Getting Fit the Wii Way

Walking is a great exercise and I enjoy walking. However, when winter sets in, the sidewalks become slippery and while I still walk I move at a much slower pace. This pace is not fast enough for the walks I take, to be considered physical exercise.

The slow pace is fine for simply seeing and being seen; knowing what is going on in your neighbourhood, changes, for example, when you walk you are more liable to notice changes. It is also much easier to stop, although when the cold wind blows, I am less likely to do that.

So it was time to give serious thought to possible and viable alternatives. Anything may be possible, but is it probable or in other words is it likely to be something that I will do.

There is an indoor track at the Civic Centre. I have walked it and find it a great workout. Will I use it three to five time a week, or even once, most likely not, in the cold weather it is too far to walk, we do not have a car and the distance is really too short to drive. The walk there may be okay after dark when the wind chill hits minus 20 and colder but an hour later after a workout. This just does not sound like an activity I will do.

There is a gym at the Centre as well, and a pool, this is all great but I am not a joiner and the same arguments about the walking track apply to using the gym or pool and the though to getting wet in the winter and then going home is simply not appealing personally.

What to do? Simple, first buy a Wii then buy Wii Fit Plus. Now before I spend this kind of money, I do some research. The reviews were acceptable, I am not a professional trainer nor an athlete looking for the maximum work out, I just want to burn off more calories than I consumer and hopefully enjoy myself while doing so.

We started with the Wii Sports disk and bowl three nights a week for about 30 minutes. It is fund and gets us up and moving. I like the baseball and play a game in the afternoon three times per week. The best workout I have had and the one I look forward to the most is boxing. I am not a fight fan but I feel good after a match.

This is how we spent the first six weeks after we bought the Wii, using the Wii Sports disk, and then it was time to undertake the Wii Fit. While Sports merely gives you your score, the Wii Fit Plus gives you feedback.

I regularly work up a sweat and know that as I workout calories are burning. This could be the beginning of a beautiful relationship.

Tonight as the wind howls and the snow whips across the window, I am staying in where it is warm and getting on my balance board.