Anyone who follows Shay Mitchell on Snapchat knows at least two things to be true: She loves her pizza, and the girl can crush a workout. But even the most dedicated fitness fanatics have certain moves that make them cringe at just the thought—and the Pretty Little Liars star is no exception.
Her hate-to-love, love-to-hate exercise? Lunges. “[Trainer] Harley [Pasternak] loves lunges, and I’m not the biggest fan of them,” Mitchell told SELF during the first-ever Propel Co:Labs Fitness Festival with Pasternak (whom she also trains with one-on-one). “He loves to see how many you can do, and I don’t even know how long we went one time but it was painful. But they do their job,” she added.
She’s not wrong about that: Lunges may be one of the simplest, most accessible exercises around, and done with proper form, they’re a killer lower-body move that targets your glutes, hamstrings, and quads. Sometimes she goes with bodyweight lunges, while other times she holds weights—either way, they’re not exactly her favorite. Although, it’s hard to believe there’s any exercise she can’t conquer with laser focus, judging by this Instagram workout:
For the most part, though, Mitchell’s one of those people who actually looks forward to her time in the gym. “I honestly love working out. I don’t look at it like, ugh, I have to go work out today,” Mitchell said. “I really enjoy it and I feel amazing after it.” By approaching it with a positive mindset and reminding herself how she feels when she’s done, she sees her workouts as something to be enjoyed, not dreaded—even when she’s insanely busy and pressed for time like the rest of us.
“If I could, I would try and get a workout in every single day, but that doesn’t always happen,” Mitchell admits. (We know the feeling.) Mitchell does strength training workouts in the gym three days a week, and then she will fit in a hike, a bike ride, or a class like indoor cycling when she has time on the other days. She also loves boxing, which is like “therapy” for her, she told SELF.
Even though she doesn’t work out every day, she still tries to stay active and healthy by following Pasternak’s guidance outside the gym. “You want to move as much as you can throughout your daily routine,” Pasternak told me. “Walk to get a coffee in the morning. Unless you’re driving, eating, or on an airplane, you should be on your feet as much as possible.” Mitchell says she tries to take 10,000 steps a day per Pasternak’s advice, no matter what. (It’s by no means a magic number, but setting a step goal isn’t a bad way to encourage yourself to move more every day.)
Mitchell also tries get seven hours of sleep every night, eat protein and fiber at every meal and snack, and unplug for at least one hour a day—again, all per Pasternak’s advice. Luckily for her followers, that daily hour-long digital detox doesn’t happen during her workouts—because moves like hers demand to be ‘grammed and snapped.
[“Source-self”]