Burn off the party season

Once all the upcoming festivities are over, what can you do to quickly get back into shape?

While all this partying might seem like a good idea at the time, entering the Year of the Dragon with an exhausted liver, a sluggish metabolism and a bloated body is far from ideal for your health.

Re-establishing your tried and true policy of "everything in moderation" is a good start, but it’s unlikely to be enough to shift that sneaky extra kilo gained over the coming weeks. A few tweaks to your diet and your exercise plan, however, might just do the trick.

Don’t be extreme

Fitness First instructor Michael Cunico warns that many of us typically go to extremes in the early New Year, the time often set aside for detoxing, dieting and unrealistic exercise regimes, ultimately setting ourselves up for weight loss failure. Instead, he recommends pragmatism to ensure your 2012 health and fitness program can be sustained in the long term.“You don’t need to be perfect, but instead allow yourself to have a cheat meal once a week where you can eat what you want,” he says.

“You can’t expect to eat perfectly 24/7, but from my experience when it’s cheat meal time, it’s most likely you’ll be restrained because you are already feeling so much better and naturally you’ll want to keep it that way.”

Include lean protein

Cutting down on processed carbohydrates and introducing some good fat and healthy protein into your diet is also recommended.

“Protein is generally quite filling and satisfying so try to include a decent-sized portion in every meal,” Michael says. “Also, don’t feel you have to avoid all fats either. We need fat in our diet, so look for healthy types like olive oil and that found in avocadoes, raw nuts and fresh coconuts.”

The importance of strength training

If you are really serious about improving your overall health and fitness, resistance or strength training in conjunction with cardiovascular or aerobic activity is an ideal way to burn unwanted fat.

Despite what some women have been led to believe, working out with weights will not make them look like a body builder. Instead, muscle builds curves, not bulk, in females, and regular strength training will sculpt the female body in a way that aerobic exercise alone can’t. Remember, the more muscle you have, the more efficiently you burn calories, and the better your bone density and blood sugar levels; and that goes for both men and women.

Factor in incidental exercise

Increasing incidental exercise is also a good way to burn fat. On the days you can’t make the gym or that important appointment with your personal trainer due to impending deadlines at work, why not make the most of the time you do have by using the stairs instead of taking the lift, or visiting a colleague in person instead of sending an email.

A brisk walk around the block at lunchtime or walking part of the way to and from work will also help boost your metabolism, decrease your stress level and clear your head.

Interesting ‘interval challenges’

Use the outdoors as much as you can to burn calories – even when you’re not working out. Michael suggests doing “interval challenges,” which he describes as a form of outdoor entertainment.

“If you're at your local coffee shop and it’s time to walk home, pick a landmark and walk faster until you reach it. Then recover and look for another landmark and push harder still until you get there. You can do the same thing if you are walking in a park. It’s about sporadically making your journey more difficult by picking landmarks and pushing yourself to reach them.”

Try these full body workouts

The most important New Year’s get-fit-again tip is to start before the damage is done! If you’re reading this and know you need to take action to stay on track, then try one of the workouts below today to kick-start your training.

Beginner

1. Assisted chin ups x 10
2. Push ups x 10
3. Hamstring curl with a ball x 10
4. Tricep dips x 10

Advanced

1. Chin ups x 10
2. Dumbbell bench press x 10
3. Dumbbell deadlift x 10
4. Dumbbell overhead press x 10

Complete exercises 1 through to 4, 3 times a week in weeks 1 to 3. Have a recovery week in week 4 and complete only 2 sets. In weeks 5 to 7, complete 4 sets. Again drop back in week 8, this time to 3 sets of the workout. Try and increase resistance in every workout, even if it is only the smallest increment. Try for 60 seconds between every exercise and 120 seconds between the whole workout.

Outdoor

Complete a 15-second intense workout, such as running up a hill or a challenging set of stairs, followed by 60 seconds of active recovery, like a light jog or stair walking. Complete this activity 5 times, twice a week.

In week 2, increase to 6 sets and continue adding a set each week. Once you have completed 10 sets it’s time to recover by reverting back to the week 1 schedule. Then, for the following weeks cut your recovery time in half and work through the same increments towards 10 sets.

Most importantly, enjoy regaining your healthy lifestyle and happy New Year!