by Michelle Wilkinson

Created on: July 16, 2010

The summer generally brings with it much better weather than you get during the winter months and so it is worth taking advantage of this to get active. Ideally, you should be doing some kind of exercise at least five times a week, anyway, but your fitness routine usually goes out of the window when it’s cold and miserable outside. You therefore have to re-establish a routine that gets you out of the house more often to enjoy the weather while getting fitter at the same time. By working on your fitness you should find it easier to stay slim, while hopefully you will be able to remain in good physical condition for longer.

Obviously, there are certain activities you can do throughout the year without the weather having much impact on your inclination to do them. If you’re a member of a gym you can use it all year round, as you’re indoors and so it doesn’t matter whether or not it’s raining! There are lots of other sports and activities which it becomes harder to do outdoors once the weather starts turning bad. When there are ten inches of snow on the ground you can’t exactly go out on your bike, for instance. You could always put your bike on a turbo trainer, but it’s not quite the same as going out and taking in the fresh air.

Thus, if you want to get active during the summer because you enjoy being outdoors you need to think about the kinds of activities which appeal to you. You may be the kind of person who prefers to exercise alone, in which case you could try running or cycling. With both of these activities you still have the opportunity to join a club and meet like-minded people, but you also have the freedom to workout by yourself. This is not the case if you decide to take up tennis, for example, as you need an opponent to play against.

There are also team sports, such as soccer, cricket, rugby and basketball to choose from. If you enjoy the competitive nature of team sports you may find that it is easier to motivate yourself to work on your fitness, as you don’t want to let the rest of your team down.

You don’t necessarily have to join a club or take up a sport if you don’t wish to, but you can still make the most of the summer sun and go out for family walks and bike rides if you want to increase your activity levels and get fitter.

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