Create Your Own Home Gym for Little or No Cost
Apart from the blaring music and the super fit and super trim instructors, gyms really only offer two main types of fitness training: (1) aerobic workouts and (2) resistance training with weights or pulleys. Some gyms also have Yoga, Pilates and meditation, but for several reasons, you may want to have your own home gym. Here are some steps to get you started.
Making Your Own Stepper
Find six old telephone books.
Glue two books together for your right foot step and two for your left. Keep the other two books for the time when you are ready to increase the intensity level.
Cover the books with any non-slip covering. For instance, that old towel you were just about to throw out. Or any old piece of clothing.
Put your beautiful looking new 'steps' side by side in front of you - as if they were your new skis or snow shoes.
Test out your stepping routines. See Tips, below.
Now for sideways stepping. Put one step in horizontal position, that is so that you can fit both feet on it, side by side. Stand with each foot on either side of that 'step' to do your sideways stepping exercises: see Tips below. Another five minutes and you're almost done.
Making Your Own Hand Weights
Take two 750mls (just over a pint) plastic bottles and fill them with water. You now have two hand weights that are just under a kilogram (about 1.6lbs). A good weight for your warm-up or if you're a beginner, it's an excellent weight to start your new muscle-toning-without-injury program.
Carry your hand weights to walk your 5kms around the lake, or ten minutes around your garden or apartment or house.
Use them to do bicep curls, tricep dips, shoulder presses.
You can buy a home gym like Bodylastics which is under $50. Although it is not a real home gym, it gives you the workout that most home gyms do not give you. It is built on resistance theory and relies on elastic bands for resistance. So it is always effective, versatile and cheap. You can use it for all types of training and generate up to 250lbs of resistance.
Making Your Own Barbells - Pretty or Heavy
Buy a steel bar about 1.5 metres long - about 5'5".
If you're just starting out, sew a little pillow a bit bigger than the size of an average hand. Fill your pillow with 1kg (2.2lbs) of sand, rice, wheat. Glue that little cloth pillow around each end of the bar.
If you want a bit more weight even at the start, use a brick on each end. See Warnings, below. The average brick weighs a whopping 9kgs (nearly 20 lbs) which is why you don't see too many builders or bricklayers wasting their money at the gym! See my Warnings about how to make a 40 lbs+ weight with bricks.
Tips
Right foot onto right two books, bring left foot to rest lightly on left-foot-book. Keeping left foot on the books/step, lower right foot and bring left down to standing position. After five minutes of that, lead with your left foot. Remember to keep that rhythm going, all you have to remember is that the foot that goes up first, is the foot that goes down first.
Sideways steps: with your left foot on the floor next to the stepper, bring your right foot to rest on the step. Then bring the left foot up to stand next to the right foot. Little step together, then lower the right foot then the left. Start again. After a few minutes, lead with your left foot.
Warnings
Break the brick up into smaller pieces. Leave a spot for you to hold the bar and then glue the brick pieces on both sides of your hand space, all around the steel pole.
You'd never dream of starting an exercise program without first checking with your doctor that you're in good shape to get in better shape. Just in case: never go from a life lying on the couch to running around the block. Do it all gradually and as much as possible make your life your exercise program, rather than having an exercise program that's an adjunct to a busy but sedentary life.
You can put heavy items in a canvas bag and hang them from the bar.
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