4 Full-Body Exercises You Can Do with Just a Chair
Sitting too much? Here’s a simple fix.

If you spend most of your day in an office chair, you’re in good company: A typical adult sits around five hours a day, and those of us who work on computers log even more time chained to the chair.
This time spent sitting carries several health risks. In fact, this phenomenon is so ubiquitous that doctors even coined a name for it: sitting disease. This refers to periods of prolonged sitting, regardless of other physical activity during the rest of the day.
Although it is unclear if sitting disease directly causes chronic illnesses, studies have found associations between prolonged sitting and heart disease, higher cholesterol, an increase in insulin resistance, loss in bone density, and obesity.
To counter the risks of sitting disease, personal trainer Rob Sulaver has the midday workout that’s perfect for getting out of your chair and on your feet. In fact, your chair will become part of the workout. And if you’re feeling bold at work, you can even pull these chair exercises off right at your desk.
TBH, you’ll probably recognize a few of these moves, but they’ve been adapted to include the chair. For a chair exercise, instead of tricep dips, you’ll do chair dips. Instead of a typical squat, you’ll do a chair squat.
This chair workout includes three sets of four moves: reverse bridges, chair dips, chair squats, and mountain climbers. You’ll do each chair exercise for 30 seconds.
Rob Sulaver is a certified strength and conditioning specialist, a certified sports nutritionist, and a certified personal trainer. He is the founding trainer of Rumble Boxing in New York City.
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[MUSIC]
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Sitting all day takes
its toll on the body.
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Today, we're gonna break up that monotony.
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[MUSIC]
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Welcome back to another
episode of Just Get Started.
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My name is Rob Sulaver.
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We all know, long work days, right?
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Stuck at our desk for
hour after hour after hour, what happens?
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Our upper spine is flexed.
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We're internally rotated at the shoulders,
typing away here.
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Tight hip flexors, because we're
in the seated position all day and
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our glutes are basically shut off.
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Here's a quick workout that you can do.
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Slip it in, in the middle of your work
day, helps kind of prevent all of
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this misalignment, and
keeps your posture in a good place.
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I've got four exercises coming your way.
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Number one, Reverse Bridge here.
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[SOUND] Opening up those shoulders and
that thoracic spine.
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Exercise number two, Chair Dips.
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[SOUND] Boom, right here.
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Working those triceps.
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Exercise number three,
chair-assisted squats.
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Getting nice and low,
working those quads and those glutes.
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Exercise number four,
Mountain Climbers here.
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[SOUND] Bam, bam, bam.
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Working primarily, that heart and
cardio vascular system.
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Okay, those are your four exercises.
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We're doing each one for 30 seconds and
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we're gonna do the whole
thing three times.
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Let's jump into it, shall we.
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Exercise one, Reverse Bridge into one.
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Here we go, 30 second hold here.
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Now the idea is open
up these shoulders and
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get this thoracic spine nice and
balanced, right?
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Again, because we're so flexed throughout
the day we need to get ourselves into
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extension to keep our posture nice and
in line.
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You're gonna feel your
triceps working here,
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you're gonna feel your shoulders bracing.
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And try to keep your hips
up as high as you can.
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Think nice long line.
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Two, one, time, beautiful.
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Take a second here.
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Feels great, especially after sitting for
so long, right?
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Exercise number two, Chair Dips.
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Get into a good positions here.
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Try to keep your back nice and
close to this chair, two, one, let's go.
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30 seconds here.
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Nice and low.
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If you've got a swivel chair like I do,
make sure you're bracing,
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trying to prevent it from moving,
a little extra challenge to the mix.
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Again, getting down nice and low,
keeping that back close to the chair here.
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Try not to slip out too much here, right?
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That just decreases your range of motion.
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Get nice and low, back,
close to the chair, all the way up.
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Two, one, time, beautiful.
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Exercise three,
opening up that lower body a little bit,
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getting into these chair assisted squats.
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Set and let's go.
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Now the game here is getting nice and low.
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This should feel pretty good.
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We're opening up that
lower back a little bit,
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getting a full range of
motion at the knees.
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If this is tough or
exceptionally uncomfortable,
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feel free to limit the range
of motion a little bit, right?
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[SOUND] Going right to here.
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As you open up, you can get lower and
lower in this squat.
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[SOUND] Again, I'm just using
this chair as a little support,
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keeping yourself nice and
upright, and time nice.
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Last one here, we've got our
Mountain Climbers on this chair.
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Set and let's rumble.
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Nice light feet.
