Keep fit for chess players
Well, let’s face it, chess is hardly the best recreational activity for keeping physically fit, so as a player hits middle age (I’m 44 in October) if they don’t have a ready made fitness regime, then the thought of starting one can be pretty daunting. There always seem to ne so many obstacles in the way of getting fit. For instance, I leave my house each weekday morning at between 7am and 7.30am (a lie in on Saturday’s as I leave at 8.20am). I then am working or travelling between work until at least 5pm every week day. On Monday night I am the arbiter at the MCC, Tuesday I’m home but have lessons online, Wednesday I run the MCC endgame group, Thursday’s are free though I have run the Phoenix event, and Friday evenings I have no excuse as I do nothing.
So, I have little time to keep fit and find the thought of getting fit in the first place intimidating. Well, I’ve found the answer. I am going to go back to something that I used to do a few years back. I am going to start juggling again. I took for granted the benefits of juggling when I was doing it before, but really I used to be doing myself quite a bit of good. Check out some of the facts here.
Juggling is fun and challenging. It’s challenging because there’s always another trick to try and master. Personally I like ball juggling rather than club, hoop or scarf juggling, and 4-ball juggling has always appealed to me the most for some reason. I think that cigar boxes are really cool to juggle, but have never had much of a chance to try them out.
Anyway, a good way to learn to juggle, or to improve is to join a juggling club, or check out some juggling video’s. If you want to know where a juggling club is near you, check out this site. And my inspiration when I was a young juggler in England was a guy called Sean Gandini. Check out this:
But if you really want to see some unreal stuff, and some football skills that would put the current World Cup teams to shame, then check out the following video featuring the great Francis Brunn.
Hello Carl,
In regards to fitness have you thought of getting a bike? It could be a good way to get to and from work ,possibly in combination with a train.Of course that’s assuming you don’t need a car for work.If you want to give it a go you’ll need to do a bit of research in regards to a suitable route to take and also how to cycle safely in traffic.It won’t really slow you down much time wise and will give you a hell of a work out!