The cake is cooked and decorated, and the mince pies are cooling on the rack ready to be frozen ready for the big Christmas blowout. That’s just the start. So much food will be chomped over a short period of time. You’re looking forward to it, aren’t you? They’ll be a load of choccies, sweeties too and lots of people to visit and eat with. Every home will be busting with goodies, and you intend to get your share.
Trying to compete with the fat man in the red suit?
Spare a thought for your waistline and your overloaded and abused-by-food body. It is not a rubbish bin. Christmas can be fun without busting your gut – literally! No, you don’t agree? Well, come back and tell us that in January when you are trying desperately to lose the weight, you piled on over the festive season. Not to mention the spots that are popping up all over your face because you ate too much sugar. You won’t be so confident then, will you?
Okay, that was too serious
Go ahead, enjoy your Christmas, eat your food and make merry with a few drinks. We are not trying to be the new Grinch. Christmas is to be enjoyed however you chose. But and this is an important ‘but’, make sure you do some active stuff as well – and not just lifting your right arm, or walking from your armchair to the kitchen… they don’t count. We mean get really active, so you burn off some of those calories before they settle forever on your hips or waistline.
Get active – really go for it!
Even if you stagger out of the door and go for a walk from time to time, you’ll do your body and your brain a favour, but we suggest some really active stuff. Chances are you’ll get back home so hungry, you’ll stuff your face again, but at least you made an effort and burnt a few calories in the process.
Suggested fat-burning activities:
PAINTBALL – 3500 calories for roughly six hours of paintball. Paintball includes three different exercises: sprinting, running, and walking.
MOUNTAIN BIKING – 528 calories for one hour of mountain biking, or tackling moderately tough terrain. That’s based on 145-lb. woman. This amount increases for higher weights and decreases for lower body weights.
GO-KARTING OR RALLY DRIVING – 900 calories for one hour of go-karting and in fact this applies to rally driving too. You don’t just ‘sit’ in a car or kart. There is a lot of body movement as you tackle the circuit.
CLIMBING OR BOULDERING – 500 to 900 calories per hour climbing or bouldering. You need to be actively climbing in that time, or your calorie burn will be on the lower side of the calculation.
AXE THROWING – 176 to 204 calories an hour If you weigh 155 pounds and 180 pounds respectively, axe throwing.
Those calories are just when you are actively taking part in your chosen activity. Because once you get your body going, you’ll keep burning calories hours after the event when you’re relaxing, or even eating again.
Get the kids involved. Despite what you may think, they love to get out and do stuff over the festive period and not just sit and stare at screens.
By CJ