Help - How To Stay Fit And Healthy While On The Road?

Suggestions please. What do you do to maintain you diet and do you exercise while on the road? How to maintain healthy lifestyle OTR?

Being healthy means a combination of maintaining your proper weight and being physically fit. We'll divide them up:

When it comes to maintaining your weight, it's all about counting calories. Fad diets, exercise programs, pills, and anything else they promote in relation to weight management is completely unnecessary. The perfect eating program is Weight Watchers and it's been around since 1963 for a very good reason - it's the proper way to eat. You take in the proper number of calories each day - simple as that. Take in a few less than you need and you'll consistently lose weight. Take in a few more than you need and you'll consistently gain weight. It's a simple matter of calories in versus calories out. I follow my own calorie-counting program which is similar to Weight Watchers even though I don't need to lose weight. At one time I was about 35 pounds overweight and I used calorie-counting to lose the weight. Once I got down to where I needed to be I continued counting calories to maintain my weight and it has worked perfectly for years now. Never gained back a pound.

I can not stress this enough - you do not have to exercise to get to and maintain your proper weight. You simply have to monitor how many calories you're taking in. I know someone that lost 160 pounds in 18 months on Weight Watchers without 5 minutes of exercise the entire time. So don't believe the garbage that advertisers try to sell you about needing exercise DVD's, gym memberships, diet pills, and everything else to lose weight. Baloney! It's all about calories in versus calories out. Simple as that.

Now of course being at your ideal weight does not mean you are physically fit the way you should be. Being physically fit takes exercise, and in that realm variety is the spice of life you could say. Ideally you would like a mix of cardio (like running), weight lifting, and stretching (like Yoga). And it's far more important to exercise consistently than it is to exercise intensely. In other words, you'd rather do 10 minute workouts 6 days a week (total of 60 minutes) instead of a one hour workout once a week (also total of 60 minutes).

When I was on the road I used to go jogging regularly and I brought dumbbells with me to do some lifting. But that was before I came across some improvements to my routine.

For starters I started doing Yoga about 6 years ago, which is the one thing I would do if I could do nothing else - it's beyond incredible. You desperately need to keep your muscles stretched and your joints in proper alignment in order to feel great. No matter how strong you are or how good your cardio is, if your muscle structure is out of balance you're going to have all kinds of problems - aches and pains, pinched nerves, stiffness, poor posture, etc, etc. You need to stretch and aling your body as part of good fitness.

I have also dropped the weight lifting and moved to "body weight exercises" which as you might expect are exercises that use your own body weight instead of weights. Push-ups, sit-ups, and pull-ups are the best known body weight exercises, but there is literally thousands of various exercises you can do to build incredible strength without the use of any weights whatsoever.

As far as cardio, the body weight exercises are a far more effective type of cardio than running, swimming, or biking because you're developing muscle endurance throughout your entire body, not just with certain muscles.

So if I were on the road today I would do what I'm doing now - a mix of Yoga, body weight exercises, and calorie monitoring.

If you're new to Yoga, the best beginner DVD's I've ever found are Yoga Zone. This is the package I started with and have recommended to people for years:

Yoga Zone - Ultimate Collection

As far as body weight exercises, an absolutely fantastic program (also the one I use) is by Mark Lauren and it's called "You Are Your Own Gym". He has mobile apps for his programs that are super cheap (like $3) and put together very, very well. He also now has programs specifically for women, a book describing his philosophy, and DVD version of his program. I recommend the apps because they have everything and they're really cheap. But I'm sure the DVD's are excellent too. The book is totally optional and not really necessary unless you'd like to learn all you can about Mark's philosophy, background, and training principles.

You Are Your Own Gym

So there you have it - that's how I would do it if I were on the road today and that is indeed what I do now at home.

