Aside from hair-raising challenges and touching moments of family love, each week Ireland's Fittest Family brings us endless inspiration to get fit, stay fit and start testing your willpower and strength in similar ways to the teams.
With Christmas just seven weeks away, this is the time of year when all the biscuit tins start stacking up and "moderation" is thrown out the door - if only for a few days. Given Christmas revolves around food, it's practically impossible to avoid indulging here and there, but it is possible to enjoy the holidays without depriving yourself of what makes it so special.
As coaches on Ireland's Fittest Family, Anna Geary and Derval O'Rourke are experts when it comes to discipline, focus and staying motivated. For them, staying healthy and fit around the holidays come down to two things: straight-forward workouts and consistency.
Derval says that keeping things "super simple" is especially important for those aiming to get in better shape this side of Christmas, and can be anything from walking around the office to climbing more stairs where possible. "It’s only a few weeks until Christmas, don’t be trying to do everything because it’s not obtainable", she says, and suggests going "to one or two scheduled things a week, be it Pilates or spin classes" to give you a routine.
If that's not possible, there are plenty of workouts that can be done at home for even the shortest amounts of time. Derval points to mums, which she is herself, as some of the busiest people: "I’m a mum and I find it hard to get out until my daughter’s in bed. For me, I just do a really simple circuit at home. Something is better than nothing."
Anna fully agrees with this, saying "Everybody has 20 minutes in their day. It just means you might need to come off your phone, you might need to watch 20 minutes less of TV, but you can find 20 minutes to do exercise. It’s starting small and building up".
Rather than focusing on fad diets and quick fixes, Anna says consistency is the way to achieve your goals, saying that "Fitness is a way of life".
"Too much emphasis is placed on these overhauls of our lives", she says. "And they might work, you might do that now and you might look great for Christmas but the minute Christmas comes then you’ll feel you deprived yourself so much that you’ll actually binge."
Anna suggests treating food in the same way as exercise, by making small, realistic changes one step at a time such as drinking fizzy drinks every second day instead of every day and whittling it down further.
For both her and Derval, however, the most important lesson is to be patient with yourself and not hold yourself to too many high standards too soon.
"People might say to me ‘Oh, I’m really disappointed, I only lost a pound’", says Anna, "and I’ll say you know there are 3,500 calories in a pound of fat? For you to lose one pound, that means you put your body through 3,500 calories of a deficit. That’s a massive thing to accomplish!"
There's one Internet trend that has a fair bit of legitimacy to it, however, and that's the hyper fixation on water and sleep. Usually the most neglected parts of our general health, hydration and rest are essential for meeting health and fitness goals you've set for yourself, and they're typically taken for granted or dismissed.
"You will not get the results you want, no matter how much you’re eating or training if you’re not sleeping enough or if the quality of your sleep isn’t great and if you're not drinking enough water", says Anna.
So even if you spend the holidays sleeping the days away, snuggled up in bed, you can officially count it as part of your fitness plan!
Ireland's Fittest Family airs every Sunday at 6.30pm on RTÉ One.
