So I can’t run (knee surgery), can’t bike outside (need to buy a new bike), and the pool at my gym is atrocious (so much so that it’s impossible to motivate myself to swim regularly). All of these problems are temporary and will be fixed within a few months. For the time being however, I’m looking to lose some pounds, and maintain cardio fitness as best as possible. My question therefore is, besides the treadmill, what cardio machines do you use at the gym? What do you do to avoid the boredom (intervals, short periods on each one to break up the monotony, etc.)?
Favourite is the rowing machine, lots of options for doing intervals on it. Cross-trainer can be a good way of maintaining running fitness when you can’t actually run but I find it pretty boring.
The best thing about the gym (and I don’t really like gyms, not currently a member of one) is being able to watch MTV/sports/movies while you exercise.
Concept 2 rowing ergometer. Swimming pool.
Exercise bike. I like the fact that I can let it pick the terrain profile and not just be steady-state. I get too bored/lazy to get a good interval workout on the trainer (unless it is a group trainer session).
what is a gym?
Years ago my gym had a machine called the cross trainer. You were semi-reclined
with two pedals and a weight stack you had to keep elevated. That thing was
a great workout. So much so that I never saw anyone else really using them and
then they went away. And I was sad.
-Jot