Christine Lampard swears by one low-pressure and realistic approach to staying fit: NEAT exercise. Standing for Non-Exercise Activity Thermogenesis, NEAT exercise refers to any movement you do that isn’t planned. For Christine, that means being on her feet doing chores around the house, walking her children to school, or dog walking – it keeps her active, without the pressure of a formal routine.

‘I don’t go to the gym but I’m always moving and I think that keeps me fit,’ she explained in an interview with Woman and Home magazine. ‘Frank is very good with gym stuff but I find that general activeness and not sitting around for too long is pretty good for me. I was up at 5.45 this morning preparing breakfast, making lunches and getting the kids ready.

‘I walked my daughter to school while she rode along on her little scooter and then I took our dog out. I’m also active around the house and it gets my steps up without trying.’

Christine says she stays fit by walking and keeping up with her children

The 47-year-old Loose Women host strongly believes you don’t need a gym membership – or formal workouts – to stay healthy, but walking (a form of NEAT exercise) is a big part of her routine.

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In a separate TikTok video for Woman and Home magazine, she explained how it can be so effective: ‘I can be very lazy when it comes to exercise. But actually, I’ve always said this, I walk. I walk and I walk. I don’t do any classes or anything like that. I’d love to get into Pilates but that’s something I’ve talked about for about 20 years and never acted on it. But walking for me, I get the dog and the children out, we go to the park, no matter what the weather is. And I’ve found walking the absolute perfect exercise for me, it gets the heart pumping, keeps everything together, keeps you just generally fit.’

Why is NEAT exercise so effective?

Non-intentional exercise like this makes up significantly more of your TDEE (Total Daily Energy Expenditure – how many calories you burn across each day), compared to the time you spend exercising in a gym doing a planned workout. NEAT makes up 50% of your TDEE, while a planned workout typically counts for roughly 10%. The more you fit movement into your day, whether that be doing household chores, walking instead of taking public transport, using a standing desk instead of sitting down, or carrying shopping instead of using a trolley, the more energy you expend and the bigger the fitness benefits.

Examples of NEAT exercise

Some other examples of NEAT include:

• Walking upstairs
• Walking the dog
• Carry grocery shopping
• Washing the car
• Fidgeting
• Playing with children or pets
• Using a standing desk
• Walking to the gym, shops, office instead of taking public or private transport
• Gardening

Christine’s underlying value is consistency over intensity – you don’t need formal workouts for results if that doesn’t work for you. Research consistently shows that regular, moderate exercise delivers meaningful health and fitness benefits, and sometimes the equivalent of fewer but more intense workout sessions. What matters most is showing up repeatedly.

As Women’s Health UK’s fitness director and a qualified Pilates and yoga instructor, Bridie Wilkins has been passionately reporting on exercise, health and nutrition since the start of her decade-long career in journalism.

After earning a first-class degree in journalism and NCTJ accreditation, she secured her first role at Look Magazine, where she launched the magazine’s health and fitness column, Look Fit, before going on to become Health and Fitness writer at HELLO!

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Since, she has written for Stylist, Glamour, Cosmopolitan, Marie Claire, Elle, The Metro, Runner’s World and Red. Today, she oversees all fitness content across Women’s Health online and in print, spearheading leading cross-platform franchises, such as ‘Fit At Any Age’, which showcases the women proving that age is no barrier to exercise.

She has also represented the brand on BBC Radio London, plus various podcasts and Substacks – all with the aim to encourage more women to exercise and show them how. Outside of work, find her trying the latest Pilates studio, testing her VO2 max for fun (TY, Oura), or posting workouts on Instagram.   

What is isometric exercise?

What are some examples of isometric exercises?

Does that mean I should only do isometric exercises?

The article below is an excerpt from my newsletter: Well Enough with Harry Bullmore. To get my latest thoughts on fitness and wellbeing pop your email address into the box above to get the newsletter direct to your inbox.

Exercise doesn’t always make a good first impression. Often, the opposite is true.

