Take the stairs plus more way to keep you fit this festive

A holiday from stress and worry shouldn’t mean a holiday from exercise.

In fact, with your schedule cleared for a few glorious days, now’s a good time to get that fitness habit on point.

Why? Because exercise has been proven to decrease stress, help with depression and anxiety, improve sleep and boost self-esteem and self-confidence. But staying active doesn’t have to mean a 6am wake-up and a gym swipe. 

We spoke to Yolanda Sokhela, she is a personal trainer and group fitness instructor who loves taking her workouts outdoors. Based in Durban, she uses the warm, sunny weather to her advantage, doing beach workouts or turning the stadium precinct into an outdoor fitness playground.

READ MORE | A guide on how to build self-discipline to exercise and eat clean

Yolanda’s tips for outdoor high-energy workouts

1. Think ahead

Decide what you’re going to do beforehand and check that the weather is onboard with your plans. When you’ve made the commitment to yourself to do a fun workout, you don’t need a thunderstorm literally raining on your parade.

2. Scout out the area

Take a drive or jog around the space where you intend to train and make sure that it’s safe and there are no hazards.

3. Take the stairs

Stairs are a full-body outdoor conditioning tool that gets results fast. A stairs workout incorporates upper body, lower body, abs, strength for those who want to build lean muscle and cardio for runners.

4. Mix up the terrain

It’s convenient training on tar or paving but doing some of your workouts on sand (oh, hi beach holiday!) will give you a good resistance-training workout and burn more calories. Keep the workouts short and intense – 45 minutes at most – wear sunscreen and be sure to hydrate. If you can, do your beach workouts early in the morning before sunrise.