Working Out While You Are Stuck In Your Car

We all spend hours in our cars each day - commuting either to work or driving our children to and from one activity to the next.  Often you might find that due to the usual early morning rush you might have missed your morning workout. How does this impact on your muscle strength and development, what about flexibility?  The longer you are stuck in our car the more frustrated and aggravated you get. Does this sound familiar?

Nowadays our lifestyles are demanding and very active. There are at times too many places to be in and far too little time! Our lifestyles are not limited to just work and our children either. What ever the reason believe it or not, but there are actually ways to workout while you are stuck in your car! This workout will help you to get your blood moving more efficiently around your body.

There are various straightforward exercises that can help you to diminish that tired heavy feeling you often have when you are behind the wheel of a car.  It doesn’t matter what order you do these exercises in, but you might find them easier to remember when you do them from head to toe or in the opposite direction.

You can start by stretching your facial muscles, raise your eyebrows, give a big smile or you can pull the muscles in your neck up. A good way to stretch your neck muscles is by looking far to the left, then returning your head to the center and then looking far to the right. You need to do this several times, also look to the ceiling and then to floor, ending with your chin on your chest.

You can improve your posture by sitting tall and adjusting your rear view mirror, so that you need to sit tall to see, you can also adjust the seat back. Sit proudly by pulling in your stomach and lifting your chest.

Move your arms, both to the front and to the back, and then to the side pulling your shoulder blades together, this will stretch your arms and shoulders. Then, using one arm at a time, bend your arm at the elbow then raise it above your head and using the opposite hand, pull your elbow back. This stretches your triceps muscle.

While sitting in the car you can also do kegel exercises, you can do this by drawing up the pelvic floor muscles while pulling in your belly button. You need to do this without using your gluteal/buttock muscles, this will feel like you have been urinating but stopping in mid-stream.

Keep the blood in your lower extremities flowing by doing ankle exercises. This will help you prevent blood clots in your lower legs while you are driving a long distance or are if you are on a plane for a long time.  Make sure that your feet are nowhere near the pedals, then circle one foot in one direction and then the other while staying as still as possible. When you are stuck at a stoplight, make things a bit more interesting by drawing the alphabet with your foot, this will help improve your balance.

You can also do toe curls when you are driving, this will prevent fluid from stagnating in your feet, causing your feet to swell. Wiggle your toes or curl and hold, but don’t keep them curled up while you are driving as you will cause a cramp.

When you are driving, nothing is strained more than your eyes. This is another workout you can do while sitting in the car, keep away from looking down the road for long periods of time, always interchange where you are looking.  A good routine is where you look ahead down the road, glance into the rear view mirror, then ahead and down to the instrument panel and then ahead again and then into the rearview mirrors on the outside of your motor vehicle.  This process will keep your neck from becoming stiff and causing spinal problems or annoying TMJ.

Rub your eyes by beginning at the bridge of your nose, then rubbing along the eyebrows toward your ears, down to your cheekbones and then around to the nose. Never rub in the opposite direction as you will damage the tender tissue under your eyes which can cause bags.

By doing these easy exercises while you are stuck in your car you can improve the shape and tone of your body.  Consequently, next time you are stuck in traffic or you have to spend the day driving from one end of the city to the other. Make use of it to keep yourself refreshed while moving the blood around your body, it will make you feel great and keep you looking refreshed when you get to your destination.