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Notice my knees are getting all
the way up to my chest here.
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Again, bracing through the core.
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Try to prevent any rotation at this chair.
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Damn, hopping through this.
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[MUSIC]
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Feeling it in the triceps.
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Feeling it in the shoulders.
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Definitely feel it in the core as well.
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High knees, light feet.
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Three, two, bam, excellent.
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Let's hop right into our next round here.
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30 seconds, two, one, we're going.
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This feels awesome opening
up those shoulders, right?
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Opening up that t spine.
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I like to remind myself,
I even put a sticker on my computer and
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anytime my eyes graze over that sticker, I
remind myself to check in with my posture.
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That constant reminder
helps keep us in alignment,
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helps prevent some of this pain.
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Exactly what this workout is all about,
right?
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And time, take a second.
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Love that.
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Right into our dips.
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Set and go.
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Again, another shoulder opener here.
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Let's get that breath tied in.
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[MUSIC]
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On to work, right?
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As you pop up, go to exhale,
help support the movement,
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helps pop us out of the hole,
keeps us moving nice and quick.
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[MUSIC]
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And keeps our breath nice and
consistent, two, one, time, beautiful.
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Right into our squats here, again,
checking in with that breath.
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[SOUND] Good exhale on the way up,
[SOUND] we'll breath in at the top.
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[SOUND] And using that chair,
getting as low as we feel comfortable.
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Opening up that lower back,
opening up those hips, and
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putting those knees through
a full range of motion.
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Five seconds here, let's finish strong.
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Two, one, bam.
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Last one here, Mountain Climbers.
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Spiking that heart rate, 30 seconds.
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Three, two, one, let's go.
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Yeah, cardio work here.
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All about that heart.
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Getting that core involved, as well.
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And that upper body,
definitely gonna feel it there.
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Speed like feet.
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[SOUND] Nice consistent breath here.
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Try not to hold your breath,
breathe throughout the whole thing.
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Two, one, time.
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Two down, one to go.
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Reverse Bridge, 30 seconds, set and go.
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[MUSIC]
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Keep your energy up here.
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[SOUND] Finish strong with me.
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[SOUND] Also,
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you know this workout is about getting
our energy up throughout the day.
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When we have to sit forever,
our energy just plummets.
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Our focus goes out the window.
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Quick little heart rate spike,
a little sweat, gets us back in the game.
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Get's us feeling good.
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[SOUND] That's what
Just Get Started's all about.
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And bam, taking a second.
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Number two here, we got dips.
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Top right into it.
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Set and go.
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Again, bracing through this chair.
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Try to prevent that swivel.
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Feeling good at this point?
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You wanna make this a little harder?
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Bring those legs out straight,
using more of your body weight.
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You wanna keep it nice and manageable,
keep those legs under you.
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If you wanna make it a little easier
you can drive through the feet as well.
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Use that lower body to help you.
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[SOUND] three seconds.
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Two, bam.
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[MUSIC]
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Exercise three, chair assisted squats.
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Make these awesome, set and go.
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[MUSIC]
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Notice how light my hands are here?
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Trying to get as low as I can
without using the chair much.
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[MUSIC]
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Quick regression,
you can always do a chair squat here.
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If this is challenging, keep it
right here, or listen to your body.
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Know your end range of motion, but
if you can get way down there.
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Two, bam, last one here.
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We got 30 seconds, let's finish strong.
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Finish with me, three,
two, one, here we go.
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[MUSIC]
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Love this, we can do everything
right at our desk chair.
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Fly through this,
only takes a couple minutes.
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Get's us back in the game,
back to our work and back to productivity.
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[MUSIC]
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That's what Just Get Started's all about.
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Let's finish strong, come on.
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Light feet, nice and athletic.
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Yeah, I'm feeling it.
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Two, one, bam.
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Beautiful work, friends.
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Four exercises, 30 seconds each.
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Got through three rounds.
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We opened our upper back.
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We worked our arms, we worked our legs,
and we spiked our heart rate.
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Getting back in the game,
back to the productivity.
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That my friends,
is what Just Get Started's all about.
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I'll see you soon.
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[MUSIC]
Bauman A, Ainsworth BE, Sallis JF, et al. The descriptive epidemiology of sitting. A 20-country comparison using the International Physical Activity Questionnaire (IPAQ). Am J Prev Med 2011;41(2):228-35.
Tremblay MS, Colley RC, Saunders TJ, Healy GN, Owen N. Physiological and health implications of a sedentary lifestyle. Appl Physiol Nutr Metab 2010;35:725-40.