Your Question:
Is it possible for Specialised Health to perhaps put together some ideas of everyday items to help our Clients maintain their exercise without gym equipment?
Great request, thankyou!
With the shutdown of gyms, and difficulty sourcing home equipment, our EPs have had to get creative, both for their own workouts and for their clients.
Firstly, incase you missed it, our last post was: Top 3 Best Things to Have for Your Home Workouts. This also included some everyday items!
Today, we’ll go through the random things around the house you may not have thought of!
Branches
NSW Team Leader, Ani told us that he had a session with a client who lives on a large property. Keeping the +1.5 meter +social distance of course, they walked around the property collecting branches. His client got in a bit of cardio as well as functional strength while he pulled the increasingly heavy trolley. Ani also ensured that his client practiced safe lifting and varied it up with bent-over rows, the branch in place of the dumbbell.
Children
A few of our EPs have admitted to using live weight!
Chantelle’s baby enjoyed her ride in the washing basket!
Depending on the size of your child there are a variety of exercises you could do in or out of a basket.
Lift them up and down to get some squats and biceps curls. To pump up your cardio try offering a piggyback!
Bags, Books and Bottles
If you don’t have any children to lift, you could try filling up a bag or suitcase with all those tinned foods in the pantry or books you have on display?
Increase the intensity of your walks by carrying a heavy bag, or increase the weight of your bodyweight squats. Add some farmers carries into your workout or, depending on the size and grip, you could also do bent-over rows (pictured) or bicep curl to shoulder press.
Alternatively, you could build some little dumbbells by filling old, but clean, milk bottles with water, mud or rocks. After the lockdown, clean out and recycle!
If you don’t have a step, but do have some sturdy books, you can use this to get a bit more range in your heel raises!
Blankets
Our Wellington EP, Lauren, was missing Battle Rope slams so made do with an old blanket! Awesome core and cardio workout!
Stones
Our Auckland EP, Yolanda, has a client who has been using a bag of stones purchased from the hardware store. Very appropriate for functional lifting and carrying!
Yolanda suggested that if you are really missing the gym and need a challenge, you could build a barbell with a strong pole and buckets at each end to get your back squats.
Tyres
Our Palmerston (NZ) EP Tessa was prepared, and dropped off tyres to her clients before the lockdown.
We are yet to hear whether her neighbours’ cars are missing tyres. Stay tuned.
But more importantly, stay tuned on our social media because she’s working on a video to share for you to follow along with your own tyre!
Letter Boxes
If you don’t have a pole or a heavy door for your resistance bands, you can do what Mark‘s client did, and wrap it around your letterbox. Bonus health points for fresh air and sunlight!
Washing Machine Parts
Our Melbourne EP, James, had a client with a spare washing machine, so borrowed some parts to use as weights during his sessions!
We hope that gives you some ideas for workouts and some insight into how we’re keeping our shared clients fit!
Biara Webster
Exercise Physiologist and Writer/Content Manager, Specialised Health
Each month we will pick a question to Q&A.
Send your questions to brad@specialisedhealth.com.au or biara@specialisedhealth.com.au
Or contact us through the below social media outlets!
