Indoor Workout
Rainy days need not be lazy days. Apart from hitting the gym, you can choose sensuous activities like pole dancing or challeng yourself to a vertical marathon via stair climbing. Mind Your Body susses out six fun exercises to try if the weather threatens to be a wet blanket

1. Stair Climbing
From high-rise offices to Housing Board blocks, Singapore's urban landscape is rife with stairs.

Climbing stairs is an aerobic workout that provides cardiovascular benefits like lowering blood pressure.

"It improves your heart's and lungs' endurance. It also strengthens your lower body like your limbs and butt," said Ms Swana Tony, a senior physiotherapist at Tan Tock Seng Hospital.

A moderate-impact exercise, climbing stairs can be of low or moderate intensity, depending on how fast your climb. If you want a more intensive workout, increase your speed or the number of flights of stairs you tread.

Ms Swapna emphasised the importance of safety and footwear while climbing stairs.

She said: "You need to wear proper running shoes and not high heels or slippers as they may not be good for balance."

While children and the elderly can climb stairs for exercise, they should take care or be supervised.

Ms Jennifer Liaw, a senior principal physiotherapist in the department of physiotherapy at SIngapore General Hospital, said that a good alternative to climbing stairs is the elliptical machine as it emulates the movement without the impact. This is a stationary exercise machine used to simulate walking or running, which is found in many gyms.

She added that those who do stair climbing should supplement their routine with other exercises.

"Strengthening and stretching the other muscles ensure that the body can perform daily functional activities and sports more efficiently and effectively."

2. Pole Dancing
Long the domain of strippers and exotic dancers, pole dancing gained mainstream popularity - and credibility - in recent years when dance studios the world over began offering such classes.

Dance studio Jitterbugs Swingapore's principal pole dance instructor Linna Tan said: "Pole dancing's not only tones muscles, it also builds strength, core stability and improves your stamina and flexibility."

Ms Caroline Png, a principal physiotherapist at Tan Tock Seng Hospital, who has learnt pole dancing for a year, agreed.

She said: "It improves your posture and it works on muscles you never knew existed. When I first started, I ached all the time.

"It's like gymnastics on a pole. It tones muscles and it's a cardiovascular exercise. I find my strength has increased."

However, pole dancing may not be for everyone, depending on one's age, interest and physical health.

Dr Chiam Tut Fu, a sports physician at Healthway Medical, said that pole dancing can improve flexibility, agility and muscular strength and endurance.

He said: "It's a low-impact, moderate-intensity exercise but body agility and flexibility are taxed."

3. Gyrotonic
An exercise programme performed on a machine that combines a standing wooden tower with pulleys, weights and handles, Gyrotonic works to stretch and strenghten muscles and increase the range of mobility of the individual.

Mr Levan Cher, the chief pain management specialist at the Body Clinic, said that doing Gyrotonic can help to relieve pain, loosen stiff joints to increase flexibility, strengthen muscles, ligaments and tendons to prevent injuries and develop better stamina and endurance. It can also sculpt the body in the sense that it helps you to develop long, lean and firm muscles.

Dr Chiam Tut Fu, a sports physician at Healthway Medical, agreed that doing Gyrotonic will enable one to gain flexibility, agility and a sense of one's body.

Ms Ng said the low-impact exercise can be catered to the individual according to his fitness level and goal. For example, an elderly person may focus on flexibility and doing Gyrotonic can help keep his limbs agile and increase his range of motion to counter ailments like osteoporosis and arthritis.

Asked how one can increase the exercise intensity of Gyrotonic, Dr Chiam said: "Increasing the load resistance and speed of movement will increase exercise intensity."

4. Wii Fit & Wii Fit Plus
Who says playing video games is a sedentry activity?

The Wii Fit series features four categories of exercises, namely strength training, aerobics, yoga and balance.

In Wii Fit Plus, players can customise their workout routines and set out how long they would like their workouts to last.

They can also choose from specialised workout routines that focus on their personal fitness goals like strength training and balance.

The game was designed with input from health professionals like Mr Kaoru Matsui, the director of National Exercise & Sports Trainers Association Japan, and Dr Motohiko Miyachi from the National Institute of Health and Nutrition in Japan.

Dr Chiam said that the fitness gains will depends on the intensity of the game chosen; a higher speed and a longer exercise duration will increase exercise intensity.

He added that Wii Fit or Wii Fit Plus users should supplement their exercise with muscular strength and endurance training.

Ms Jennifer Liaw, a senior principal physiotherapist in the department of physiotherapy at the Singapore General Hospital, explained the importance of cross-training or performing different modes of exercise.

She said: "Fitness has many facets. It involves cardiovascular exercise, strength as well as flexibility exercises. Cross training is essential to ensure that one does not develop injuries."

5. Zen Do Kai
This mixed martial art was created in 1970 by Australian Bob Jones.

Peter Robertson, the founder of Zen Do Kai Freestyle Karate & Kickboxing Singapore, said: "Zen Do Kai is similar in philosophy to Bruce Lee's Jeet Kune Do. It's an amalgam of the most effective elements of many fighting styles but the roots are in Okinawan karate."

Zen Do Kai draws from influences as disparate as Muay Thai kickboxing, Western boxing and aikido.

Mr Robertson said: "The beauty of the martial art is that every person that does Zen Do Kai brings with them their own influences.

"It grows with every generation into a more relevant and effective system of self defence."

Zen Do Kai is divided into two main strands - Zen Do Kai freestyle karate and Zen Do Kai kickboxing.

In karate, students learn the traditional elements of karate while kickboxing classes focus on sharpening students' reflexes and body conditioning.

Mr Robertson said: The structured and varied exercise regimen is designed to provide new and changing physical demands, which keep participants interested while avoiding burnout and injuries."

Mr Philip Tan, an exercise physiologist and strength and conditioning coach at Changi Sports Medicine Centre at Changi General Hospital, said Zen Do Kai can provide cardiovascular benefits such as improved aerobics fitness if performed for an adequate duration.

He added that the intensity of the high-impact exercise can be increased or decreased by shorter or longer rest time between rounds.

6. Somatic exercise
This series of slow, gentle movements was developed by American Thomas Hanna in 1976.

Hanna's programmed reduces the effects of kinesthetic dysfunction, or the inability to sense whether your muscles are engaged or relaxed.

He hypothesised that the body responds to the stresses and traumas of everyday life and some muscular contractions or extensions become involuntary. These can cause stiffness, soreness and pain.

As the exercises are perfomed slowly and when the individual is lying down or sitting up, they are suitable for everyone from the elderly to those undergoing physiotherapy.

Ms Eeca Goh, the founder of Somatic Bodyworks, said: "Somatic exercise reminds your brain how to sense and efficiently use your muscles. By doing somatic exercise, you can compensate for harmful movement patterns you develop over time.

"Whereas traditional body exercises make the muscles stronger, somatic exercises make the brain more intelligent in sensing and controlling the muscles."

She said somatic exercises can help correct problems like backache, knee pain and poor breathing.

Ms Goh said that she used somatic exercises to relieve herself of shooting pains in her right arm which began after she had a car accident in 2002.

She said: "People who do somatic exercise have better body awareness, body alignment, flexibility, coordination and less muscular imbalance, resulting in less aches and pains usually attributed to ageing.

"I stopped having backache and knee pain because somatic exercises corrected my posture and walking gait."

Dr Chiam Tat Fu, a sports physician at Healthway Medical, said somatic exercises are usually done as part of an injury rehabilitation or muscle spasm reduction programme and the emphasis is not on attaining cardio-respiratory or muscular strength and endurance.