I have heard one too many complaints lately that “it’s too dark” or ”too cold” and even “it’s too hard this time of year”.

Arrhh!!!

Well, yes exercise outside this time of year is not exactly thrilling, so we need to adopt a layering strategy. I head out

on cold mornings rather unbecomingly decked out in beanie, gloves, and multiple layers of t-shirts under a fleecy windcheater zipped to the chin, and I have rather cruelly been described as closely resembling a cat burglar. And yes, I would probably jump sky high if I bumped into myself on the dark back streets of the western suburbs. But

hey, it’s not a fashion show out there. I guarantee if you adopt the rug up approach you will return from your early morning walk or run warm as toast and endophinally (a newly invented word) energized to smoothly sail through the rest of your day.

One enterprising patient told me recently that she slips her trackies on under the doona and then leaps out of bed, out the front door and into her morning run! Well done!

So let’s just embrace the cold, rug up snuggly and get out there.. and we’ll be ready to leap into spring with vim and vigour and less layers!