The Best Home Exercises For Weight Loss
The year 2020 sucks. Lockdowns and social distancing have put our lives on hold and widespread gym closures have turned us from pumped to slumped.
Now that restrictions are finally lifting and weight rooms are reopening there’s nothing stopping us from getting back to the grind and making up for lost time, right? Well, maybe not. Getting back in the gym after a long break can be tough, and the thought of starting from scratch is daunting.
If you’re ready to get back to your pre-pandemic workouts, we have a few tips and tricks to help you nail your 2020 comeback.
1. Be Realistic with Your Goals
Even if you’ve been doing home workouts regularly you’ll likely have lost some stamina, strength, and speed during lockdown. If lifting’s your thing, here’s what happens to your body during your first month away from the rack:
- Week 1 - you might not notice a difference in how you look or feel.
- Week 2 & 3 - lean muscle mass begins to decrease.
- Week 4 - many people start losing actual muscle.
The good news is that even if you’ve been stuck at home for several months, you’ll get your strength back quicker than it took you to build it in the first place. You’ve got your good friend muscle memory to thank for that. Muscle memory makes it easier to relearn skills and build strength even if you’ve been living your best couch-potato life all summer, so you’ll notice gains faster than you did when you first started working out.
With that in mind, keep your workouts chill, to begin with. Smashing the gym after months of inactivity is a terrible idea, and pushing your body to its limitless with punishing workouts will inevitably lead to injury after a long break. So, take it steady and build your weights/reps/speed gradually.
2. Get Your NutritiOn Back on Track
Lockdown has thrown our schedules in the trash, and healthy eating habits went in there with them. We can’t be the only ones hammering the snack drawer, right?
Pre and post-workout meals are widely considered the most important ones for gains and recovery, so start by getting those feeds back on track and the rest should follow.
To structure the perfect pre-workout fueling:
Aim for 20-30 Grams of Protein
Protein consumption is a key factor for making gains and will help you rebuild muscle after months spent being sedentary. It’ll also aid recovery, so you can get back on the bench faster after every workout.
If you’re going for animal protein like chicken or ground turkey, eat 2-3 hours before your workout to give your digestive system time to do its thing. For whey protein or egg whites, you’ll be ready to smash a session 30-60 minutes later.
Stock up on Carbs
Carbs aren’t technically essential for building muscle, but they’ll give you the energy you need to dominate every set. That’s because your muscles use the glucose from carbs as fuel, and during high-intensity exercise, your body will eat through it to be able to keep going.
Your body weight, age, and goals will impact how many carbs you require to be ready to hit the iron hard, but your pre-workout meal should be 25-40% of your total daily intake. Aim to carb up around an hour before your workout to get your insulin and blood glucose elevated at the right time for an effective session.
3. Use a Pre-workout Supplement
What does pre-workout do? The short answer is everything you need it to. Pre-workout is designed to boost energy, muscle performance, and strength. A good formula will have you lifting more, running further, and making massive gains, giving you the edge you need to make your comeback after a couple of months of pro-level TV-watching.
Iron Brothers’ pre-workout supplement contains 13 powerful ingredients that work together to level-up your physical performance and improve cognition and focus.
Pre-workout Ingredients:
- L-Citrulline Malate - this naturally-occurring amino acid is found in watermelon and is a powerhouse ingredient for increasing energy, relieving fatigue, and strengthening muscles.
- Pomegranate extract - as well as boosting endurance and recovery, pomegranate extract is said to have health-boosting antioxidant effects that’ll help get you back to your pre-pandemic best.
- L-Tyrosine - this brain-boosting amino acid improves mental alertness and memory, keeping you sharp during the most punishing gym sessions.
- Beta-Alanine - the addition of Beta-Alanine boosts performance in high-intensity exercises like CrossFit and increases time to exhaustion so you can go for longer.
- Caffeine - just the right amount of caffeine improves clarity and focus, keeping your head in the game for the duration of your workout.
Pre-workout supplements taken in liquid form kick in after 5-15 minutes, so aim to take yours on the way to the gym and you’ll be firing on all cylinders by the time you hit the weight room.
Smash Your 2020 Comeback
Getting back to the gym after a forced hiatus is tough and can be majorly frustrating, but it doesn’t have to be a total nightmare. Take your time to make your return to protect yourself from injury and fuel your body properly before and after your workouts. Add a killer pre-workout supplement to your diet and your return to greatness will happen sooner than you might think.
Let us know in the comments how your 2020 comeback is going. Stuck in a slump? Our Iron Brotherhood is on hand with support and advice on how to get back to beast mode.
Additional resources:
- https://www.jefit.com/general-fitness/get-back-to-the-gym
- https://www.fitbod.me/blog/muscle-memory-for-bodybuilding
- https://www.transparentlabs.com/blogs/all/what-is-the-best-pre-workout-meal-for-building-muscle-mass
- https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/eat-before-workout#TOC_TITLE_HDR_3
