Sooooo, I ran in my house today! Jen and I both ran and watch what seemed to be a Jay Z and Kayne West music video marathon. It wasn't a bad run, but I wish I could of been out side hitting the pavement. This made me think of two things. I need to invest in a treadmill or have some kind of cardio workout planned for really bad weather days.
Coach Paul was telling me how he has a treadmill and runs on that a lot during the winter. We have a small house and not a lot of room to put one. He suggested putting it my garage and running in there.
So here is my question to all of you. What do you think I should do? Invest in a treadmill or get a gym membership. Both are going to be an investment, but I really want to be on track for my 5k and other races this year.
What do you think?
5 comments:
Gymn membership would be nice if they had a pool and hot tub. It's always nice to just float after a workout. The hot water would be good for relaxing you too. Plus there's a ton of other things you can do too. Treadmills are big and do take up a lot of room. Plus once it gets nicer out you won't use it much and then its just taking up space. Those are my thoughts. I've enjoyed reading your blog every morning before heading to work. Keep up the good work my friend. You are an inspiration to me.
If you do a gym membership, you'll be able to build muscle too (if you use their machines). Muscle helps burn more fat. The hard part is having the time/motivation to go to the gym. A lot of people just don't go because they don't set aside time. We have a gym membership to the cheapest place around us (it's not one of those big chains that has all the super fit people there to intimidate you). It's nice, but we don't use it like we should. You'll also be in a contract that can sometimes we a burden. A treadmill would be really nice to be able to run at home, but that's all you'll be able to do with it. But, you only pay for it and then it's yours until it dies. You don't even have to worry about intimating people around you. It's a hard trade off. Good Luck!
My vote would be a gym membership. Not only will a gym have better equipment (e.g. treadmills that more realistically emulate running on regular surface), but they offer more options for cross training. If your goal is weight loss, I *highly* recommend adding a strength training regiment into your mix. Strength training helps ensure that the weight you lose is from burning fat and not catabolic conversion of muscle mass. You also get the benefit that a stronger core means a stronger runner.
And, as a for something you can do at home that can produce a good full body workout while mixing both strength and aerobic training, I recommend a (single 35lb) kettlebell. The kettlebell swing (a fairly easy to learn basic kb exercise) is *fantastic* for fat loss. It's intense (so you don't have spend hours lifting weights). It's:
* adaptable (so you don't have to buy an entire range of various dumbbells/barbell plates, one weight will give ya a great workout with a variety of excercises)
* compact (easily hidden under a coffee table)
* effective (intense kb exercises like the kb swing or snatch are estimated to burn around 20 calories/minute)
* cheap (a top of the line 35lb kettlebell from DragonDoor.com with good instructional book and dvd costs around $150 (after shipping), easily less than a tenth of a good treadmill.)
* fun (always a matter of personal opinion, but I can tell you that I *love* em)
* old school (I'm about as big of a fan of technology as there could be, but there is something particularly satisfying about hefting a ball of cast iron around). :-)
Anyway, that's what *I* choose to buy myself for 'at home' workouts over winter, and I've been loving it.
-- William, your sparkbuddy
I like the gym memberships... for me all I have to do is get myself there. That's it, just make a plan to be there at some set time every day, and it works. Once you're there, there isn't really anything else to do that can distract you, so you'll end up working out.
That's my 2 cents.
I actually vote for the treadmill. Not only that but I once got a really nice treadmill on craigslist for pretty cheap. Just a thought.
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