Golf, tennis, Pilates, or jogging – exercising with your partner will bring you closer together
- Working out together relieves stress and frustration, and can strengthen your relationship, experts say
- Transforming from a couch potato into a fitness enthusiast is easier with a partner, as you get to support and challenge each other
Instead of snuggling side by side on the sofa with your partner and letting another Netflix show wash over you, why not go jogging together? Or how about taking part in a sweat-inducing Pilates session in place of the umpteenth quiet evening playing a board game?
1. Don’t hesitate
Exercising together is fundamentally good for relationships, according to Eric Hegmann, a couples counsellor and author in Hamburg, Germany. It relieves stress and frustration, you spend time together, and it sharpens the libido. “So go for it!” he says.
Your “we’re a team” feeling will get a particular boost if you compete against another couple in a sporting activity. In the words of Hegmann, who advises every couple to arrange regular date nights: “A joint afternoon workout once a week is definitely terrific, too.”
Jens Kleinert, director of health and social psychology at the German Sport University’s Institute of Psychology in Cologne, says: “When doing sport together, you experience your partner in a different role. This does the relationship good.”