Increase Stamina with Stairs
“OH NO!” This is how I would react every time at the sight of stairs. Hence, I always wanted to live in one floor apartment with elevators.
One day there was a reality check— my first experience of fire drill at my work place around 5 years back. Hmm…. I was not too impressed with the drill because my office was located at the 5th floor and I was forced to run down and again climb up 5 floors worth of stairs!
As luck would have it, the more I ran away from stairs the more they chased me. I moved into a three- storied house. Reality checks again. After a few months stairs started bothering me so much that to avoid them I made my husband move from our bedroom which was in the third level to the main floor level for major part of the time span. But how long could I avoid the stairs? I realized that I was facing physical problems like shortness of breath, lack of stamina, feeling of extreme exhaustion and tiredness, leg pain and so on.
One day I got this brain wave of utilizing stairs to my benefit in order to overcome my physical problems. I decided to count how many stairs I climb every day. To my surprise, I calculated that I climbed the entire flight of stairs approximately 10 times a day. Then I started climbing 12-15 stairs 5 times continuously. It took me only 1 minute 30 seconds to complete all 5 sets in this exercise routine. I continued doing the same for a week after which I noticed an increase in my stamina. I could now climb each set of 12-15 stairs for 10 times instead of the previous 5 times. I was super happy with myself and was feeling fresher and fitter. What more, it just took me 2 minutes, yes 2 minutes per day to lose some important calories and increase my fitness. Eventually, I could walk a greater distance and I also did not hesitate to participate in hiking trips on weekends. This was one of the very important steps in my transition from a lethargic to an active woman.
In attempting to utilize stairs more beneficially, I realized that I could also use them for my regular exercises, especially during bad weather. Stairs are available everywhere and can be used effectively for workouts. I have since, started preferring stairs over elevators or escalators, as I burn more fat, my muscles tone up better, I am not dependent on the fickle Seattle weather anymore, my stamina and energy have increased 3 times, and most importantly I do not require any exercise equipment. Stair-climbing is the most convenient and fast way to stay fit, active and energetic.
Read more on how to start climbing stairs for exercise at runsociety.com
Health tip of the week
“Include stair climbing in your exercise routine”
Leave a Reply