Sound-bite Training

I've mentioned it a couple of times before, including in yesterday's post. What exactly is sound-bite training? A sound-bite is a term that is used in radio and TV programming. It works on the principle that broadcasting time is ultra precious and there is little time to waffle usually (despite the average politician's attempts to do so).

So to ensure you maximise what little time is given to you, a competent speaker needs to make use of sound-bites i.e. hard hitting words and phrases designed to stay in the conscious recall of the listener. He makes his point using very succinct and confined words.

I have unashamedly borrowed that language for home training. Let's get real - despite knowing that you need to do more exercise, you have massive competing pressures on your time. If you have a busy full-time job, are a parent which takes account of most of your non-working time, have a house to maintain etc etc then training time is short and sweet. It may be that you can build some training into your leisure time, especially as the kids get older eg take them swimming (which I aim to do once each weekend) or go cycling (but are they able to go at a speed which is of real benefit to you?-in my case they're not at this stage.

So how do you fit in more exercise. Enter sound-bite training. You take no real time out at all but instead squeeze in body-weight training and hiit training in your spare moments throughout the day. You might even need to spread out the sets to achieve this. But see the day as a continuous training possibility.

If you come across say a kids playground whilst on a walk, why not squeeze out some pull-ups or chin-ups? When I'm at home and the coast is clear, I will sneak into the garden and use the tower for chin-ups and dips. Then squeeze in some push-ups at another point (as mentioned yesterday  - a range of classic push-ups, diamonds and crucifix push ups). Maybe some leg training at another point - air squats, alternating lunges and assisted (balance wise) pistol squats. Maybe another point do some bridges and pike presses

To be clear - I am not saying that this replaces proper gym sessions with a longer and perhaps more intensive structure. This works as a complementary. It also works to supplement as well - for example, tomorrow i will take my boys swimming (unlike cycling I have to work a bit harder now when we race and can do my own thing a little easier) and then I might sneak in some sound-bite boxing later.

Happy training!