Beat, drink and be merry…
Getting competitive in the comfort of the pub

So you’ve been happier than a pig in swill, over-indulging on an epic scale for the last month, but now everywhere you turn lame-o losers keep telling you it’s time to clean up your act, right? Wrong! January is positively the worst month to get sporty in Shanghai – it’s brass monkey weather out there and raining cats and dogs. But it’s warm and dry in the boozer, plus they positively encourage you to wet your whistle. What’s more, they have their own olympiad of competitive pursuits with which to satisfy your sporting instincts. So crack open a brew, take a nice long drag on that fag and keep reading…

This new fitness craze involves suspending your body (and inhibitions) and taking to the air on the FlySet. This ingenious piece of equipment resembles a trapeze bolted on a swivel and attached to the gym ceiling. Created by Reebok with the help of acrobats from the infamous Cirque du Soleil, the class is set to actual music from Cirque shows and the choreography (which took eight months to perfect) is based on moves that performers actually do. After an exhilarating hour of swinging, straddling, spinning, lunging, hanging and twirling you’re left grinning. Despite the promise of incredibly sore muscles the following morning, it makes for a great, fun, all-body workout which streches, tones and builds muscle. So long treadmill, we’re doing our exercise in the air.

5253 0093, www.willsgym.com

Have a go if you think you’re hard enough…
Sporting sisters doing it for themselves

The weekend can be many things to a woman: time to spend the week’s earnings on yet more tat or an opportunity to escape the smog and venture beyind the city limits. It can afford you that hour and a half you couldn’t squeeze into the week to get matching tips (finger and toenails, don’t you know!) or that afternoon for a long overdue dodgy-DVD marathon while nursing a throbbing head. Or it can be a chance to get down and dirty and cause some physical pain. Oh yes, we mean it: For some of Shanghai’s fairer sex, the weekend holds the possibility of pulverizing opponents. And with only one ball to worry about, these women are focused and driven, their pretty eyes firmly on the prize. And prizes a plenty there have been recently for two of Shanghai’s top women’s teams – the Shanghai Sirens and the Sassy Shrimps.

Get the blood pumping through www.urbanatomy.com

They are all-too-familiar Shanghai stories: You’re new to the city, or shy, or both, and you’re finding it difficult making friends. You’ve found friends and now you’re partying like a rock star (read: drinking like a fish) and you’ve got the big fat belly and listless weekend daytimes to prove it. Yup, if we had ten kuai every time we’d heard these tales of woe we wouldn’t need to bother with sport at all; we’d splash out on liposuction.

Slow-talking stoners, blue-eyed dreamers, worshippers of rocksteady and preachers of “that amazing tube dude,” often spring to mind when we think of surfers and surfing. But this ancient Hawaiian sport is actually an incredibly rewarding, fun and addictive way to keep fit. And everyone can do it. Surfing is one of the best sports to improve agility, upper body strength, balance and to tone muscles all over your body (without ever noticing them appear!), plus you’ll get an indescribable adrenaline rush as you ride down the face of your first wave.

A killer event takes place next month in Sanya, Hainan - China’s version of Hawaii – and should not be missed. Dozens of surfers (and beginners) traveling from Shanghai and all over China will hit the pristine golden sandy beaches, surf all day and, after getting suitably energized, toned and tanned, enjoy a huge beach bonfire in the evening.

The weekend trip, organized by Icon X (in connection with surfinghainan.com), begins on 29 October. They’ll arrange transfers from the airport, 3-star or 5-star accommodation just minutes from the beaches and provide professional Santa Cruz surfboards, gear, coaching and lunches - all for RMB1999. Surf’s up.

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