With the Covid-19 pandemic around us, everyone is forced to stay indoors resulting in reduced physical activity. On top of it, with lack of exercise equipments at home, people are stuck with the thought of how to keep oneself physically active and how to do an effective, impactful workout. One easy to do quarantine workout with an easily available inexpensive tool is Skipping Rope.Yes you read it right, Skipping. Even if you haven’t done it before, give it a try.

Skipping Rope is very easy and is not at all time consuming. To start with, one can do skipping for 1-5 minutes and progress to 10-15 minutes in advanced stages. You can do it daily or even twice a day.

Guidelines for quarantine workout of skipping–

• Start with some warm up and stretching of calf, quadriceps and shoulder muscles.
• Ensure your rope is correct length for you. Step on the centre of the rope and pull it taut. The end of the rope and not the handles should reach your armpit.
• Take frequent breaks of about 20-30 seconds in between to allow heart rate to return to normal.
• Listen to your body, progress slowly.
• Incorporate cool down stretches at the end of the skipping session. Also, massage the calves to avoid any soreness.
• Add variations for increasing challenges like jumping up high, skipping on one leg and slow run and skip.

Precautions

1. People with existing heart conditions, knee arthritis, foot-ankle pain conditions should avoid skipping.
2. Skip on a cushioned non slip surface or soft surface like rubber or on wooden flooring. Avoid hard surfaces like concrete or tiles as they put more impact on your joints.
3. Wear comfortable shoes for skipping. Once you are used to skipping, you can try barefoot skipping too.
4. Posture during skipping is important- Keep your back straight, chin parallel to the ground, don’t look at your feet and always land on the ball of your foot.
5. Do not rotate your shoulders, use your wrists.
6. Do not jump too high, stay close to the ground.

Benefits of Skipping

• It’s a good aerobic/ cardio workout.
• It helps in burning calories faster.
• It strengthen the whole body including muscles of the leg, arm and abdominals too.
• Builds stamina.
• Improves balance.
• It’s a good coordination workout for brain.
• Improves attention skills/focus.
• Above all, it requires just 10-15minutes of yours.

So what are you waiting for, start skipping your way to health!

Enjoy your quarantine workout of skipping with music.

Send your queries to bloggerarorae@gmail.com

• Health tips