter options for the match. Winter is a good reason to try something new, be it skiing or figure skating.
In the summer I take part in orienteering and mountain trails, and in the winter I try to check in for one or two cross-country skiing. This gives me the opportunity to look at the nearest goals and get involved in the training process with high motivation.
10. Convenient Timing
It is difficult to fit workouts into work-home-family mode. Convenient timing is the key to stable training volumes and regular training. You can take your children to kindergarten or school already in jogging clothes and, without wasting time for another change of clothes, run through the morning forest.
Many offices have showers, so you can safely devote your lunch break to a healthy lifestyle and movement, and articles on the benefits of movement for increasing productivity will help you in communicating with management.
Another option: go to workout while the child is on the section. In such cases, you can use the locker rooms of their sports sections or clubs.
Regular training during the cold season will not only bring you a strong body but also prevent injuries. So if you are looking for motivation, apply the above tips in your routine to keep yourself motivated to workout during the offseason.
