British Olympic swimmer Sharron Davies doesn’t look like someone who spends much time at a desk, but she has nonetheless devised a desk-based workout for those of us who do.
Ms. Davies became a household name in 1976 at the age of 13 when she swam for Britain at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal. Although she didn’t win a medal that time, she did eventually earn a silver in the 400-meter individual medley at the 1980 Moscow Olympics and remains one of Britain’s most successful swimmers.
Still exceptionally fit, she has created a series of videos for The Times of London Web site aimed at boosting fitness for office workers. She offers tips on neck and wrist rotations, calf stretches and even bicep curls with hole punchers, all performed in the comfort of your cubicle. The easiest way to find all five segments is through links on the fitness Web site SportsGeezer.
Here’s my favorite segment, which features “desk dips,” which Ms. Davies notes are good for those “wobbily bits” on the back of your arms.
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13 Comments
Great Sharron Davis exercises. Thanks!
— Darryl MOn the one hand, I’m in favor of anything that lets people incorporate motion into busy lives.
On the other hand, those busy lives are themselves a problem. The blogs are full of commenters who talk about getting home from work at 9 or 10 at night, running full-tilt all day with no time to stop for healthy lunches, or spend time with kids, or put in a simple half hour at the gym. We are a nation with no time to cook, no time to exercise, no time to play.
I realize there are a lot of careers where you’re routinely expected to bill 60, 70, or 80 hours a week, people working two jobs to make ends meet, or volunteer commitments outside of work that keep you running in all your free time. Working exercise into that schedule can certainly be an improvement over just sitting still.
But I can’t help but think that there’s a problem when, as a society, we’re so obsessed with multi-tasking and getting ahead that we’re working eating and exercising into our workday routine because we can’t imagine taking the time away from our desks.
When I started consulting, I was expected to bill 45-50 hours a week with occasional ‘heavy’ (80-90 hour) weeks. I found that the more I billed, the less productive I got. Twelve-hour days with working lunches, sitting on conference calls while I did data analysis, with the phone on ‘mute’ so no one could hear my keys clicking? ‘Brown bag’ roundtable lunch meetings? Working dinners with a couple of pieces of pizza grabbed before heading back into the project? I got less done than ever.
I started popping up reminders at 12:30 to take a lunch, and ‘take a lunch’ meant that at least two days a week I had to get away from my desk, go sit in a cafe or restaurant for an hour, and read a book or a newspaper. The days when I took actual ‘away from work’ breaks, my productivity and accuracy were noticeably improved. I could walk a block or so, get some thai or a sandwich, then walk back, with my head clearer, my blood sugar stabilized, and my energy level improved.
Sure, it seems counterintuitive that a fifteen-minute ‘coffee break’ to go stand in the parking lot and look at the trees would shorten a hectic day, but it does. It seems like working through lunch *should* increase your productivity, but it’s not necessarily so. And while exercising at your desk is better than nothing, if you’re reduced to grabbing a sandwich out of a vending machine and doing some bicep curls at your desk *every single day*, maybe you need to be looking at the larger picture.
— RowanSince my husband stopped working 9 months ago, I have had a standing lunch date outside the office each day. Initially I was resistant, but now I find that I come back into the office refreshed and way more productive than I used to be with the brown bag at the desk routine. I do sneak out though - past my coworkers with their brown bags, I don’t think they would approve and would judge my level of commitment …
— BritBabeto Rowan:
It’s been shown that if you do 50 minutes of intense work on anything, from a project at work to studying for an exam, following them up with 20 minutes of rest will make you feel better and you will get things done faster. Of course to Americans this is a foreign concept. I’ve seen people sneer at the idea of taking a full 20 minutes to break. Five is allowable, 20 is an atrocity! It’s no wonder that I felt more relaxed and pleased with my life when I lived in Spain. Americans are so time-obsessed and then they put too much stock in the amount of minutes they spend on something. It’s terrifying when you see it from the outside.
— AnyaThe exercises are great-not much strength or coordination required to begin. I could imagine an office worker could get a group going if they could take their lunch break at the same time. Isn’t it weird that people are eager to get a new recipe, read a new a paperback, discuss sports, gardening, clothes, decorating, TV, movies, etc., but bring up exercise and they get defensive. But what could be more important physically, mentally, and/or emotionally??! I don’t get it! I will be doing these exercises, (along w/ my 12 mi per wk of brisk walking) but it is way easier for me because I’m in front of my home computer. Oh, and this is undoubtedly preaching to the choir. Very few non-exercisers will even look at this.
