The goals and needs of fitness enthusiasts have pretty much remained constant for decades. However, that hasn’t stopped the fitness industry from innovating and producing new products every year. Here are four new products that are making waves in the West. Keeping in mind the pattern where products that have been successful abroad make their way into India through local partners, chances are a couple of these products will soon be seen in our exercise studios and home gyms.
Tonal: This is one of the hottest and sleekest multigym machines out there right now, a favourite with A-list athletes, including basketball star Lebron James, tennis great Serena Williams and golfer Michelle Wie West. Slim like a modern-day television, Tonal comes with a built-in display screen. Multiple bars and handles attach onto the cables that come out of the moveable arms on the main unit.
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All you need to do is install it on the wall and use the attachment bars and handles to do all your weighted workouts. Tonal uses sensors to give you the experience of resistance for weight training, and you could adjust this as per your requirements. There is a vast library of workout videos that you could choose from once you subscribe, but what sets it apart from others is Tonal has a module that analyses your strength levels, in order to bring you workouts that enable you to lift more effectively. It is loaded with multiple trackers and sensors to give you detailed performance analytics and help you reach your goals faster.
Thor Kettlebell: Whether or not you’re a fan of Marvel’s Avengers films, I’m sure you know of the Norse god Thor and his famous hammer. A Boston-based company called Tribe Wod, in its attempt to make exercise fun, has built a kettlebell in the shape and likeness of Thor’s hammer. These Thor Kettlebells come in different weights, starting at 7kg and going all the way up to 32kg. Just like conventional kettlebells, you could use these to perform bicep curls, swings, push press, cleans, jerks, snatches, goblet squats and a lot more…all the while feeling like a superhero. And what’s more, there are free YouTube videos by Tribe Wod showing you workout routines with the Thor Kettlebell.
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Handy Gym: As the name suggests, this one is ideal for travel workouts or for those who live in cramped spaces. This is also likely to be a hit among those who don’t like lifting weights. The Handy Gym is small contraption that works like a band but is a lot more versatile and lets you do a whole lot more while giving you the feeling of working out with weights.
It can be used as a rowing machine as well as a dumbbell for bench press and overhead press. It is a flywheel, lightweight device that uses no rubber bands, making it sturdy to use. It comes in three resistance variants starting at about 40kg while going up to 100kg. However, the Handy Gym alone won’t suffice, and you would have to add some accessories (most of them travel ready) to get a full workout. It uses ‘inertial technology’, a kind of strength training method that is independent of gravity, for eccentric training, and it allows for resistance training without you having to lift any weights. Of course, there is an app and a video library to guide you through your workouts and help you achieve your goals.
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Fit Home Gym: There are plenty of pull-up bars and parallel bars for home use but I have seen none as convenient as this one. The Fit Home Gym offers both pull-up and parallel bars and even the low push-up bars in a single unit. What’s more, it comes in a flat pack that can slide under your bed and stay out of your way.
The Fit Home Gym includes a flat board and different bars. The board stays on the floor and you use the bar to set up your pull up and parallel bars. It is the base design that makes this work and allows for a sturdy set of pull-up bars, unlike the ones that we usually fix between the doors or hang up from the door frame. The base also has hooks to attach bands and bars for squats, overhead press and bicep curls. The makers claim the home gym is stable and durable for people weighing up to 136kg. It has its own app that comes with an archive of more than 100 different exercises.
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