The treadmill continues to be the most predominantly used piece of fitness equipment by individuals as a means to improve fitness levels and reduce waist lines.  During Michigan Winters, more consumers purchase treadmills for their homes for these purposes than any other piece of equipment.  And, by Groundhog's Day, too many people have lost their motivation and, consequently, they don't use their treadmill effectively, if at all.  The primary reasons - boredom and immeasurable results!  Below, American Home Fitness has listed three easy, effective and challenging (read "interesting") treadmill workouts that will keep you on track with your fitness goals and keep you motivated to keep coming back for more!  And, with good motivation and good equipment, your ultimate achievements will be well within your reach!

The workouts suggested below are listed in order of least challenging to most challenging and always consult your physician before beginning any new exercise or fitness program. 

Fat Burning  Workout

This is a great workout for the beginner to start with, as it familiarizes him or her with the function of the treadmill and its heart rate features and does NOT over tax the body's joints and lung capacity, all while efficiently burning fat for fuel. Using a heart rate measuring treadmill (almost all treadmills at American Home Fitness have some heart rate measuring feature), engage either the Quick Start or Manual Program and set the treadmill at a speed that gradually elevates your heart rate to 60% of your age-predicted maximum heart rate (calculated as 220 - age x 60%).  Once achieved, hold this level of intensity for 35 minutes, adjusting the speed or incline level of the treadmill to keep your heart rate within the 60% zone.  After 35 minutes, cool down with a slow walk with the incline set at zero.  Keeping the exercise intensity at a low rate for 30 to 60 minutes will naturally utilize more fat burning resources for fuel.  At the outset, the new user should incorporate this Fat Burning workout 3 to 5 times a week for the first month of their new program, increasing intensity only as dictated by improvements in condition and as measured by heart rate read outs during the workout. 

Interval Workout

Now that you have become comfortable with your treadmill and begun the shaping up process, we can now turn to a slightly more challenging workout -the Interval Workout.  As the name suggests, this program functions in timed "intervals" of stronger effort and active rest.  After a five minute warm up, increase either the speed or incline to a level in which your Rate of Perceived Exertion (RPE) is at a level 7 on a scale of 1-10 and hold that level for 1 minute.  After one minute, reduce the speed and incline down to a point where your RPE is at a level 3 and hold for 2 minutes.  Repeat this pattern six more times and complete the workout with a 5 minute cool down.  While the percentage of fat calories used to fuel this workout will not be as high as in the Fat Burning Workout above, the efforts made during the "Work" interval will help you burn significantly more calories throughout this workout, making this a very time efficient and effective tool in your workout arsenal.  All treadmills at American Home Fitness have some type of pre-set interval workout program on their console, which will help you get started on this intermediate program.   This program should be utilized as an alternative to the Fat Burning Workout and done no more than twice per week and never on consecutive days.

Hill Sculpting Workout

By interchanging the Fat Burning and Interval Workout programs 3 to 5 days a week, along with a portioned controlled eating regimen, you are probably starting to see some weight loss and improvement in your endurance.  With those accomplishments in place (and congratulations to you!), the Hill Sculpting Workout will compliment these achievements by utilizing the incline feature on your treadmill to strengthen and sculpt your legs and glute muscles.  After your gradual 3 to 5 minute warm up, set the treadmill speed at a comfortable (NOT aggressive) walking speed and increase its incline to 10%.  If necessary, reduce your speed to a rate by which you can manage this incline level.  The critical variable of this workout is the incline, more so than the speed of your workout.  Once the incline is set, keep this workout interesting by integrating intervals, by which you hold the incline for 4 minutes, reduce it down to 0% incline for 2 minutes and then repeat this pattern for 3 more sets, finishing the workout with a 5 minute walking cool down.  If you are wearing your heart rate monitoring device, your heart rate should elevate to 75% of its maximum during the incline phase and reduce back down to 50 to 60% during the active rest phase.  Science has shown that utilizing your treadmill's incline feature in this way will activate more than 3 times the amount of muscle tissue in the lower body than steady running on a flat surface.  And you know what that can mean:  BETTER LOOKING LEGS AND BACK SIDE!

We at American Home Fitness focus on creating positive, life-changing results for our customers.  Too often, we are approached by people that have had a less than satisfying experience with home fitness equipment, many times with a treadmill.  Often times, the problem lies as much with a lack of direction or understanding of how to use the equipment as it does with the quality of the fitness equipment purchased.  While American Home Fitness does pride ourselves on providing the best and most complete lineup of fitness equipment in Michigan, we also value our ability to provide exercise guidance and suggestions so that our customers get the results they are seeking from their purchase.  If you ever have a question regarding fitness or are looking for guidance or motivation, stop in and see us.  We'd love to help you get focused, re-energized and back on track to a healthy and rewarding lifestyle

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