How active are you now?

Try the quiz to find out your fitness level.

1. Where do you live?
a) In a house with one or more flights of stairs
b) In a ground-floor flat or bungalow
c) In a first-floor (or above) flat – and I usually use the stairs
d) In a first-floor (or above flat) – and I usually use the lift

2. What is your main mode of transport?
a) Public transport (bus, train)
b) Car or motorbike
c) Bicycle
d) Walking

3. For how long would you walk or cycle in a typical working day?
a) Less than 10 minutes
b) 10-20 minutes
c) 20-30 minutes
d) At least half an hour or more

4. What do you usually do at lunchtime?
a) Stay where I am and eat lunch at my desk
b) Go out to buy sandwiches
c) Go for a walk
d) Play sport or exercise

5. At work, how do you move from floor to floor?
a) Always take the lift
b) Walk up or down – but there's only one flight
c) Walk up or down any number of flights
d) We're on the ground floor

6. Do you own a dog?
a) No
b) Yes, and I walk it regularly
c) Yes, and I walk it occasionally
d) Yes, and I employ a dog-walker

7. You've just got home and discovered you are out of milk. What do you do?
a) Turn around and walk to the shops
b) Send someone else to get it
c) Drive to the shops
d) Do without

8. How do you shop?
a) Drive to the supermarket once a week
b) Shop locally more than once a week and carry it home
c) Shop locally more than once a week and drive home
d) Me? Shopping?

9. If you had to run 50 metres for a bus, how would you feel?
a) Barely out of breath
b) I'd be glad to sit down and recover
c) I'd be red in the face and panting for five minutes
d) I'd wait for the next one

10. Do you play a sport or exercise?
a) At least three times a week
b) About once or twice a month
c) Once in a while
d) Never/Not if I can help it

YOUR SCORE
Award yourself points for your answers as follows:
1. a) 4; b) 0; c) 4; d) 0 (Add one point if you have a garden)
2. a) 3; b) 0; c) 4; d) 4
3. a) 0; b) 1; c) 2; d) 4
4. a) 0; b) 1; c) 3; d) 4
5. a) 0; b) 2; c) 4; d) 0
6. a) 0; b) 4; c) 2; d) 0
7. a) 4; b) 0; c) 0; d) 0
8. a) 0; b) 4; c) 1; d) 0
9. a) 4; b) 2; c) 1; d) 0
10. a) 4; b) 2; c) 1; d) 0

If you scored...

30-40: Congratulations! You probably exercise regularly, are active in everyday life, and are well motivated to continue.

20-30: Pretty good: you understand that it's important to exercise and want to find ways to be even more energetic.

10-20: Could do better: you're missing too many opportunities to build physical activity into your daily routine.

0-10: Don't despair! You just need help to get started, with lots of fun ways to build in more exercise into your life. See facing page for ideas.


Welcome 2008 – this could be the year to say goodbye to the flab by simply standing up, pottering around the house, or even shaving your head and having more sex!

Professor Marc Hamilton of the University of Missouri has found that the sheer effort of standing upright is enough to double the metabolic rate, and the amount of calories you burn.

"If you stand up, you are much more likely to end up pacing or pottering around and that seems to make a crucial difference.

"Many activities, like talking on the phone or watching a child's ball game can be done just as enjoyably upright, and you burn double the number of calories when you're doing it because you're probably going to pace around."

In a series of studies he showed that enzymes responsible for breaking down fat are suppressed when a person is sitting rather than standing, leading to fat being stored, rather than burned off.

He says: "To hold a body that weighs 170lb upright takes a fair amount of energy from muscles. There is a large amount of energy associated with standing every day that can't easily be compensated for by 30 to 60 minutes at the gym."

Andrew Shields, editor of a new book, 365 Ways To Get Fit, published in association with Sport England, also believes small activities in daily life, like brushing teeth or turning on the television, can be bulge busters.

He recognises the benefits of standing: "Simply standing up uses 0.3 calories per minute. It's small changes made to a lifestyle will build together to make a real difference – it only takes 30 minutes a day to feel healthier and happier. So don't go crazy and start running every day because it's probably unsustainable.

"Your aim is to gradually increase the amount of activity in your life – an extra bike ride here, an additional game of football with the kids there – and to extend the duration.

"Stay out half an hour longer when walking in the country, or prolong that afternoon gardening session."

So, if even the thought of breaking into a sweat breaks you into a sweat, check out your fitness level with his quiz and follow his easy steps to melt away the calories.

