The prompt for The Sunday Stills Photo Challenge this week is Inside. Terri from Second Wind Leisure hosts Sunday Stills, and each week there are different prompts. I’m not a photographer but I thought I’d just give it a go.  I find this challenge opens my eyes to my surroundings, as I think about the prompt during the week. . This week Hugh from Hugh’s Views and News is the host!

As I was doing a warm-up on the cross trainer during the week, my thoughts went to my gym equipment. I am fortunate enough to have quite a well equipped gym at home, so I’m able to do most strength exercises without going to a gym. The only piece of equipment I would add, is a Leg Press Machine. This I would love, but it’s quite a bulky piece of equipment and I really don’t have the space for it.

Garmin

My Garmin sportswatch is the piece of equipment that I use the most, even though that use is static. It’s on my wrist, to constantly record every little thing that I do, and collating it all into activity and health reports.  I love looking at all the stats, even though there is much more information than I would ever need. I have my daily steps goal set at 15000, which motivates me to keep moving towards a higher total. Every week, Garmin puts me into a step challenge, with other users, which gives me another reason to keep moving. Below is an example of an activity. This was a bushwalk that I did during the week. It was a fairly slow walk due to the rocky and muddy surface. But it gives an example of the break up of information that I get. This is only a sample. There is much more than this available to me.

Spin bike

I use my spin bike every day. Three times each week, I do a 55 minute spin class, and on strength training days, the spin bike is my choice for a pre-workout warm up. I’m sure my knee injury would never have improved without the spin bike. Essential to my recovery was the  physio’s recommended  stretching exercises and the  time he demanded I spend on the spin bike. When I first started it was only 2 minutes, with gradual increases every couple of days. Back then, I was feeling very disheartened and never would have imagined that just a few months later, I’d be able to manage an entire spin class with it’s speed and climbs.

Rowing Machine

Occasionally, I use the rowing machine for warm ups, but usually it is part of a cardio program. Mostly my cardio is either spin, walking or cycling. For variety, I will do cardio in the gym which is a combination of the spin bike, rowing machine and cross trainer, alternating each. For these cardio combos, the rowing machine is my main focus, so the circuits are usually – bike, 5 minutes – rowing, 10 minutes – cross trainer, 5 mins. Three circuits of these give a ‘sweaty’ workout of 60 minutes plus stretching.

Multi Weights Station

This piece of equipment is central to my weights program. There are multiple exercises that I’m able to do on this machine. I usually combine machine weights, such as this with dumbells and barbells.

Off  Road Bike

I wouldn’t be without my off road bike. As I age,I find myself worrying about how much longer I will be able to ride, but so far all is ok. These days, I usually ride on the O’Keefe Rail Trail, which is quite close to our house. We live on the edge of a National Park so there are many dirt tracks nearby.

Ankle Weights

Because I don’t have leg press machine, I use my ankle weights for leg workouts. My leg workout consists of knee lifts and pilates style floor exercises. With 2kg ankle weights strapped on, it’s quite an intense workout.

Exercising without equipment

I should finish off by saying that it is absolutely not essential to have equipment in order to exercise. It’s possible to exercise every part in your body using bodyweight exercises. I will post more about these later.

What’s your favourite piece of exercise equipment? I’d love to hear your choices. Perhaps you prefer to exercise without equipment. I’d love to hear about any of your exercise experiences and promise to reply to all comments. Lets have a conversation.

Links to my other blogs:
Best Bookish Blog
Tracking Down The Family

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