Fitness machines date back to the 1950s, when muscle beach bodybuilder Harold Zinkin created his multistation Universal Gym Machine. As the fitness industry gained momentum, manufacturers competed to design, develop and add detail to their exercise machines. This equipment, with its bells and whistles, often explains why prospective gym members choose one facility over another.
Benefits
As technological conveniences replaced manual labor, muscles atrophied and fitness declined. Indoor heat and air conditioning made people less adaptable to inclement weather, thereby minimizing the time spent performing outdoor exercise. Fitness machines allow you to take your workout indoors. For those unaccustomed to handling free weights, the pin-loaded plate stacks on the machines facilitate safe and easy weight changes. Most resistance-training machines adjust to your height, leg and torso length, allowing you to place your body in the most leveraged position for the exercise.
Types of Workouts
Fitness machine users perform resistance-training workouts, aerobic exercise, concurrent aerobic and resistance-training sessions and circuit workouts, which intersperse resistance training and cardiovascular intervals. Fitness goals, inherent muscle strengths and weaknesses, and personal preferences determine the type of workout, as well as the equipment used to perform it. Aim for three weekly strength-training workouts, with 48 hours between sessions. The American College of Sports Medicine recommends 30 minutes of aerobic exercise on most days of the week. Cross-train with different cardiovascular machine types to prevent overuse injuries.
Concurrent Training
Fitness club members typically rush into the gym wearing their street clothes, sign up for the aerobic machine waiting list, change into their gym clothes and start their aerobic workout. The limited number of aerobic machines often necessitates this sequence. Reversing the sequence by lifting weights first may cause you to burn less glycogen and more stored body fat, says Mayo Clinic exercise specialist Edward R. Laskowski, but you may be too fatigued to perform a high-energy aerobic session. Cardiovascular exercise warms you up for strength training, but may leave you too fatigued to perform the resistance-machine workouts in proper form. University of New Mexico exercise physiologist Len Kravitz suggests choosing aerobic equipment that uses different muscles from the ones you are training.
Circuit Training
Circuit training works best for people who have not yet built the strength and aerobic endurance necessary for a full-fledged workout. Begin with a 10-minute warm-up on any aerobic machine. Then, perform 15 repetitions on the lat pull-down machine. Do three minutes on any piece of aerobic equipment, and continue to intersperse these three-minute intervals between each strength-training machine. Continue with the chest press, the seated row, the chest fly, the leg press, the leg curl and the abductor/adductor machine. These machines work the major muscle groups. As your strength and endurance improve, progress to concurrent workouts and add smaller muscle groups exercises such as biceps curls and triceps extensions.
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