Walking is a great way to improve your overall fitness and lose some weight in the process, but if you’re looking to challenge yourself, it’s always a good idea to add some variety into your workout. Climbing stairs can help you do that and you can do stair workouts at your house, at a park, or along your normal walking route.
Benefits of Stair Workouts
Stair workouts help you build your lower-body strength as they use more muscles in the legs, like your thighs and glutes, than just walking. While walking up stairs, you’re also using the resistance of your body weight to strengthen your legs and burn more calories. Going down stairs helps build strength and decrease fatigue as you increase the duration of your walks.
What to Keep in Mind Before Stair Workouts
For any new workout, it’s important to try and avoid injuries and to rest between sessions. Start slow because you’re working a different set of muscles. The up portion of your workout should be the challenging part, so go easy when going down.
Stair Workouts to Try
Start by walking up the steps two to three times at your regular speed. Then walk briskly up and down the stairs using every other step. Repeat four times. Once you’ve done the fifth set, walk up the stairs skipping a set for five sets and then walk down normally for five sets. To end the workout, complete three sets of crossover steps by moving to your left and crossing the right leg in front of the left as you move up the stairs. Walk down and repeat in the opposite direction.
If you want to make it more challenging, place a resistance band around your ankles or above the outside of your knees to walk up the steps, try Bulgarian split squats, or Tricep dips.
