Best Portable Exercise Equipment

After the prolonged trip away from home, I have determined to find ways to do exercise pretty much everywhere. Here is a list of the equipment I will take with me on the road from now on. They are easy to carry and give one a pretty good all round workout.

For me, these items have to be light weight, easy to pack and do not waste a lot of space. After all, the airlines are getting more and more restrictive with the luggage size making it more difficult to hand carry everything on board. I would do absolutely everything I can to avoid having my luggage checked as the waiting time for the luggage can take a very long time.

Surprisingly, all I need are the following three things to get a good all round exercise routine completed:

1. Pull Up Handles

These portable handles are made to hang on top of a door or anchor on any strong frames. Once the handles are anchored properly, you can do pull-ups and various other body exercises. The one I got is the Lifeline one but any other brand should get the job done.

Here is how it looks like,

2. Resistance Bands

There are various types of resistance bands for doing exercise. First, the flat type is the most portable one as one can simply pack them as the last item you stuff into your luggage. Second, there are two types of flat resistance bands. One is just a very long rectangle where you can grab both ends to pull and stretch it. The other one is a loop for which you can pull it between your arms or legs for resistance training. Third, there is also the tube type that usually comes with handles and anchors to attach to a door or other fixtures.

I find the third type although stronger in general but they are not as portable or as useful when one is travelling. Hence I will stick with the flat types which both the single layer ones and the loop ones are very handy exercise equipment that takes virtually no luggage space.

I tried several brands from local sports equipment store but the resistance was too weak for my need. This one is the one I bought that I find good enough for my need,

3. Jumping Rope

I choose to include this in the list only after I figure out that it is still a good thing to include it because it is not necessary that all travelling ended up at a hotel or business related.

One can get jumping rope everywhere but one cannot do it everywhere. For example, it is not likely you can do rope jumping effectively within your hotel room. Nonetheless, if you are travelling to country side or a vacation house, you can easily find an open area for rope jumping.

4. Armchair

Surprisingly, this one you do not need to carry it around. All you need to do, if there is no armchair in your hotel room, ask for one. An armchair with strong arm rest are pretty much all you need for various dip and push up exercise. The catch is that you cannot do full range motion so you cannot really get full body workout with just the armchair but it is good enough if you have really nothing else with you.

Next time, I will have my portable gym everywhere I go.

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