Apparently beds are good for more than just sleep and sex.
One particularly underrated and overlooked activity you can do in bed is ‘exercise’. And yes, sex technically falls under the fitness umbrella, but we covered it yesterday.
Co-Founder of Bodypass and Exercise Scientist Georgia van Tiel says that the bed is a great place to workout. It’s “toning, lengthening and strengthening, and it’s a workout using just your bodyweight,” she explains. ” The spring and instability of the mattress also increases the demands of the workout.”
If you’re not already an early morning person or are an incurable insomniac with nothing better to do, try these minute-moves to get your mind right. “And, if you’re feeling especially spritely, give it a couple of rounds,” says Georgia. That’ll sort you out.
EXERCISE 1: SPRING LOAD COIL
How: Lie on your back with your arms along your sides, palms facing down. Press your legs together from ankle to inner thigh. Press into your hands and switch on your core as you raise your feet up over your hips, lift your hips up off the bed to raise your feet straight up toward the ceiling. Bring your hips back to the bed.
What it works: Lower abdominals and thighs.
EXERCISE 2: BED HEAD BRIDGE
How to do it: Placing both feet on the bed head with the knees both bent at 90 degree angles and your back flat on the bed, with both hands facing flat on the bed, raise your hips as high as they will go. Bring the hips back down to the bed and repeat. To increase the intensity hover the hips just off the bed each time.
What it works: Glutes and thighs.
EXERCISE 3: PILLOW TOP PLANK (WITH A TWIST)
How: Get into plank position with your forearms and hands flat on the bed, and your shoulders stacked over your elbows and legs straight, tilt your hips to the right, keeping them just off the bed, pause, come back to the centre and do the left side.
What it works: Your forearms, abdominals and obliques.
EXERCISE 4: AB CRUNCHER
How: Lying flat on the bed, place the soles of your feet together to create a diamond shape. Raise your legs high up off the bed to, resting them against the bed head or a wall for support. Crunch up towards your legs. Alternatively, you prop your legs straight up again a wall with your back flat on your bed, and crawl up the wall using your core for strength.
What it works: Abdominals.
EXERCISE 5: BEDSIDE PUSH UPS
How: Place both feed on the bed and both hands on the ground beside the bed. Go into a pushup position and lower to the ground. Push up and repeat.
What it works: Forearms, biceps and abdominals.
EXERCISE 6: JUMP AROUND (JUMP UP, JUMP UP AND GET DOWN)
How: Exactly what it sounds like. If you’re lucky enough to have high ceilings, jumping on your bed proves a good workout. As far as Georgia’s concerned, that’s how every morning should start: “sex, and then jumping around for a few minutes to an ’80s mix.”
What it works: Cardio (your heart), calves, and hamstrings.
