Alicia Wagner Calzada | 210SA Contributor Capoeira is a Brazilian martial art where players learn how to kick butt over drums and singing.

If you find yourself trying to outrun stray dogs at the track or you're still contemplating opening the pilates book that's only ever graced your bookshelf, it's time to branch out and discover that exercise can be fun again.

Leave the regimen of waistline worrying and caloric anxiety behind. Exercise is really important, but it doesn't have to be a dread-filled excursion to the track or to the gym.

Capoeira is a Brazilian martial art. It is everything that your workout is missing: singing, dancing, laughing and dynamic activity.

“It is aerobic and anaerobic at the same time. You're going to use every muscle and work on every type of flexibility,” said instructor “Caranguejo” Brian Thomas, who has played capoeira for more than 12 years and has instructed classes in San Antonio for three years.

A normal class includes: practicing movements and drills that tone and strengthen your core muscles and increase flexibility, learning how to play the traditional instruments and singing capoeira songs in Portugese.
 The class ends with a roda, a circle where players take turns integrating the movements in a spontaneous two-person game, while the other players sing songs and play musical instruments around them.

“Capoiera is about community, that is why we have the music, the instruments, everything together in harmony. It takes people to make it happen,” says veteran player Michael Pleasants.

Another fun way to stay fit is doing a hot and steamy Bikram yoga session. This bad-boy of yoga is not just for naturally flexible people.

It consists of a 90-minute session in 105 degree heat where you sweat and push yourself to do 26 positions and breathing exercises that develop your core muscles and increase flexibility.

In any particular class, you could see teenagers to octogenarians.

The workouts are so challenging that even Spurs players come to practice. Lisa Ingle-Key, co-owner of the Bikram Yoga studios in San Antonio recalled the first time Spurs' ace defender Bruce Bowen came to a morning Bikram yoga session frequented by grandmothers and working women.

“He told me afterwards that he got his butt kicked by these 60-year-olds,” said Ingle-Key.

“You work within the range of flexibility and motion in the postures, and as strange as it sounds, it becomes more difficult as you are able to do more of the posture and hold it. No two classes are ever the same,” said Ingle-Key.

So if your exercise schedule isn't compatible with the one friend that won't judge you for the way you look in spandex, or if your jogging partner consists of an iPod, it is time to try something new.

Olivia Doerge | 210SA Contributor