The benefits of family exercise: how staying healthy together helps to strengthen family bonds
- Family exercise creates uninterrupted time for parents to be role models to their children
- Several families across Hong Kong talk about how exercising together has helped bring them closer
What started out as a fun activity for Danielle Roman two years ago soon became a healthy addiction for her entire family.
At the time, the mother of three and a partner at an international law firm was looking for ways to overcome her physical and mental fatigue. Spartan racing sparked her interest and, not long after, her children’s, too.
Seeing Roman return from races bruised, battered, but jubilant with a finisher’s medal inspired her husband and their children, now aged nine, seven and five, to give Spartan racing a go. Last year, they started entering family races together and this year, they celebrated Mother’s Day by doing a family Spartan race in Taiwan. They now spend every Sunday together doing sprint and interval training at the running track.
Doing sports as a family offers a plethora of benefits for parents and children, says Roman, who, having placed in the top three spots in seven Spartan races across Asia this year, will become the Spartan Ambassador for Hong Kong on January 1, 2020.