This is something that is of particular interest to me, because I am overweight and currently working on trying to lose some of the excess pounds, and I've been contemplating how I'm going to handle that once I get into trucking (which, while a very mentally taxing job, can be pretty sedentary physically). Yoga did cross my mind. I wonder -- is there space inside the cramped cab of a truck to do any yoga poses? I thought about picking up some dumbbells as well, like Brett said. And I might occasionally take a few laps around the truck stop too. I bet it'll feel good after sitting for 10+ hours.

Brett's absolutely right about eating vs. exercise for weight management, though. When trying to lose weight (or just maintain a healthy weight), it's 80% diet, 20% exercise. When you're on the road and you do eat, try to make it something with nutritional value. Skip the nasty Big Mac and fries at Mickey D's and instead have a salad with chicken and some fruit. I'm not sure what dining options truck stops offer, but most fast-food joints nowadays are incorporating more healthy selections into their menus. I don't know about you, but I certainly plan to take advantage of them when I get out there on the road. :)

Counting calories does work. The problem is for one reason or another you forget to do it after a while. Whether your in a hurry or just feel like comfort food you stray.

Now while counting calories does work it should be mentioned that if you have trouble loosing weight or maintaining a certain weight for whatever reason ,enter lame excuse here, then trying to do it while on the road will be 5 times harder due to various factors...ie lack of will power.

Now it should also be said that you have to eat the right calories. If you decide that 1200 calories a day is good for you, you can not eat two bags of chips ,two candy bars and drink two sodas and call it a day. Those are empty calories and mostly sugar and will not fill up so you will have to eat more to stop from being hungry. Plus you will want to make sure to have the proper fiber in take. You can not go two to three days without a bowl movement. Its not normal for ANYONE! I care what anyone says. If you are not going at least once ,maybe twice, a day then you need to look at how much fiber intake you have.

Sorry GuyJax, but a calorie is a calorie. Fat, carbs and protein. Throw in a few vitamins and essential amino acids and you are good to go for the body. If you have to many simple sugars, they cause the blood sugar to spike and then fall due to insulin being pumped in mass quantities and then you will be hungry a while later. Complex carbs are better for hunger management. As Brett said, it is all about calories in vs calories out. Physical activity helps burn additional calories.

I park as far away from the truck stop as I can which is one reason I prefer mom and pop shops much bigger lot,stay away from high Carb foods and starches,never go to the buffet that is a fat factory.

Sorry GuyJax, but a calorie is a calorie. Fat, carbs and protein. Throw in a few vitamins and essential amino acids and you are good to go for the body. If you have to many simple sugars, they cause the blood sugar to spike and then fall due to insulin being pumped in mass quantities and then you will be hungry a while later. Complex carbs are better for hunger management. As Brett said, it is all about calories in vs calories out. Physical activity helps burn additional calories.

You missed the point of my post. I know 1200 calories is 1200 calories but if you fill up on empty calories with junk food then you will get hungry again very soon and will need to to eat again to fill full therefore consuming more calories than the person needed and will gain weight rather quickly due eating more calories than needed cause of the junk food.

Freightliner is marketing a pretty nifty fitness system for Cascadia and Concord model tractors.

I can post the link if no one minds or you can check it out out CDLLife, then Health & Fitness. FIT system.

I'm sure the other manufacturers or some other aspiring entrepreneur won't be far behind for other makes of trucks.

Sorry GuyJax . I did miss your point and we agree 100%.

Thanks for this thread as this topic was on my mind also. My wife has successfully used this calorie tracking app to lose weight. http://www.mynetdiary.com

I just downloaded the "You Are Your Own Gym" app that Brett recommends and setup my profile on the mynetdiary app to track my calories. Mynetdiary has projected that by limiting my intake to 2253 calories per day that I will lose 1 lb per week and reach my target weight in 5 months. Looks like I won't be starving but I'll need to be more careful and aware of what I'm eating. True, I only want to lose about 20 lbs but just as important is setting up new exercise habits and a greater awareness of my food consumption.