Creative Ways to Set Up a Home Gym on a Budget

The wedding party you are throwing will probably be the biggest, and most expensive, celebration of your lifetime. Even a budget bride will spend a few thousand dollars on her wedding and honeymoon, which often times mean cutting back on other expenditures (like your Lululemon apparel obsession) in order to pay for the wedding.

One thing that should never suffer as a result of your financial situation is your health.  If you are pinching your pennies, you can still obtain your wedding dress dream body with these creative ideas for setting up a home gym on a budget.

Home Gym #1 – Absolutely Free

Yes, free! You don’t need expensive equipment to shape up.  There are many different household items you can use to get a great workout:

• Use a chair instead of a workout bench (for tricep dips, seated squats with abdominal crunch, and side-leg raises).
• Use cans of food instead of dumbbells (for bicep curls, shoulder raises, tricep kickbacks).
• Use a recyclable grocery bag filled with books instead of a barbell (for upright rows, deadlifts, overhead tricep extensions).

Home Gym #2 – Products for less than $25

Because our bodies can adapt to exercises after a short period of time (sometimes in as little as three weeks), spicing up your workouts with new fitness equipment will keep your body progressing to it’s wedding gown greatness.

• Stability Ball – If it’s a flat belly you’re looking for, adding a stability ball to your arsenal of muscle toning tools helps recruit more of your core stabilizing muscles than traditional crunches.
• Yoga Mat – A 20 minute meditation session can rejuvenate your body and even help manage pain.
• Set of 3 Resistance Bands – If you travel often, this is a great budget solution that is completly portable.
• Foam Roller – Tightened and tangled muscle fascia can lead to injuries and inhibit your full range of motion during workouts, which might mean your bum isn’t going to get any perkier, no matter how many squats you do! Take a cue from elite athletes and perform five to seven minutes of foam rolling before your workout.
• New Workout Video – Adding a new video to your collection can get you moving with very little thinking required (especially helpful in the early mornings).

Home Gym #3 – Products for less than $75

There are some really fun (isn’t that a subjective word!) pieces of home fitness equipment on the market that new exercisers will find easy to learn, while challenging advanced exercisers at the same time.

• Gymstick – This is a few steps up from your regular resistance bands because there are tons of lower body, upper body and core exercises you can perform with this one piece of equipment.
• Boxing in a Box – Everlast has a home gym speed bag set complete with gloves, wraps and a jump rope for a workout with a 1, 2 punch.
• 5-in-1 Dumbbell Set – If you’re tight on space, an adjustable dumb bell set is a great piece of equipment that both you and your fiance can use.

The most important thing about your home gym is that you stock it with equipment that you’ll actually use. Have a budget-friendly home gym idea? Share with us by commenting below.

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