Exercise is important for anyone. Keeping fit and active is good for both your physical health and your mental well being. Unfortunately, exercise can be an expensive hobby. Gym memberships and all the fitness gear you need can soon add up. If you’re on a budget, you might think that fitness isn’t accessible for you, but that doesn’t have to be the case. Here are some ideas to help you stay fit, without breaking the bank.
Workout With Friends
Do you have friends with similar fitness goals to you who are also on a tighter budget? Form an exercise group together and meet up a few times a week to work out. Choose free spaces like the local park or a high school for a run, the community pool for a swim, or someone’s home to do fitness videos together. Make things fun by working out together and then doing something like having coffee together afterward. You’ll feel more motivated, without spending more money.
Buy A Deck Of Cards
You can create lots of workout routines using a deck of cards and bodyweight exercises. Assign a move to a suit in the deck, such as push-ups for clubs, crunches for hearts, burpees for spades, and squats for diamonds. Shuffle the deck and turn over a card. If you reveal a four of diamonds, do four squats. For the eight of clubs, do eight crunches. Assign numbers to picture cards as you would for number based card games. Keep flipping cards over until you’ve finished the deck, or can’t keep going any longer, for a fun twist on mixing up a workout with no need for equipment.
Look For Free Passes
Many gyms offer free or discounted trial passes. Sign up for these to get access to classes or the gym equipment. Set a reminder on your phone so you don’t forget to cancel before you get charged. This can also work if you do want to sign up for a class. You can try a few to find the right one for you without wasting money on classes you don’t enjoy.
If you do want to join a gym, free passes are also a good way to try a few out so you can find the best one for you and shop around for the right price to help you find a membership that you can afford. Ask your friends if their gym offer guest passes, so you can try their gym for free too.
Don’t Buy Equipment
You don’t need a lot of fitness equipment to get an effective workout. You can work out for free at home by doing body weight exercises like push-ups, squats, and crunches. Get your cardio in by dancing to your favorite song, or running up and down the stairs. There are plenty of benefits of doing cardio at home, as it won’t cost you a thing and can be fitted in whenever you have a spare few minutes. Use Youtube videos to guide you and get a real workout without leaving the house.
Take Part In Corporate Wellness
More and more companies are beginning to invest in the health of their staff. Many companies have deals with local gyms for discounted memberships for their staff, and some may even provide classes at the office, such a morning yoga session before the workday starts. This is great for you, as you can save money, and it works for your company, as healthier staff need less time off ill. See if the company you work for offers anything like this. If they don’t, why not suggest it?
Go Outside
Lots of parks have outdoor workout equipment in them that you can use for free. See if your local park has anything like this. You can also do lots of exercises outside without paying anything. Go for a walk, or do hill runs. Take up jogging. If you own a bike, go for a bike ride. If you’re lucky enough to live near the beach, go for a run on the sand. Sand is harder to run on, so it will work you even harder. You can swim in the sea too for a whole-body workout.
Invest In A Kettlebell
Kettlebells are a very effective tool for a workout and are ideal for use at home. For most home workouts, you only need one kettlebell, making them a cheaper option than buying a set of dumbbells. You can add a kettlebell to many body weight moves to add resistance to make the move harder. The other advantage of a kettlebell is that it is small and easy to store at home, or put in the car to take with you for an outdoor workout.
Make DIY Weights
If you’re on a tight budget but still want to add weights to a workout, you can make your own weights with ordinary things from around the house. Use heavy tins or bottles. Save gallon milk jugs and fill them with water to make them heavy. You can adjust the weight by changing how much water you put in. Who needs dumbbells?
Buy a Used Bike
Secondhand bikes often turn up on eBay, Craiglist, and Facebook marketplace. Keep an eye out for one in reasonable condition at a good price. Cycling is great exercise, and once you’ve bought the bike, doesn’t have to cost you a thing. If you can afford to, replace the saddle for a new one for a comfier ride.
Take Inspiration From Influencers
There are lots of fitness influencers on YouTube and Instagram, lots of whom post workouts that you can do at home with minimal equipment, whether you want to do yoga or a HIIT session. Try a few different influencers to find a few that you like and follow them to get new ideas. Search for things like ‘at home workouts’ ‘body weight exercises’, and similar terms to find workouts you can do.
Shop Second-hand and Cheap
Look out for fitness equipment on selling sites. Things like weights often turn up used after someone has lost interest in their fitness kick, so you can easily furnish your home gym without spending too much. If you prefer new, buy cheaper equipment. For example, resistance bands are generally cheap and can be used for a wide range of exercises. Jump ropes can be used for a fun cardio workout, and are very reasonably priced.
Before buying any new workout equipment, have a look in the garage or the attic fist. Lots of us have old exercise equipment we’ve forgotten about. What do you have already that can be used or repurposed? That old step from the steps aerobics fad can be used as a weight bench and a step for cardio. The weights your husband bought and never used can be dusted off and used for you. Ask your friends and family if they’re clearing out old fitness equipment, and see if they have anything that you could make use of.
Use Your Phone
Many phones have fitness trackers built into them now, and even if they don’t there are dozens of free apps out there. You can use fitness and diet apps to track your speed and distance on a run, time intervals for a HIIT workout, or monitor your calorie intake. Apps like this are usually free, so you can track your fitness without shelling out premium apps or expensive kit like GPS watchers or fitness tracking devices.
There are even some free apps that can guide you through a workout, such as plans to improve your push-up skills, or apps that teach you a yoga pose a day.
Walk More
Walking is good exercise, and is easy for most people to do. Find ways to fit more walking into your day. Get off the bus a stop early on your way to work and walk the rest of the way. Go out for a walk on your lunch break or after work in the evenings. Plan a long walk at the weekend with the family or a friend. If you can, walk to the local shop instead of driving there when you run out of milk. Park further away from wherever you’re going so you can squeeze in more steps without really noticing it. Ask your friend with a dog if you can join them for their dog-walks, or offer to dogsit when they go away, so you have to get out for a walk. If you like dogs, you could also offer your services in the local area as a dog-walker, so you can walk more and earn some extra cash at the same time.
You don’t have to spend a fortune to be able to stay fit, healthy, and active. Incorporating being more active into your daily routine, and making the most of what you have can all go a long way to helping you stay healthy. Enjoy exercise without making too big a dent in your wallet.
