Okay those of you that follow the site know that I either post here or on Facebook about my daily workouts. Sometimes I forget to post (not really, I just don’t do it) which isn’t very cool; but anyway… I actually did a two part workout. The family took off for a bike ride and since I jog and I don’t have a bike, I walked with my daughter who has a Balance Bike. She is getting really good on the balance bike and I actually had to trot to keep up. It was kind of chilly out so I realized that I just didn’t want to face cold air jogging today, so I came back in and jumped on the Christmas gift: The XBox Kinect Sports. I’ve been playing this already, but this is the first article about it. I have to make a comparison of course. The Wii provided a very good workout, but holding the controllers created an unnatural stress which could contribute to joint stiffness or the old Carpal problems. More importantly, I tended to focus on the controller movement instead of isolating muscle groups. The Kinect utilizes a sensor that reads your body and therefore doesn’t need controllers. What a difference!
There is a more complete overall body workout because your range of motions are not limited by the controllers and therefore you can actually torque the body, twist, lunge, jump, squat and place yourself into more realistic workout positions. While the Kinect Sports lacks all of the games needed on one disc Season 1 is not bad at all. It has Boxing, Track & Field, Beach Volleyball, Bowling, Soccer and Table Tennis. I actually have both Season 1 and 2 which also includes Football and Tennis as well as Golf and Darts.
Today’s Workout: 1 mile walk and then 45 minutes on the Kinect. Nice warm up and then I jumped into boxing. Boxing uses the core: trunk twists, side bends and extensions when punching. You get a serious burn when punching in your shoulders as well. There is also a slight leg workout when squatting to uppercut. After Boxing, I rolled into Track& Field which provides you with an explosive workout. You begin with running in place for the 100m dash, running and throwing in the javelin, a great core and leg workout in the long jump and then the hurdles and then the discus works on the core. I capped off the workout with bowling which is basically a cool down. Overall an excellent workout with sweat dripping from the beard.
What Was Your Workout Today? Oh yeah, buy some kicks and stay motivated.
