No gym card required

Are you one of those people who don't exercise because they hate the gym? Well, now you have no excuse – we've put together some ideas for alternative forms of exercise that don't require you to be a card-carrying member of anything other than your political party of choice!

Take it outside
All that sweating in an air-conditioned gym environment may not be so good for you, anyway – many health experts believe exercising outdoors is better for your overall health and fitness, and there are a number of reasons for this. For example, you tend to work your body harder out of doors, because the speed and difficulty of your activity vary, whereas inside a gym, you fixate on the lights and buttons on the treadmill, and keep the intensity of what you're doing fairly constant.

It also seems that walking up an actual hill, with a gradient that varies more randomly, demands more effort from you than simply upping the resistance or gradient on a cardio machine.

It's also a lot more interesting to walk around the neighbourhood or on the beach, for example, than it is to mindless pound away at a treadmill. Similarly, a cycle ride through a local park is a lot more refreshing for your mind and body than the spinning units or stationary bikes that have you pedalling away furiously without actually going anywhere.

Exercising outdoors also improves both your sleep and your stress levels – don't you remember how exhausted you were after a family picnic as a child? All that fresh air (even in the city) does you the world of good and, if you're an insomniac, this should be very good news.

Exercising outdoors (provided it's not done within three hours of bedtime) is an excellent way to improve your sleep. In addition, an Australian study has shown that exercising outdoors actually improves your mood – researchers found that outdoor runners experienced a far greater boost in feelings of well-being than their treadmill-bound counterparts.

Psychiatrists have long known that depressive conditions respond positively to outdoors exercise, and we know for ourselves that being outside can boost our moods – just think about how much better food seems to taste when eaten al fresco! Ailments such as seasonal affective disorder – a type of depression caused by lack of exposure to sunlight, usually during the winter months – prove the point that we're intended to spend time outdoors regularly, or our minds and spirits sink into misery.

How much and how often?
When you don't have the benefit of on-site gym instructors, you may feel unsure of how much exercise you ought to be doing, and at what intensity you should be working out.

Says Kathy McQuaide, health promotions and marketing manager for the Sports Science Institute of SA (SSISA): "For general health benefits and maintenance of optimal body composition, the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) recommends accumulating 30 minutes of moderate intensity activity on most days of the week. Your training heart rate should be about 60-85% of your maximum heart rate (MHR), where your predicted MHR is 200 less your age in years."

So, if you're 25, your heart rate during training should be 60-85% of 220 less 25, which is 60-85% of 195 – which works out to between 117-166 beats per minute. You can measure this by taking your own pulse periodically, or by investing in a heart rate monitor: this is a band worn around the chest and linked to a watch which tells you what your heart rate is.

However, especially for women, aerobic exercise isn't enough – you need to be doing some resistance training too, especially since it helps to ward off osteoporosis in later years. Resistance training is harder to do outside a gym, but you can purchase your own dumbbells at sports stores, for example, or buy a resistance band and use that, provided you consult a personal trainer or even a biokineticist for advice on which exercises to do, and how to do them correctly.

Kathy adds: "To achieve muscular fitness benefits, the ACSM recommends resistance training twice a week, doing one to three sets of 10 repetitions of eight to 10 different exercises at approximately 70-85% of your one-repetition maximum. Your one-repetition maximum is the maximum weight you could lift in just one repetition," she explains.

"If you're just starting out," she advises, "use the lower range of these recommendations and gradually increase the frequency, intensity and duration."

Image: Nick Boulton