A Trainer Says This Under-$30 Resistance Band Will Transform Your At-Home Workouts

As a personal trainer and athlete who’s continually training for long-distance races, I found it a little painful not to be able to hit the gym when pandemic lockdown life started. Not training was not an option—and while my wife and I had plenty of gym equipment at home, our setup was more designed for those in-between days when our schedule didn’t quite allow us to make it to the gym, or when we wanted a shorter, lighter workout. So when home became the only place we could exercise, pandemic life forced us to get creative with our at-home workouts.

My favorite resistance band product—the Whatafit Resistance Band Set—came to the rescue as a surprisingly impressive tool that worked my entire body, while enabling me to keep my muscles strong. I also found that the resistance band offered a ton of versatility in my training. (Just, for example, try these resistance band exercises—all you need is a railing or another very stable, stationary spot in your home.)

If you’re like me, it’s understandable to think you won’t get the same quality of workout at home as you do at the gym. What I discovered was that the Whatafit Resistance Band (which is available on Amazon for $29.99) can not only keep your body in motion when you can’t make it to the gym; but it can actually uplevel your exercise routine and motivate you with fun, new moves.

The benefits of training with resistance bands

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Holly Perkins, certified trainer and author of Lift To Get Lean, explains to The Healthy why the resistance band belongs in any home gym. “Resistance bands . . . are particularly good for home workouts because they allow you to position yourself around the band to adjust the effort level and increase or decrease the intensity of the band.” She adds, “This is great for homes where more than one person is using bands, because each person is able to adjust the effort level to his or her fitness level.”

The benefits of resistance band training

There are several reasons the Whatafit Resistance Band Set is now a regular part of my training routine:

Resistance band exercises may actually increase strength and build muscle in a way that’s comparable to free weights. Muscles grow in relation to the amount of time they’re being activated under tension. Resistance bands increase this “time under tension” because your muscles are engaged throughout the entire movement. This is opposed to free weights, with which you tend to let the weight hang during the exercise and lose tension.

Also, a 2018 study published in the Journal of Human Kinetics found that resistance bands “increased the muscle activation level substantially” in some upper back and shoulder muscles, which the researchers said was “possibly due to elastic bands being a more unstable resistance modality.” Because it’s your body keeping the band steady and not a large piece of gym equipment with a pulley or other engineering to help control your movements.

A resistance band may even work muscles that using other equipment can neglect, as it allows for unique ranges of motion: Compared to free weights and machines found in gyms, resistance bands let you perform exercises in various ranges of motion (how much and to what extent a joint moves). This improves overall mobility and functional strength, which is important to maintain as we age.

Resistance bands are appropriate for just about every age and fitness level. This is partly because they’re easier on the joints than free weights, which means less chance of injury. Also, as one 2016 physical therapy study found: For older adults who lived in rural areas, resistance training with exercise bands improved balance, flexibility and mobility.

Resistance bands are convenient. They’re compact, lightweight, portable, and easy to store: If you don’t have much space for workout equipment at home, a resistance band is super easy to roll up and store in a small bag or suitcase, making it possible for you to use them almost anywhere: Do your workouts at home, in a hotel room, at a park, or even beside your desk at work during a break. As Perkins says, resistance bands “are great because they provide an excellent source of variable resistance for do-anywhere workouts.”

They’re one of the most affordable pieces of home workout equipment. Many high-quality resistance band sets can be purchased online for less than $30. The Whatafit Resistance Band Set comes includes a range of extra-light to extra-heavy strengths for even more added variety to your workouts. Many also come with various attachments, such as elastic exercise bands, mini bands, loop bands, tube bands, door anchors, and cushioned handles.

Says Dean Seda, a personal trainer certified by the National Academy of Sports Medicine: “Many people have discovered they can be creative and utilize spaces at home for exercise they wouldn’t have thought they could use.” Seda adds: “For example, some resistance band sets have a door attachment. You can put that either over the door, under the door or in between the hinges and perform resistance band exercises from various angles as if it were an adjustable cable machine at the gym. Amazing!”

So for this investment, what you get is an exercise tool that’s multifunctional and adds plenty of variety to at-home workouts to build strength and add definition to your arms, shoulders, back, chest, and legs. (Inspired? Try out these upper body resistance band exercises.)

What to look for when buying a resistance band set 

When you’re shopping, look for a set that will provide the best bang for your buck. The bands should have strong wear resistance and elasticity to avoid snapping or tearing that’s often seen with lesser quality products.

This is what makes the Whatafit Resistance Band Set stand apart from the rest. It includes five multifunctional exercise bands (extra light, light, medium, heavy, extra heavy), an additional five loop bands, a door anchor, two cushioned handle attachments, and a carrying pouch for easy storage and portability. These bands and bonus attachments are designed to withstand intense daily workout sessions. They can truly amp up your home workouts by adding more exercise possibilities.

Including resistance band training in your home workouts is a safe, easy, and cost-effective way to challenge yourself and inject some variety into your at-home workouts.

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