* 365 Ways To Get Fit, by Sport England with Andrew Shields, published by Collins & Brown, priced £7.99. Out January 8, 2008.


BURN-OFFS FOR MEN

* Have more sex! For a 76kg (168lb) man, 30 minutes of passion burns about 160 calories.

* Alternate between using urinals and sit-down toilets. Sitting down and then standing up works the muscles of your thighs, bottom and lower back.

* Shave your head – then your body will have to use calories to generate more of its own heat. Regular head shaving will also do wonders for flexibility in your arms and shoulders.

* Use a razor rather than an electric shaver. It takes that bit longer and requires greater control from fingers. Use a manual toothbrush rather than an electric one.

* Polish your shoes more often – it's a gentle workout for the shoulders, arms and wrists.

* Carefully "kick" the light switches off. Lift the knee first, then extend your bare foot so that your toes push the switch. This is beneficial for thigh and core stability muscles.

* Help carry drinks from the bar even if it's not your round, and burn six calories per minute. Raising yourself from your seat works all the muscle groups in your legs.

BURN-OFFS FOR WOMEN

* Towel your hair dry instead of using a hairdryer. This provides a gentle workout for biceps and shoulder muscles, and is a great neck stretch.

* Wear less! By doing so you'll have to create your own body heat, which is the very root of the calorific process (one calorie being the amount of heat required to raise the temperature of one gram of water by one degree Celsius).

* When driving and the traffic lights are red, pull in your tummy muscles and clench buttocks. Hold until the lights turn green! Great for firming your bottom.

* Assign an exercise to each room of the home, do it once or twice daily – eg, five sit-ups in the lounge, 10 star-jumps in the kitchen, five hops on one leg along the hall.

* Get off the bus one stop early, and burn six calories for each minute that you walk. Standing on public transport (and trying to keep your balance) or pacing the platform when that train is late burns calories.

* Have baby can exercise! Whether it's pushing the pram as a pulse-raiser or holding your newborn to add resistance to squats, a "powerpramming" workout adds purpose to that daily push around the park. For ideas visit www.powerpramming.co.uk

* Fidget – squirming around in your seat, standing up and sitting down, and crossing or uncrossing your legs can burn up to 350 calories per day.

Quick fixes for fighting that flab

* Ditch the remote control – getting up and changing the TV channel manually 10 times a day, with the TV two metres (6ft) from the sofa, burns an extra 10 calories a day. (That totals 3,650 per year, enough to burn 0.5kg (1lb) body fat. Walk around during ad breaks to burn up to six calories a minute.

* After reading the newspaper, crumple up each sheet to work the muscles of fingers and wrists. After crumpling press pages together in a big ball, to exercise the muscles of your shoulders and arms.

* When sitting, occasionally lift feet from the floor and hold the position, to work the abdominal and hip flexor muscles.

* Use a doorway to help tone the sides of your shoulders. Standing upright with your arms hanging straight down, push outwards against the door jambs with the backs of your palms. Hold for 60 seconds then step away from the door, relaxing your arms and letting them drop to your sides. Then, feel them "levitate"!

Score with the chores

* Dusting, vacuuming and cleaning may seem boring, but doing them can help tone and lower blood pressure.

* Burn 230 calories an hour making a bed, 80 calories with 15 minutes of vacuuming.

* Chop your own vegetables, instead of buying ready-chopped. This uses around two calories per minute, while the washing or scrubbing is of similar benefit.

* Turn putting the shopping away into a gentle weight-training session. Do five shoulder presses with a bottle of water before stowing it on the top shelf, and five bicep curls with a bag of potatoes.

* Clean the bath regularly even if you're a shower person. A five-minute scrub burns around 20 calories.

Major myths about fitness

* If you stop exercising your muscles turn to fat.
WRONG: They can't – muscle and fat are completely different substances in the body.

* I'm fat because I burn calories slowly.
WRONG: Fatness is not caused by a sluggish metabolism, a notion wrongly believed for many years. A study showed that although fat people expend more energy than slim people, they also tend to underestimate how much they eat – by as much as 800 calories per day.

* Running is bad for the knees.
WRONG: Running is actually good for your knees and ankles and hips as well. Scientific studies show that moderate amounts of running can help protect against problems such as osteoarthritis by keeping the major joints of the body strong and mobile. Wear supportive shoes though and keep a good posture.

* You can't help putting on weight as you get older.
WRONG: Although it's true that from about the age of 30 we lose around one per cent of our strength and cardiovascular fitness per year, we can maintain and even improve our physical attributes through exercise as we get older. Weight gain is usually caused by being less active and eating more.