Fitness with Found Objects
First published in The Leither magazine, May 2021
As a Personal Trainer living and working in Leith, I’m surrounded by creative people. From this perspective, you can view exercise and movement as an art form. Whether it’s doing a fast walk up the Crags to check if the gorse is smelling like coconut yet, or putting together a webcam workout to stretch out and invigorate bodies tired from slumping at a laptop, there is a level of invention required in prescribing movement without resorting to using machines (i.e. a gym).
And since we’ve been living without gyms during lockdown, people have got seriously creative in their fitness solutions. I’ve been PTing for over 16 years, and thought I’d exhausted all the possible ways of moving the human body. Up until last year. When my fitness studio shut, things got more interesting. Many of my clients continued their training by switching to webcam workouts – exercise sessions done via a smartphone or laptop camera. The challenges of keeping people fit via webcam is that everyone has a different useable bit of space in their homes, some smaller than others. Add to this that many tenement floors are unsuitable for jumping up and down on (hello, downstairs neighbours), and that sometimes internet connection can be a bit patchy.
So what can you use for a workout, when you own no fitness equipment? Bodyweight exercises (using your own body weight as resistance) are a good place to start. Think press ups, squats, lunges, triceps dips and sit ups. To add variety to these basic moves, you need to add resistance.
Over the years I’ve used everything from big bags of rice or pet food (many brands have a handy carry handle) to logs found beside a hearth. If you want to make a weight, but only have cans of food, pop 4 to 6 cans in a tote bag and presto! Instant weight! A weighted tote bag can be somewhat cumbersome to bicep curl, so why not try a 2L (4 pint) milk bottle filled with water? Not too heavy, but do loads of repetitions of an exercise and you get a good workout.
During lockdown I ran Zoom fitness classes for Leith Festival volunteers and we developed a whole workout using tinned food. If you want to add to the intensity of an exercise, just hold and ‘pulse’ the end position. Try this, hold a can of beans (or any can really, preferably not beer, as it will get frothy) in each hand and straighten your arms out to the side, elbows straight but not locked out. Arms are long and parallel to the ground. You there? Good.
Now, keep your arms straight out to the side and ‘pulse’ the moment. Tiny movements up and down. Try this for a minute. Can you feel it in your shoulders? You’ve just done a set of lateral raise that strengthens and tones the side of your shoulder (lateral deltoids). Well done!
I train some people who run up and down their tenement stairs for a pulse-raising leg strength workout. Your neighbours will either think:
1. You’re very forgetful (damn, forgot my mask!),
2. You’re completely batty, or
3. Simply that unusual times call for novel fitness solutions.
You can use steps outdoors, my favourite step race is seeing how quickly I can run up the Scotsman steps behind Waverley Station. Two steps at a time, I believe 22 seconds was my best. I’ll need to try that again sometime.
Other easy ways to do leg strength: sprint drills up the wee hills in Leith Links, or head towards Arthurs Seat. The nature reserve at the end of Platinum Point has some interesting sleepers, they’re good for balancing on, tricep dips or stretching and looking at the view.
In the old days we all used to go to a shop for our groceries, and I know many Leithers walk their shopping home. I got a great arm workout when I bought an overly-large rubber plant from Kirkgate Lidl. Carrying it home was good exercise, and worth it in the end. When my brother David visited Leith, he commented “look at all the people carrying stuff around”. Just as he said that, two folk sauntered past carrying a rolled up rug. Be more old school and do errands on foot.
Tree trunks, park benches, heavy bits of scrap metal, groceries – the most random things can be excellent fitness props. If you use your imagination, you can build a whole ‘found object fitness’ repertoire. If you need guidance or motivation, you may like my new book ‘Get Fit & Enjoy It: Learn Effective Exercise without a Gym’. Written and photographed in Leith, it features wonderful gender-neutral muscle illustrations by local artist Rona Innes.
The book is available from Elvis Shakespeare and Logan & Malloch, Leith Walk or from our online shop.
