She wants to rope more Hongkongers into fitness, so what’s Vanessa Cheung’s game? CrossFit, cold showers and kale
The Nan Fung Group director and gym co-owner, who recently launched a community health initiative, tells us how she got the fitness bug, how she stays in shape and how to squeeze exercise into your day
Growing up the youngest of three children, and a member of the third generation of the family that controls the Nan Fung Group, a Hong Kong property developer, Vanessa Cheung has big boots to fill. But her boots weren’t made for walking – at least not in the beginning.
As with many Hong Kong children, education was the focus of Cheung’s childhood. Aside from swimming and skipping every day – her mother said it would make her taller – she and her classmates didn’t learn about fitness or body awareness. “I didn’t grow up cartwheeling and tumbling in the park. Our schedules were packed with after-school activities like drawing, maths tutoring and choir.”
Cheung went on to complete a bachelor’s degree in biology at the University of California, Berkeley. It was only there, aged 17, that the fitness bug bit.
“It started with spin, weights and kick-boxing classes. Working out was a great way for me to clear my mind and help me to study. The more I trained, the more I wanted to improve, and learn different forms of exercise,” she says. By the time she began studying for a master’s in landscape architecture at Harvard three years later, exercise had become its own form of study. She ran 10km every day, striding out in the sun along the picturesque Charles River.
