wang writes

Sorry for a lack of updates so far and in foresight, for the next couple of weeks. As you may know the Asian Youth Games are on so it really gets pretty hectic where I work. Doesn’t help that newsmakers take more than a day to get back to you, which obviously puts any daily newspaper in a fix…. This week in addition to all that madness, my brother is getting married and I’m doing a few canapes/appetizers/finger foodie things for the tea ceremony on Saturday.

It’s weeks like these that really test my ability to manage my time, keep my cool, think straight. Even more so at times like these I have to get in some exercise everyday or I just can’t operate.

Speaking from experience, I have these tips for busy bodies:

– Focus on quality, not quantity. Short and sharp workouts are best, as studies have shown as long as intensity of training is kept high, a drop in quantity for a few weeks will not affect your fitness much. On Monday, I did 4×1km loops — HARD effort — of Chip Bee, sandwiched between a warm up and cool down. My legs were totally shot after.

– Try to fit training into your journey. For example, I biked to work yesterday (on the singlespeed, for a tougher workout) and took a longer route instead that took me 75min instead of 25min by the usual route or 15min by car. It’s ideal to do this because you have to get to work anyway, and that takes time, so why not kill two birds with one stone? The other way is to run home, which I might do tonight depending on how late I finish (I was done at 11pm yesterday). You have to get home anyway, right? Incorporate your workout into your travel.

– Jump rope and Swiss ball exercises. I love these because I can do it in the comfort of home, with my hair in a mess, wearing anything i want, requires little prepping and works a good sweat after just a few minutes. Cross training also alleviates boredom and works muscles you often neglect.

– Don’t sweat it if you skip a training day. Hey…. you’re not going to get fat or slow after missing just one day of training.

– But keep watch on your calories. Reduced output means you can’t input as much as you would on a big training week. So keep tabs on what you eat if you want to keep in shape.

My last tip, appropriately, should be don’t waste time doing things not really important, like blogging.

So adios!