INTRODUCTION:

For the past 4 weeks, my family and I have been in quarantine after our arrival in Sri Lanka. For two weeks we have been in a hotel quarantine, and for the other two, we have been at home. I decided to look at the situation as an opportunity to grow as an individual, develop new skills by facing challenges, and show resilience. I primarily strived to demonstrate perseverance, and overcome the mental and physical challenges of being isolated in a country with fairly strict post-travel regulations. My goals for the month were to participate in physical activity for a minimum of 6 times a week for 30-60 minutes per day.

 

PERSONAL FITNESS:

In my previous post discussing my goals, I am looking at becoming physically stronger and maintaining my fitness. I strived to do a minimum of 3 workouts, 20-30 minutes in duration each, every week of DP. Currently, I am fulfilling this goal, as well as the one set for me this month, increasing the intensity of my goal as isolation can make people very inactive. During this month, I succeeded in consistently exercising 6 times a week averaging around 45 minutes each day. I followed the quarantine-famous Chloe Ting 2-week shred program, allowing me to exercise with a plan, preventing me from failing to meet my goal. I followed other workouts on extra rest days, from channels such as “MadFit”, “Lilly Sabri”, and “Popsugar”. After a large amount of up and down planks, burpees, and lunges, our hotel quarantine was over and I had endured it, feeling stronger and motivated.

After the two weeks of hotel quarantine, I starting focusing on my cardio by using the indoor cycle at home, increasing my heart rate, and reaping all the benefits that physical activity provides. Since it allowed me to calculate multiple factors of my cycling, such as number of miles, I created some sub-goals, allowing me to keep pushing myself and consistently improving. I cycled 4 days a week,  following indoor-cycling videos from the “Global Cycling Network” and going on self-guided rides. One of my sub-goals was to hit 7 miles in under 25 minutes to increase my maximum output. I managed to hit this goal after a week, making it my personal best. I and still building on this goal, striving to get to 8 miles in under 25 minutes.

I still incorporate body-weight fitness into my routine, trying to build all muscle groups (upper body, core, and legs), as cycling is focused on the lower body. Hopefully, as I maintain fitness, I will be able to use this conditioning in football and volleyball once school permits it.

 

Overall, I have found that I am getting increasingly fitter, as workouts I did at the start of quarantine are becoming easier to complete. In order for me to continue growing, I have started recording my weaknesses in fitness, discovering that my upper body needs the most attention. Therefore, I will start to incorporate 2 upper body orientated workouts into my week. This will allow me to build on my weaknesses and grow my physical strength. I plan to continue with my progress and start looking into developing my coordination skills, for the purpose of being ready when sports are reintroduced in or outside of school. I plan to continue doing physical activity for at least 30 minutes a day for 6 days every week. A more specific goal I hope to work towards is being able to do 30 push-ups in under a minute. This will be a good way to track my progress on my upper body since I can only manage to do 20 at the moment.

I have found physical activity has helped me stay motivated and positive during these trying times, thus I am confident that I will keep up the consistency. Of course, there are days that I feel less motivated and want to stay in bed, but pushing through that is what perseverance is about. My goal to get stronger pulls me out of bed and gets me staying active, which in turn, makes me happier and content. I have found that I have become more productive, especially right after a workout, which is why I have started to do morning workouts. I hope this will allow me to start my day off on the right foot, and make me a more productive individual.