— justice 2007Anya:
So true. Generally, if I am focused on something or working on something really challenging, after about an hour I’ll take a break and go outside for a little bit. It seems like, especially when I have a tough problem thwarting me, I come back from that break and something I’d been missing or overlooking stands out for me and I get the problem solved faster. I don’t think the 20 minutes would have been well-used staring at the screen intently, but I have had co-workers who strongly question my tendency to get up and walk away for ten minute in the middle of a tough project. Usually, though, when I come back in with a better perspective, they don’t complain. I used to have a boss who let employees bill up to half an hour of ‘floor time’ a week. ‘Floor time’ was when you got out of your chair and paced around, lay on the floor staring at the ceiling, sat in a corner of your office reading, just something to get you away from your chair and the screen. Some weeks I didn’t use any floor time, some weeks I used it all. I liked to take my ‘floor time’ right before the final edit on a technical document, because then I had much better editing skills.
— RowanAs always, Rowan’s comments are right in line with my thoughts.
— wcI would like to add to these comments. A poster stated that he would not want an obese person sitting at the reception desk since this person would not present a good image of the company.
— Ohio WomanI think that is bunk. The company I am employed by has such people at the front desk and it is how they do their job that counts. It is more important that they are friendly than their clothes size. Why all the pressure on women to be thin? This is because women will always be held to a higher standard than men. It is ok for men to get fat and old and stupid.If a man does not want to get married to the woman he got pregnant he dodged a bullet as they say but then the woman is looked at like the single girl who got knocked up that the man did not love enough to want to marry.
Men have it easy.
Now maybe instead of browsing the internet all day at work, I can actually do something somewhat productive to promote my health. Either that or I’ll just sit and read MyLifeInaCube.comall day. Is it lunch time yet?
— Regal McDonaldThis is terrific. Thanks Tara.
It’s not only a great desk routine, it pretty good too for those who are older, or who have arthritis or some other slight limitation.
Some years ago I taught a seated (mostly) exercise routine to older women. These exercises were part of it. The only thing I would change for older people or anyone new to exercising is to put the chair against the wall when using it for squats. Somehow, that chair just seems to have a life of its own otherwise.
— NSI looked at the Dip segment for starters. I’m no exercise expert, but am learning a bit due to some recent connective tissue problems.
The focus of two exercises in this segment seem more localized than I’d have thought, even w/in a cubicle. The pushup wants the work to be all in the arms. I noted the bend of the wrists, which would seem to take the brunt (if one has any wrist issues, as I do). I’ve recently learned an array of exercises for the arms that can be done w/in a cubicle, some with weights, many using an exercise band, which could easily be brought to work.
The rising-from-chair one I learned from a physical therapist–who recommended it to strengthen core muscles. The instructions were to do the exercise in exactly the manner this gal’s instructions say Not to (i.e., to sit, bend at the hip and lead with the butt; maintain excellent control of both the core and leg muscles; to rise, just reverse). A back care program at another PT facility advised the same method, to lower back problems.
— MWhile the Cajuns of South Louisiana are known for how hard they work, there is no shame here in taking time away to play hard. Meetings and work tasks are important, but so is socializing with your coworkers and spending time with your family and friends. Brief coworker conversations are interspersed throughout the day.
In addition, Anya is correct about needing a break in order to provide a fresh perspective on a task. Driving home from work, I often think of additional situations that must be explored and analyzed. Often, when I am completely stymied on a difficult computer model, I leave the office and while eating lunch I will think of a new strategy. Years ago I realized that “staying late” or “working through lunch” to make progress on a big task did not accomplish very much. If I get to a low blood sugar condition, I will begin to doubt my work and make changes that really mess up my models.
In my industry, 40 hour work weeks are often made of 4 10-hour days or 4 1/2 days with 9 hours each. For the most part, I do not think that as much work is done in either of those systems as is done in a regular week with 5 8-hour days.
— AcadieI live in Tokyo, and the working hours here are simply mind boggling. It’s common for young salarymen to be at the office until around 2 in the morning, travel back home (often up to a 2 hour commute in the Tokyo metropolitan area), and then repeat the cycle the next day at 8 am. Terrible! I always wonder how they can possibly be productive with that kind of schedule.
I’d also like to respond to Ohio Woman by saying that while it may not be fair, it is true that people want to see an “attractive” presentation of the company. I do think that it should be changed, but businesses take great lengths to present themselves well; it’s why they require a certain dress code at work, for example. However, being overweight is very different than simply wearing a sloppy suit, and it is an infuriating form of discrimination. However, I also need to point out that I think in this case, they discriminate against women and men equally. While I believe women have a tougher time with image in general society, I believe overweight people of either gender have an equally difficult time in the workplace.
— Kirsten