Green Up Your Fitness Routine

Self-powered Woodway Curve – manual treadmills!

I’m a green gal – loud and proud. Heck, I used cloth diapers with both of my kiddos… plus I compost and recycle religiously. But I’m not the eco-fittest person. Yes, I try to bike places rather than drive, but then I’ll use energy-gobbling treadmills.  So, my new mission is to sweat the small stuff… at least when it comes to reducing my carbon footprint. To help us all be eco-fit warriors, here are 5 “greener” ways to workout in the Valley.

Self-powered Woodway Curve – manual treadmills!
Self-powered Woodway Curve – manual treadmills!

1. Choose an eco-conscious gym – Some gyms are more eco-friendly than others. Gyms that recycle get a major point from me, but that’s just a start. At Off the Grid Fitness, most of the cardio machines are either self-powered or return energy back to the “grid” – how cool is that?

2. Hit the trails, not the treadmill – Not only do we live in the land of the sun, we live in the land of trails. There are the McDowell Mountains, South Mountain, Camelback, Phoenix Mountain Preserve, Pinnacle Peak… and on and on. And we just happen to be in the sweet spot weather wise for hiking, trail running and mountain biking. So get out there!

3. Bike to work/bike to the gym – A past boss of mine decided he wanted to lose weight so he challenged the whole office to bike to work for a month. I’m proud to say that I’m the only one who did it… and kept doing it. And now I’d way rather bike to most places than drive. It not only cuts your carbon footprint (yay!), it’s free and it means you don’t have to schedule in a separate workout. I love multitasking!

4. Get a reusable water bottle – I have a major pet peeve with plastic water bottles (don’t even get me started), but rather than bash them, I’d rather sing the praises of reusable bottles. First, they look way cooler (check out these from Alexbottle.com), the keep your H2O colder… and no landfill guilt!

Easy-to-clean bottles from Alexbottle.com
Easy-to-clean bottles from Alexbottle.com

5. Give old shoes a new purpose – What do you with old sneakers? If you said toss ’em, give yourself a slap on the wrist. Nike’s Reuse-A-Shoe program turns your used and abused trainers into athletic surfaces for courts, tracks, even playgrounds. Just take your old kicks to a Nike store and they’ll put them to great use.

6. Power down and power up – Ditch the plug-in workout machines. You don’t need electrical power to power up, not when your very own body weight works wonders. Equipment-free squats, pushups, lunges and planks work the whole body and help improve balance and core strength.

Bonus: Workout for FREE this Saturday! AmenZone Fitness Tour is hitting Chandler on Feb 16 at 10am. You WILL feel the burn – and it’s eco-friendly! Click here for all the details.

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