My Plan for "Staying in Shape" This Summer

This Wednesday marks April 1st, which for a lot of people is around the time of year when the school year for college students begins to wind down and people are going home. You can see summer just on the other side of the bridge, which also means people are going to be trying to get into their best shape possible.

In light of that, I decided to take a bit of a break from sports writing today and give you my personal plan on how I plan to attack this summer in terms of staying in decent shape, what I’ll be eating, how much I’ll be eating, what my workouts look like, my mindset going into it, and and how that’s changed throughout the years. I just felt like this quick little post could help people out.

For starters, a few years ago, I was able to lose about 60 pounds after high school. I started off my fitness journey at about 190 pounds and at age 18 or 19 and being 5'8" probably wasn't great.

Since then I’ve been able to get down to as low as about 133 pounds, and today, I’m about 145 pounds, where I’ve been for about a year and a half now consistently.

Workouts

Starting off with my workout plan, I won’t be changing this much from what I do most of the year. I lift at least five times a week, sometimes even six. As far as rest goes, I kind of just go by need. I work at a gym, so a lot of the time I try to tell myself throughout the week that I’m not going to go in on a day off and I’ll just work out on the days I’m working, but then I always tend to get bored or feel somewhat guilty about not working out on a certain day. That’s something I need to improve on, but overall, rest days will go as needed.

As far as the split I’ll be doing, it’s varied throughout the year. I’ve done push-pull legs, I’ve done upper-lower, I’ve done upper-lower-push-legs, and right now I’m doing what is called the Batman split, which is a five-day split. It goes as follows. Day one is chest, shoulders, and biceps. Day two is back and triceps. Day three is legs and core. Day four is chest and back. Day five is shoulders and arms.

That’s just what I’m currently following right now. I’ve done that for about a month, and I’ve enjoyed it. I would probably like to get some more lower body workouts in there, so I might go back to a push-pull-legs split for a bit, but overall I was just getting a bit bored with that split, so I decided to switch it up.

As far as workouts go, nothing is drastically changing. It’s just about being in the gym consistently, progressively overloading my workouts, and making sure I’m active throughout the week.

Foods, Protein, Calorie Intake

In terms of food, this and calorie intake are probably going to be most important to people when it comes to losing weight and staying in shape throughout the summer.

Fortunately, I’ve been dieting or just knowing what my body needs for a while now to feel energized, and I’ve gotten to a point where I actually enjoy eating healthier foods. I’ve found they make me feel better, more at peace, and they don’t crash my energy levels. Just for example, last night I went out for a birthday dinner for myself, and they brought mini donuts to the table. It might not be the healthiest thing, but even when I had one mini donut, I felt extremely tired almost right away. I’m not sure what that is; I might have to get that checked out, but yeah, that’s just something I’ve noticed.

So I feel like I know what my body needs to feel good. For calories, I’m probably going to be trying to eat about 2300-2500 calories per day with about 180-200 grams of protein per day. This is a far cry from where I was a few years ago, where I was eating almost 1500 calories a day trying to lose weight. I don’t need to do that anymore. I just want to maintain where my physique is at or improve it. I’m not interested in going on a bulk or going on a cut.

So yeah, I’ll be eating about 2300-2500 calories per day. Some days I might go over, some days I might go under. It is what it is.

As far as the foods I’ve been eating, it’s been pretty consistent. I eat mainly the same things every day. Breakfast usually looks like a yogurt bowl with fruit, with a side of eggs and egg whites, maybe occasionally some bread in there. Lunch varies, usually some type of meat and vegetables. Dinner is again meat, vegetables, and a carb source, typically potatoes or sweet potatoes (I prefer those over rice).

As far as snacks, it’s a lot of typical “healthier” options. Fruit, vegetables, and protein bars. Popcorn is actually a fairly low-calorie snack; I’d recommend throwing that in your diet. It’s a little bit of extra fibre. I usually end the night with a Ninja Creami, which is basically a protein ice cream machine I’m sure you’ve seen all over TikTok. My base usually looks like some almond milk, a scoop of protein, a bit of sweetener, and then whatever mix-ins I want to throw in later. It depends on the flavour.