A recent survey found that unpleasant experiences in PE lessons put 28 per cent of people off exercise “for life”.

In the UK, if you didn’t take to football, rugby, athletics or netball like a duck to water, there’s a high chance you came to believe that sport isn’t for you.

Then, as an adult, someone stresses the importance of exercising for your health, so you do what everyone else seems to be doing and go for a run. That invariably feels horrible because your body isn’t quite ready for it, so you stop.

The thing missing throughout this process is choice. It’s hard to develop a healthy relationship with something you feel forced into. But exercise becomes less of a chore if you can find a form of movement you enjoy and actively choose to do on a regular basis – whether that’s swimming, pickleball, home workouts, qigong, Nordic walking or something else.

That is the theme of this week’s newsletter – making exercise work for you:

This probably isn’t the first time you’ve been told to enjoy exercise. That’s easier said than done – and far harder for some than others. Simply running more or pressuring yourself to go to the gym every day isn’t going to work. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t possible.

Anne Dockery, a 77-year-old champion runner and triathlete from Bristol, demonstrates this point beautifully. Her bulging medal cabinet would turn any athlete green with envy, yet she only started running at 52.

“I thought running was really boring at first,” she tells me, laughing. “Now I don’t know what I would do without it.”

So what changed? She joined a club.

Anne became part of a diverse group of runners who hit the trails and tarmac every Sunday. They chatted, they ran, and she soon found herself covering up to 18 miles in a day. But it didn’t feel like exercise – by adding a social element, she found a way to make it fun.

There’s a lot more to Anne’s story, including her fight for fitness brands to represent over-45s fairly, which I’ll be diving into in next week’s newsletter.

This is not an isolated case. My uncle joined a volleyball club in his sixties. In the past decade, my mum and several friends have discovered the unbridled joy of Cornish pilot gig rowing. Another friend found a dance class she loves and hasn’t looked back.

Few of these activities feature in school curriculums or exercise guidelines, but they are all forms of movement. And as World Health Organisation guidelines from 2020 state: “Every move counts towards better health.”

I’ve experienced this personally, too. After growing like a weed during my sixteenth summer, I joined a new sixth form as a gangly teen in a foreign-feeling body. I felt awkward and uncomfortable – bulking up in the gym felt like a straightforward solution.

So I went along, lifted a few weights to the best of my ability, then spotted people sniggering at my efforts and promptly left. The gym was clearly not for me.

Fast forward to 2026, and I now write about fitness for a living while teaching people how to lift weights outside of my nine-to-five. What happened in between? I made lifting weights work for me and regained exercise autonomy in the process.

I don’t think anyone enjoys being sniggered at (although I’ve since found most gyms are supportive environments). But what I do love is learning.

So I went to a discount store, picked up a cut-price set of spinlock dumbbells and a barbell, then started inhaling every piece of strength training-related literature I could get my hands on.

I proceeded to pump iron in my garden shed over the coming months. My body changed, my mindset changed, and I grew to love it. Later, I was able to return to the gym with a pep in my step and a self-made exercise plan in my back pocket.

One of the best ways to build confidence is to start exercising with a coach. Once you’ve learned how to perform five to 10 fundamental full-body exercises (think squats, lunges, presses and rows) with good form, you have everything you need to build a robust body.

If the gym environment feels intimidating, accessible home workouts – like the one featured in The Independent’s strength training guide – are a great, time-savvy alternative.

Or you can increase the enjoyment factor by heading outside with sessions like coach Dan John’s favourite kettlebell workout. There are extra health benefits if you can rope in a few friends too – an ongoing 80-plus-year Harvard study has highlighted the importance of strong social connections in living a longer, healthier life.

Of course, these two examples only cover strength training. From all the reading and interviews I’ve done, the optimal exercise mix (on paper) involves regular strength training, challenging your heart and lungs at least a couple of times per week, and a good dose of general movement (ie walking).

But the more important takeaway from this newsletter is that any movement is better than none – and fun is invaluable. Combine the two and you’ll be laughing.

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