I remember, with great fondness and a big smile, when my mom and dad used to take me and my little sister to the park, where at the time, they had a big trampoline. We were so young at the time, that the trampoline seemed absolutely huge to me, but I’m sure looking back that it was just the same as the big ones people have so often in their backyards.

Back then, you really couldn’t buy them for your backyard easily like you can now. You couldn’t just run to your nearest Dick’s Sporting Goods store and charge it – it was more like a special order thing. 

Sometimes, taking vacations and staying in hotels with gyms, no matter how small they are, is a really great way to either take your workout in a whole new direction because you may not have all your devices at hand that you usually do, or to try a new piece of equipment, gadget, or fitness accessory.

We recently went on a tiny little getaway to Pittsburgh, and stayed at a Doubletree Hotel, where there was a pretty decent little gym. It even had that nice new tile that minimizes impact on your joints laid down, and smelled or new rubber – not at all like dirty socks and sweat like most gyms end up smelling!

It’s the holiday season, and I’ve already seen a few Facebook posts from friends and acquaintances saying that they were really hoping their families bought them a treadmill or a bike or some other such piece of exercise equipment so they could really have something at home to work out on.

Especially the women and men who have kids at home and care barely ever find any time, if any, to get out anywhere to an exercise class or to the gym.

We have a new informational page on how to find the best treadmills for running that you should definitely check out if you’re in the market or are going to be in the market for a treadmill for runners any time soon .There are some special considerations when buying a treadmill for running that those who use them primarily for walking don’t need to worry about as much.

Running can be hard on your joints, and it can also be hard to run on a treadmill that isn’t built right for high impact running. So read our new page on the best treadmills for running – it’ll help you to

There is one thing at the top of my “must have” or deal breakers lists when I am on the hunt for high quality exercise equipment that I can use in my own home. That top of the list item is comfort.

You have to be comfortable on any piece of workout equipment if you will ever set foot on it again, or at least want to set foot on it again, after that first initial use. For this reason, you should really stick to buying higher quality when it comes to gym equipment.

It’s probably no surprise to you at all, since exercise equipment such as elliptical machines, treadmills and the like, are pretty high ticket items, with the economy the way it is now, that the amount of larger exercise equipment pieces that are being sold as gifts has been on the wane, not only last year, but so far this year too.

If you’ve been searching for some new gym quality fitness equipment, then right now is one of the best times of the year to start looking, especially online. There are some awesome deals on everything from weight sets and fitness accessories to recumbent exercise bikes and DVD’s of yoga workouts, cardio blasts, and plenty of other workout regimens.

Some people think that weight lifting is going to add weight on, but it actually helps you to lose weight and burn calories at a faster rate than if you were just flabby and had a lot of body fat. However, it is important that you still do cardio as well when you are doing your workout regimen, to maintain the actual calorie burning piece of the workout. The thing with lifting weights is that the actual weight lifting itself doesn’t burn tons of calories in and of itself, like cardio activity does, but when you build muscle mass, you actually burn calories at a higher, faster rate when you are sitting still, and that’s where you get your bang for the buck from weightlifting.

It is quite possible that with all of this economic turmoil that is occurring, and especially with many top economists predicting that it will continue into the new year and beyond, that we will be seeing some of the best deals on everything from electronics, to clothes and novelty items, to fitness equipment and even dieting and weightloss deals, that we’ve seen in a long time, or even in our lifetime.

Tony Little makes a new little stepper that is supposed to help sculpt the problem areas on women – their butts and thighs (aka saddle bags) away with using the piece of equipment regularly. Of course, anything that is reasonably priced that claims to help sculpt and tone these huge problem areas for me, I’m a sucker for, so I got online and purchased one, except I found that the reviews on that particular product were mixed, so I ended up going with something called a Body Slender machine that was very similar but looked more sturdily constructed and costs about $60 used.