But yeah, food-wise it’s 2300-2500 calories per day, aiming for around 200 grams of protein. Some days might go over, some days might go under. As long as you’re consistent, one or two days where you’re not on track won’t make or break your progress.

At the end of the day, it’s just the typical foods you see when people are trying to lose weight or stay in shape. A lot of Greek yogurt, a lot of lean meats, a lot of fruit, a lot of diet soda, and protein snacks.

Balancing "Fun"

As far as what my balancing fun category looks like, I kind of just look at this as not putting as much pressure on yourself. I have a couple trips potentially lined up. I have a trip to Japan next month, which I’m looking forward to, where I (hope) won’t be tracking any food. I might also end up booking something with my friends later on in the summer. We’ll see where that goes, because typically plans don’t always happen, but we’ll see.

When I do go on vacation, I try not to track what I’m eating, but I’m still a bit self-aware of what makes me feel good and what doesn’t, and I go based on that. I also base it on where I am and how likely it is (or isn't) that I will get the chance to try this food again. When I was in New York, I ate probably way too much, more than I should have. But I still came back lighter because I was walking so much, and I knew I wanted to try all the food because I didn’t know when I’d be back.

So don’t let your progress or your goals get in the way of you having fun throughout the summer and enjoying those experiences. It’s still something I need to improve on, but I hope you can do it better than me.

As far as balancing fun while I’m at home, that’s also something I need to get better at. When it comes to alcohol, I’m not someone who really likes to drink. Some people might say I’m not fun because I don’t go out that often or like to get beers, but I just don’t enjoy it. It doesn’t make me feel good, and I feel like it hurts my confidence in a way. I’ll do it occasionally, but if it were up to me, I’d much rather go to a movie with friends or go to an arcade than go to a club. That’s just my preference.

I’m also going to try to play a bit more sports this summer. Maybe some baseball, maybe work on my golf game, maybe some tennis. I just enjoy being active, so anything that keeps me outside and somewhat social, I want to do more of that.

Overall, I’m going to try my best this summer to not let my food obsession or fitness goals get in the way of spending time with people and enjoying experiences. It’s something I need to get better at, but it’s something I know I’ll improve on over time.

Steps

Walking is the most underrated form of exercise you can do to stay in shape and lose weight. It’s the easiest one you can do, and it’s the one I tend to find the most relaxation in. I’ve even set goals for myself over the years.

When I first started trying to lose weight, my goal was 10,000 steps per day, and it stayed that way for a while. Over the past year, though, I found that was a bit too easy for me to hit, so I wanted to push it a bit more. Lately, I’ve been trying to get in about 12,000-15,000 steps per day, and I’ve been fairly successful with that.

Like I said, it’s one of the most underrated forms of exercise. You can do it every day. Just go walk around your neighbourhood, throw in your AirPods or headphones, listen to a podcast, listen to music, and just get outside and enjoy the sun. We just got through winter, which wasn’t as bad as past years, but still, get outside.

If you’re in an office, go take some walks on your break. If you’re working from home, get a walking pad and get some steps in there. Anything that keeps you active. Set a step goal for yourself and make sure you hit it.

I do think it’s a pretty easily achievable thing, and you should have a step goal if you’re trying to stay somewhat lean throughout the summer.

Mindset

In the last category I want to get into here is mindset and my way of thinking throughout all of this. I really want to get better this summer at not letting a lot of this stuff become an obsession and take over my life. As I’ve written before, I’ve let my fitness goals, my fear of food, and my fear of gaining weight get in the way of plenty of experiences and time with people, and I don’t want to let that happen anymore.

I’m still a very socially isolated person, and I want to get better with that. I feel like a lot of that isolation, or not wanting to go out with people, has come from a fear of gaining weight or not feeling good, as ridiculous as that sounds.

This summer, I want to make sure I get better at not letting these things take over my life. I want to enjoy experiences with people, get outside, explore places I haven’t been before, spend time with others, and overall just become a more well-balanced person. Someone who can balance having fun and enjoying life while still staying on track with their physique and fitness goals.

I hope you took something away from this. Again, I’m not a professional. I just wanted to give you some insight into what my mindset is this summer, and I felt like putting this down somewhere would be good for me going forward.