Growing tired of your daily routine at the gym? According to the American Council on Exercise, a nonprofit fitness organization, you may not be the only one, as more fitness enthusiasts are taking their workouts to the air with anti-gravity fitness classes.
Anti-gravity exercises are workouts that allow you to exercise while suspended or in mid-air. Anti-gravity yoga, for example, requires that participants use silk hammocks (suspended from the ceiling) to stretch and contort their bodies in ways traditional yoga doesn’t allow. The workouts combine movements from dance, pilates, and yoga into one exercise. In addition to letting you stretch further with less strain, other benefits of these classes include better agility and alignment of the vertebrae with the spine. (These classes can be found at participating Crunch Fitness gyms throughout the country.)
Not to be outdone, trainers at select Equinox Fitness centers are taking clients for runs on the Alter-G, an anti-gravity treadmill developed from NASA technology. The treadmill requires that your lower body be surrounded in an anti-gravity bubble so as you run on the treadmill, a percentage of your body weight is suspended thus reducing the pressure on your joints. This allows marathoners to train for speed and endurance without the risk of injury. Likewise, it allows the morbidly obese to run without taxing their joints with their extra weight.
Proponents of anti-gravity workouts argue that being suspended in the air forces your body to use muscles it wouldn’t otherwise use. But as with all exercises, it’s the variety that ultimately helps you develop new muscle and keeps your daily routine from feeling like a chore.
[via Reuters: Gravity-defying workouts lift fitness routines]