How to put the bounce back into your jog and uplift your mind
Not feeling energised? Help understand your mental wellbeing with ASICS’ new platform
Without a doubt, the past 15 months have been tough on us all. Through lockdowns, not seeing family, losing loved ones and only being able to leave our homes for food shopping and daily exercise, it’s been hard.
But it’s the latter that got many of us through it. We all know that exercise and sport have the transformative power to lift our spirits and to make us feel good about ourselves. And that’s true for us as individuals and even entire nations – just look at the re-opening of stadiums and how it brings people together through a love of sport. It’s a feeling of stability, a sense of community and togetherness and is totally uplifting.
One sports brand that has this idea quite literally at its core is ASICS. Although formed in 1949, it changed to its current name in the Seventies, and the Japanese company’s name is actually an acronym for the Latin phrase anima sana in corpore sano, which translates to healthy mind, healthy body, showing just how ahead of its time it was.
In the spirit of its ethos, earlier this month, ASICS launched its mission to uplift a million minds across the world. How, you ask?
ASICS has partnered with mental health charity, Mind, and has come up with the Mind Uplifter™, a platform, which has been rigorously developed in partnership with Professor Brendon Stubbs, who is a world leading authority on exercise and mental health, to show how movement can positively impact the mind for the better.
Have you ever wondered if exercise can help with your confidence? How it can help improve your memory? Or how your emotions and brain functions affect your performance – such as how well you’re coping with stress or how confident you are?
By simply scanning the contours of your face, asking you six questions on how you feel using a scale of 1-10 before doing at least 20 minutes of exercise, and then repeating the scan and questions, you’ll get your results and be able to understand and see how all of this affects your mind.
After completing the scan online, you can then share it, and from 1 July you can see how your results contribute to the World Uplift Map, which feeds into the world’s biggest live study into the impact of sport on the mind.
By sharing it on social media, you’re also helping to raise money for charity, as for every #MindUplift shared ASICS will make a donation to Mind to support research into mental health in sport and support more people to move for positive mental wellbeing.
But if you still find you’re struggling to get back into your groove at the moment, or you’re lacking energy, or that real spring in your jog that you used to have, maybe you haven’t got the right shoes for the job?
Finding the perfect pair is no easy task, but ASICS’ interactive Shoe Finder can help you pick the ideal shoe for you, while you’re still at home. All you need to do is answer four simple questions – then a pair of trainers are selected for you.
NOVABLAST™ 2, £130, ASICS
If you’re looking for something to give you that extra oomph and bounce, and really energise your runs (and let’s face it, who isn’t), look to the brand’s new NOVABLAST™ 2 trainer. The midsole shoe has been designed for a trampoline effect, with a powerful bounce-back helping you to go further. They’re also soft and breathable, thanks to the engineered mesh.
Triathlete and ASICS athlete, Beth Potter, says: “Training in ASICS NOVABLAST™ shoes really energises me. So light and bouncy, they literally lift my mood with every stride”.
There’s little else satisfying than putting a new – and well earned – spring in your step. So feel uplifted and get back out there.
Join ASICS’ mission to uplift a million minds across the world and visit minduplifter.asics.com