We all know that walking stairs can be tiring or just seem to come at the worst time.
Even though I come from a strong sports background, I’m still guilty of taking the escalator or elevator over the stairs plenty of times. But there are also times where I would choose to take the stairs just to get a short workout in—a quick 5-second jog or sprint up the stairs to give me a jolt of energy. Yes, I need this in my life sometimes especially after the lunch hour at the office when I’m feeling tired and weighed down. The feeling of, “I stuffed myself with way too much lunch and so I need to do something about it and wake myself up.” Haha! Although I try to make sure that I never feel this way after lunch, sometimes it’s just unavoidable. Perhaps you didn’t have enough discipline to say no to the snacks in the office or you simply just wanted to treat yourself to a big lunch. It happens to all of us.
Since stairs are pretty much everywhere we go, we might as well use them to our advantage. One way to do this is simply to just incorporate stair running into our daily workouts. On my high school track team we used to work out on the stadium bleachers. Think of it as just an added level of intensity to your regular daily jog around the track or neighborhood. We had to jog, sprint, or hop (on one leg and on both legs) up the stairways of each section of the bleachers and jog back down until we made it back to the track. Then we’d jog around the track until we got to the other side of the stadium to the opposite bleachers and repeat the same thing. We had to do this workout non- stop for 20-45 minutes.
Yes this workout can be very challenging, it it’s a bit much for anyone just starting out, but at the same time it’s very rewarding. Take advantage of the built in moderations to the level of difficulty. Start small, jogging up and down, and eventually work your way up to sprinting or hopping up before rewarding yourself with an easy jog back down.
Doing stadium bleachers forces you to engage all of the body’s largest muscle groups, yielding a greater calorie burn and stronger, more powerful muscles. This is also a workout that requires you to go against gravity by going up stairs, which is far more challenging than simply running around a track. I want to encourage you to try stadium running if you haven’t already. The health benefits are certainly worth it. Check out this article for more benefits of stadium workouts.
[…] mechanics even with the extra momentum from gravity. Sprint resistance goes against gravity: running up stairs, uphill, etc., which helps improve explosive strength and stride […]