It’s time to ditch the elevator.
Taking the stairs instead of the elevator is simply better for your health. It allows you to get more steps in and increase your heart rate. Take it a step further and incorporate a stair workout into your exercise routine! Climbing stairs is a killer workout for the whole body, and I’m not just talking about the Stairmaster at the gym. Climbing stairs gets the legs burning and heart pumping, and the best part is that stair workouts are totally free and can be done almost anytime anywhere. In fact, taking your workout outdoors by finding a set of stairs outside has its own set of benefits for the body.
- Enjoy the sunshine and boost your body’s vitamin D supply
- Increase cardiovascular and muscular endurance
- Sunlight increases Melatonin production to improve sleep cycle
- Higher Serotonin levels promote a positive mood
Why stairs?
Stair workouts make a great addition to your workout routine for a change of pace. If you tend to get bored with your cardio workouts or simply want to try something new, a stairs workout is a great place to start. The body quickly adapts to routine forms of exercise, so switching up your exercise modes often helps overcome exercise progress plateaus and even challenges the brain! This type of workout not only improves cardiovascular function but builds leg, core, and even back strength.
Running stairs can be a form of high-intensity interval training which entails short repeated bouts of high-intensity activity with specified amounts of rest in between. High-Intensity Interval Training has several benefits above steady state cardiovascular training. Some of these include improved muscular power, fat and weight loss, and positive metabolic adaptations.
This form of exercise allows you to be creative in structuring your workout and to train the whole body multiple ways through various different exercises.
Warm up:
Always begin with a light to moderate dynamic warm up before your workout for about 2-5 minutes to get the muscles and joints loose and elevate the heart rate. This can be in the form of fast walking, jogging, jump roping, etc.
For a simple stairs workout, run up the stairs. Then, come back down at a slow-moderate speed for active recovery and repeat. Depending on the staircase, set a goal for how many times you want to try to go up and down, or set a timer for 20-40 min and give it all you’ve got!
For an added challenge, try running up every other step.
Grab a workout buddy and try any of the following for a stair workout mix-up:
- Lunge steps
- Kickbacks
- Side squats
- Squat jumps/box jumps
For an added challenge, incorporate any of these into your rest breaks:
- Push-ups
- Tricep Dips
- Mountain climbers
- Planks
Get more with CORE! CORE has a number of certified personal trainers dedicated to helping you reach your fitness goals. For other forms of high-intensity interval training, try our Vasper machine–get the benefits of HIIT in just 20 minutes or less. Exercising with a buddy is also proven to help attain fitness goals. If you’d like to work out with a friend, come to one of our many Semi-Private Training (SPT) classes!