Posted on February 12, 2021 by Kate Halsall

We have blogs about what to wear when you’re doing an outdoor workout in the cold. We also have blogs about how to stay motivated to work out in this weather. This blog however, is me simply wanting to share my top tips for outdoor workouts that have been tried and tested with my clients who continue to train in the snow, the rain, and the minus degrees temperature!

Keep Rest To A Minimum

By minimum, I mean 20-30 seconds. Keeping rest to a minimum between exercises is great for giving your muscles a breather whilst keeping your heart rate up. It is also great for muscular endurance, calorie burn and fat loss. As an added bonus it also means that the sweat you’re generating doesn’t make you cold!

Circuit Training

Circuit training can combine body weight, weighted and dynamic exercises. They are a great way of improving overall fitness and if planned correctly can hit everything in the body. When you think about structuring a circuit workout, don’t just consider whether your chosen exercises will be timed or for reps. You also need think about the order of your exercises to ensure you keep that blood pumping and the heart rate up. As an example, one of my go-to plans would be:

  • Lower Body
  • Upper Body
  • Core
  • Cardio
  • Full Body

Big Compound Movements

Compound exercises are great because they work multiple muscle groups at once. They burn more calories, get your heart rate up and help with mobility (especially good if you sit at a desk all day!). You don’t need weights for these either! So make sure you’re adding squats, deadlifts, incline pressups and hip thrusts to your workouts.

Include Some HIIT

Love it or hate it, one sure fire way of keeping warm is to throw in some cardio! Whatever your choice of exercise, just ensure that it is suitable for the conditions you are training in. There’s no point injuring yourself for the sake of a workout. It also doesn’t have to be a massive amount either – I like to add some cardio tabata’s in – something short and sweet!

Combine to these suggestions a good warm up (jogging, running up and down steps etc) and a warm down (dynamic stretches), you’ve got your workout made! No excuses!