Exercise Equipment That You Don’t Need (Pt. 3)
Exercise Equipment That You Don’t Need (Part 1)
Exercise Equipment That You Don’t Need (Part 2)
Bench and Free Weights
There are millions of garages with a bench and a set of weights in them. The equipment is usually covered in dust. The bench is used as a chair or as a resting spot for boxes. The weights are rusting away.
I like free weights and use them in my workouts, but they are not necessary for weight loss. Strength training can be done without lifting free weights. When you are a beginner at strength training, your body weight or inexpensive resistance bands can provide all the resistance you need.
If you have free weights at home, dust them off and use them. However, if you are considering buying some, don’t. Use the inexpensive strategies in the Don’t Go Broke Activity Plan.
Push-Up Aids
Any device that claims to improve the push-up is a waste of money. The push-up is a great body weight exercise. You can strength train with push-ups for years without needing to add extra resistance. You can simply switch to a more difficult variation of push-up.
The average person can not do 3 sets of 12 regular push ups without any additional push-up device. So, the average person does not need any additional push-up device.
In the Don’t Go Broke Activity Plan, you will learn how to make the regular push-up more difficult by increasing the distance between your hands or adding an inexpensive resistance band.
Push-ups are a great exercise for working your chest and arm muscles. Push-ups can also strengthen your core. There is no need to buy any device to enhance or improve them.
Exercise Apparel
Sporting goods stores and department stores are filled with exercise apparel that is supposed to help you work-out. Unfortunately, none of it works. This is not to say that technical fabrics are not beneficial but they do no have to be expensive.
Expensive clothing and footwear will not help you lose weight. There is no magic in the logo. You may look attractive while you work out, but you will not burn more calories. Your closet may be fuller, but you will not be any thinner. You could save money and buy your exercise apparel at Wal-Mart or Payless.
Target and Wal-mart carry moisture wicking exercise clothing for a fraction of what you pay at “specialty stores.” This type of clothing is much better than working out in cotton t-shirts as they draw the moisture away from your body.
This also applies to those body suits that are supposed to make you sweat more. The sweat suits that look like space suits. These suits will make you sweat more and eventually stink more. However, the suits will not help you burn fat.
Excessive sweating does not help you burn more calories. Excessive sweating simply creates a need to drink more fluids. Excessive sweating will make exercise more uncomfortable. If you have one of these sweat suits, do not use it. If you do not have one, do not buy one.
Exercise Equipment That You Don’t Need (Part 4)
Weight loss can be enhanced and better maintained with strength training. For more information on my favorite strength training tool, read my review of the Bowflex SelectTech Dumbbells.
Photo by TheTruthAbout….
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{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
I disagree when you say that devices that aid push ups are a waste of money. A couple of weeks ago I started doing push ups using push up bars, not only does this allow me to go lower on each rep. But my chest and core have improved dramatically since switching from standard push ups. I have also recently purchased a weight vest to lower the amount of reps I have to do in each set. Because without it I was able to do around 70 push ups before I failed. With the weight vest on I’m now only able to complete 15 to 20 reps till I fail.
This is a great time saver for me, as well as giving my body a much better workout.
Keith @ My Body Fat ´s last blog ..Weekly Weigh In November 27th 2009
The push up aids may give you a better workout, but a better work out does not mean greater weight loss. If your goal is weight loss, your resistance training should be focused on maintaining muscle and burning calories. Not on muscle hypertrophy or strength gain.
I use the aids to shorten my workout, because I’m seeing better results from shorter more intense workouts. This also includes my cardio workouts, when I first started out I was told all the wrong information. To lose weight do long cardio sessions at low intensity, lift lower weights for higher reps.
I now know that this is wrong, to lose weight you need to train harder for shorter periods, because it will elevate your metabolism for many hours following your workout and will help in weight loss.
At the moment I’m training hard with weights in the 4 to 7 rep range, the advantage to this is my metabolism is running at a fairly high rate. I’m eating around 4000 calories per day to maintain weight. But the disadvantages to training hard are you are constantly feeling hungry and this is when I find myself overeating which is eating into my success.
Keith @ My Body Fat´s last blog ..Weekly Weigh In November 27th 2009